Is social media dead?
6 Minute English
BBC
4.5 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 8 January 2026
⏱️ 7 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
What is your favourite social media platform? Do you still use it as much as you did three or four years ago? With the rise of generative AI, many social media users are finding their feeds cluttered with content that they feel no real connection with. Is social media on a downward spiral? Neil and Pippa discuss this and teach you some new vocabulary.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, radio, podcasts. |
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| 0:10.1 | Listen to real BBC news reports and answer the questions to practice your listening skills. |
| 0:16.5 | From Lionel Messi to guerrilla friendships, you'll find lots to interest you. |
| 0:21.1 | Go to the skills section of our website now, BBClearningEnglish.com, and improve your listening today. |
| 0:29.3 | Six Minute English from BBC LearningEnglish.com |
| 0:36.0 | Hello, this is Six Minute English from BBC Learning English. I'm Neil. And I'm Pippa. Whatever |
| 0:42.2 | you think of social media, in less than a generation it has changed the internet. Facebook, Twitter, |
| 0:49.1 | now known as X, and in the early days, MySpace, used to be places to post messages to friends or share photos of your breakfast. |
| 0:57.4 | But with the rise of AI, the fun of connecting with friends changed into something much stranger, |
| 1:03.2 | as Tristan and Asma, presenters of BBC World Service program, The Global Story, found out. |
| 1:09.2 | Oh, what is this? |
| 1:14.6 | I think it's a man who's supposed to look like Jesus. It's a man who looks a bit like... |
| 1:16.6 | Who also looks like his dog. |
| 1:17.6 | He's been A-I'd, right? |
| 1:19.6 | Has to be A-Ied. |
| 1:20.6 | He's holding his dog and his face looks like his dog. |
| 1:23.6 | So he's half- Jesus, half-dog. |
| 1:25.6 | A half-dog, half-DegJesus photo is generated by AI and posted online. |
| 1:31.7 | It's an example of how the use of AI in social media has evolved so much that today, |
| 1:37.2 | it's hard to know what's created by humans and what's not. |
| 1:40.5 | In this episode, we'll discuss how social media is changing in the age of AI, and as usual, |
... |
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