#Algorithmic Addiction

[anarchyroll]

📲 Addicted by Design: How Algorithms Exploit the Human Mind 🧠

Inside the calculated architecture of algorithmic addiction—and why the systems keeping us hooked aren’t accidental, they’re engineered for profit. Photo by Gabriel Freytez on Pexels.com This Isn’t a Bug. It’s the Business Model. Addiction isn’t a side effect. It’s the product. The algorithms driving our feeds, for‑you pages, and autoplay queues weren’t built to serve us. They were built to…

[mermaidsparkles03]

Social media is training you to be more impatient. For the sake of curating your algorithm as fast as possible + as accurately as possible. It wastes your time so you feel like you have no more time to waste dealing with people. It rewards your wasted time + impatience with a meme. You curate your feed so you only see what you want to see, until it becomes unbearable to be patient with the diversity of life + its circumstances.

On top of all that, you also expect it to adapt with you as you mature. As you have human thoughts + change your entire perspective in the blink of an eye. That’s not what the algorithm is trained to understand. The algorithm is trained to react with how you’ve been reacting to it your entire time on that app. It isn’t capable of understanding how people can change their minds.

[numelfanclub]

I JUST LEARNED SYLVIX WEEK IS ON RN AND I DON'T THINK I CAN DO IT BECAUSE I JUST GOT OFF STSG WEEK AND I HAVEN'T PLAYED FE3H IN A HOT MINUTE.... EUEUEU.... THAT BEING SAID EVERYONE HAVE SOSO MUCH FUN I LOVE SYLVIX THEY'RE SO SILLY BILLY HERE'S MY CONTRIBUTION BECAUSE I AM GOING TO GET BURNOUT IF I PARTICIPATE 🩷🩷

[francesderwent]

“People ask me this all the time, they’re like what’s it like to be male, and I say well I don’t know, because I am male. It’s not an object to me, floating out there, that I can observe…it doesn’t work like that because in my experience, I can’t abstract maleness into an object apart from subjectively living it, occupying it, being it….And this can appear in an age of vanity as a great crisis. Because it means that within me there is a detachment between who I am and my image that I just can’t heal. I want to consume my own image, and I can’t, and it’s frustrating. It’s like, how can I occupy this maleness when I can’t even describe it because I’m so intimately close to it, I am it, that I can never possibly buy it off a shelf or take it and do seven steps to become it. You see this in heterosexual behavior as much as homosexual as much as transgenderism, which is men trying desperately trying to push their masculinity out into a number of products that they can buy in order to confirm that they’re men. Which you wouldn’t even do unless it was some crisis within yourself, like you needed it to become distant so you could consume it again so you can have a life-image correspondence. It’s like, alright, I'm buying beard oil and I’ve got a truck….Within this, women can appear as an object of envy, because your sex, it seems from my perspective, is an object. It’s not something that I have saturated with myself. It’s not the thing that I’ve already eaten and now I’m looking for something else. It’s the thing I don’t have….The point is that when the woman appears, she appears as an object in a way that maleness to the male can never appear. And so she appears as a possible object of consumption, and in that as salvation. Because then everything that’s weird and subjective about gender in the woman appears to be solid, whole, and understandable. I can investigate it. It has parts, it wears these clothes, it tends to do this sort of thing, it has this kind of voice—all are things that are objects to me. Not what’s flowing out of me, not what’s happening whether I would or no, it’s something out there.”

—Marc Barnes, Gender in a Big Beige World, starting around 1:43:19

[wrenthetitmouse]

remember, handing over control of what content you consume to an algorithm is pretty much handing that control over to a corporation. so much of the content that algorithms tend to push either generate outrage or encourage you to buy something. next time you're scrolling your instagram feed or your tiktok FYP, pay attention: how much of what you see contributes to either outrage/division or encouraging consumption under capitalism?

take back control. it's so easy to let algorithms determine everything you see - take back control of at least some of the content you see. watch things that you want to watch, instead of what CEOs want you to watch, and remember YOU ARE NOT IMMUNE TO PROPAGANDA.

[the-most-humble-blog]

<!-- BEGIN TRANSMISSION --> <div style="white-space:pre-wrap"> <meta signal-type="TIMELINE_DECISION_POINT::SCROLLCORE_DOMINANCE_VS.TITS"> <script>ARCHIVE_TAG="SKELETOR_VS_ALGORITHM::SCROLL_REWRITE_EVENT" EFFECT: libido override, neural imprint reconditioning, trap-centric preference reset </script>

🧠 LET THE RECORD SHOW:

Big Booby Algorithm: 0 Blacksite Literature™: 1

And the traps of Skeletor? Eternal.

