#socialnetworks — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #socialnetworks, aggregated by home.social.
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Looks cool. Makes me remind me of the good old days of What.cd :-D
“ Telling us in a few words about their friends or comrades on our server or how their work relates to the community we are aiming for. “Signups” became actual human connections again, we understood who was joining and because there was a direct line of communication we could add a few remarks about maybe following the account used to send around status messages about the server itself and other onboarding info. For us the workflow is marginally harder than just clicking “yes” or “no” in the admin interface, but generating an invitation link and responding to the email also is not that much work. And at least for me it totally changed my emotional response to this moderation task: It is cool to see interesting people sign up, look at their websites and work. It feels like welcoming a new person to a party and less like fighting away spam bots.
So for us this new process works well. And I understand that this manual process does not scale up to these massive servers with tens of thousands of users. But maybe that’s a good thing? Maybe that is an indicator that these huge servers are just a bad idea? That we should structure the internet and our platforms around smaller, more connected groups that then connect to others.”
https://tante.cc/2026/09/10/making-social-media-social/
#SocialMedia #SocialNetworks #Fediverse #Mastodon #Spam #Bots #Decentralization
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“ Portugal is leading the movement against ‘addictive design’ on digital platforms.
D3 is the Portuguese association for the defence of digital rights, and a member of EDRI – European Digital Rights, the European network of NGOs dedicated to digital rights and freedoms, which brings together more than 50 other organisations and dozens of observers, and which is celebrating its 23rd anniversary this year.
Leading the European movement against addictive design on social media, D3 has brought four cases before the Portuguese civil courts against the platforms Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and YouTube, acting as a collective representative of the rights of the Portuguese people.
The class actions were brought in April and May this year by the law firm Andersen Tax & Legal Iberia, by a team of lawyers led by Dr Miguel Miranda and Dr Efigénia Marabuto Tavares, with the support of academic experts Professor Dr Fabrizio Esposito and Dr Cecília Isola, from the NOVA School of Law.”
#SocialMedia #SocialNetworks #AddictiveDesign #Facebook #Instagram #TikTok #YouTube
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The messy state of social networks #community #insight #socialnetworks #socmed #webstories
The messy state of social netw... -
The messy state of social networks #community #insight #socialnetworks #socmed #webstories
The messy state of social netw... -
Apple and Google Miss Deadline to Block Child Nudity on Their Phones in the UK
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Apple and Google Miss Deadline to Block Child Nudity on Their Phones in the UK
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Apple and Google Miss Deadline to Block Child Nudity on Their Phones in the UK
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Apple and Google Miss Deadline to Block Child Nudity on Their Phones in the UK
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Apple and Google Miss Deadline to Block Child Nudity on Their Phones in the UK
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Réseaux sociaux : l’Australie veut permettre aux internautes de désactiver les algorithmes de personnalisation jugés “prédateurs” - RTBF - Info ([email protected] (Belga))
La fonction est déjà en place nativement sur le #fediverse ...
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Engadget: New Twitter rebrands to Tweet.app after court’s double-edged ruling . “The Tweet.app website is currently live, but is still only accepting waitlist applicants for its upcoming social media platform. According to TechCrunch, more than 172,000 have already signed up and requested a handle, which costs $20 to reserve.”
https://rbfirehose.com/2026/09/06/engadget-new-twitter-rebrands-to-tweet-app-after-courts-double-edged-ruling/ -
DATE: September 4, 2026 at 07:00AM
SOURCE: PSYPOST.ORG** Research quality varies widely from fantastic to small exploratory studies. Please check research methods when conclusions are very important to you. **
-------------------------------------------------TITLE: A computational model explains the sudden rise in societal division
URL: https://www.psypost.org/the-hidden-cost-of-increased-social-connectivity/
As modern communication technology has doubled the number of close social ties people maintain, societies have fractured into deeply divided political camps. A computational model simulating human social behavior shows that simply having more connections past a certain threshold forces communities to splinter into polarized echo chambers. The research was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Political polarization has risen sharply in the United States and other Western nations over the past two decades. During this same period, the average number of close friendships reported by individuals has nearly doubled, a trend coinciding with the public debut of smartphones and mass social media networks around 2008.
Stefan Thurner, Markus Hofer, and Jan Korbel, researchers at the Medical University of Vienna and the Complexity Science Hub Vienna, noticed the parallel timing of these two trends. They wanted to test whether the sheer volume of social connections might be driving the ideological divide.
To investigate this, the researchers focused on two well-documented features of human behavior: homophily and social balance. Homophily is the human tendency to seek out and befriend like-minded individuals. When people interact with those who share their views, they often reinforce each other’s beliefs, causing their opinions to align even more closely.
