Chapter 3

Bo Burnham expansively discussed networked communications and its impacts on society and himself during the COVID-19 lockdowns. Regarding networked communications, there are three different categories that he discusses: internet interactions, social media, and internet addiction. 

For internet interactions, Burnham mainly discusses FaceTime and texting. FaceTime is depicted through Bo Burnham FaceTiming his mom. The longer he was on a FaceTime with his mom, the more annoyed and agitated he got at her [1]. Even though technology makes you able to talk to others and even see others, Burnham still felt alone and disconnected from his mother. Under further analysis, I found that men who are lonely are three times more likely to committing suicide than men who cohabitate [2]. This connects with how Burnham, who lives alone during a lockdown, often has suicidal thoughts. With texting, Burnham discusses a lifeless exchange of value and sexting, finding that he still feels lonely after texting people. 

In "Inside", Burnham performs a song called "White Women's Instagram" [3]. This song depicts Burnham as a white woman on Instagram,  showing how people are free to post whatever they want on social media. This connects to misinformation easily being spread and the internet having traumatizing photos that can scar people. Burnham mentions how people can weaponize the internet to convince others to believe false claims, which can be seen by the amount of misinformation regarding social events. In a study of social media posts, it was found that 84 social media posts were spreading misinformation, while only 78 posts had correct information [4], meaning that more than half of the studied posts are attempting to spread misinformation. 

Internet addiction is the topic that Burnham discussed the most. Burnham's song "Welcome to the Internet" [5] can be connected to internet addiction:

A little bit of everything all of the time

This quote is saying how prevalent the internet is and how it is always accessible. By always being accessible, people are more prone to becoming addicted to the internet [6]. It was found that the accessibility of Twitter helped contribute to internet addiction for both women and men with p-scores of 0.045 and 0.002 respectively [6].  Burnham also discusses how the internet is created to keep people entertained and never bored [7]. Then goes on to say how this consistent access to the internet from a young age will result in dissociative mental disorders [7]. With further research into that topic, it was found that there is a positive correlation between using the internet for more than five hours a day and dissociative disorders, with a p-value < 1 [8]. "Inside" touches on a lot of topics relating to networked communications that have had a lot of impacts on our society. 

Notes

Spam:

Have too much content on the internet.

Internet Interactions:

Facetime with Mom (annoyances with facetiming with people. "Waste time facetiming with my mom"

Being alone for a long time can bring depressive and suicidal thoughts. Internet can prevent people from having physical connections

Streaming

All human interactions should be contained in a "safe space" which is the digital space

One should be scared of the outside world 

Cryptocurrencies:

Not mentioned in the movie

Text Messaging:

lifeless exchange of value: a cheapening of human existence

Sexting: ruins confidence, at the end day of alone

Political Impact of Social Media and Online Advertising:

what companies stand for. Companies should advertise themselves by how they help people when you buy from them. 

White women's Instagram: incorrect data

Censorship:

Freedom of Expression:

Can do anything on the internet and find anything as well. Gruesome stuff and nasty stuff

Children and Inappropriate Content:

Phones are poisoning the minds of children. They can develop a dissociative mental disorder when they are in their 20s

Grooming

Kids using an iPad at age 2

Breaking Trust:

Internet Addiction:

Phones are poisoning the minds of children. They can develop a dissociative mental disorder when they are in their 20s

"Boredom is a crime on the internet"

"Apathy is a tragedy"

Kids using an iPad at age 2

Always having access to everything all of the time

"A little bit of everything all of the time"

Sources

[1] "Inside" by Bo Burnham (11:10)

[2] Shaw R. et al., Living alone, loneliness and lack of emotional support as predictors of suicide and self-harm: A nine-year follow up of the UK Biobank cohort, (National Library of Medicine, Jan. 15th 2021), https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7758739/ (09/22/2024)

[3] "Inside" by Bo Burnham (20:28)

[4] Luo H, Cai M. Cui Y.,  Spread of Misinformation in Social Networks: Analysis Based on Weibo Tweets, (Wiley, Dec. 16th 2021), https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1155/2021/7999760 (09/22/2024)

[5] "Inside" by Bo Burnham (56:40)

[6] Kawabe K. et al., Association between Internet Addiction and Application Usage among Junior High School Students: A Field Survey, (National Library of Medicine, May 1st 2021), https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8124386/ (09/22/2024)

[7] "Inside" by Bo Burnham (1:00:00)

[8] Craparo G., Internet addiction, dissociation, and alexithymia, (ScienceDirect, 2011),

 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1877042811020301 (09/22/2024)