Are You Actually There?

An Experiment On Whether The Internet Already Died And What It Means For Us As Humans

H.E. Dr. Cody Dakota Wooten

Aug 16, 2026

Are You Actually There?

An Experiment On Whether The Internet Already Died And What It Means For Us As Humans

Written by a human, for humans, always.

I’m running a small experiment.

I have written, by hand, over 1,300 articles in an equal number of days.

No AI, no slop.

But everywhere I turn these days...

I see so much slop, nonsense, and useless content.

Are real people even here?

Are you actually reading this?

Or is this place on the internet already dead?

I post articles to a couple of different platforms.

I post pieces of my articles to other platforms for shorter-form content.

I’m not going to pretend like I have a gigantic following...

Nor do I require one to write my articles.

Trust me...

If you are chasing the following, fame, and glory, you will not be able to make it writing articles every single day...

I know because one of the platforms I publish to has a writing streak leaderboard, a tool purposefully designed to encourage people to keep their streaks...

And never have I ever seen 20 people simultaneously make it to 365 days straight or more out of over 85,000 writers on the platform.

People drop all the time...

Many who are more talented writers than I.

But I am really curious about three things in this experiment...

One is whether people are actually on these different platforms.

One of the craziest things I have seen with AI...

Is that AI creates content which is responded to by AI...

Meaning the real people are not really in the mix.

Has that already happened here?

Or worse...

That people are on these platforms...

But so passively consuming whatever is placed in front of them that they have become a part of the zombie hive-mind...

Slave to whatever algorithmic loop they have become trapped in.

The second thing I am interested in is whether people who are interested in actually getting real content in front of them can find it...

From whatever platform they are coming from.

Because I post in multiple places...

It could be that some platforms have real people that are actually interested...

While others have no real people left.

It is also possible that the algorithms are so broken these days...

That even if real people do exist on a platform...

They may never actually see it...

Especially underneath all of the slop.

Are we just all doomed to only see slop all the time now?

Or is there at least a bit of hope, on some platforms, that real people still exist?

The third thing I am interested in...

Is whether people who are reading ever engage.

NO.

I’m not saying you have to engage if you do not want to...

I actually encourage you to act however you would normally act when you read an article.

If that means you read and leave, that is cool.

Most platforms will document that there was a read, and that is great.

If you want to like, clap, follow, send signal, or give a heart, that is great too.

If you like to have real conversations with the author of a piece, then I’m here to talk.

If you are the type of person to write another piece and agree or disagree with what is being said, tag me or send it to me, and I’d love to see your thoughts.

No matter how you choose to interact with something you read, I’m curious...

Because it is possible that those who are still reading just do not normally interact...

And that is something important to know because it might mean that people just go and think after reading...

Which is itself incredibly valuable just on its own.

I’m not trying to gamify a system that I think is pointless to do anyway...

Because in a month they will change their algorithm again, making that a waste of time and a moot point.

That is not my goal.

My goal is to see what is actually happening...

Because this is what we have to begin to realize...

Depending on how we are interacting on these different platforms that exist...

Is going to determine what happens to our brains.

As humans...

We are designed for growth, cultivation, and community.

These are all essential aspects of being healthy as people.

Can these platforms even accomplish any of that?

If real content and writing are getting overrun to the point that all we see is slop...

Then we will become products of that slop.

We will be failing to grow...

We will not really know what needs to be developed or cut away...

Because all of the information we are receiving inherently cannot provide that.

We will become the average of the slop we consume...

And given AI Model Collapse, which occurs when AI begins to train on AI...

Means the average will become meaningfully worse over time.

That does not bode well for us as humans...

But it may be something we need to watch for.

With this...

If people are able to find real content on different platforms...

Is it a matter of “which” platform?

It is possible that different platforms will accomplish different things.

Some platforms may be lost and hopeless at this point...

Left to die with people who have become zombies on those platforms...

Incapable of thinking for themselves anymore.

Other platforms may be great places to find real content and writing...

But people find it, get what they came for, and leave.

There is nothing wrong with that, and perhaps that is how people simply get better information.

Then some platforms may not only be designed for community and conversation...

But actually accomplish it in reality.

There are many platforms and groups that I have been in over the years that claimed to “build community”...

But ended up being useless...

Either because the platform or those running the group did not put real effort into them...

Or they incentivized the wrong things.

This has even happened on platforms that I currently and regularly use.

I do not post on every platform to purposefully engage with others...

Some platforms just are not great at that, and that is alright.

They often have other benefits that make it worth staying on them.

But...

If we are not able to find any real community online...

If there is no real interaction...

We have to ask the question as humans...

Where do we get interaction from?

Real and genuine interaction...

Not just sycophantic and virtue-signalling interaction that ends us leaving us feeling hollow and drives us to the worst versions of ourselves.

Yes...

Many people have become very popular online, but in the process have dehumanized themselves and/or others to receive fake interaction...

Which causes them to slowly decay on the inside.

We need to have real interaction with others if we are going to be healthy...

But the truth is that it is very rare on the internet these days...

And even on the platforms that appear to have it, the reality is that it is all just staged.

That is not sustainable for our being.

If it is not possible to obtain on the internet today...

Either we need to create something where it is possible...

Or take the tried and true method of finding real humans in the real world to interact with.

It is important to know what different platforms accomplish, though...

And not to believe you will receive something from a platform that could never provide it in the first place.