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Ask HN: If Social network is created today, what do you want to see?

kkocial about 4 hours ago 41 comments

RU version is available. Content is displayed in original English for accuracy.

If someone has to create a social network today, what would you like to see in it?

- TikTok/Instagram like engaging videos?

- Twitter/Reddit like discussion panel

- Your own public diary journal

- or, Latest events happening across the world from your feed?

Building one here - https://qocial.com and would love your feedback.

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Discussion (41 Comments)Read Original on HackerNews

cbare37 minutes ago
What would it look like if social media were optimized for flourishing rather then engagement?

Bring your own filter/ranking algorith?

I wonder if there's not a fundamental conflict. Social media is essentially _addictive_ media. The most pro-flourishing move you can make is to disengage from social media.

kocial8 minutes ago
- Bringing your filter is nice; I will add that.

- _ addictive_media: maybe some option you can turn on and off when it is addictive and when it is not, something like that?

nicdabout 1 hour ago
An emphasis on driving users towards IRL socialization, and strengthening geographically local communities.
kocialabout 1 hour ago
- Yup, local social first, since we lost that in the online game. Doing something similar on qocial.com
derwiki25 minutes ago
We don’t need one. Fool me once, shame on me.
kocial6 minutes ago
- Singularity, Loneliness: we are already heading towards it.

/future - says hi.

rufasteriscoabout 2 hours ago
A business model that does not exploit users, ever.

If you make it one where loss of trust leads to immediate loss of revenue and forces you to take the user side on all matters, well then all features are there to improve and maintain trust.

mr1337about 2 hours ago
If it's free, you are the product. Not saying it's not possible, it's just unlikely to happen, unfortunately.
faangguyindiaabout 1 hour ago
Human greed has no limits; just because you pay for a product doesn't mean your data will not be sold and mined for additional profit, or that dark patterns and ads will not appear.
kocialabout 1 hour ago
No, I disagree. What I have seen is that

- Acquiring users for the hefty discount has led the platform to think they can recover from future sales.

- Assuming their buyers will consider them their long-term household shop.

- While new business with a new discount bumps in and the fight begins. We all know fights are ugly.

rufasteriscoabout 1 hour ago
I would not know what that business model could be, it was a wish :)

But open source thrives, is free, and we are not the product.

In theory redirecting ads money towards users, could be a path, in practice it seems the economic value is not there.

kocialabout 1 hour ago
- Redirecting ad money towards users is like asking users to be vulnerable to get paid.
kocialabout 2 hours ago
You just signed up to say that? Are you Elon Musk? Lol
kocialabout 2 hours ago
- Not sure how any social network can exploit users apart from filthy ads and spammy traffic.

- But I think a platform like Twitter is already taking great initiative in that under Elon Musk.

markus_zhangabout 2 hours ago
I just need forums, social network can go away.
mpegabout 1 hour ago
I think the reason it feels that way (I agree) is that forums had real community; I met irl friends in forums, people I stayed close with for many years

The modern day equivalent is probably discord, there are servers with really close communities where everyone knows each other

kocialabout 2 hours ago
- Hell Yeah, 2000-2010 era :) best.

- Tons of forums coming from PHPBB, vBulletin, mybb etc.,

markus_zhangabout 2 hours ago
Yep and BBS is good too. Like, HN actually only has part of the functionality of a BBS — back then you could post pictures on BBS, download warez, and even play games. It is way more colorful and fast than any other format afterwards.

If we enjoy HN, we should enjoy more about BBS. The only problem is that people don’t know about it.

kocialabout 2 hours ago
I think Mastodon is trying to do what forums used to be back then.
mr1337about 2 hours ago
I do miss the golden age of forums, before centralized general-purpose sites like Digg and Reddit.
PaulHouleabout 3 hours ago
Like instagram but focused on still photos but with less annoyances like dm scams, text in pictures, sexy selfies, etc.
kocialabout 3 hours ago
For those, I think someone already tried building them, but eventually it will either end up adding videos soon and becoming Instagram, or a photo marketplace like Pexels, Freepik/Magnific, Unsplash, etc.
kocialabout 2 hours ago
The best one is imgur, which already exists and is dying slowly :(
linguaeabout 2 hours ago
I want 2006-era Facebook. No algorithmic feed. No viral posts. No AI slop. Just updates from my friends and acquaintances.
kocialabout 2 hours ago
There was no feed on Facebook in the first half of 2006; it was just a kind of scrapbook.

The feed was added in the second half, and that's what took off.

vednigabout 3 hours ago
no ai bots

no social engineering

freedom to say whatever you want however you want

kocialabout 3 hours ago
- No AI bots; agreed

- No social engineering; curious what this means here - you mean no social influencing on any topic?

- For freedom, the world always comes down to the jurisdiction and law of your country. If you violate the law, the platform needs to cut .

gojkoaabout 3 hours ago
- no bots, ai slop stopped at the door

- feed from people I actually follow, in an actual chronological timeline (not optimized for engagement, not deprioritized because it has an external link)

- topical feeds with topical filters (e.g. I don't care about politics but care about tech news)

kocialabout 3 hours ago
- Filters; very interesting, something like you can create a tab for like #tech and on tap all chronological posts about it from the network?
bdangubicabout 3 hours ago
true social network

- I choose my network

- I never see anything (literally) that isn’t a post from someone in my network - full stop

- post are chronological

that’s it. I have been off all social media platforms since 2017 but would “return” if true social network existed. there isn’t one anymore, the best description of what we have currently are ad networks, there is nothing social about today’s social networks to the point that it really makes no sense that we still refer to them as social

neomabout 1 hour ago
kocialabout 1 hour ago
kocialabout 3 hours ago
So,

- a closed social network, where you see what you follow.

- posts are usually chronological unless some posts are muted/promoted.

That's a very common thing; many social networks already have:

On Facebook/Twitter, you see what you add/follow.

krappabout 3 hours ago
Not entirely - both Facebook and Twitter also show you "suggested" content and contacts and quoted/reposted content from people outside of your network. Social media algorithms are designed to maximize engagement and encourage adding to your social graph. OP seems to be suggesting a social network where algorithmic feeds don't even exist and all content is whitelisted.

I want to suggest federated social media like Mastodon, which is pretty close but it still has boosts and quote tweets, although you can turn them off in your settings.

kocialabout 3 hours ago
- Interesting; so see what you follow and cut the other crap.

- Mastodon is cool, but I'm not sure what its future is.

slaterabout 3 hours ago
Privacy first. Everything else is secondary.
kocialabout 3 hours ago
Well, what I understand is that you mean - no selling of your content, no third-party SDK, and no sharing of your data.

What does the other thing include in privacy?

slaterabout 3 hours ago
No dark patterns hiding new or changed settings.

And any new settings should ALWAYS default to what the average user would likely choose, not what the marketing department cooked up this week and "absolutely must be enabled by default!!!11~"

kocialabout 3 hours ago
- Interesting; see what we see on today's network, like Facebook/Twitter/Instagram/Tiktok is not hidden settings but snooping from one platform to another, including what your eyes see and where.

Your eyes don't unlock your phone; they also unlock what you are seeing on your phone.

Your speech doesn't just enable verbal communication; it also sends a message to your phone about what you are discussing.

Many of these can only be avoided by avoiding social networks where such tech is used.

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