Social Media is Oxy

 Social media is the new oxy. Consider this: both were developed for ostensibly positive reasons, both are used (and misused) by legions, and both are highly addictive. Oxycodone, found in OxyContin and Percocet, was initially developed as a pain-killer for those in acute distress; social media companies espoused their ability to help connect people to people, and to “make the world a better place”. Far too often, social media is making the world a bitter place.

If the calculus is to “chose profit over safety” (thank you, Frances Haugen), it begs the question- how much profit does a trillion-dollar company need? There are very rich new-media companies with very rich bosses; how about shaving a percentage point off the billions in annual profits by choosing social responsibility over cash (or, in the case of Amazon, by offering your employees better pay and working conditions?

 Watch to see if real change comes from all the attention being paid to social media companies. Will this be a ‘big tobacco moment’ (which actually lasted for years) which lead to a dramatic decrease in smoking - or will it be like the ‘great reckoning’ after the 2008 financial crisis that seemed to reckon exactly nothing?

Good commentary on the Facebook testimony.

TN