Slashdot Mirror
Linus Torvalds on Social Media: 'It's a Disease. It Seems To Encourage Bad Behavior.' (linuxjournal.com)
From a wide-ranging interview of Linus Torvalds with Linux Journal on the magazine's 25th anniversary: Linux Journal: If you had to fix one thing about the networked world, what would it be?
Linus: Nothing technical. But, I absolutely detest modern "social media" -- Twitter, Facebook, Instagram. It's a disease. It seems to encourage bad behavior. I think part of it is something that email shares too, and that I've said before: "On the internet, nobody can hear you being subtle". When you're not talking to somebody face to face, and you miss all the normal social cues, it's easy to miss humor and sarcasm, but it's also very easy to overlook the reaction of the recipient, so you get things like flame wars, etc., that might not happen as easily with face-to-face interaction. But email still works. You still have to put in the effort to write it, and there's generally some actual content (technical or otherwise). The whole "liking" and "sharing" model is just garbage. There is no effort and no quality control. In fact, it's all geared to the reverse of quality control, with lowest common denominator targets, and click-bait, and things designed to generate an emotional response, often one of moral outrage.
Add in anonymity, and it's just disgusting. When you don't even put your real name on your garbage (or the garbage you share or like), it really doesn't help. I'm actually one of those people who thinks that anonymity is overrated. Some people confuse privacy and anonymity and think they go hand in hand, and that protecting privacy means that you need to protect anonymity. I think that's wrong. Anonymity is important if you're a whistle-blower, but if you cannot prove your identity, your crazy rant on some social-media platform shouldn't be visible, and you shouldn't be able to share it or like it.
Linux Journal: Is there any advice you'd like to give to young programmers/computer science students?
Linus: I'm actually the worst person to ask. I knew I was interested in math and computers since an early age, and I was largely self-taught until university. And everything I did was fairly self-driven. So I don't understand the problems people face when they say "what should I do?" It's not where I came from at all.
Linus: Nothing technical. But, I absolutely detest modern "social media" -- Twitter, Facebook, Instagram. It's a disease. It seems to encourage bad behavior. I think part of it is something that email shares too, and that I've said before: "On the internet, nobody can hear you being subtle". When you're not talking to somebody face to face, and you miss all the normal social cues, it's easy to miss humor and sarcasm, but it's also very easy to overlook the reaction of the recipient, so you get things like flame wars, etc., that might not happen as easily with face-to-face interaction. But email still works. You still have to put in the effort to write it, and there's generally some actual content (technical or otherwise). The whole "liking" and "sharing" model is just garbage. There is no effort and no quality control. In fact, it's all geared to the reverse of quality control, with lowest common denominator targets, and click-bait, and things designed to generate an emotional response, often one of moral outrage.
Add in anonymity, and it's just disgusting. When you don't even put your real name on your garbage (or the garbage you share or like), it really doesn't help. I'm actually one of those people who thinks that anonymity is overrated. Some people confuse privacy and anonymity and think they go hand in hand, and that protecting privacy means that you need to protect anonymity. I think that's wrong. Anonymity is important if you're a whistle-blower, but if you cannot prove your identity, your crazy rant on some social-media platform shouldn't be visible, and you shouldn't be able to share it or like it.
Linux Journal: Is there any advice you'd like to give to young programmers/computer science students?
Linus: I'm actually the worst person to ask. I knew I was interested in math and computers since an early age, and I was largely self-taught until university. And everything I did was fairly self-driven. So I don't understand the problems people face when they say "what should I do?" It's not where I came from at all.
I knew I was interested in math and computers since an early age, and I was largely self-taught until university. And everything I did was fairly self-driven. So I don't understand the problems people face when they say "what should I do?"
So the advice he's really giving here, just in a roundabout way, is "Do what you like".
That is, if some aspect of computer technology is not complying enough that you want to try and work with it for fun, move around until you find something that does so move you.
I would say there are a lot more areas to explore now than there used to be when studying CS, so it's easier for younger students to feel a bit lost and not really know what to do. Explore niches and find out what is naturally fun and interesting, even better if it cross-correlates with any other interests you have.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Thank you Linus for saving me from becomming nuts. I'm so happy to find out i'm not the only one - that's trying to avoid at a high cost these awful social media. Thank you for linux - thank you for this kind supportive message.
