Socialode  News

A US judge has officially ruled that Meta, the company behind Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, did NOT violate antitrust laws  when it bought Instagram (2012) and WhatsApp (2014). And just like that, Meta avoided a potential breakup that could’ve rewired the entire social media world. So what does that actually mean? Let’s break it down on a potential Meta breakup of future social media. The TL;DR A judge said Meta doesn’t have a social media monopoly , partly because the l

If you’re a guy in your late teens, 20s, or early 30s, chances are you’ve seen the phrase “male loneliness epidemic”  floating around TikTok, YouTube, or Reddit. Maybe you’ve even felt some of it yourself, that weird mix of isolation, pressure, and “everyone else seems to be doing better than me.” You’re definitely not alone. Across the country, young men are opening up (often anonymously) about feeling disconnected, unseen, or shut out of conversations about mental health. A

Last spring, a Wharton professor, Shiri Melumad, gave 250 people a simple task: write advice to a friend on living a healthier lifestyle. Half of them used AI-generated summaries . The others used good old-fashioned Google Search . The difference? Massive. The AI group’s answers were painfully generic: “eat healthy,” “drink water,” “get sleep.”The search group, meanwhile, shared nuanced advice about physical, mental, and emotional wellness, actual insight, not copy-paste moti

Social media was supposed to keep us informed. Endless news. Global access. Instant updates. But somewhere along the way, the feed became the filter—deciding not just what we see, but what we believe. A new study from researchers at NYU and Stanford  shows that people are far more likely to click on sensational, low-quality news than credible journalism. The reason ? Algorithms reward engagement, not accuracy. When anger and shock drive clicks, the truth becomes optional. Th