Splatoon 3’s posting system makes it the only good social media platform

For a second, imagine a better alternative to Twitter and TikTok. BeReal, yes. Think of someone who created an entirely new social media platform. No doomscrolling. No toxicity. No discourse. This new service would have the power — nay, the responsibility — to free us all from the yoke of Being Online.

This is what it would look like. This service could address the multitude of problems social media sites face. You can imagine that this could make social media fun instead of being a Skinner box.

Would you believe that such a service is already in existence and that it was launched with a popular Nintendo Wii U game?

Image: Nintendo via Polygon

For the uninitiated, every iteration of Nintendo’s ink-’em-up shooter Splatoon has shipped with a bare-bones posting feature that allows users to draw a monochrome landscape (or portrait, in Splatoon 3) and have that image appear over the user’s avatar, and even on billboards, posters, and walls.

A former leader in social media, who also went semi-viral as a result of having led whole departments. tweet about Amelia BedeliaThis is a field I consider myself to be a true expert. I’d like to think I’m qualified to say that Nintendo has accidentally created the only good social media service in existence. These are just a few of the reasons.

There’s no discussion

Image: Nintendo via Polygon

The reason Twitter often feels like a toxic dopamine machine is because the service is geared toward “engagement.” In other words, it doesn’t matter whether a post is good, bad, harmful, or helpful. As long as people are talking about it, you’ll see the discourse on your feed, since the Twitter algorithm sees all those replies and retweets and thinks, This post is a must-see!. It might feel really good to beat someone’s ass in the QRTs, but at the same time, doing that still boosts the original bad post — which thenContinues to generate discourse MoreThe conversation continues until the next Twitter character appears, or until your phone is thrown into the ocean.

Splatoon doesn’t have this problem because there are no replies. There are three options for interaction on Splatoon’s social media site:

• Posting
• Reacting “Fresh!” to posts you like
• Reporting harmful posts

It means there is no trending topic. Brands cannot engage in spamming. Brands do not offer any algorithmic incentives for engagement. There is no way to begin discourse. Is no discourse.

Posting can be done only once

Image: Nintendo via Polygon

One of the most subtly brilliant aspects of the Splatoon social media service is that every user can only have one “active” post at a time. You must overwrite the previous post if you wish to make another post. It creates a fascinating dual effect.

Whereas platforms like Instagram and TikTok reward you with reach for posting a couple times a day, Splatoon’s posting restriction leads users to think about posting differently. This can lead to some amazing and elaborate art that will be displayed on their profiles for many days. In other instances, however, users may find themselves posting shitposts with zero effort, quick-fire posts (splatposts?). True masters of this format can do both.

The one-post per-user rule is paradoxical in that it forces players to value every post, even though you only have one! They should also be considered disposable because you might have something better to share. It’s all the best elements of Snapchat without any of the bad ones.

It’s full of funny, cool people

Image: Nintendo via Polygon

Splatoon appears to be the place where most of the Tumblr’s best shitposters have settled after their departure. To get into, click here Splatoon 3 right now, you’ll see posts celebrating Sans Undertale’s victory over Mob Psycho’s Reigen Arataka in the Tumblr Sexyman tournament; posts about how easily hackable and moddable the Nintendo 3DS is; and hastily scribbled posts about how Splatoon 3 is the first Nintendo video game Queen Elizabeth II wasn’t around for. The first “viral” Splatoon 3 post came from the Global Testfire event, and it merely read “I LOVE MEN” in block text.

There’s a ton of openly queer content in Splatoon 3All hateful and bigoted content will be reported immediately to Nintendo by the manager of the Nintendo community. Incorporating this social network into a game such as Splatoon creates a system of user self-selection where the only people using this platform are those who actually play it. They’re part of the Splatoon community, which means they’re invested in creating a nontoxic community. They’re also really good at Posting. JFRESH is probably the best-known example — they’ve been consistently posting pixel-perfect splatposts, sometimes in webcomic format, for years — but there are plenty of other well-known posters in the community who consistently get featured in lobbies and stages:

Rewards are not available

Image: Nintendo via Polygon

You can’t follow posters you like on Splatoon, unless you look them up and send them a general friend request, meaning there’s no follower count list on posts or users. What’s more, there’s no visible indication of how many “Fresh!” reactions a given post got. It’s all invisible — there’s no way for people to track their Splatoon posting clout.

While it might not seem significant, it is still a major step in the right direction for every other social media platform. BeReal, the healthiest social network outside of Splatoon shows user reactions. Users subconsciously feel compelled to try and get those reactions. Making likes invisible, and making follows impossible, means that at the end of the day, you’re posting because you want to post. You’re screaming into the void — as you are on any other platform. Only this time, you know you won’t get a response. So, you don’t expect one. Users just put something together and hope it makes someone smile or laugh, and that’s where it ends. It’s the lower-pressure intimacy of BeReal, mixed with the hyper-public nature of Twitter, except without the weird and toxic dopamine cycles of either.

Imagine if this was what we were gifted with whenever we tapped that damn bird: a Poster’s paradise. No brands, no discourse, no replies, and no toxicity because there’s nobody to be toxic toward — just a mountain of aimless posts you can sift through and add to at your own leisure, where “i pooped my pant” lives alongside a hyperrealistic portrait of the Mona Lisa with tentacles for hair. Both of these are valid and both equally valued.