—

📉 They showed him cleavage. He chose cadence. 📖 They offered him flesh. He chose flex theology.

No amount of tits could override the rhythm.

No giggle-loop selfie could compete with villain-coded hypertrophy.

That wasn’t a post. That was timeline recalibration.

You didn’t just scroll.

You evolved.

—

🛐 Reblog if you’ve chosen strength over seduction 💀 Bookmark if Skeletor’s delts are now canon 🔁 Quote this when another man breaks free from cleavage servitude 🧠 Follow for more literary override and cartoon-coded exorcisms 👉 https://www.patreon.com/TheMostHumble

Check Out the Original Post!

🛐 HE-MAN TRIED TO TRICK US: SKELETOR WAS SWOLE AS F☰☰K TOO

</div> <!-- END TRANSMISSION [AUTO-FLEX IN: 00:07:77] -->

[sunnyyflowerrs]

me: i need to lock the fuck in

discord and tumblr: exists

me: curse these addictive algorithms (rots day away)

[wavesoutbeingtossed]

Twitter is not real. The people who drive engagement on Twitter do not have the pulse of what happens in real life. If what was said and hyped on Twitter were real, there would have been a very different election result. So for the love of god stop believing anything you hear there (or any platform) and just live your lives and engage with the things that matter to you and stop worrying about about what people on the internet are saying.

[lobotomy-lady]

heheee my drugs come in da mail tomorrow exactly one week after my last order of the exact same thing but I got more than 5 doses this time . replacing my expensive ass kratom extract habit w/this for sure, I am so glad I found it before the fascist FDA inevitably bans it despite the fact that it has no known lethal dose, bc they apparently love it when people are overdosing on tranq in the streets instead

[critical-skeptic]

The Illusion of Complexity: Binary Exploitation in Engagement-Driven Algorithms

Abstract:

This paper examines how modern engagement algorithms employed by major tech platforms (e.g., Google, Meta, TikTok, and formerly Twitter/X) exploit predictable human cognitive patterns through simplified binary interactions. The prevailing perception that these systems rely on sophisticated personalization models is challenged; instead, it is proposed that such algorithms rely on statistical generalizations, perceptual manipulation, and engineered emotional reactions to maintain continuous user engagement. The illusion of depth is a byproduct of probabilistic brute force, not advanced understanding.

1. Introduction

Contemporary discourse often attributes high levels of sophistication and intelligence to the recommendation and engagement algorithms employed by dominant tech companies. Users report instances of eerie accuracy or emotionally resonant suggestions, fueling the belief that these systems understand them deeply. However, closer inspection reveals a more efficient and cynical design principle: engagement maximization through binary funneling.

2. Binary Funneling and Predictive Exploitation

At the core of these algorithms lies a reductive model: categorize user reactions as either positive (approval, enjoyment, validation) or negative (disgust, anger, outrage). This binary schema simplifies personalization into a feedback loop in which any user response serves to reinforce algorithmic certainty. There is no need for genuine nuance or contextual understanding; rather, content is optimized to provoke any reaction that sustains user attention.

Once a user engages with content —whether through liking, commenting, pausing, or rage-watching— the system deploys a cluster of categorically similar material. This recurrence fosters two dominant psychological outcomes:

If the user enjoys the content, they may perceive the algorithm as insightful or “smart,” attributing agency or personalization where none exists.

If the user dislikes the content, they may continue engaging in a doomscroll or outrage spiral, reinforcing the same cycle through negative affect.

In both scenarios, engagement is preserved; thus, profit is ensured.

3. The Illusion of Uniqueness

A critical mechanism in this system is the exploitation of the human tendency to overestimate personal uniqueness. Drawing on techniques long employed by illusionists, scammers, and cold readers, platforms capitalize on common patterns of thought and behavior that are statistically widespread but perceived as rare by individuals.

Examples include:

Posing prompts or content cues that seem personalized but are statistically predictable (e.g., "think of a number between 1 and 50 with two odd digits” → most select 37).

Triggering cognitive biases such as the availability heuristic and frequency illusion, which make repeated or familiar concepts appear newly significant.

This creates a reinforcing illusion: the user feels “understood” because the system has merely guessed correctly within a narrow set of likely options. The emotional resonance of the result further conceals the crude probabilistic engine behind it.

4. Emotional Engagement as Systemic Currency

The underlying goal is not understanding, but reaction. These systems optimize for time-on-platform, not user well-being or cognitive autonomy. Anger, sadness, tribal validation, fear, and parasocial attachment are all equally useful inputs. Through this lens, the algorithm is less an intelligent system and more an industrialized Skinner box: an operant conditioning engine powered by data extraction.

