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Culture War Roundup for the week of July 22, 2024

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I think it was essentially a three step process for this and all other hobbies:

  • The original Internet culture was generally left-libertarian.
  • Internet forums ate the hobby: because they were such an efficient way to engage with other hobbyists, they outcompeted every alternative cultural center of the hobby.
  • The left-libertarian founders and their successors largely became woke leftist, bringing the forums along with them.

The second and third steps happened in parallel during the aughts and early teens.

Not just the fact that reddit and facebook ate most hobby forums?

I would add the centralization of internet forums into places like reddit under bullet point 2.

One of the downsides of unification, super-spreader mods and ideas can travel much farther than in a more fractured landscape.