Exploitation in Social Media Landscape: The Web 3 Solution

In all the various outreach efforts I've been involved in, I consistently emphasize a crucial aspect when I have the opportunity to share my online experience. I always try to enlighten people about how they can make the most productive use of their time online. I can recall my experience with Facebook in 2006, it was the first platform where I began my social media journey.

I was captivated by the fact that anyone could view my pictures and read what I shared online. This was during Facebook's early years, which was grabbing the attention of people far and wide. At that time, I was pursuing my undergraduate program, and the school library doubled as my study space and my gateway to Facebook, thanks to free Internet access.

A significant portion of my time was spent on Facebook, liking people's photos and articles; this aspect eventually didn't strike again with time and so I stopped using Facbook. With time, I realised it was an unproductive use of my time; it was not adding anything of value to my life.

I believe my experience reflects that of many individuals who spend more time online without making it productive. Discovering social blockchain platforms made me realized how my valuable time and attention could be harnessed productively, which completely transformed my perspective on the online experience.

It was then that I realized how I had not fully capitalized on the resources(attention and time) at my disposal but had only giving these valuable resources away for free. Time and attention are our most precious resources, continuously exploited when we are online.

Social media platforms, businesses, and users alike all depend on them to generate income. This is the essence of the attention economy, where platforms, business entities and individuals all benefit from the scarce resource of attention, with social media players profiting from it the most.

Many people eagerly join platforms because they are popular and entertaining. While we all have different reasons for joining different platforms, some users go beyond being mere users to capturing the attention of others for their own benefit. Those who never learn to monetize their attention never see a return on their investment.

This highlights one of the limitations of most Web 2 platforms: where only platform owners and successful users reap the benefits. This is where I find Web 3 decentralized platforms like Hive particularly appealing. Here, even as you contribute your attention and time as inputs, you have the opportunity to reap immediate rewards, creating a mutually beneficial situation for everyone involved.

unfortunately most people have no clue of the kind of exploitation that happens to them within the social media landscape. But in all I have to come appreciate how Web 3, holds the promise of a more equitable and rewarding digital frontier where users can reclaim benefits of what's rightfully theirs, their time and attention.