My Latest Social Media Distancing

Okay, here’s what’s up. I’m pausing my social media usage. Why? Lately, Twitter and Facebook have been negative or harmful. I’ve felt the adverse effects on myself, and I’ve seen it happen to others. Again, I’m re-thinking that social media’s affect on society is detrimental. It’s also unnecessary.

Social Media Moratorium

I posted recently that I won’t, at this time, delete my Facebook account. That’s not changed. So far, I’ve done a few things and am considering others:

• Logged out of my Facebook and Twitter accounts.
• Deleted the Facebook and Twitter bookmarks from my laptop.
• Deleted the Twitter webapp from my iPhone. (I already deleted the Facebook and Messenger apps and I don’t use Instagram.)
• Maybe remove the Twitter widget from my blog.
• Maybe stop my blog cross-posts from WordPress to Twitter.

Rather than Delete or Deactivate any of my social accounts now, I’m going dormant by removing my quick easy access to them and ceasing most activity with them, at least for a season.

What’s buggin’ me now about Facebook and Twitter? Why do I feel like it’s time to cease and desist, “deplatforming” myself? Well, as you may have noticed, it’s all the political stuff and bad news.

Also, I’m reminded of the extant problems with social media in general, laid out concisely in Glenn Reynolds’ short book, The Social Media Upheaval. I think it’s worth reading again.

I’ll feel some acute FOMO, but it’ll be short lived. When news is so negative online, I choose to distance from it and live more positively with hope offline.

That said, I’m still gonna surf the web! There are many great websites with their own comment sections and sub-communities. And I like sites that are niche-topic-social-sites. On those, people only post about the subject that the site is all about; basically, you can geek-out there! Three examples:

• Flickr – a social-like site about photos.
• Goodreads – a social-like site about books and reading.
• Grouvee – a social-like site about video gaming.

Of course, I’ll also continue my blog. I can geek out on whatever, with a focus on cool tech and fun gaming. And I’ll engage more in the WordPress Reader with other active bloggers.

Before Social Media, there was the Blogosphere!

I still use email and texting and instant messaging with my closest friends and family. So why do we need social media…? Actually, we don’t!

So there it is. Two weeks into 2021, and I already need to step away from the social feeds.

I guess that’s progress.