That is, if some aspect of computer technology is not complying enough that you want to try and work with it for fun, move around until you find something that does so move you.
I think this is applicable to any relatively technical profession. I remember seeing an ad for a home computer (Atari?) when I was 7 and I thought it was the coolest thing I had ever seen. Been hooked since then. I hear similar stories with doctors, lawyers, etc... If it doesn't grab your attention right away, it's probably not worth the investment in time and money to figure out, once you have a JD or MD or BS in CS, that it's just not that interesting enough. IE, if you aren't sure right away, then the answer is probably no. Not always, but usually.
Emails are rude to one person or a small group, and probably between people that know each other to some degree. Social media is broadcast worldwide. Linus even points out that email has some of the same problems for the same reasons.
I don't think Linus would disagree that he's often an utter prick either. In most cases I think he fully intends to be.
It's important to remember that the crappy stuff is what we tend to hear about. Meanwhile 3+ nines of usage of these platforms is perfectly bland, uninteresting, and useful. Facebook has been a great tool for keeping in touch with my dispersed sisters. No one is forcing me to read a bunch of empty shitposts, and I don't. I used to avoid Twitter until a colleague demonstrated how it could be very useful as an information source for our job. The majority of usage on these platforms is all like this, not very interesting. But the shitposts get all the attention. It's much like when I used to work in a bookstore. Co-workers used to complain all day about how these 'stupid customers' could not put books back in the right place. I admit, I made that mistake too, until one day a mentor told me to look at how many people came in and out of that store every day (I date myself, this was pre-Amazon) and think about how few actually put the book back wrong or some other annoying thing. Come to think of it, that little piece of advice may have turned my life around..anyway, stop being such a negative nellie.
This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
The problem with social media seems largely that we have not have time for the culture to learn what are helpful and unhelpful ways to use it. We just assumed it was wonderful and everyone should be on Facebook. Slowly a set of principles will develop about how to use the new media and parents will teach their children to use it wisely. But the first decade of social media has indeed been a disaster as Linus indicates.
The Internet is a double-edged sword. It lets communities form based on shared interests regardless of how far apart they physically are. For example, I don't have many people I know locally that I could talk with about some games I play, but online I can find dozens (if not more) of people to discuss it with.
On the other hand, it can let communities based on falsehoods or hatred form and fester. A person who hates Group A might be the only one in his community that hates this group. If this is the case, he'll be forced to hide his hatred and it won't be encouraged. Normal societal pressure will keep to "socially acceptable levels." (Whether these levels are too high or not is another conversation entirely.) With the Internet, though, he can find a bunch of people who hate the same people he does. They can feed off each other and grow ever more extreme. Add in the anonymous nature of the Internet (either actually anonymous or perceived anonymity) and things that they wouldn't ever say in person (like physical threats) can come spilling out online. Eventually, these can flow from the online world to the physical one.
Social media can speed this along more, but social media is just one application of the Internet. Take Facebook/Twitter away and you'll still have sites like Reddit where these groups can thrive. Take Reddit away, and they'd set up their own forums in their own corners of the Internet. There's no way to get the good of the Internet (faster communications/building positive communities) without getting the bad as well.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
were no different than current social media.
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
1) Requiring someone to know at least three programming languages by the end of high school is a particularly idiotic form of gate keeping because it ensures that everyone who 'passes' has wasted their time learning the syntax for various languages rather than actually learning how to program in those languages.
2) Nobody has ever said "must know three programming languages" is sexist and nobody would. That's entirely in your imagination.
3) Nobody has claimed college is faster than self-training. It is, however, more thorough and forces you to study subjects you would otherwise skip and forces you to follow through with projects rather than abandoning them. The breadth of knowledge and discipline that you have to develop to get the degree is what people value about college over self-training.
One person's "rational statement" is another person's "crazy rant". Defending the Second Amendment or each state having (as the Constitution specifies) equal suffrage in the Senate or deportation of illegal immigrants would qualify as "crazy rants" in some circles and companies.
In a world where technology companies have gone overboard with political and societal issues unrelated to their product, anyone who doesn't adhere to the hive-mind is putting their career at risk by posting under their real identities. It's easy for Torvalds to take this stance as he doesn't need to work for anyone else on a regular basis and he's already known as a "flaming asshole" (which, by the way, was something I used to like about him -- as a thought leader in his area, he made high contrast statements without sugercoating which got the message across to all much more effectively than carefully worded "policy statements" and advice to "you may want reconsider introducing an error not previously returned by an API").
