Location-Share FOMO and Fake Sign Language

“narcissism of adolescence"

2023 MTV Movie & TV Awards up 23% in viewers despite writers’ strike; Abel Tesfaye wants to kill the Weeknd; even Joe Biden can't get a Bluesky invite; and the internet (or at least one specific corner of it) is really losing its mind over the Taylor Swift-Matty Healy dating rumors.

WHY TEENS SAY LOCATION SHARING IS THE GREATEST—AND THE WORST, wsj
Location sharing has become such a fixture that many teens say they’d be overlooked socially if they didn’t use it. But it also results in FOMO, because young people are seeing it play out in real-time when they’re excluded from things; other teens say location sharing makes them self-conscious about where they live and where they go. Location sharing is part of the “narcissism of adolescence,” says Devorah Heitner, a digital-culture researcher. “Everyone wants to feel they matter at that age,” she says.

FACEBOOK FIGHTS FOR RELEVANCE AS GEN Z TURNS AWAY: ‘I DON’T EVEN REMEMBER THE LAST TIME I LOGGED IN’, fortune
According to Tom Alison, the head of Facebook, “We used to have a team at Facebook that was focused on younger cohorts […] About two years ago we said no — our entire product line needs to change and evolve and adapt to the needs of the young adults.” AI is predictably central to Meta’s plan for luring younger users (back?) onto the platform.

THIS LOOMING RECESSION ISN'T STOPPING US FROM SHOPPING, fashionista
Recession be damned — personal spending on goods and services rose 2.8% and 1.3%, respectively, and Americans between the ages of 19 and 35 (of whom there are roughly 70 million) are particularly big spenders; a recent survey conducted by Intuit found that nearly three in four Gen Zers "would rather have a better quality of life than extra money in the bank." 

THE WOMEN WHO ARE GIVING DATING APPS THE SUMMER OFF, nyt
Feels like yesterday we were reading about Hot Vax Summer…my how things have changed.

Atoosa Moinzadeh is also on that wave. Ms. Moinzadeh, a 30-year-old Brooklyn resident, has been on dating apps for almost 10 years, after first downloading Tinder in 2014. She’s “tried all the apps,” including Bumble, OKCupid — even Coffee Meets Bagel for a “really brief period.” Tinder and Hinge were the two she used most recently, but she deleted them both in March after her frustrations began to mount.

FAKE SIGN LANGUAGE IS SPREADING ON TIKTOK. DEAF PEOPLE ARE WORRIED., wapo
Sign language set to music has become trendy on TikTok, particularly among hearing creators. More than 850,000 people follow Anthony Eagle Jr. on TikTok to see his sign language renditions of songs. But “there’s just one problem — the sign language is sometimes wrong.”

AMAZON'S TIKTOK-LIKE INSPIRE SHOPPING FEED IS NOW AVAILABLE TO ALL CUSTOMERS IN THE US, techcrunch
Oh good, just what we need: Another highly-addictive, optimized-for-buying TikTok feed — except this one’s owned by Amazon!

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