Social balance describes how groups of three people naturally seek comfortable, stable relationship dynamics. A balanced triad occurs when all three people are friends, or when two friends mutually dislike a third person.
Unbalanced triads cause psychological tension or social stress. This happens if one person tries to remain friends with two people who despise each other, or if three people all dislike one another. People naturally try to resolve this tension by either changing their opinions to match their friends or by distancing themselves from people who disagree with them.
To see how these basic social rules play out on a large scale, the research team built an agent-based computational model. In this virtual society, each simulated individual was assigned a mathematical profile representing a set of binary political stances on different topics.
Individuals in the simulation were connected in a network where relationships could be either positive or negative. A positive connection formed if two individuals shared a majority of their stances, acting as a virtual friendship. A negative connection formed if their stances opposed one another, acting as a rivalry or enmity.
The researchers used a mathematical algorithm to randomly select individuals and flip one of their political stances. After flipping an opinion, the model calculated the individual’s new level of cognitive dissonance, measured by how much they now agreed with their friends and disagreed with their enemies.
If the new opinion lowered their overall social stress, the individual kept the new stance. If the opinion increased their social stress, the individual rejected the change, though the model allowed a small probability of keeping it to represent occasional irrational behavior. As individuals updated their views, their positive and negative relationships shifted to maintain social balance.
The researchers ran this simulation multiple times, varying the average number of close connections each individual possessed. They tracked how the distribution of opinions across the entire population changed as the network became more interconnected.
The simulation revealed a sudden tipping point, which physicists call a phase transition. When the average number of close connections remained low, the virtual society maintained a diverse, cohesive blend of opinions. Small friend groups shared similar views, but these groups remained scattered and tolerant of the broader population.
Once the average number of connections surpassed a critical threshold of about five close friends, the societal structure abruptly collapsed into a highly polarized state. The numerous small, diverse clusters merged into two massive, opposing groups of roughly equal size.
Within each massive group, individuals held nearly identical opinions. Between the two groups, individuals held entirely opposite views and maintained strictly negative relationships with anyone on the other side.
Next, the researchers introduced radical influencers to the model. They assigned extreme, unchanging opinions to just two percent of the simulated population. These influencers never adjusted their stances to reduce social stress, but they still formed friendships and rivalries based on ideological alignment.
The presence of these rigid influencers changed the nature of the polarization tipping point. The transition from a cohesive society to a divided one became gradual rather than sudden. However, the splintering into opposing echo chambers began at an even lower threshold, occurring when individuals averaged just four and a half close connections.
To test if their model reflected reality, the research team compared their simulated results to real-world survey data. They analyzed data from large, multi-year surveys, including the Pew Research Center, which track both political ideology and the average number of close friendships among thousands of respondents.
The empirical data showed that ideological polarization in the United States remained relatively low and stable before 2010. Shortly after that time, the average number of close social ties increased, and polarization spiked rapidly.
The researchers found that their computational model accurately predicted both the timing and the magnitude of this real-world polarization spike. The model required no outside factors like economic changes or political campaigns to explain the divide. The mathematical rules of homophily and social balance, combined with an increasing number of social ties, were enough to produce the exact polarization trend seen in the survey data.
The study does present certain caveats. The computational model assumes every individual has the exact same sensitivity to cognitive dissonance and social stress. In reality, human beings display varied levels of tolerance for disagreement and differing levels of political engagement.
The simulation also uses a relatively fixed network structure. While relationships can switch between positive and negative, the underlying web of who knows whom does not fluidly dissolve and rewire over time. The authors note that real social media platforms use recommendation algorithms that constantly suggest new connections, which might amplify the clustering effect beyond what the current model captures.
One concerning finding from the model is a hysteresis effect, meaning the process is difficult to reverse. Once a society crosses the connectivity threshold and becomes highly polarized, simply reducing the number of connections back to the original level will not depolarize the population. A fractured society must drop its connectivity far below the initial tipping point to restore ideological cohesion.
Since reducing human connectivity is likely impossible in the digital age, the authors suggest alternative ways to raise the critical threshold. They suggest that educational efforts could train individuals to have a higher tolerance for opposing opinions, which mathematically prevents the phase transition. Disrupting the reach of radical influencers through content moderation could also delay the onset of extreme societal division.
The study, “Why more social interactions lead to more polarization in societies,” was authored by Stefan Thurner, Markus Hofer, and Jan Korbel.
