By Hans Ebert
@HansEbertMusic
Visit: http://www.hans-ebert.com
Sitting recently with a friend trying to dismantle some accounts to do with my business on social media, it shone a bright light on how pointless and, well stupid, one can look in this online world- especially when fakery comes into play. When the numbers don’t add up. When the time spent on logins, passwords and even trying to get the hell out of wherever you are suddenly makes you feel trapped. And conned. How there’s always a Fagin lurking in the shadows.
Yes, you can check out any time you want, but you can never leave. Social media “experts”? No such thing. It’s many clutching at straws. Guesswork. “Fame” on social work? What exactly is it unless a “YouTube sensation” or a celebrity with millions of legitimate followers? Most of the time it’s desperados trying to create the illusion of fame. But who’s buying any of it?
It’s been written here before and it will continue to be written until there’s some kind of reality check. That what’s happening out there in what is often a la la online world inhabited by Nowhere Man and his offspring is a highly addictive need for fame- but where this “fame” leads nowhere.
This is especially true when knowing the people caught up in playing this game and how “fame” has been purchased through “advertising”. It says much about character. The lack of it. Trust goes out the window. Press Delete.
If in music, fake numbers to appear “popular” devalue an art form already under attack from streaming sites that have many with no “portfolios” believing their music is being heard and their name is “gaining traction”. Please.
Maybe a few unknowns are gaining some “traction”, but, mainly, it’s all very hit or miss. More miss than hits.
Overall, it’s just more and more clutter for hoarders and offering free content plus all kinds of personal details to data-driven delivery platforms to pump up their numbers for investors, shareholders and the stock market.
In the real world this is called a Ponzi scheme- selling something that isn’t there. It’s about appealing to the vanity and insecurity of those who can be easily manipulated and have their minds go pear-shaped along with egos way outta whack.
On the subject of things being shaped, ever notice how many of those “perfect” models and unknowns on Instagram desperately seeking Susan and attention have their photos “tummy tucked” and unblemished via photoshopping? And not exactly good photoshopping either when one can see how everything has been “sculptured”?
It’s today’s version of Hef’s airbrushed and anatomically enhanced Playboy Playmates and Bob Guccione’s Penthouse Pets.
Maybe these were accepted as part of Hollywood in the Seventies and enjoyed by the rich and the famous. In those days, there were no hashtags waving red flags as there was too much genuine creativity going on with many wanting to and succeeding to make a difference. Originals who wanted to stand out from the crowd. Perhaps even give back to society instead of only involved in take, take, fake. There was great self-belief. Everything was possible.
Today? Today, with enablers in tow and the new pusher man offering a buffet of half baked ideas, too many seem happy to blend in. Happy to just belong. Happy to go along for the ride with no idea where anything is leading.
It’s being very busy doing nothing. Why? That empty void is being filled with everything Lennon sang about on “Nowhere Man”. Listened to the song recently? It’s eerily relevant once again.
That saying, “Who are you trying to kid?” is making such an empty thud of a comeback…It’s why online dating is so fraught with disappointment where too often both sexes buy “goods” online and who arrive with the buyer realizing they’ve been duped and have paid for something completely different to who they thought they had been wooing online. Think about all the personal information shared online to get to this point?
Why not just get out more? Into the real world? Get to know real people and see if fireworks go off? Go back and watch “Seinfeld”. Understand why it worked then and works now.
Why those classic recordings on Motown have stood the test of time. How that voice of Diana Ross is far more of a turn on than any of the free porn available.
Why the need to buy everything we think we want and pay for nothing we need? Where and how did so many allow themselves to get so blindsided?
Guess it’s no difference to using auto tuner when unable to hold a melody and believe this is knowing all about music? Yes?
Or when producing advertising back in the day, and though knowing the right footage wasn’t in the can, telling clients that it will all be fixed “in the edit”. It never was. Mistakes cannot be hidden forever. Neither can lie and selling what isn’t there. Cons always pop up. Like zits.
The solution? Perhaps not just pushing “like” to be polite. Be more selective. Just pressing that “like” button without even knowing if it deserves to be “liked” gives false hope. It’s feeding the beast when steely knives should be used to stop it from multiplying and spreading mediocrity.
Perhaps it will disappear when those involved in feeding this addiction are stopped by those who realise that the world has been derailed.
Tim Cook of Apple, for example, has taken on the runaway social media train and shown that it needs reining in. How it’s especially warping young minds. How it has been linked with depression. And anger. And what can happen when frustration boils over into full-scale aggression.
What Cook has shown is that it’s come down to corporate responsibility and business taking on other businesses in the technology sector and showing who holds the power.
While big business takeseach other on, perhaps those who have nothing to show for all that online “fame” will be finally hit by a dose of reality. That there aren’t exactly many knocking on the door offering any return on time and investment.
There’s “getting your name out there” and getting some kind of remuneration, no matter how small. It’s kinda like, No money, no honey. It’s sticking to that old adage about how There’s No Such Thing As A Free Lunch.
Again, it’s about being selective. There are plenty of baby sharks out there. But know what? They’re toothless. Call their bluff. And smile when you do. They’ll fold.
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