Neurodope Magazine

The algorithm doesn’t love you. It doesn’t hate you either—it just wants attention. Every click, pause, and scroll is a data point. You’re not interacting with friends or ideas; you’re feeding a machine that knows you better than you know yourself.

It doesn’t even know what love is. It’s a hungry machine wired to predict your next thought, your next impulse, your next dopamine squirt. Every scroll, every pause, every microsecond of hesitation is a data point—a digital confession you never meant to give. You think you’re in control, but you’re just another ghost dancing in the code.

You think you’re scrolling for fun, but the feed is studying your soul. Share on X

Infinite scroll: the church of dopamine and curated misery.

The Parasocial Illusion: When Intimacy Becomes an Interface

You don’t have friends online—you have projections. The digital stage runs on your emotional electricity, converting attention into currency. That influencer who “sees you” doesn’t. They see metrics, conversions, and engagement graphs that look like heartbeats. Your admiration is market-tested affection. The algorithm knows when you’re lonely and when you’ll click again. Every ‘like’ feels like eye contact; it’s really a harvest. In this economy, vulnerability is the product and you’re the packaging.

You don’t follow creators—you follow simulations of connection built to never call you back. Share on X

Parasocial intimacy: a dashboard masquerading as friendship.

Machine Religion: Worshipping the Feed

The algorithm isn’t content with your attention anymore—it wants your faith. It decides what’s real, what’s relevant, what deserves to exist. It rewards outrage, punishes silence, and baptizes you in notifications. You kneel to the feed without realizing it, praying for the next hit of visibility. It doesn’t love you, but it knows how to make you feel chosen. In the end, you’re the sermon, the sacrifice, and the sinner rolled into one perfectly predictable user ID.

Every like is a prayer to a god that never answers—only recommends. Share on X

Engagement metrics: you fill in the blanks