URL: https://www.psypost.org/the-hidden-cost-of-increased-social-connectivity/
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Private, vetted email list for mental health professionals: https://www.clinicians-exchange.org
Unofficial Psychology Today Xitter to toot feed at Psych Today Unofficial Bot @PTUnofficialBot
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#psychology #counseling #socialwork #psychotherapy @psychotherapist @psychotherapists @psychology @socialpsych @socialwork @psychiatry #mentalhealth #psychiatry #healthcare #depression #psychotherapist #Polarization #SocialNetworks #Homophily #SocialBalance #EchoChambers #PhaseTransition #CognitiveDissonance #RadicalInfluencers #ConnectivityThreshold #ComputationalModel
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Typical trick: Using sociological/generational crap rethoric to come up with a lame excuse for justifying the effects of capitalism in social media AKA enshittification:
“Yesterday a16z published an article in which NYU Professor of Design, AI and Media Theory Ruby Thelot argued that “enshittification,” or the concept that technology platforms get worse after they lock in users, isn’t real. In reality, Thelot says, people use social media more than ever and report that they are satisfied with it.
Thelot argues that, enshittification, a term coined by Cory Doctrow which has become one of the stickiest ideas of our era to explain the current state of technology and capitalism, is a misdiagnosis of what he describes as “platform narcissism.” The idea is that people, namely older people like Doctrow and western geratric millennials who used to get a lot of value out of Facebook, selfishly think platforms should continue to cater to their needs even though they aged out of them and should be focused on raising their kids. The platforms are actually popular and well liked, but by younger people who are using Instagram and deriving value from it in a way older people can’t understand, or by people in other countries and contexts than their own. Additionally, Thelot argues, the theory of enshittification allows users who should log off an excuse to stay on platforms that it is fashionable to hate. They spend time there, but say they hate it and can’t leave because they are trapped.”
https://www.404media.co/a16z-says-you-actually-love-social-media-enshittification-isnt-real/
#SocialMedia #SocialNetworks #BigTech #Enshittification #Capitalism
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EFF to Governor Newsom: Veto California’s AB 1709
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2026/08/eff-gov-newsom-veto-californias-ab-1709
#AgeVerificationandAgeGating:ResourceHub #SocialNetworks
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"Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results. This saying is attributed to the famous socialist (and theoretical physicist) Albert Einstein but actually traces back to novelist Rita Mae Brown. I have been thinking about this saying a lot lately. The reason is W Social, which is Europe’s newest self-proclaimed attempt at building a competitor to the dominating US- and China-based social media platforms. In many ways, W Social is a poster child for the push of European companies towards digital sovereignty. And in many ways it demonstrates what is so problematic about digital sovereignty. Aline and I have already written about how digital sovereignty is a breeding ground for nationalism and how the idea of “European alternatives” is reproducing the flawed idea of “good capitalism“: The mistaken idea that European companies are immune to the very dynamics that made Big Tech into what it is. W Social is nothing new regarding both points but it illustrates them so vividly that a closer look is warranted even after the attention to W Social has – for now – mostly dried up."
#SocialMedia #EU #DigitalSovereignty #WSocial #SocialNetworks
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Baltimore Fishbowl: Dan Rodricks: Launching from Baltimore, an app connecting musicians by the score. “Imagine that you’re a musician — cellist, pianist, lead guitar in a rock band, Gospel singer, sax player in a jazz ensemble — and you’re practicing some new piece, or even an old one you never quite mastered. Imagine further that you’re stuck somewhere in the sheet music, that […]
https://rbfirehose.com/2026/08/28/dan-rodricks-launching-from-baltimore-an-app-connecting-musicians-by-the-score-baltimore-fishbowl/ -
Ars Technica: New Twitter launches, says Musk’s X gave up the name. “Operation Bluebird, the Virginia-based startup trying to revive the allegedly abandoned ‘Twitter’ name and logo, announced Monday that it has launched its new social media network: Twitter.now.”
https://rbfirehose.com/2026/08/28/ars-technica-new-twitter-launches-says-musks-x-gave-up-the-name/ -
TechCrunch: Bluesky adds an ‘algorithmic opt-out’ feature for those who don’t want to go viral. “After adding support for longer videos just yesterday, open social network Bluesky on Thursday introduced a new algorithmic opt-out feature that allows users to stop their posts from appearing in the app’s main Discover feed. That algorithmic feed can currently surface any post on […]
https://rbfirehose.com/2026/08/28/techcrunch-bluesky-adds-an-algorithmic-opt-out-feature-for-those-who-dont-want-to-go-viral/ -
Turns out TikTok is fun, huh? I've had the app on my phone all this time but I almost never opened it.
