You know what I like about smaller social media / indie spaces online? There are no bullshit ads. People can still make money but they aren't going on targeted ad rampages with unlimited cash flow. If, among all the shitposting and jokes, you see a link to something that costs money — something on an online store, a subscription, a link to a game on Steam, a new book, etc. it's almost always for independent artists and creators. Whether it's posted by them or by someone who just genuinely liked the thing they made.
Mega corporations wish they had that kind of organic, word of mouth advertising. But instead they've created an entire industry based around learning more about us than we know about ourselves, all to manipulate us into buying stuff instead of just making cool shit, releasing it out into the wild and letting people decide for themselves if it's what they want.
I don't mind seeing an "ad" for something I like. Not something a bucket of microchips in a data center 1000 miles away predicted I might like based on my browsing history or something I bought on Amazon one time — something that wasn't shown to me based on my activity somewhere else. My purchase history at a store that sells my data, something I searched, something TikTok heard me say when my phone was on the other side of the room charging...
Lately I'm trying to vote with my wallet in a positive way rather than doing it only through boycotting terrible companies that make my skin crawl. That's the other half of the equation, right? There's an incomprehensible amount of cool art you can find in smaller communities. Indie games that play like something you'd find on the Super Nintendo if it was a current-gen console. Books written and published by someone who never went on a nationwide press tour backed by a major publisher. Zines. Yes, zines are still a thing, and they're cool as shit. Independent journalism that doesn't go through the filter of some eccentric billionaire who owns the newspaper.
Life doesn't have to be so goddamn creepy. Imagine a world without marketing directors going on cocaine-fueled ChatGPT sessions in the presidential suite of some upscale hotel in The City, scheming on ways to manipulate the masses into buying more shit that's just going to break or be out of style in a couple months.
There's nothing you can do about billboards or massive LCD screens plastered on every tall building downtown, but you can definitely curate a lot of what you're being shown online through hanging out in smaller, more human-centric communities.