So, no, it's not just whistle-blowers who should enjoy anonymity. Apparently when Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay were publishing the Federalist Papers under the anonymous pseudonym "Publius" they didn't think so either.
Of course, being a native Finn, perhaps Torvalds doesn't quite grok a diverse culture for some reason.
Why is there an "insightful" mod and why isn't it "-1"? If I wanted insight, I wouldn't be reading
I'd agree about the 99%... if we lived in a world without what some call "social justice", or without "deplatforming". People trying to get you fired by email-bombing your employer, for having an Ungood opinion. Or not getting hired for your political views. Many, many more people than the 1% whistleblowers have very good and valid reasons to want to keep their professional, political, gaming, and social personae separated. Identity is abused more often and in far worse ways than anonymity is.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
Here's the thing:
I'm not an expert at everything - and I KNOW that.
That's awesome because thinking "don't know" equals "stupid" PREVENTS learning.
I'm not under the delusion that I'm an expert at everything, or that I'm supposed to be. I'm grateful that nobody ever put into
my head the idea that if I have room to learn, I suck, or am stupid. I would hate to have that wrong idea because a need to insist that you know everything prevents learning.
I can't count the number of times there has been discussion here on Slashdot and somebody posts a mistaken idea of what the law is. That's fine, if they aren't an employment attorney, they aren't SUPPOSED to know everything about employment law. I'll post the actual text of the law and far too often the person who guessed wrong gets defensive and has to try to argue that the law doesn't say what it says. The actual text of the law is "employers may not ..." and they feel the need to argue it means "employers must", just because that was their first guess. They completely miss the opportunity to learn anything.
They have this crazy idea that if they were wrong, that means they're stupid, so they will go to any length to avoid recognizing that their first try was wrong, and therefore learning something. Thinking they are supposed to already know prevents them from ever knowing. Being afraid of LOOKING stupid ensures they permanently ARE stupid.
A couple of hours ago I posted a messages in my company chat practically beggingmy new co-workers to tell me what's not very good about the work I just did at my new job. I did that because I want to improve it. I would my work to *actually* be good, so I want to know how to improve it, rather than me just pretending it's good. Why? Because of how and why I got hired here.
At my last job, two months ago, I was teaching classes, making presentations to educate co-workers about security and programming topics, with a side-dish of law. I really enjoyed doing that and wanted to do more of it, but I knew I wasn't great at it. I earnestly asked my co-workers / students for feedback after every presentation, telling them I needed their help to improve. Three weeks ago I landed what may be my dream job. I'll now spend my days mentoring my a thousand programmers on security and creating robust software systems - and getting paid quite well to do it. I got this job because I was able to talk about how I had taught programmers at my last job, the successes in mentoring. I never would have had success mentoring if I wasn't constantly asking co-workers to tell me how they think I could improve.
> It IS a personal insult if you put all your best effort into something and the immediate reaction from the receiver is that it is stupid.
There are a lot of smart people here on Slashdot.
If you handed out cadavers to all of us and had us "put all our best effort" into a practice brain surgery, approximately 100% of us would make several major mistakes.
Not because we're stupid, because we haven't mastered the application of a specific skill in a particular context.
Stupid people can do things well. For example, a lot of idiots are good at getting elected. Stephen Hawking is brilliant, and his cake decorating really, really sucks. He's smart, he hasn't mastered the particular skills of cake decorating.
Smart is having the ability to learn. Stupid is not learning.
Bottom line, here's the difference between smart people and stupid people.
When they become aware that they did something stupid:
Smart people learn from it and then know next time.
Stupid people get offended.
No I think it's quite different. Linus has never been an attention whore, posting silly content for the sake of increasing his popularity. He cursed a lot of times in a way that wasn't subtle, sure, but the goal was not to increase his popularity or lower that of a competing guy, which seems to be the primary goal of social media. That's the tragedy of social media: it encourages to focus on the links instead of the content, up to the point where negative content creates more links and is thus more valuable than anything else. That's a damn low SNR.
Disclaimer: I don't do social networks, and I've never seen anything tagged social media in the regular press that I have found positive or worth anything.
Video of some good progressive thrash music
Congratulations on proving Linus Torvalds correct.