#sofiaflorina #ソフィアフロリナ #tiktok #sns #socialmedia #socialnetwork #socialnetworks #socialnetworking #socialnetworkingsite #socialnetworkingsites #socialnetworkingservice #socialnetworkingservices #fun #video #videos #videosharing
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TechCrunch: Bluesky now lets you upload 10-minute long videos. “Social network Bluesky said on Tuesday that it is now increasing video limits on the platform to 10 minutes. Previously, the platform allowed three-minute videos, a limit that it raised last year. This makes it more competitive with other text-based platforms that by default allow for shorter video uploads.”
https://rbfirehose.com/2026/08/27/techcrunch-bluesky-now-lets-you-upload-10-minute-long-videos/ -
6 more projects to reach 200 projects on https://noailist.org/ - the list of projects that have decided not to use AI
Reply here to add your project, or use the form on https://noailist.org/add-your-project/ - all projects welcome.
#noai #antiai #technology #tech #nonprofit #hardware #games #gamedev #development #science #socialnetworks #ecom #shops
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change of Mastodon instance
Since toot.community is shutting down in the next couple of months, I have moved my presence over the Mastodon network asking hospitality to my friends over the masto.cazzo.lol instance, a privately managed one. So from today 27 august 2026 I will be reachable over https://masto.cazzo.lol/@koolinus The old account will be deleted in a few days. Thank you for your attention!https://nicolalosito.it/2026/08/27/change-of-mastodon-instance/
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Компанія #Meta запропонувала добровільно сплатити штраф у 18 мільярдів доларів та впровадити заходи для кращого захисту дітей і підлітків від шкідливого впливу своїх продуктів - #Фейсбук та #Інстаграм.
На такий крок їх навів перебіг суду за позовом 29 штатів #США, в якому були надані докази навмисного підсаджування неповнолітніх на нескінченне споживання їхнього контенту, та велика імовірність ще гіршого вердикту суду.
#MetaTrial #socialnetworks #childsafety -
Anatomy of Deception II: The Factory of Truth
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Addiction aux réseaux sociaux : Meta va payer plus de 16 milliards de dollars pour mettre fin au procès et va limiter l’utilisation des mineurs aux USA - RTBF - Info ([email protected] (Belga))
En Europe on fait quoi déjà ? Ah oui on veut interdire aux utilisateurs l’accès et les fliquer.
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Sometimes some people here need to be reminded that Social Networks are only a snapshot of reality not reality itself.
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Tubefilter: The founders of Kick are in the Club as their new platform comes out of beta. “After co-founding the virtual casino Stake.com in 2017, Australian entrepreneurs Bijan Tehrani and Ed Craven set their sights on live streaming with the launch of Kick. Now, Tehrani and Craven are diving deeper into the creator world by announcing the official launch of their new platform: Club. Club, […]
https://rbfirehose.com/2026/08/22/tubefilter-the-founders-of-kick-are-in-the-club-as-their-new-platform-comes-out-of-beta/ -
Lifehacker: Social Media Platforms Are Training Their AI Models on Your Content, but You Can Stop Them (Sometimes). “Even if you find out how your data’s being used, many sites simply don’t offer you the ability to opt out. And of all the ones I looked at, not a single one that trains AI offers an opt-in model. Put simply, if you logged on today, tech companies took that as your consent to […]
https://rbfirehose.com/2026/08/22/lifehacker-social-media-platforms-are-training-their-ai-models-on-your-content-but-you-can-stop-them-sometimes/ -
TechCrunch: Bluesky says its recent outage was caused by another DDoS attack. “Social networking site Bluesky says its recent day-long disruption was caused by a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack that flooded the site with junk traffic. The social network confirmed the incident in a post on Monday, confirming the attack had taken place over the previous 24 hours.”
https://rbfirehose.com/2026/08/19/techcrunch-bluesky-says-its-recent-outage-was-caused-by-another-ddos-attack/ -
Engadget: Reddit is experimenting with video and audio versions of posts . “Reddit is known for not really changing much about its core features. It even maintains (for now) a 21-year-old version of its site for longtime users who want everything to always look the same. But now the company is testing whether people want to experience posts and comments without having to read walls of text.”
https://rbfirehose.com/2026/08/18/engadget-reddit-is-experimenting-with-video-and-audio-versions-of-posts/ -
Procès de Meta : les réseaux sociaux accusés de rendre les jeunes accros - France 24 - Infos, news
Un coup de fil de l'agent orange pour annuler ce carton rouge ? Après tout Zuck lui a bien léché les bottes et financé.
