> I have a feeling it’s the kids’ fault.
Look at how broad the definition on Wikipedia is.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_media
I don’t think that’s the kids fault.
Also, from that Wikipedia article:
> Depending on interpretation, other popular platforms that are sometimes referred to as social media services include YouTube, Letterboxd, QQ, Quora, Telegram, WhatsApp, Signal, LINE, Snapchat, Viber, Reddit, Discord, and TikTok.
The broad interpretation that includes Reddit would also categorise HN as social media which I think is fair.
I think the problem actually is the adults that are not being specific about which problems they want to stop when they broadly say that social media is bad.
Like you say, the problem is specifically things like algorithms that are tuned for engagement, which results in all kinds of negative effects.
That being said even this is not specific enough. HN although different is also run on an algorithm that is meant to surface the most interesting things. The site rules on HN avoid some of the bad effects, but it’s still possible to be negatively impacted in other ways like checking HN too often and too long instead of doing other things.
