2017 - Sean Parker and Chamath Palihapitiya warn how Social Media was deliberately designed to exploit human vulnerability and is actively destroying society Sean Parker, ex-Facebook President on Nov 8th warns how the site was deliberately designed to exploit human vulnerability: 1:06 - "God only knows what it's doing to our children's brains." 1:21 - "That thought process was all about: 'How do we consume as much of your time and conscious attention as possible?' And that means that we need to...give you a little dopamine hit every once in a while [via likes, etc]...and that's going to get you to contribute more content, and that's going to get you...more likes and comments. It's a social validation feedback loop." 2:01 - "...the...creators [of fb]... understood this consciously, and we did it anyway." 2:20 - Part 2 Chamath Palihapitiya joined Facebook as a developer when the company was about a year old, becoming VP for User Growth. His warning from Nov 10th: 2:33 - "The entire society is set up to not be patient anymore." 3:06 - "Consumer internet businesses are about exploiting psychology." 3:54 - "I feel tremendous guilt" [over Facebook’s exploitation of consumer behavior ...its divisive effect on society] ... “Even though we feigned this whole line of, like, ‘There probably aren’t any really bad unintended consequences,’ I think in the back, deep, deep recesses of our minds, we kind of knew something bad could happen,” 4:23 - “...we have created tools that are ripping apart the social fabric of how society works. That is truly where we are.” 4:42 - “If you feed the beast, that beast will destroy you. If you push back on it, we have a chance to control it and rein it in. And it is a point in time where people need to hard break from some of these tools and the things that you rely on. The short-term, dopamine-driven feedback loops that we have created are destroying how society works. No civil discourse, no cooperation, misinformation, mistruth. And it's not an American problem. This is not about Russian ads. This is a global problem. So we are in a really bad state of affairs right now, in my opinion. It is eroding the core foundations of how people behave by, and between, each other. And I don't have a good solution. You know, my solution is I just don't use these tools anymore. I haven't for years. It's created huge tension with my friends. Huge tensions in my social circles.” 5:55 - "... I... innately didn't want to get programmed, and so I just tuned it out. ... And now to see what is happening, it really bums me out." 6:41 - "...bad actors can now manipulate large swathes of people to do anything you want." 6:58 - "...we compound the problem. ... We curate our lives around this perceived sense of perfection because we get rewarded in these short-term signals: hearts, likes, thumbs up. And we conflate that with value, and we conflate it with truth. And instead what it really is is fake brittle popularity - that's short term, and that leaves you even more, and admit it, vacant and empty [than] before you did it, because it forces you into this vicious cycle where you're like, 'What's the next thing I need to do now?' 'cause I need it back. Think about that compounded by 2 billion people. And then think about how people react to the perceptions of others. It's just... really, really bad." 7:51 - "I did a great job there [at Facebook], and I think that business overwhelmingly does positive good in the world." 8:08 - "I can control my decisions, which is 'I don't use this shit.' I can control my kids' decisions which is 'they're not allowed to use this shit.' ... But everybody else has to soul search a little bit more about what you're willing to do, because your behaviors... You don't realize it, but you are being programmed." 9:05 - "Start by turning off your social apps and giving your brain a break. 'Cause then you will at least be a little bit more motivated to not be motivated by what everybody else fuckin thinks about you." 9:18 - "...posting your fucking waffles online... is wiring your brain for superfast feedback. ... So you're training your brain here, whether you think it or not... These things where you're spending hours a day are rewiring your psychology and physiology..." 10:09 - "There's a reason why Steve Jobs was, like, anti-social media. I am telling you I am not on these fucking apps." 10:19 - "...I am proactively trying to rewire my brain chemistry to not be short-term focused." Sean Parker's talk is from the Axios event in Philadelphia w/Mike Allen, Nov 8, 2017. Chamath Palihapitiya's talk is from two days later, Nov 10, 2017 at Stanford. He is an owner of the Golden State Warriors and a venture capitalist.