The final speaker in this session at the Weizenbaum Conference is Marko Skoric, who begins by drawing parallels between the early cable TV and late social media eras: cable TV, in its early days, was similarly social and diverse in its programming.
Social media, though, can also enable the gathering of like-minded groups, as well as the unsocial exclusion of others whose interests do not match our own; but there is also a shift from networked to clustered publics, where members of the same cluster no longer necessarily know or are even aware of each other. These taste-based clusters maximise engagement and minimise choice.
At the same time, social media also enable serendipitous exposure, and this offers a potential path to tolerance, social mobility, solidarity, and social cohesion – and even to discovery, innovation, and enlightenment. In doing so, they also enable solidarity.
Yet the establishment of digital safe spaces also leads to a loss of linking social capital; this is potentially especially damaging for marginalised groups. Increased regulation of social media platforms may serve to limit serendipity.
