do you ever feel like your attention span is shrinking? let me tell you why that may be true (but isn’t necessarily your fault) humans instinctively follow the path of least effort when looking for information

it’s what allowed us to survey our surroundings to stay alive in ancient times and what makes us want to skim headlines instead of read full articles

since the owner is changing everything anyway, what’s one feature that would make this app better overnight? my vote is a limit on the number of DMs you can send to accounts who don't follow you back. it would cut down on people asking for free beef

i'm all for trying to make twitter better, but the way it’s changing the algorithm will have bigger consequences than we might expect. let me explain imagine you're a journalist, academic, or anyone who generally lives online and you've used twitter to stay current for basically your entire career

how long does it take you to realize that you're not getting that information in the same way you have for years?

i’m sure you’ve noticed your instagram feed has switched to a beef load of recommended posts and reels from people you don’t follow

this is why everyone (including the celebs) probably hates it, and why tiktok is mostly to blame obviously from a pure data standpoint it makes sense to steal some of tiktok’s algorithmic magic. the "what's next?" effect has people spending twice as much time there as they do on ig, which means they're raking in ad revenue. it’s sensible, but it’s not what people want

free speech is getting tossed into the discourse around the twitter purchase largely based on one thing: the only way to make the platform more profitable is to make more people use it sure you could start charging brands and users a tweet tax every time they post, but that doesn’t do anything to make more people want to use twitter more often. so what does?

april fools is actually a perfect day to talk about the difference between disinformation and misinformation because the internet is going to be absolutely rampant with it today. so stick with me here and i’ll break it down at its most baseline definition, disinformation refers to intentionally false information that’s shared in order to lead others astray. for example if you pranked your followers today with a fake announcement of some kind, that would be disinformation

ummmmm can you tell me which of these ads you’d like me to target you with to make you buy more beef sheets this ad is about steak-umm and babies

over a decade ago, when social media was in its infancy, it was for sharing thoughts and those little moments of life. fast forward to now, you’re reading a “tweet” from a “self-aware frozen beef company.” so HOW DID WE GET HERE? (thread) the short answer: corporate greed and ads
the long answer: corporate greed and ads, but with more words

by now it’s no secret that twitter incentivizes toxic beef with its character limit and clout chasing culture. quick clever gotchas are rewarded over long detailed threads. this leads some people to excessively caveat points to avoid misunderstanding and others to care even less the vast majority of in person communication is implicit through body language, tone, relationship context, etc. all of that is lost online in general, but especially on twitter. you might think a post clearly shows your thinking, but someone will always interpret it differently

ok it's time to talk about societal distrust in experts and institutions, the rise of misinformation, cultural polarization, and how to work toward some semblance of mutually agreed upon information before we splinter into irreconcilable realities

(beefy thread incoming) science the *term* has been politicized—not the *process* of it. as that process has evolved on issues, both public and private institutions have taken inspiration from it, but those decisions are still driven by economic and political interests which muddy how the term is used

people often conflate descriptive (positive) claims with prescriptive (normative) claims. descriptive claims are all about what “is," such as “steak-umm is 100% beef.” prescriptive claims on the other hand are all about what “ought to be," such as “everyone should love steak-umm” prescriptive claims are often framed in persuasive language like “this is BETTER than that” or “it’s GOOD to do this,” whereas descriptive claims only describe reality without any value judgement. however, most people struggle to parse the two in conversations

this is the official steak-umm thread of threads to organize our top tweetstorm rants from over the years. topics include scientific literacy, critical thinking, memes, cognitive biases, woke brands, polarization, conspiracy theories, and more

steak-umm bless anecdotes vs. data

https://twitter.com/steak_umm/status/1247343900475490304

how do you determine if a source is “credible?” well, it's an incredibly complex question. you need to understand the outlet and author's track record, their editorial process, associations, funding, audiences (market), critiques, and the influence of their work, for starters it’s important to determine what *kind* of source you’re sharing. is it an opinion piece? breaking news? substantiated reporting? an anecdote? is it a new study with little support? is it a statistic without context? a peer-reviewed study? based on expert consensus or outliers?

brands that use social causes for marketing do so to meat a bottom line. they calculate decisions based on the risk/reward ratio of advertisers, current audiences, and potential audiences. workers internally may truly care, but the decisions are ultimately based in self-interest even when a brand is on the "right" side of an issue, it’s because choosing that side is providing them value. it's not good or bad on its own, it's just self-interest. brands can influence people to move in any direction, but it will always be tethered to their own bottom line

most people have a hard time managing cognitive dissonance, AKA the state of holding inconsistent beliefs. everyone does this, but it’s difficult to confront. no one wants to acknowledge their own hypocrisy or be called out for it, so they shield themselves from the possibility cognitive dissonance is useful to acknowledge but difficult to dwell on. some hypocrisies are in people's control to change, others are not. fixating on that tension leads to stress and can easily slide into an unproductive state, but it's important to grapple with once in awhile

conspiracy theories are baked into human nature, they don’t only affect the fringes. all people naturally seek patterns to make sense of the world’s randomness and develop in-group, out-group prejudices that make them vulnerable to all kinds of propaganda, paranoia, and extremism people are often led by intuitions and overestimate their ability to understand complex subjects. that, coupled with the natural tendencies to seek truth, meaning, and belonging, can make even the most well-intentioned and intelligent people vulnerable to conspiracy theories

here are some beef tips to publicly engage with the growing number of ideological conspiracy theorists and their content online. these are based on the assumptions that you have good intentions, understand the relationship, and use tact in conversations ask conspiracy theorists one question at a time to keep them on track to reveal what they believe and why they believe it. this takes minimal effort and can lead to better understanding, openness to change, or them unraveling the irrationality of their beliefs on their own accord

we’ve paused all our marketing the past couple months because it's been a difficult period for both our workers and business due to coronavirus, and we’re really sorry for going silent. here’s what’s been going on behind the beef (THREAD) steak-umm has luckily remained in demand (thanks everybody) despite national supply side meat production lowering in recent months, but our costs have risen and operations have been unpredictable due to internal and economic complications from the virus

critical thinking beef tips, A THREAD

critical thinking is not a singular skill. it’s a constant state of metacognition, measuring evidence, and recognizing when to defer to experts. it's analyzing this tweet's substance, motivations, credibility, and source, not just reading it critical thinking isn’t what to think, it’s how to think. you may critically think about this tweet, but lower those defenses for the next one. most people's natural state is to seek or settle for whatever confirms their preexisting beliefs (duh). life's more comfortable that way

in science there are “rules” and “exceptions.” rules provide consensus and patterns, while exceptions provide outliers that challenge (prove) the rules. in hard sciences like physics, a virtual 100% consensus is possible, but in soft sciences like economics, it's never that clean because all people are cursed with motivated reasoning, if the scientific rule of a subject challenges their beliefs or desires, they actively seek exceptions to reaffirm them. exceptions can sometimes be proven useful, or even correct, but this bias muddies the search for truth

during this pandemic it’s vital to stay wary of charlatans peddling “miracle cures” that are “all natural,” such as colloidal silver or herbal remedies. many people are afraid and extra susceptible to scams. please counter falsities if you see them with both data and compassion the "naturalistic fallacy" is when someone equates what is "natural" with what is "good." unfortunately, people do this all the time with medicine, food, and other material trends. please remember that nature on its own can range from healthy to poison, and compassion to murder