1. 2016 was the last time social media felt genuinely social
Gen Z and Gen Alpha are nostalgic for 2016 because it represents the last time social media felt genuinely social and not driven by monetisation. The whole 2016 throwback internet trend came from the longing for unhinged humour, dog filters, and posting anything and everything to your story, and that nostalgia signals something deeper about how behaviour online has shifted.
2. Social media has shifted from expression to income
Now, those same platforms are being used for something else entirely: career building, personal brand building, and income streams, which is understandable given inflation and the breakdown of the “standard” career. Younger generations are using the internet as infrastructure for making money rather than just expressing themselves, and public platforms are increasingly functioning as tools rather than outlets.
3. Posting has become intentional and performance-driven
People have shifted from casual sharing to more intentional, performance-driven content tied to personal branding. We weren’t chasing algorithms back then or optimising content outside of posting at the right times when feeds were chronological, and while we were still chasing clout, it was tied to having a desirable or fun life rather than turning yourself into a business.
4. Social media now functions as entertainment
Public social platforms have shifted into entertainment platforms, effectively replacing TV, where content is designed to be watched rather than participated in, and users behave more like audiences than communities.
5. People are exhausted by commercialisation
Now, people are exhausted by commercialisation, and The Backslash 2026 Edges report highlights growing fatigue with overly optimised, algorithm-driven content alongside a rising scepticism around what is real versus staged, which is starting to impact how people engage and what they trust.
6. Trust has broken down across creators and culture
Trust has broken down across creators, places, and culture itself, because you can’t trust that a restaurant isn’t paid for, you can’t trust that a fashion choice isn’t sponsored, and you can’t even trust if the story times you are listening to are real or just dramatised half-truths designed to chase views.
7. Niche spaces are becoming more valuable
When creators bring mass attention to niche places, spaces, and fashion, they lose their value, because crowded becomes uncool, so people retreat into IYKYK spaces curated by people they actually align with, using taste and selectivity as a way to signal identity.
8. The middle layer of social is disappearing
What’s happening now is more extreme, because that middle of casual friends and acquaintances is quickly being cut out entirely, with posting to the grid declining and increasingly seen as cringe or performative, while interaction shifts to DMs, close friends, family, and private groups with less and less in between.
9. Macro forces are reshaping behaviour
This shift is being driven by a combination of forces, where AI is flooding feeds with low-effort content, the creator economy is pushing everyone to monetise, a bad economy is forcing people to think about income differently, and traditional career ladders are starting to feel broken.
10. Social media has split into two distinct worlds
The shift is pretty clear, where public spaces are now defined by performance, monetisation, and entertainment, while private spaces are defined by trust, taste, and real connection, and culture is increasingly moving in private first before leaking out into the mainstream.