Yes, the internet is getting worse and no, you are not imagining it. Whether it is 10,000 hyperbolic reviews praising a piece of plastic junk from China, a search engine result that turns up more ads than answers, or the rampant creation of fake news by generative artificial intelligence, the average user’s experience has deteriorated. And that is without even mentioning the entity formerly known as Twitter.
Sure, it is still an eighth wonder of the world that you can do so much without ever leaving a screen. My child self, with my six library tickets (my own, my dad’s and my Auntie Kathleen’s) would have been dizzy with joy if she knew that millions of books would one day be only a click away.
But so many of those books are so very bad, and often, good authors cannot make a living. There is a large, grinning snake coiled around the roots of the tree of knowledge.
We have been here before, sort of. Over a decade ago, people were moaning about how much the internet had degenerated. Content farms paid freelancers buttons to produce reams of low-quality material designed to optimise traffic and maximise advertising revenue. Internet users did not like it, so Google optimised its algorithm, code-named Panda, to choke off revenue.
Once upon a time, you could more or less trust Amazon reviews. Now, there are so many that are clearly spam, including negative reviews, that they are almost worthless
So what has happened in the interim? Google has apparently discovered that profits beat the heck out of the internet being a nice place to be.
Today, if you are looking for, say, a recommendation on the best slow cooker, most of the first page on Google will be list-type articles, all giving you different answers. A significant number of these articles will lead to Amazon.
Once upon a time, you could more or less trust Amazon reviews. Now, there are so many that are clearly spam, including negative reviews, that they are almost worthless. Amazon itself is aware of the problem and created the Vine programme, which rewards trusted reviewers by giving them a special status. However, only a tiny proportion of reviews come from Vine users.
The internet is full of spammy, poorly written articles recycling the same content so that it is like wading through treacle to find anything useful. To avoid all the advertising and poor content, some people started appending the word Reddit to their searches. Reddit is a huge collection of forums where people congregate to shoot the breeze on their interests and obsessions and vote on other people’s posts.
By appending Reddit, people were making a statement – they wanted a human answer, even if Reddit has its own problems, including explicit content and a reasonable number of frankly weird people.
Of course, those earning cash from terrible content started appending the keyword Reddit to their results so that you were sent back to the same irritating drivel. Why doesn’t Google care that people are becoming frustrated with its core product, the search engine? One of the most insightful articles on this was written by former Google employee Ivan Vendrov on his SubStack, Nothing Human. He calls it the tyranny of the marginal user.
So why, according to Vendrov, does every app get worse over time? He uses the example of the original dating sites, such as OKCupid, that made you fill out forms with hundreds of questions. You could then find people with compatibility scores ranging from 0-100 per cent.
[ Tech giants using AI to remove billions of fake accountsOpens in new window ]
It was eerily accurate. Vendrov is aware that commodifying loving relationships is dubious in itself but is appalled at the fact that almost every dating site is now reduced to swiping left or right.
The US website, Newsguard, which provides a rating system for transparency and credibility of news sites, has to date found 623 websites where the content is entirely generated by bots with little or no human oversight
Apps depend on daily active users. You have to keep your figures climbing, even if it degrades the product and annoys your original loyal customers. You are forced to pander to the marginal user, whom Vendrov illustrates using a fictional character called Marl.
Marl has the attention span of “a goldfish on acid”. If you don’t hook him in 1.3 seconds, he will be back on TikTok and you will never see him again. To grow, websites have to target and capture Marl. Vendrov says that we all have our Marl moments – aimlessly scrolling in bed or in an airport queue. Sadly, most of our digital economy depends on us being in this state. Add AI to the mix and you have an unholy mess. The US website, Newsguard, which provides a rating system for transparency and credibility of news sites, has to date found 623 websites where the content is entirely generated by bots with little or no human oversight. Newsguard also found 17 linked TikTok accounts with 336 million views and 14.5 million likes as of September 25th, 2023, using AI-generated voiceovers to spread outrageous misinformation.
It’s all somewhat depressing. Given that the US, India, the UK and more than 35 other countries, possibly including Ireland, are facing elections this year, it is also scary.
Maybe we need to start accepting that it’s time to get off the internet and spend more time talking to real human beings. And when we do click, that we know where and why we are doing so.