If there is one book you take the time to read, read “The Chaos Machine” by Max Fisher.

In 1994 INCIID was founded by three professional women with a combined 16 years of infertility and 12 pregnancy losses. I developed INCIID’s first and very long “page” using straight HTML We were digital pioneers in the wilderness of unstructured, loosely connected computers. INCIID  was the first to bring consumers and professionals (reproductive endocrinologists and attorneys and other industry professionals) together in real time. One of the first things we did with our site was to establish early “social media,” which in those days was just a bulletin board forum where consumers could get information and exchange idea. We were strict about respect and civility and did not allow misinformation.

Information has become a loaded term these days.  INCIID brought together a group of highly respected advisors so consumers could get the best information based on science and facts. Long before, we abandoned online listservs because the information was a black hole of terrible behavior and bad science. With the establishment of INCIID forums, we also provided rules, rights, and responsibilities within our community. We didn’t allow misinformation, selling medications, or fighting. Disagreements were fine as long as civility remained.  Our community thrived, and life-long friendships all over the world occurred.  We sometimes were accused of “censorship,” but as a company, our philosophy was doing what was in the best interests of our community, We had as many as 10K active participants and 20-30 million individual page views each month.  We were naive to think once large companies created their forums, they would moderate the same way.

Modern-day social media caused a worldwide and ongoing crisis. We are outsiders in this philosophy — while sites like Facebook and Twitter gained notoriety and popularity, they are all about gathering as many eyeballs as possible for the sake of the almighty dollar! They are communities of conspiracy theories. These social media factories created a digital cesspool spreading the toxic disease of conspiracy and misinformation.

Author, Max Fisher has written the inside story of social media and how it has rewired our minds and is destroying our world. Fisher explains in gripping detail how the media giants are changing of future and not for the better.