I do not think I ever started using social media.
I use Facebook to keep up with relatives in distant lands.
I have a LinkedIn profile that I never visit.
I have never used Twitter. If someone’s point is so basic or stupid it fits in 30 or 60 characters I do not care about it anyone. I have never used Snapchat, Instagram, Tumblr, Flikr, Humpty Dumpty or whatever any of that shite is for similar reasons.
For me Facebook has been essentially Read Only for many years. I was active on Twitter for a while, not anymore.
My son used to read Twitter all the time but after he saw his iPhone showing him spending four hours a week on Twitter he deleted it. He has two kids, 3 and 1, wants to spend more time paying attention to them and their mother. Good move, I think.
None of us are going to be at our end days and regret not spending more time on social media.
I’ve been off of Facebook for years and I think deleting it has contributed to my happiness, but I have definitely lost friends because they just don’t think outside that network. I also depend on a couple of Facebook group members’ ability to remember to tell me when and where to meet for events and that hasn’t always worked out.
My uses:
Facebook: keeping in touch with people via messenger, usually those who are in their late 30s on up. Everyone else texts.
Twitter: I use it like an RSS news feed and occasionally read points of views from friends and family who chimed in.
Forums: more long-form communication.
This is pretty much how I “use it” as well. I have no interest in it, but should something come up my wife has an account. She uses Facebook to keep in touch with her cousins and other relatives, I don’t keep in touch with anybody. I also hate it that I can’t even write a letter to the editor of our local paper without a freakin Facebook account. So they have been without my wonderful opinion for years now.
Yeah, this part sucks.
I created a FB account about 10 years ago to see what was what, but I didn’t find a comfortable groove with it so I never jumped in. Felt like trying to write Christmas cards in a public toilet.
I’ve known my two (2) Facebook friends since junior high. One of them I stay in contact with through various means; the other ended up defaulting to FB almost exclusively, and we’ve lost touch.
I created a FB account when it opened to non-students, barely used it. Spent a few years logging on to re-do the privacy settings, eventually cancelling when the Oculus purchase reminded me I only ever logged on to change settings.
Twitter I quit again a few months ago. Its a toxic, hate-filled nightmare if you are into politics. Huge improvement in life other than
Im on reddit and its a right wing hotbed too.
but at least Twitter is no longer wasting 2-3 hours a day. Twitter and FB are the devil. Truly ripping apart the fabric of society.
Twitter can be useful, just follow insightful and/or funny people and never, ever, read any responses.
So I basically quit using FB. Honestly the only reason I’ve not deleted my account is that the local X-wing groups organize everything on there. I literally only use it to check in on events every week or two. Never post anything, or even look at anything my friends/ family post there.
This includes my wife. She’ll say ‘did you see the pictures I put up?’ And I always answer no. I genuinely hate FB as a company and their effect.
I have to use What’s App at work though, as well as Slack.
Basically the forums here (and another site to a much lesser extent) are it for me. Oh, and the official FFG forums for X-wing.
You may notice a trend.
Facebook - deactivated. Was easier than trying to clean the dumpster fire.
Twitter - love it, but never post. I spend probably 10-30 mins per day. Periodic maintenance is essential, my goal is to keep the number of posters I follow to about 80, only about half of which are regular posters.
Instagram - use it to share pictures with immediate family.
Well I can have Facebook deactivated but can still use the Messenger for contacting certain people. Mostly family. So I still use that.
I suppose if I were to heavily curate it and keep my group very small it would be more viable but that is too much work for just a little pay off at this point. Plus I just really dislike having discussions on Facebook. Control and interface, typing in a small box, the enter key functionality, everything. On top of it all my closest friends don’t really even use it that much. (like me) Perhaps if they did I would still be using it becomes of them.
… when it comes to the quality of the other users’ content.
The posts on a forum like this are at least as public as on twatter or on fakebook. They just are far more coherent, thought out and sensible than those on Shortbus-Special Media.
I feel exactly the same on these newfangled social media gubbins. Overrated and culturally, politically destructive. We better get over that bullshit. Aint nothing good come out of it so far. Arab Spring was not a good thing in the end.
I used to fakebook, but mostly for the lolcats and such. Then I found we have a fine .gif and .jpeg thread here, plus all of you guys and gals and I was out of there. Because fuck that noise.
Between Qt3 and Mudspike I have all the internet friends I need.
Yeah, that’s been a key for me since it started so I’m lucky; family, a few friends and coworkers (only those who essentially demanded it), people I’ve dated and that’s it. But plenty of people have 1000+ contacts, and I just couldn’t stand such a thing.
I think for many it’s a source of pride to put up a big number.
Other people use FB for business reasons. A lot of authors do some marketing via FB.
Facebook is wholly pernicious. Any good that comes from it is outweighed by the terrible mischief that it facilitates. Even if they wanted to fix it (and they don’t), they couldn’t. It needs to be burned to the ground.
BTW, my saying so publicly and repeatedly doesn’t keep FB recruiters from calling me.
I added this to Pocket and then put down my phone and picked up my ereader to read it.
Interesting. I’m glad I never really got caught up in texting, so I avoid it for the most part. I don’t use twitter but I almost feel like I do because I read so many articles and Qt3 posts that quote twitter. My online huckleberry is simply websites, and only a few of those. Still, I check Qt3, ESPN, and Google News so often that I spend a lot of time staring at these things.
What especially gets me is when I spend my workday looking at a computer screen and then go home and stare at a computer screen. It’s kind of gross.
Yeah the things I don’t get are that and smoking.