00:00:00.000as we roll on in 2026 the good the bad and the ugly social media is being highlighted around
00:00:11.040the world and it could be good at times but it could be very very ugly as well to talk more
00:00:15.820about it thrilled to be joined by one of our newest members here at tpl media shalisa backer
00:00:20.520shalisa how are you hey good how are you jim good good let's let's get before we get into some of
00:00:25.860stuff that's going on when exactly did social media take a hold on society the way it is right
00:00:32.020now when did that start that's a really good question you know what i think i think covid
00:00:37.300had a lot to do with it people were bored obviously that's when tick tock really blew up as well
00:00:42.740and it has just had a hold on everybody and it doesn't matter how old you are ever since in some
00:00:48.660way shape or form social media has some sort of hold on you you know i thought tick tock was
00:00:53.140strictly uh you know pre-teens teens college kids but i i have a one of my wife's cousins a dairy
00:01:00.740farmer in his 50s who watched tick tock videos of other dairy farmers milking and i like you do
00:01:07.540and what is it about the tick tock algorithm that made it what it is i i don't know what it is i
00:01:14.580don't know how they know what's going on inside my head but somehow somehow it just always knows
00:01:19.380knows what you're going through and somehow it ends up on your algorithm like that needs to be
00:01:23.180studied how they know exactly what's going on in everybody's life if they know exactly what content
00:01:27.720to feed you and also i get nervous to like look things up on tiktok sometimes because i'm like
00:01:32.880well now my whole feed is going to be this so when did it go from uh sharing information about where
00:01:39.340you're going to eat from dinner and birthday messages and letting people know i saw a good
00:01:44.380movie to turning to toxic where you say something a and it goes down whether it's people who are
00:01:52.400just trolls or bot farms and it spirals out of control yeah and i think that also makes us think
00:01:58.700like are people really that bored that they have like nothing to do then just troll online and leave
00:02:05.140stupid comments for lack of a better term stupid comments and it's like aren't we tired of it and i
00:02:11.860i really wish i could tell you when that shift happened but i think it happened so gradually
00:02:17.380and now looking back on it we're like what happened how did we get here so a little social
00:02:22.900experiment i posted something on my facebook that went on my threads i didn't mention trump
00:02:28.420i didn't mention america i didn't mention player names i didn't mention canada or the us i just
00:02:33.860said to paraphrase i could look it up but when i watch hockey i don't think politics i just watched
00:02:39.780the hockey game i just want to watch it i did see that and i liked it so that's fun to thousands of
00:02:45.940comments from people who thought i was commenting on trump and america and one individual said well
00:02:53.380i guess i know who you voted for so i put a response saying well i voted ndp i'm canadian
00:02:59.620and they said why are you commenting on american subject matter and i didn't and this is what like
00:03:05.220i was like i was no names no country it was as generic as possible and it went crazy and i was
00:03:14.260fascinated to see how one comment fed off the other and they started to fight with each other
00:03:19.940it really it really is fascinating and sometimes you're just wondering like how how that it just
00:03:26.740it doesn't make sense to me sometimes and this is like somebody who's chronically online i'm
00:03:30.340on social media all the time more than i'd like to admit but it it just it gets really really scary
00:03:36.980and it's it's crazy how some content that you think is harmless like just like that one post
00:03:42.100on threads or whatever the case is how it just completely blows up and something that's actually
00:03:46.580important like important subject matter to what's going on in the world it gets like no hits and no
00:03:52.660views right so what how do you know if you're on social media that it's a bot commenting on what
00:03:58.980you did and if it's just some rando who just feels like spewing hate well i think usually if you look
00:04:04.980at their profiles usually their their username is also a good tell you know you'll see like a random
00:04:10.340numbers or it'll say like user 59977 something like that no profile picture yes uh and if you
00:04:16.740look at their actual feed they probably have no posts or just like generic posts that are maybe
00:04:22.340ai created and things like that and then you'll see you know real people most likely will have
00:04:26.900a photo of themselves as their as their profile picture you look at their feed and see what
00:04:30.420they're posting or what they're reposting and it's sometimes hard to tell because these bots
00:04:34.740and ai are getting very convincing these days so i i'm a believer in using different social
00:04:40.660media platforms for different topics you know facebook is more personal family um you know
00:04:47.060instagram i find my buddies and we're talking hockey and golf and dogs and like silly stuff
00:04:51.860like that am i right is it should you use different platforms for different things in your life i mean
00:04:57.460i do it too i do too i mean i barely use facebook anymore to tell you the truth if i didn't if i
00:05:03.060didn't need it for work i wouldn't use it i'll be honest and i feel like instagram is kind of
00:05:07.300becoming that too and i don't know if this is a generational thing but i used to i love instagram
00:05:11.620i used to love instagram that was my number one platform but now i'm finding oh is that right yeah
00:05:15.940Yeah. And, you know, back in the day when Instagram started, what, 10, 10, 15 years ago, it was like posting food photos.
00:05:23.600Right. You know, that was a big thing. Right. That was what Instagram was used for. And then it just it progressed into, I don't know.
00:05:31.060Now it just feels like it is flooded with things that are just untrue. A lot of fake news on the platform, a lot of AI generated content that is becoming so convincing, like people are believing it.
00:05:43.140And I also think this has to do a lot with Bill C-19 here in Canada because they have blocked all news sources on meta platforms.
00:05:53.380So Facebook, Instagram threads, you can't see any news.
00:05:57.080So any local news, any national news, even some radio stations have been blocked.
00:06:02.780So don't you think that's feeding into the fake news phenomenon that's going on?
00:06:07.320And people don't have any trusted content and trusted sources.
00:06:11.540Well, there was a big incident this week where Ben Mulroney on Global News posted what he thought was a video from the war in Iran.
