It's time to reintroduce the “social network”
It's now November 2024, and yes, it's time to reintroduce the idea, the notion of a “social network”. And to report on the existence of such networks.
At first glance, this may sound strange, after all, people have been using social networks for 20 years, and they have long been well known, used daily by billions of people.
And yet it's necessary to do this now, for two reasons.
The first reason is that the kind of website that 20 years ago was called a social network has ceased to exist and has become something else, something very different and much less interesting than what it (apparently) was at the beginning. Those first social networks were embraced with enthusiasm and joy. Suddenly, we could now find out, remotely and in real time, what our friends (who chose to inform us about what they were doing) were doing, writing, talking and thinking. And we could also meet new people and make new friends (even looking for affinities of interest). And all this still seemed to be given to us for free... By the time we started seeing advertising on the social network, it should have been understood and called a “commercial social network” by its users – but it wasn't; the term “social network” was kept on the lips of users and also in the press. And it stayed that way, even when, years later, we learned that these companies constantly collect and organize users' personal data to create individualized advertising profiles that are used to show targeted advertising (to specific people). In other words, the “social network” was, in fact, a commercial social network – and a kind of enclosure where people are kept trapped, confined, to see advertisements and buy the products of the companies that advertise there (which, with targeted advertising, have started to reach specific people, mobilizing their desires and vulnerabilities). Thus, these commercial social networks are actually, and could be specifically called, marketing and advertising networks. This state of affairs was the first configuration of commercial social networks. The second configuration came about when, while maintaining the previous activities, these networks allowed their users to 1) market their own products there (turning the “network” into a market place), and 2) work for the advertising companies and the commercial social network, creating accounts and channels which, with a sufficient number of “followers”, could then be “monetized” by displaying (in various forms) advertising from the advertising companies. In other words, the users who began to carry out this latter activity began to work as salespeople for the companies that advertise on the commercial social network (which, in turn, thought it would be better to give the salespeople a different name: “influencers”). Added to this framework is the creation of an algorithm, refined continuously, which assembles users' timelines and modulates the visibility of sellers (influencers) in order to maximize the profits of the commercial social network and the advertising companies (who thought it would be better to call themselves “brands”). This being the current state of affairs, it is clear that today's commercial social networks have long since borne no resemblance to those “social networks” that emerged 20 years ago, where people felt free to engage in joyful, spontaneous online sociability, uninterested in commercial prospects.
The second reason why it is now necessary to reintroduce the “social network” to people is because, yes, something we can call a social network again, and now improved and more secure, is available, in the form of what we call a non-commercial social network. Now, adopting a radically different model, this new version of the social network has no advertising, no advertising companies, no collection and classification of personal data, no strategies to keep you stuck and glued to the “platform”, no salespeople/influencers, no algorithms designed to sell products or regulate the visibility of people and posts; there really is no company behind the network looking to make a profit.
How will people react to this news? The reactions will come from two different groups: 1) those who used the commercial networks in their early days, when their commercial strategies had not yet been revealed (and who will then be able to recognize with satisfaction some similarities between the current non-commercial networks and those old networks); 2) those, younger, who only know social networks with advertisements and limiting and addictive algorithms. Will the new social network model now being presented interest these two groups? This interest would depend on what circumstances?
To find out more about these networks and the context in which they operate, read our introduction to non-commercial social networks.
[November, 2024] Updated: November 10, 2024