Another interesting source I found on the Dead Internet Theory from Harvard: https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2025arXiv250200007M/abstract

Summary: The Dead Internet Theory is the idea that social media is becoming dominated by bots, AI-generated content, and corporate interests. This study looks at where the theory came from, its main ideas, and how it affects social media. It focuses on how platforms prioritize making money and keeping users engaged over real human interaction, making the internet feel less authentic and trustworthy.

Detail: One interesting detail from the paper is that an estimated 40–60% of web traffic comes from bots. I also learned the extent to which bots on these websites also artificially increase likes, comments, and shares, making online communities appear more active than they actually are. While I already suspected this on platforms like X. I feel like this study brought to life just how much of a problem it truly was.

People's expectations for a bot are different from those for a normal user, given that it's an automated response rather than one from an actual human. If someone knows that content comes from an actual human, it adds to its trustworthiness. On the flip side, a bot indicates that someone is trying to gather, scrape, or automate the delivery of information, which could make people trust it a lot less.

I find it really interesting how some ancient ethical frameworks are still heavily used and seen today, especially in different countries. While Confucianism was primarily adopted in China and Eastern Asia, I've noticed a very similar type of culture in how my parents grew up in India. Sometimes, traditions and certain frameworks are so strong that they're not only seen in multiple cultures, but even make it into the modern day.

Curiously, I've noticed a difference in Western culture's take on this versus that of many Eastern countries. While respect for elders and parents is still really important in Western culture, it seemingly isn't emphasized as strongly or traditionally as it is in Eastern cultures even today.

I believe that tech workers should always evaluate the ethical considerations of what they're building throughout the entire process, from conceptualization to development to A/B testing. This is because, oftentimes, we don't realize the destructive potential of a specific technology until it's too late.

I think the responsibility of tech workers is to consider and address these potential issues very early in development so that we can fix them before they become serious problems.