Facebook DID influence the Elections

It's hard to imagine, just twelve years ago, that the media would have been reduced to Facebook, degenerated into what we have today.

Facebook's Monopoly is Unhealthy

In an age of short attention spans, political adverts went too far, causing the first female candidate great harm. Sure, there are many variables of why the Democrats lost.

But buried behind the opinions, there's data, the real danger that Facebook's monopoly on content distribution has gone too far.

Meanwhile, we have Facebook's CEO saying Facebook did not influence the elections. 2 Billion users (many of whom may not actually be dead), might tell you otherwise.

Scarier then which candidate won, is a darker truth, tech companies such as Facebook, Google, Amazon and others, have the potential to create a techno-police state.

Rise of the Personal Brand

We are starting to see some serious signs of how this plays out. Trump is the new epitome of the rise of the personal brand.  

A real estate mogul turned reality TV personality, as I surveyed Facebook groups, it was easy to see how this candidate had more popular backing than HC, though not as much as Bernie Sanders had.

Facebook magnifies emotions, and one candidate was better at harnessing emotions and drama in his campaign rhetoric. It's really that simple, Facebook is making us dumber.

#FutureRunDown

We Now Live in a G-0 World

There is then a sense we live in G-0 world, where countries retreat into their borders. We are seeing this in China, Russia, England and now of course in the U.S. of America. There are no super-powers, only factions, corporations. Many of the world's simulations, shows this would be a distinct possibility, we are now one step closer to that. Now listen closely.

As China rises in power, democracy in the U.S. as a trusted institution that has legitimate authority is preciously hanging in the balance. The non-Trump supports will no longer tell you how they really feel, because they are scared.

Algorithms Starting to Rule

The other important point to make about living in a G-0 world is we're on auto-pilot. Facebook doesn't have to take responsibility, because we are moving to a world controlled by algorithms.

Algorithms that don't need to make ethical justifications, for having a media-bias that backfires or anything else. Ratings, mobile advertising, money.

Tech Companies Foster Systems of Control

That capitalism would degenerate democracy is sort of inevitable when we consider tech companies now own the future, not Governments, or people or countries. That's the real truth behind the madness.

Politicians will come and go, popular sentiment will shift, but the companies that control the medium, the message, are in many ways only getting increasingly powerful.

End of Media; Killed by Mobile Advertizing

From HC's leaked Emails to DT's sketchy personal lifestyle, everything gets magnified in the Age of Facebook in morbid ways that is actually further destroying the credibility of a legacy media.

This is actually damaging the dozens of publications struggling to survive in the Media and Advertizing industry.

Who is to benefit from such hype, not the content creators or the citizens, the platforms behind the architecture of the internet.

What's "trending" in Facebook can now change the world, so it's time they take their role seriously and with greater concern for their impact upon the world.

Facebook's Total Disregard

For example, until earlier this year Facebook had a team of 15 to 18 independent contractors who were in charge of writing headlines for Facebook’s “trending news” box. So in some sense, the fate of public opinion is now in the hands of tech companies and algorithms.

One well-time scandal that puts the credibility of an entire campaign in doubt, and that's News, and that's history! Facebook has to accept it's role in politics, for turning the Media into what it has to become, and the virtual death it is now undergoing.

Facebook's death glitch (Leonard Cohen's ghost), is actually symbolic of the death of democracy. Let's not fool ourselves here.

Patriarchy Wins in a Patriarchal Ethics of Media

There was such a rampant lack of empathy and fairness in this year's Presidential campaign, that without better human editorial guidance, the vote is trivialized by a media (social media), in which we are creating a world, where the loudest voice wins (insert Fake sensational news). And that, Facebook, is a new low in America.

If you see some truth in this article, feel free to SHARE it with your network. It's ironic then, that young people (who aren't on Facebook) didn't turn up to vote, with a 20 years low in voter turn-out. The silent majority whom Facebook does reach (the Brexit demographics), changed history.

What do you think, has Facebook's control over the media and content distribution become unhealthy for our institution of democracy?

Bonus Video