The Social Dilemma

This documentary-drama hybrid explores the dangerous human impact of social networking, with tech experts sounding the alarm on their own creations.

It's the whistleblower documentary that is already one of the most-watched Netflix shows in Australia - but should be compulsory viewing for every parent. And, with the federal government working on a new Online Safety Act, it should also be watched by every politician.

The Social Dilemma is a documentary by Jeff Orlowski that interviews dozens of former executives and developers from major technology companies.

It not only confirms everything we suspected - that technology companies wield far too much power and put profits over morality - but reveals the sheer scale of how they have turned teenagers into addicts and the extent of the harm they are doing.

"Its like a prison experiment . They are roping people into The Matrix to profit from them and were not even aware its happening," said Tristan Harris, a former Google executive .

The Social Dilemma shows how big technology companies have effectively enslaved humans , selling our lives as a commodity . By giving these tech giants our most intimate, personal details, we have enabled them to earn trillions of dollars by selling that to advertisers.

And these advertisers will happily pay, because it means they can target exactly the segment of the population most likely to buy.

Youth mental health group Orygen wants social media platforms to put their artificial intelligence capability to work helping people instead of using it to determine how best to keep people scrolling and what ads to push onto them.

Yourtown - a youth mental health organisation - suggests social media companies should be forced to hand over their data so researchers can get a better understanding of just how harmful the content can be. It also wants the eSafety Commissioner to be given more powers to deal with online bullying.

The Social Dilemma | Official Trailer | Netflix

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We tweet, we like, and we share- but what are the consequences of our growing dependence on social media? As digital platforms increasingly become a lifeline to stay connected, Silicon Valley insiders reveal how social media is reprogramming civilization by exposing what's hiding on the other side of your screen.

ABOUT THE SOCIAL DILEMMA

The world has long recognized the positive applications of social media, from its role in empowering protesters to speak out against oppression during the Arab Spring uprisings almost a decade ago, to serving an instrumental role in fighting for equity and justice today. And in 2020, during an astonishing global pandemic, social media has become our lifeline to stay in touch with loved ones, as well as proving to be an asset for mobilizing civil rights protests. However, the system that connects us also invisibly controls us. The collective lack of understanding about how these platforms actually operate has led to hidden and often harmful consequences to society-consequences that are becoming more and more evident over time, and consequences that, the subjects in The Social Dilemma suggest, are an existential threat to humanity.

The Social Dilemma is a powerful exploration of the disproportionate impact that a relatively small number of engineers in Silicon Valley have over the way we think, act, and live our lives. The film deftly tackles an underlying cause of our viral conspiracy theories, teenage mental health issues, rampant misinformation and political polarization, and makes these issues visceral, understandable, and urgent. Through a unique combination of documentary investigation and entertaining narrative drama, award-winning filmmakers Jeff Orlowski (Chasing Ice, Chasing Coral) and Larissa Rhodes (Chasing Coral) have once again exposed the invisible in a manner that is both enlightening and harrowing as they disrupt the disrupters by unveiling the hidden machinations behind everyone's favorite social media and search platforms.

The film features compelling interviews with high-profile tech whistleblowers and innovation leaders including Tristan Harris of the Center for Humane Technology; the co-inventor of the Facebook "Like" button, Justin Rosenstein; Tim Kendall, former President of Pinterest and former Director of Monetization at Facebook; Cathy O'Neil, author of Weapons of Math Destruction; Rashida Richardson, Director of Policy at the AI Now Institute, and many others. Demonstrating how social media affects consumers on a personal level, these fascinating insider insights are seamlessly woven into a captivating narrative, including Vincent Kartheiser (Mad Men), that illuminates the very real consequences these seemingly innocent technologies can have on our everyday lives.

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Good on APPLE

APPLE says it will press ahead with mobile software changes that limit tracking for targeted advertising - a move that has prompted complaints from Facebook and others.

The iPhone maker said updates to its mobile operating system would give users more information and control on the tracking of their online activity by apps on Apple devices.

Apple this year delayed the changes to give online advertisers time to adapt.

But in a letter to the nonprofit group Ranking Digital Rights, Apple said it planned to move forward next year "because we share your concerns about users being tracked without their consent and the bundling and reselling of data by advertising networks and data brokers".

The letter from Apple privacy chief Jane Horvath noted that Apple intended to support online ads but without "unfettered data collection".

"Facebook and others have a very different approach to targeting," Ms Horvath said in the letter.

"Not only do they allow the grouping of users into smaller segments, they use detailed data about online browsing activity to target ads."

This article is from the November 22, 2020 issue of The Herald Sun Digital Edition. To subscribe, visit https://www.heraldsun.com.au/.