The influence of Corporate media, and Google will implode unless they can go hug the cactus. That’s my simple message as I prune out YouTube subscriptions, unfollow famous voices, and migrate over to Bluesky. Maybe you have, too.
But first, I have a new neighbor. He comes from Greece or Idaho – I haven’t gotten close enough to find out. Fox News blared from his TV sixteen hours a day, stopping only when I started making judicious use of the circuit breaker panel. Now he thinks TV speaker trips the breaker when the volume goes over 80dB – I hope he never figures out the truth. The noise made me want to set a wild ferret loose in his bedroom, but I don’t know how to pick locks.
“I miss the old days,” Rose Marie The Landlord said one sleepless night in late summer. “All you needed was three months’ rent and a good set of teeth.”
“Teeth?” Counting stars at three in the morning because of insomnia left me in no mood for deep technical explanations. “Why teeth?”
“If he takes care of his teeth, he takes care of everything else.” Rose Marie slurped at a stadium cup filled with Dr. Thunder and cheap vodka. “I hate him, but you can’t pick your tenants.”
Somehow my neighbor felt like Google – a neighbor you once welcomed, and now could only hope to tolerate. But now what?
As far as Google and Corporate Media influence is concerned – it’s over folks – let’s stop kidding ourselves. The influence of Google and Corporate Media encouraged consumption at the cost of cognizance. Now it’s reached a tipping point that can no longer be tolerated and I’m taking a well-deserved break. If you aren’t Google or Corporate Media and you’re tired of their influence, please feel welcomed to do the same. We need some time and distance for our own mental wellbeing.
That’s the first problem. Now here’s the second. Indie publishers like Giant Freakin Robot are shutting down under the deterioration of Google as a resource for new readers. Even the engineers can’t understand the LLM they’ve created, but they know the system prioritizes large brands and Old Money Media to keep Independent Publishers under control.
The Beginning of the End or the End of the Beginning?
“Take out the trash!” Rose Marie The Landlord screeched from her back door. The guy next to me moved in last week, still expects daily maid service. I took his trash out once and I’ve been paying for it ever since.
“You filthy swine!” I pounded on the wall. “Your kind should be pelted with stones!”
He pounded back and I returned to my keyboard. One might descend into despair but my personal theory is that this is the beginning of the end for corporate media. Google isd fast-tracking itself into Intel levels of irrelevance, and other search options will be only too happy to take over.
In November, I talked a lot about keeping my world small and working on myself. At the same time, insights emerged about productive activities, voices to listen to. I tolerated the Corporate Media’s sheer deafening cacaphony of ‘listen to me / agree with me / don’t listen to them / don’t agree with them’ for years. Now their vulnerabilities cannot be ignored. They don’t know what’s going on, either. I can’t do this anymore, folks – It’s got to stop. I need to listen to silence for a while, silence might be good for you, too.
This comes from two different areas of concern – one is corporate media and the media / narrative complex they’ve constructed for themselves. The second is the ongoing issues with Google, Internet search traffic, and the threat presented to independent content publishers. Two different issues, but with the same negative outcome, and with the same cactus-hugging solution.
How Corporate Media Failed Us
First, corporate media and the media / narrative complex. As the pandemic raged in 2020, I started with good intentions. My natural diet of late night talk shows and news felt … calming … someone knew what was going on, they were putting our current events into context. You had to take what was said with a grain of salt, but they did seem to at least have a finger on the pulse of what was going on.
Four years later, where are we? Welp … the election happened and I’m not a political person, but I do watch the news and late-night TV, and no one can argue that the election was their ‘9/11 moment.’
For those of us who don’t remember, 9/11 was a slap in the face to America’s military / industrial complex. Briefly, a question had to be answered. How could these organizations with billions of dollars at their disposal fail to prevent the tragedy? Congruently, journalism considers itself ‘the Fourth Estate‘ – the media / narrative complex if you will. Leading voices considered the outcome of the election to be a tragedy (no joke, watch how they responded to everything before and after November 5th). They could not prevent their ‘tragic outcome,’ either. Where’s the accountability?
Anyway.
My neighbor moves past my door, swearing. I ignore his meaningless antics lest I become the subject of some ill-typed Nextdoor post. Who needs that drama when we’re ringside to the cozy dystopia of the 21st century?
I’m not here to be the media’s canary in the coalmine. They’re big, I’m little. One day, after it all comes crashing down, someone will pick through the rubble and say ‘Inkican called it.’ Hopefully I’ll be around to enjoy the vindication and validation.
Disrupt All Disruptors
All disruptors must be disrupted – for a world built on ‘challenging the status quo,’ Google and corporate media are incapable of challenging themselves. They used new technologies to build a ladder, then pulled the ladder up after themselves. If it didn’t work for traditional companies in the late 90s, Google, why do you think it’s going to work now? Crabs escaping the crab pot have built-in enemies – the other crabs – soon they all find themselves in the soup.
Want to escape this sad destiny? The answer is simple, even if it’s painful. Google and Corporate Media must …
Go Hug the Cactus
This metaphor of ‘hugging the cactus’ means different things to different people – my interpretation is simple: true growth means embracing painful truths. We’re only as sick as our secrets – pushing against reality turns us into two positively-charged magnets that can never click together. Hugging that cactus means agonizing acceptance – but it’s only in those seconds of self-sacrifice that people see who we really are and that we’re willing to do the right thing at deep personal cost.
Hugging the Cactus for Google is simple, but painful – it means a reckoning with itself and its culture. Hundreds of other big companies have tried it successfully and Google can, too. Perhaps it means a lot of leadership change, and golden parachutes. Or maybe not – maybe Google can disrupt the disruption archetype by NOT throwing institutional value away. They can re-establish themselves as leaders again by showing the world what it means to live with humility, and lessons learned.
Hugging the Cactus for Corporate Media is simple, but painful – Yes, Corp Media can re-invent itself after the failures of narrative and influence in 2024, too. Look fellas, everyone knows you screwed up. Why bother to hide it? Why ignore it? Doesn’t your position as ‘the 4th estate’ exist so you can give power to the afflicted, and afflict those in power? Well, afflict yourselves for a while. Figure out what went wrong – stop ignoring the hard conversations – realize that you’ve failed at the basic test of journalistic ethics ‘come work for us, again,‘ and reboot yourselves. You tried to do it without actually doing it – good for you – now go hug the cactus and REALLY do your job.
Or not.
My neighbor is an evil cabbage but no different than other Americans living their lives. Hollywood taught them that they’re all the heroes of their own story, making us either background characters or villains. There’s no stopping them, short of forcing them into a chair and making them watch Golden Girls episodes until they can paint a hundred sentences with an oil brush clamped in their teeth: ‘I am not the main character. I am not the main character. I am not the main character.’
Look, true growth means embracing painful truths. Hugging the cactus means getting cozy with chagrin. You can force that kind of growth to a point, but you can’t mandate it – lest you find yourself running a modern day Re-Education Camp.
As a guy who has to hug the cactus on the regular, I can tell you that the discomfort doesn’t last but the discernment does. When it comes to Corporate Media, Google, and influence – the choice is up to them.
