title: "The case for dopamine dispensers" subtitles: "Likes and clicks and green badges and comments and analytics and ____ can be helpful, actually" author: ["Amolith"] cover: ./cover.png published: 2023-02-26T23:09:00-05:00 categories: ["Technology"] tags: ["TODO"] draft: true toc: false
Dopamine dispensers --- likes on social media platforms, stars on GitHub, clicks on your website, etc. --- are inherently damaging and lead only to addiction ... is what I used to say. Lately, I've begun thinking otherwise. They absolutely are dangerous and can promote harmful behaviour, but in moderation, I believe that they can be quite helpful.
There are a few examples I often see vilified and I'll address each one:
- Social media "likes" (fediverse favourites, Reddit upvotes, etc.)
- GitHub stars
- Website views
Software development
- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31963467
- https://ntietz.com/blog/moving-off-github/
- https://lists.sr.ht/~sircmpwn/sr.ht-discuss/%3CF98B7AC8-6EAF-4884-9C3B-DA3711BE7085%40traduction-libre.org%3E#%3CCBMEJKAUK9CL.34S27FE2XA4G0@taiga%3E
- https://www.coss.community/cossc/ocs-2020-breakout-drew-devault-4407
- https://drewdevault.com/2019/05/24/What-is-a-fork.html
Website traffic
Social media
This is perhaps the more dangerous