So a few years ago after deciding the church is a load of bunk, I created a second Facebook account exclusively to communicate with Exmos. One "me" remained the Mormon me. The other "me" was the account used to friend exmos and "deviant" individuals. Same person, friends all sorted into two categories separated by account. For the most part, I did not post any content on either account.

You know that article by Mat Honan about liking everything on Facebook and how it completely jacked up what showed up on his news feed? If you haven't read it it's worth reading. Basically it illustrates how over time, Facebook will simply show you more and more of what you want it to show you, to the exclusion of pretty much everything else. http://www.wired.com/2014/08/i-liked-everything-i-saw-on-facebook-for-two-days-heres-what-it-did-to-me/all/1

So anyway, I have two Facebook accounts, a Mormon one and an exMormon one. The news feeds could not be more different and I've favorited almost nothing on either of them. Let me tell you about the Mormon one.

On my Mormon one I've kept up pretenses, replying to posts like, "Got my mission call!", inspirational quotes like, "I only said it would be worth it", and other cult-y things posted by the TBMs I know. Or I just associate with them in general. I have usually not specifically "liked" church-related things, usually just liked normal things done by church-related people.

Still, My Mormon Facebook account has very little in it that is not church-related propaganda. It's like a 24-hour Mormon propagandathon perpetuated by the members themselves. Every time someone gets a brilliant share it on Facebook idea it shows up. (Usually at least a couple of them a month.) A few non-church related things get through some of the time, but my Feed may as well be Deseret News given it's general subject matter.

What seems to be happening on my intentionally-left-Mormon-FB-feed is that as my TBM friends like church-related content, my feed gets full of more and more Mormon content simply by interacting with Mormons. I would imagine that many of us would choose the "I don't want to see this" option or unfriend people, or not respond at all, which would probably alter the algorithm. But I have been careful not to do this on the Mormon account and I keep being supportive of the Members, even if not supportive of church content.

On the non-Mormon account there is absolutely nothing LDS church related at all through no effort on my part whatsoever. It's like the LDS church doesn't even exist. No amount of 100,000 Book of Mormon posts has even made a blip on the radar or shown up in any way.

So to the point...

I predict that Bednar's admonition to flood social media is going to accomplish one thing and one thing only; it will flood the member's own news feeds with more church stuff all the time by strengthening the algorithm's "like" association with church material. I doubt it will help spread the word at all. It might a little, but I'm confident that my non-Mormon FB account will remain completely unaffected by any effort, as will the majority of Facebook users.

But the members...oh their feeds are going to be so full of Mormon diatribe all day long, all the time, non-stop. I think it will soon be pretty much all that they will ever see, and that's the point.

It's brilliant really. It will create the illusion to Members that the church is growing everywhere (told ya so!), because the church will be in their faces, all the time through their own social media accounts that they check a dozen times a day. The effort will create the appearance to members that the church is filling the whole earth--even if what is actually happening is the Members' world just got a lot smaller.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 08/20/2014 12:05AM by The Man in Black.

I don't Facebook, but I could see how that would happen.

Whatever the request by the Big 15, it all comes down to money. I naively thought it was souls, but it's always money.

Reminds me of a joke...



A man died and was spirited to Heaven, where he met St. Peter at the gate.

"Welcome to Heaven. I'll be showing you around." They walked a short way and came upon a group of people singing, shouting and raising their arms in the air..."This is where the pentacostal followers worship."

They walked a little further and saw some people taking holy communion "Over here are the Catholics".

They walked by several more groups of followers openly worshiping in their own ways. Then Peter said "shhh, be very quiet now" as they walked past a long, tall brick wall. On the other side they could hear shouting and singing - what sounded like a big party going on.

The man asked who was behind the wall. Peter said "Oh, those are the Mormons...they think they're the only ones here!"

More busy work to try to re-confirm their own beliefs.

I like the way you think!
And the peculiar people get more peculiar.

I read the article about liking everything on facebook. And remember the news that broke about Facebook doing a social experiment regarding spreading emotions [and probably attitudes] through facebook interactions?

We all tend to see things through our own filter. But Facebook magnifies that filter to the point that it could really distort someone's world view.

They also decide what personal posts you'll see on the feeds of others. I also have two accounts, one that I use for political stuff, and another on which I have IRL churchy friends who would take issue with my politics. While logged into my no-politics account, I visited the page of someone I used to know (with whom I'm not friended), who has apparently become obsessed with end-times dogma, and had several crazy posts about armageddon being imminent interspersed among his family photos. When I went back later, while logged into my political account, to read those posts, the armageddon posts were all gone, but all of his other family stuff was still there. Turns out I can only see those posts when I'm logged in on my church-friendly account; they disappear every time if I look for them from my other account.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 08/20/2014 04:25AM by inmoland.

It used to be that I would "like" almost anything a friend posted. Then I noticed that if a friend posted three cute puppy photos on each day and I consistently liked all of them, then my feed would become overwhelmed with cute puppy photos. So I'm more judicious now about what I "like." I try to help steer my feed to some degree.

I could see TBMs liking everything Mormon-related on FB. That will soon be all that they see.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/20/2014 05:48AM by summer.

Yes exactly, very well said; and it really is brilliant. Perception is reality and facebook is a perpetual perception machine. Mormons, always a little sheltered from the larger culture, are now sheltered even more than their parents.


It's not just Mormons, though. We're ceding quite a lot to these networked algorithms. But I suppose we gain a lot, too.

Here are two takes on this gain and loss, one by Nicolas Carr and the other by Stephen Fry:

http://youtu.be/MA_kxQTutbA

If perception is reality we should take care what we perceive.

Remember that anything and everything you put on Facebook is open for their re-use. They can sell your personal information and even use it for advertising. They take any and all photos and artwork and can re-sell it for any purpose. It is in their terms of service.

Anyone who posts there deserves what happens.

asdf



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 08/20/2014 02:11PM by mrtranquility.