In 2025, a fitting update to Timothy Leary’s 1966 call to action might be: “Turn on, log in, scroll up.”
Despite Silicon Valley’s narrative that social media empowers us to be part of the action, most Americans are content to let the algorithm take the wheel. We let the influencers influence and the creators create. The rest of us are just grazing consumers, passively scrolling through whatever is served to us.
In a recent New Yorker essay on “Posting Ennui,” the author observes on how, 15 years into the social media era, she no longer sees “what I ate for breakfast” posts in her feed. The personal sharing that once defined social media has largely dried up. Morning Consult backs this up: 61% of Americans say they’re more selective about what they post, and that figure jumps to 70% for Millennials and 66% for Gen Z.
But just because we’re not posting doesn’t mean we’re not consuming. Far from it. Most studies show Americans spend over two hours a day on social media — four hours for teens. The algorithms are that sticky.
In fact, the feeds are so sticky that YouTube just announced it’s retiring its “Trending Now” list, admitting it no longer reflects how content moves in 2025.
“Back when we first launched the Trending page in 2015,” YouTube wrote, “the answer to ‘What’s trending?’ was a lot simpler to capture with a singular list of viral videos that everyone was talking about. But today, trends consist of many videos created by many fandoms, and there are more micro-trends enjoyed by diverse communities than ever before.”
As algorithmically served content becomes the dominant mode of consumption, the same holds true for advertising. According to Gartner’s 2025 CMO Spend Survey, 420 C-suite respondents ranked social, digital video, and digital display as the highest-impact and highest-spend channels.
That’s not to say linear media is irrelevant. Adweek reports NBC reportedly requires a $16 million commitment from advertisers just to secure an $8 million Super Bowl spot. But increasingly, linear is seen as a supplement to digital, not the other way around, which is why it is imperative that all broadcasters’ digital advertising solutions extend beyond their O&O.
AI Headlines from around the web
- YouTube Monetization Algorithms Crack Down In a post this week, YouTube announced beginning July 15, “inauthentic content” will be deprioritized on its platform. That means mass-produced, duplicative, and text-to-video content gets the boot.
- ChatGPT ThisClose to Launching a Web Browser Reuters says the AI giant’s latest shot across Google’s bow is an AI-integrated browser that also may be another threat to content creators’ web traffic.
Originally published by Jacobs Media
