March 1. 2352

It was supposed to be freedom.

Power to the people, say what you want, read what you want, create what you want. Be recognised for your talents. Be appreciated for who you are.

It was a lie, and everyone believed it.

When social media became the hip thing, everyone jumped on board. Everyone was too blinded by their shiny new toy to see the truth.
Of course it's easy for me to say all this, I have 300 years hindsight. Yet it worries me that this record I am writing, this log of histories evolution into what my society became, is pointless. I mean the corruption and control back then was no different than it was 5 months ago when the government was still in power. It has taken us 300 years to say no more and yet I have seen leaders and followers emerge already. I have seen the ones that couldn't survive without their comforts. I have seen the ones that became mindless savages and I have seen the ones that retained themselves.
There are still leaders and followers.
And looking back, it is clear what social media was - a machine for creating compliance and money.
Give me your name, your address, your age, and tell me what you like to do, say, watch, hear and with whom and I will sell that information to companies that will advertise their wares to you that we know you like, because you told us. In return, I will give you a platform that allows you to announce to the world whatever you want.
So we believed this was a fair trade. We could express outrage of world atrocities. Shame our leaders when they did us wrong. Vent our anger at any unjust or unfair moment in life.

Then what?

The earliest big social media campaign I can find is also the template for all that followed.
No HAB 2127, the tax hike protests of 2133, the No More Watching campaign of 2310 and all the rest. They all follow what is now known as the Kony 2012 campaign.
All these campaigns had massive interest, huge impact on social media sites, with clear goals and a deadline to complete an objective and they all failed. They got people to complain and moan and state opinions and agree that something had to be done, but when it came time for those supporters to go and physically show support, to actually show they were trying to achieve something, those millions of supporters became thousands, some even less than hundreds.
And nothing was done.
No follow up when it collapsed, only the odd complaint here and there before it became a punchline on a HomeWeb forum then forgotten.

Because what the government found out in 2012 was that as long as the people have somewhere to complain, as long as the internet, HomeWeb, whatever we called it then or now, let us unload our feelings and opinions about a topic and express a solution for someone else to create then we feel we have achieved something. We feel we have done our part and hope the problem will now go away.

We go back to being compliant.