By removing the need for interpretive complexity and relying instead on scalable, binary psychological manipulation, companies minimize operational costs while maximizing monetizable engagement.

5. Black-Box Mythology and Cognitive Deference

Compounding this problem is the opacity of these systems. The “black-box” nature of proprietary algorithms fosters a mythos of sophistication. Users, unaware of the relatively simple statistical methods in use, ascribe higher-order reasoning or consciousness to systems that function through brute-force pattern amplification.

This deference becomes part of the trap: once convinced the algorithm “knows them,” users are less likely to question its manipulations and more likely to conform to its outputs, completing the feedback circuit.

6. Conclusion

The supposed sophistication of engagement algorithms is a carefully sustained illusion. By funneling user behavior into binary categories and exploiting universally predictable psychological responses, platforms maintain the appearance of intelligent personalization while operating through reductive, low-cost mechanisms. Human cognition —biased toward pattern recognition and overestimation of self-uniqueness— completes the illusion without external effort. The result is a scalable system of emotional manipulation that masquerades as individualized insight.

In essence, the algorithm does not understand the user; it understands that the user wants to be understood, and it weaponizes that desire for profit.

[7yorishiroxz]

I need to gey my ass off twitter caus that shiy gives me fucking mental illness...

[sharkenthusiast]

something that's really funny to me as someone who keeps stumbling onto tumblr reposters on other platforms is how niche the ecosystems end up being on each platform. like you get they typical older style posts on pinterest and the ones that kinda give off tweet vibes on instagram but by far the funniest to me is the weird number of youtube shorts people who do the minecraft parkour background read aloud style posts, who've cultivated a love of batfam posts within their little niche. like from what I can tell is one person started it off, and then everyone else went "hey people really love these videos, maybe I should read some myself" and as someone who doesn't know shit about anything dc I find it fascinating. I feel like I'm watching a whole environmental niche evolve in real time

[megkuna]

i really do still prefer tumblr as a social media it just sucks there's no gofushi shippers here. meh

[yeeowch]

literally every single ad i get on ig is for perfume now

[princesssarcastia]

listen to me. are you listening? tiktok is not uniquely anything when it comes to the internet. it is a tool and a platform like any other, used by all kinds of people—by nearly every kind of person or entity to whom it is available, in fact! and while what the u.s. government is doing right now to force the ownership of the company to change hands is bad and happening for the wrong reasons, to put it mildly—

claiming that the u.s. establishment is interested in shutting down tiktok because its been sooooo good and revolutionary for progressive/left-wing organizing is uhh. horse shit. that's not true. everyone uses tiktok. you, statistically, probably use tiktok. so do some of the congresspeople endorsing legislation that might end in tiktok being banned. so do right-wing influencers and terfs and trad-wives. just like everyone uses every other social media site.

don't fall into that trap of thinking that just because you and the people in your circle use this tool for good, that this tool is only used for good. it is actually just a tool for everyone!

here's an excerpt from a book called, The Wires of War, by Jacob Helberg which, if you're interested in why the u.s. congress is actually pulling this shit with tiktok, is a great read. this excerpt follows a section where Helberg described the role social media played in the Arab Spring in 2011. emphasis mine.

It would be several years before the 2016 election awakened the West to the ways in which the Internet could exploit the vulnerabilities of their societies. But for the autocrats in Bejing, Moscow, and Tehran, the Arab Spring was a technological awakening of their own. Seeing other repressive governments around the world crumble, illiberal regimes in Russia and China accelerated their treatment of the information space as a domain of war. "Tech-illiterate bureaucrats were replaced by a new generation of enforcers who understood the internet almost as well as the protesters," write Singer and Brooking in their book, LikeWar: The Weaponization of Social Media. "In truth, democratic activists had no special claim to the internet. They'd simply gotten there first. "

[ahopelessprincessreincarnation]

Is it just me, or has other people's Twitter(I am not calling it "X" or whatever the fuck Elongated Msukrat wants it to be named or something no matter what. Lmfaoooo he can suck my fat throbbing and imaginary girl dick)been really...garbage at recommending them tweets and stuff related to what they're actually interested in lately?I know social media algorithms are probably always exploitative and shit because capitalism but maybe I'm just now noticing??I don't know they feel more put of place and negative than usual(To be fair, Twitter is sorta a form of "digital self-harm" or at the very least self-triggering for me but who cares?:P)Its not like I even want to be on the annoying blue bird app anyways but for some reason constantly arguing with people in a morally-righteous way and being upset and scared all the time when I'm on there...it feels really good at the same time??I don't even know anymore sorry if my explanation doesn't make sense, are there any psychological studies on why this happens?(That sounds dumb, sorry for being an idiot but I'm genuinely curious).