Half of the examples on this page seem dystopic as fuck; Active attempts to capture and monetize even offline friendships and socialization. The other half seem to be getting you to pay up-front for hollow promises of a social media platform that Doesn’t Suck™.

One of their examples gives people kickbacks if they convince their friends to buy a product from them or help the product go viral. If they get their way, you will not be able to trust whether your friends recommend stuff to you because they think you’ll like it or because they’re getting paid for it.

I think capitalism has noticed that “Social Media Refugees” are a hot new market to capitalize on. Mozilla is clearly in the process of being assimilated, and the tendrils of capital are winding their way through the rest of the “better alternative” network.

This is fascinating and if the analysis is correct (which I think it is) it’s also really exciting because it means the cultural pendulum is swinging from increasing homogenisation to increasing diversification. I think this is going to be really liberating because people’s imagination within a subculture won’t be getting dragged down by the weight of trying to bring everyone along with them. This feels tribal in a good way. People outside of these subcultures (or sub-countercultures) will benefit from what emerges from their ‘streamlining’ too.

I’m noticing that this is happening alongside a reinvigoration of leftwing politics in my part of the world. I don’t know what, if anything, might connect them causally but I can’t help but think that we’re seeing a collective response to the cultural/political/economic dead end we’ve reached and its precarity, fear, loneliness and meaninglessness.