We Need to Rethink Social Media Before It's Too Late. We've Accepted a Faustian Bargain
In this Guardian opinion piece, published as The Social Dilemma reached Netflix audiences, Jeff Orlowski writes in his own voice that social platforms operate on a surveillance-based, advertising-funded model he argues rewards divisive, algorithmically amplified content over shared, verifiable information. He links rising political polarization and what he calls a breakdown of shared reality to design choices optimized for engagement rather than wellbeing, and separately notes that youth anxiety and depression have climbed over the same period platform use has grown — framed as an association rather than a demonstrated single cause. Orlowski calls for structural change to the advertising business model itself, not just individual willpower or awareness campaigns. TechKids Foundation cites this piece as Orlowski's own, unmediated policy argument, distinct from interviews and profiles written about him.
Orlowski, Jeff. "We Need to Rethink Social Media Before It's Too Late. We've Accepted a Faustian Bargain." The Guardian, Sept. 27, 2020.