Typically, I start off my Secret Subject Swaps with the post itself. This time, I am starting it off with the prompt so you can understand what I'm talking about from the start.
My prompt this month is "Recently an app called NewNew was created that allow users to pay for shares of a human life. Essentially users can pay to vote on decisions that other users make and how those users will spend their time. Responses have been both that this is a new way for content creators to profit online by choosing to share their lives and that this is a pathway for monetizing abuse, bullying, and stalking. How do you see it? Do you feel technologies are moving in positive or negative directions?" It was submitted by the INSANELY talented Jenniy from Climaxed.
When I got this prompt, I didn't response to Karen for a couple of days because I thought maybe I'd wronged her in someway because this prompt scared me. I kept looking at it thinking "what the hell am I going to do with this?! This is too smart for me!"
Then I relaxed and researched it and feel confident in my response now.
So this app NewNew. I looked it up, read about it a little bit, considered downloading it but didn't. Mostly because I didn't want another app hanging around on my phone. But from my research, I was able to form an opinion.
I can see this app having its good about it. For example, if I were to use it, I'd have people voting on what I eat, if I should go for a walk, things like that with the explicit purpose of helping me battle my weight loss. See, I was recently diagnosed as a type 2 diabetic and it is because of my weight, so anything to help, right? I could see something like this maybe being beneficially because it would make me actually do something instead of watching movies or playing Sims 4 all day. Plus, I would make money on it, so....perfect, right?
But on the flipside, I would open myself up to having perfect strangers verbally abuse and cyberbully me and that isn't good for my depression or anxiety. I already feel like this happens on a daily basis anyway, which is why I've developed a minor case of agoraphobia. I mean, I COULD open myself up for this and at least make money off it, but I don't want dirty fundage like that. Money at the expense of my mental well-being is not money worth having.
There is a creator on TikTok named Marissa (@sheismarissamatthews). Her content can be absolutely hilarious and she is all about body positivity. However, on the daily, she is getting trolled by commenters telling her she needs to lose weight. This is to the point where she has been in absolute tears and on the brink of taking her life. She's very candid about this and yet people STILL are negative toward it. It's pathetic.
An app like NewNew would give people the impression that she has given them carte blanche over her life and open her up to even worse treatment.
Everything in life has its good and its bad. Like cake...it tastes good but isn't healthy. Good/bad. I think the same can be said about this app. If you use it for positive, you can probably get positive out of it. But I think we are almost letting social media apps control our lives as it is. I feel like technology is a needed evil that has its good and its bad. I can't say if it is moving in a positive or negative direction definitively because for every crap app out there, there are 5 good apps and vice versa.
So, I think with NewNew, the newness will wear off and it will become just another app people use on occasion. I think it can be a good thing, but it would need to be closely monitored, closer than Facebook is monitored. And I hope that, if someone IS using it and they ARE being abused (against their will, because, let's face it, there some freaky deaky's out there that like that kinda thing), bullied and stalked, they would step away, delete the account and report to the proper authorities.
With everything on social media, ALWAYS use caution and be careful.
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