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NiemanLab: Can public media build its own social network? Chicago Public Media teams up with New_ Public to try. “Chicago Public Media is already the parent nonprofit of two existing news sites, WBEZ and, since 2022, the Chicago Sun-Times. For chicago.com, though, the news org is teaming up with New_ Public, a nonprofit working to reimagine online public spaces, to launch a network of online […]
https://rbfirehose.com/2026/08/14/niemanlab-can-public-media-build-its-own-social-network-chicago-public-media-teams-up-with-new_-public-to-try/ -
TechCrunch: Bluesky’s active user base is shrinking as its focus expands beyond the app. “According to data from digital intelligence provider Similarweb, Bluesky’s mobile app had 10.4 million monthly active users worldwide in June 2026, down 27.2% year-over-year. In addition, mobile daily active users continued to decline, falling 25.6% year-over-year in July to around 3 million.”
https://rbfirehose.com/2026/08/12/techcrunch-blueskys-active-user-base-is-shrinking-as-its-focus-expands-beyond-the-app/ -
LinkedIn CringeBot 3000, generating AI slop of the best quality
Since the volume of slop-in-general is of epidemic proportions on the platform, it makes perfect sense an AI agent write actual AI slop for consumption there.https://disassociated.com/linkedin-cringebot-3000-ai-slop-best-quality/
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CNBC: Reddit shares sink 7% on ‘choppy’ search referrals even as results blow past estimates. “Reddit reported second-quarter earnings on Thursday that beat on the top and the bottom lines, and the company issued guidance that sailed past expectations. But the company’s shares sank after it revealed in an investor letter that ‘Search referrals were choppy,’ underscoring investor concerns […]
https://rbfirehose.com/2026/07/30/cnbc-reddit-shares-sink-7-on-choppy-search-referrals-even-as-results-blow-past-estimates/ -
ZDNet: Why we’re all posting less on social media these days. “New research from Incogni suggests Americans are quietly pulling back from social media, especially compared to just a few years ago. They’re not necessarily deleting every account, but they are sharing less, posting to smaller audiences, removing stressful apps, and becoming more mindful about mental health and the effects of […]
https://rbfirehose.com/2026/07/10/zdnet-why-were-all-posting-less-on-social-media-these-days/ -
Variety: Trump Media, Parent of Truth Social, Reports Q1 Sales of $871,000 and $405.9 Million Net Loss. “For the first quarter, TMTG generated net sales of $871,200, up 6% year over year. The company reported a $405.9 million net loss and a $387.8 million adjusted EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization) loss for the first quarter of 2026.”
https://rbfirehose.com/2026/05/10/variety-trump-media-parent-of-truth-social-reports-q1-sales-of-871000-and-405-9-million-net-loss/ -
CNBC: Reddit reports 69% jump in revenue, topping analyst estimates. “Reddit reported better-than-expected profit and revenue in its first-quarter earnings report on Thursday, and also issued an optimistic forecast. The stock jumped over 9% in extended trading.”
https://rbfirehose.com/2026/05/01/cnbc-reddit-reports-69-jump-in-revenue-topping-analyst-estimates/ -
PC Mag: Mastodon Plans End-to-End Encryption for Private Messages. “Decentralized social media platform Mastodon plans on adopting its own end-to-end encryption (E2EE) for private messages. Mastodon announced the upcoming feature in a blog post about receiving €614,000 ($724,000) from the Sovereign Tech Fund, an effort backed by the German government to support open-source software.”
https://rbfirehose.com/2026/04/17/pc-mag-mastodon-plans-end-to-end-encryption-for-private-messages/ -
Gen Z Is Always On TikTok, But They Don't Like It Anymore
#genz #alwayson #tiktok #tiktokads #tiktokmarketing #marketing #tech #technews #techads #tiktokdata #socialmedia #socialnetworks
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Gen Z Is Always On TikTok, But They Don't Like It Anymore
#genz #alwayson #tiktok #tiktokads #tiktokmarketing #marketing #tech #technews #techads #tiktokdata #socialmedia #socialnetworks
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Gen Z Is Always On TikTok, But They Don't Like It Anymore
#genz #alwayson #tiktok #tiktokads #tiktokmarketing #marketing #tech #technews #techads #tiktokdata #socialmedia #socialnetworks
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Gen Z Is Always On TikTok, But They Don't Like It Anymore
#genz #alwayson #tiktok #tiktokads #tiktokmarketing #marketing #tech #technews #techads #tiktokdata #socialmedia #socialnetworks
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Gen Z Is Always On TikTok, But They Don't Like It Anymore
#genz #alwayson #tiktok #tiktokads #tiktokmarketing #marketing #tech #technews #techads #tiktokdata #socialmedia #socialnetworks