00:06:20.480And it was a video from a like an actual video game.
00:06:23.600Yeah, it was a visual from a video game.
00:06:25.900And they have to obviously have a student apology.
00:06:27.660Yeah. And all of these deep fakes and AI photos of like celebrities in the hospital.
00:06:33.840And it's looking more and more convincing.
00:06:36.220and even like with the things that are going on in iran and all around the world really everything
00:06:41.100in the middle east it is so hard to find verified content you're scrolling seeing all of these
00:06:46.220videos and my first thought like as somebody who's on social media all the time it's like
00:06:50.460okay is this real or not if you were 12 shaliza could you have handled social media i i don't
00:06:57.260think so not with the way it is now and i always say this i'm so grateful for the generation that
00:07:02.140i grew up in we were kind of like the crash test dummies right for social media you know we started
00:07:07.180with the dial-up internet then we got into msn messenger and then we slowly progressed to
00:07:12.460facebook and beyond as you got older as we got older yeah as a as a teen as a preteen now there
00:07:19.020is so much content being thrown at them i don't know how to handle it i couldn't handle it i can't
00:07:25.340handle it as an adult and with a with an undeveloped nervous system with an undeveloped brain you're
00:07:30.620looking at all of these things and i was actually having a really interesting conversation with
00:07:34.060someone the other day they were talking about how her 12 year old daughter her algorithm is all like
00:07:41.500dieting and and um beauty things and at 12 and it's like how do they know this and for for boys
00:07:50.060for 12 year old boys it's a lot of violence it's a lot of video game violence and and shooting
00:07:55.980things and that kind of also makes me think of the tumblr ridge shooting in british columbia
00:08:02.460when you have a troubled teen who maybe had some identity yes uh she identified as a girl but she
00:08:08.140was born a male and that's fine trans right i'm here for the lgbtq plus community that's besides
00:08:14.220the point it's all of the things that they are exposed to on social media really really messes
00:08:18.700with your head and am i correct that uh ai chat gpt had flagged this individual's account yes but
00:08:25.580didn't tell the authorities nope so then what's the point of doing all that then what's the point
00:08:30.300of having access to that so i i had a conversation with someone recently and we talked about the
00:08:36.780social media restrictions in australia now to me australia is a very democratic progressive country
00:08:43.020but they had identified a problem with their youth and put in restrictions that you can't have social
00:08:48.300media if you're a certain age now i am pro freedom pro everyone do what you do but i am seeing
00:08:54.300evidence that it's having a real adverse effect on our youth and i'm okay saying if you're 14 or
00:09:00.460under in canada you can't be in social media i agree i completely agree and right now i think
00:09:05.900it's it's a tough spot for a lot of parents because a lot of them don't want to give in
00:09:10.060they don't want to give them the phone they don't want to do this but then they're seeing all their
00:09:13.340friends have it and everyone else is on social media so then you feel left out and then you
00:09:16.700feel isolated so then that's another mental health issue where you feel like you can't connect with
00:09:21.500your peers right so it's like where do we draw the line and there was a well it's actually quite
00:09:27.020a sad stat a story that came out in ontario the amount of young men seeking help for online
00:09:33.180gambling problems because of all the gambling apps on their phone as well it was staggering the
00:09:38.060amount of young men asking for help also can i just point this out actually as i'm doom scrolling
00:09:43.900on tick tock because i am guilty of doom scrolling i will tell you that but i am seeing a crazy
00:09:49.820amount of ads for sports betting apps and for uh gambling apps as well yes it's it's very strange
00:09:56.460like if i were to open tick tock right now i can guarantee you the first ad i will see is for like
00:10:00.220bet 365. am i allowed to say the names of them whoa we are now we are now but for bet 365 and
00:10:07.660like i don't even remember the names of them but i'm like why is this being pushed out to people
00:10:13.420so much well that i don't understand so i i know with my wife and i my partner and i when we'll
00:10:19.340look up hey we want to go to ikea get a shelf or we're looking at uh you know doing something
00:10:24.780all of a sudden all our feeds are populated with you know ads and stories like i've just grown to
00:10:30.780be accustomed to that they're listening but it is weird to me that in your um algorithm which
00:10:37.900is nothing to do with sports gambling or online betting you're getting ads for but that's what i
00:10:43.580don't understand my algorithm is very simple it's it's it's makeup it's true it's it's you know fun
00:10:50.220light-hearted things it's millennial nostalgia and then i just keep seeing all of these casino apps
00:10:55.500so if you're a 13 year old boy in canada who maybe is looking at basketball and video games
00:11:03.420and i don't know cats and you're getting gambling ads in the algorithm what's to stop them from
00:11:09.740starting to look into and getting sucked exactly and i mean you can put an age restriction on
00:11:14.380those things but there's a way around them right you know it's the same thing as you know doing
00:11:20.140under 18 things when but the kids have been doing that exactly for hundreds of years exactly there's
00:11:26.380always a way around it i mean i may or may not have had a fake id back in the day but that's
00:11:38.840What are the things where it is a good thing?
00:11:40.760Oh, there are absolutely so many pros.
00:11:42.400I mean, for businesses, for small businesses, there are so many ways for them to get their content out there.
00:11:46.920And, you know, bakeries, people who are running businesses out of their homes, a lot of people who do like lash extensions and beauty services and things like that.
00:16:17.220And if you are this billionaire, you are behind all of these platforms, you have the opportunity to use your voice, to use your influence, to actually make a difference.
00:16:26.040And I, like literally, and I'm going to keep coming back to this.
00:16:29.340If I were ever in a room with Mark Zuckerberg, the first thing I would do is ask him,
00:16:32.600what do you have against news on your platforms?