Social Media Is Ruining Developers!

When social media first came out, the  main goal was “connecting people. ” We were following people we already knew,  and sharing simple updates with them. There were ads, but they were basic. The main goal was growth and user adoption. Only a small number of people were  actually making money on social media. If you wanted to earn money by sharing content,  the best option was to start a YouTube channel. But as platforms scaled, we started hearing  something we're all quite familiar with right now: "The Algorithm. ” The main goal started shifting toward holding  the user's attention for as long as possible. They realized that if they showed  everything chronologically,   people would lose interest and leave. So they began deciding what you  should see to keep you engaged. Suddenly, we cared less about  what our friends were up to,   and we started spending more time on  strangers' posts and different communities. We interacted more, we commented  more, and we shared more. And this caused a lot of people to  start building their own audiences,   and businesses to move onto social media. So these platforms started earning more. But it wasn't enough. They needed  to maximize profit per user. Users were no longer just participants. Whatever you do on the internet, how many  milliseconds you spend on a single post,   even predictions of where your eyes land on a  picture, all of it is stored by these platforms. And even knowing all of this, I  still get a strange feeling when   I open Facebook after weeks away and see  how uncomfortably personal the ads are. There have been many court cases around  how these platforms process user data,   but each time, they've found a way around it. But targeted ads are just the tip of the iceberg.

The most dangerous part is human manipulation. They can shift how people think, influence  elections, and spread misinformation at scale. And unfortunately, it's now incredibly  hard to tell what's real and what isn't. This is where it starts  affecting developers the most. In the previous video, I talked about  how developers are being influenced   by AI-related fear, and how programming has  become much more frustrating in a short time. And this will likely continue, as long as  we keep believing everything we see online. Because right now, developers are  surprisingly easy to manipulate,   even though they're supposed to be among  the most logical-thinking people out there. I don’t blame them because  it's their future on the line. It's hard to stay rational when  people are constantly pushing the   idea that you won't be needed  in the tech industry anymore. But it's not just about AI. We can just as easily be manipulated about  the tech stacks and tools we use every day. Because nobody seems to care about  proven, reliable technologies anymore. Instead, people promote the  newest, most hyped tools. Because that's what gets engagement. But the real problem is how quickly the  number of these profiles and posts is growing. We’re surrounded by opinions online because  that’s exactly what platforms reward.

Around 2020, platforms started  paying creators directly. Through engagement-based rewards, ad  revenue sharing, and subscriptions. But this wasn’t about improving content  quality or sharing meaningful information. It was about maximizing engagement and time spent. So more and more people jumped on the  hype train and became content creators. I won't even get into the general  cringefest on social media,   but let's talk about how this  specifically affected developers. The most used platforms among  developers are X and LinkedIn. Of course, YouTube is still the most popular,   but it's been running the same  monetization model for over two decades. And it’s not as easy to get attention  there as it is to write a viral post on X. After Twitter’s acquisition, the platform changed  significantly, becoming more controversial. Because controversy drives engagement. That's why useful content often  gets ignored, while meaningless   arguments, never-ending debates, and  low-effort posts take over the feed. And after the introduction of revenue sharing,   even more people started  creating this kind of content. If you want to get paid, it’s simple. Start a heated discussion, or post about  how some new AI tool will change everything,   and tell people they’ll fall behind  if they don’t use it right now. These posts play on developers’ fears,   offering hope that they’ll stay relevant if  they follow along, or fall behind if they don’t. And now there’s a growing trend  of “make money with AI” content,

essentially teaching people to  generate AI content and sell it   to others. Which is just a polished way  of saying: here's how to scam people. And then there's the article writing trend. If you spend any time on X,  you've probably seen this article. It blew up so fast that people started  mass-producing articles that all looked identical. Same structure, same cover image style. They  don't even bother to change the template. Now your feed is flooded with self-improvement and   productivity articles and videos  written entirely by ChatGPT. Medium used to be one of my favorite websites.   I've read hundreds of great articles on there. Now it's almost unreadable. You have to dig through pages of AI slop just to  find one article a real person actually wrote. Because they pay creators by engagement. Everything on the internet is getting worse. Bots are creating posts and comments. People who've never read a  book are writing articles. People who have learned one automation  tool are calling themselves AI experts. And people without real development  experience are giving programming advice.

A couple of years ago, when you  wanted advice from senior developers,   or when you asked them a question, you'd almost  always get the same annoying answer: "It depends! ” It depends on what you're building. It depends   on what you want to achieve. It  depends on your long-term plan. Nobody would casually say,  "This sucks, don't use it. ” But now, everyone is a “master,” and  everyone feels the need to express   strong opinions, even without real experience. Because if you buy a blue verification  badge, you're suddenly an important person.

The way many of these people make money  isn’t by building useful products. It's by getting attention. By showing how they use the latest tools. Recently, I came across a YouTube channel where  a guy shows how burgers are made at McDonald's. And it gets millions of views. And now his main job isn't  working at a burger place anymore. It's content creation. If people get tired of watching  burgers, he'll probably switch   to another restaurant and  start making different food. That's exactly how you should think  about a lot of these creators. Their only goal is to ride the  hype and create content. That's it. And if you follow their advice, you'll  probably be pretty disappointed when your   vibe-coded AI habit tracker or AI-generated  YouTube channel makes exactly zero dollars at   the end of the year while you're  still paying off your new Mac Mini.

First, take a serious look at  how you're using social media,   and stop chasing every single hype cycle. I know. You don't want to miss  anything. Everything is moving fast,   and it feels impossible to look away. So here is my solution. Pick a schedule. Once a week, once  a month, whatever works for you. On that day, you can go  through everything at once. New tools, new AI models, discussions, videos. And actually try the things  that seem worth trying. See for yourself if anything is  genuinely worth going deeper on. That way, you won't waste  your time on technologies   that were hyped one week and disappeared the next. And trust me, you won't miss anything important by   not checking what Claude Opus 4. 7 can do  differently from 4. 6 the moment it drops. More importantly, you’ll focus on what  you’re actually building instead of   feeling like you need to keep up  with everything on social media. Another important thing is realizing that  we’re living in an era of misinformation. Anyone can post about any  topic and sound like an expert. So be selective. Be skeptical. Choose carefully who actually earns your trust. And make them earn it through  demonstrated experience. And finally, you need to  understand that nobody shares   their real million-dollar insights for free. Most of the time, they’re either selling you hope  or using your attention to promote something. If you follow these principles, you’ll  start to realize how much of this noise was   meaningless and how much it was actually  draining your focus and mental energy. And hopefully, you’ll feel a lot  lighter and more focused, as I do. As you might know, I’m working on a JavaScript  core knowledge series on my website. If you write code but aren’t fully  confident about best practices,   you can visit lama. dev or click  the link in the description.

If you want to see more videos like this,  please like the video and leave a comment. And I’ll see you in the next one.