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Reasons to Quit Social Media

• shuntress 5y ago
  I don't want to quit social media What I want is for interactions with other people in online social spaces to be less destructive.
  • trutannus 5y ago
    "I don't want to stop using drugs, I just want drugs that are not going to harm me while I use them" Unfortunately, social media by its nature is going to be harmful. It was never designed to consider the world we live in now.
    • colecut 5y ago
      What you're looking for are the illegal drugs
    • scarecrowbob 5y ago
      What exactly is wrong with that? We decided we wanted to derive cars, but without the harmful effects of being in crashes, so we decided to create safer vehicles. I like some drugs, and a lot of them are okay in some situations with some boundaries... even if a lot of the users are using them for unhealthy reasons in situations that make the drugs problematic. I like social media-- I'm literally using it right now to communicate with you. But I do that because I value your thought (even though I disagree with it) and I am able to interact with you in a space that both moderates my behavior by giving up/down vote feedback and which doesn't have a lot of tolerance for poor discourse habits. If you apply those same rubrics to other social media and don't tolerate them when it violates those boundaries, I believe it's possible to use them in healthy ways.
      • trutannus 5y ago
        Nothing is wrong with wanting that. I just don't think it is realistic. I've purged all social media other than HN at this point.
      • Minor49er 5y ago
        > I like social media-- I'm literally using it right now to communicate with you If you're extending the definition of social media to include sites like Hacker News, you may as well categorize the entire Internet as social media
        • scarecrowbob 5y ago
          I dunno... I feel that the sine qua non of "social media" is user generated content conducted between specific users, tied to specific accounts. Not even wikis meet that definition, and certainly not most of the author-generated content-based site like blogs or market sites such as amazon, or news sites where the discussion isn't the putative content.
          • Minor49er 5y ago
            But don't wikis commonly have a "Talk" section or similar? The pages that are posted and edited would surely fall under author-generated content.
            • scarecrowbob 5y ago
              I believe a lot of the internet has social aspects. Is it possible that the "social" aspects of this media operate on a sliding scale? I understand the point that literally any website could be thought of as "user generated"... I've personally made quite a few websites. But the level of interaction and the modalities of how I and a lot of folks use things isn't as interactive as, say, twitter. So, perhaps for some user populations a Wiki is a social experience, especially for the folks who edit them. Though from my perspective, it feels entirely possible to use it without engaging in that social aspect. I don't feel the same about Hackernews and/or reddit in general.
              • Minor49er 5y ago
                The social aspects absolutely work on a sliding scale. I completely agree. But I don't think that the amount or variety of social engagement is what really contributes to something being classified as "social media".
    • silicon2401 5y ago
      > Unfortunately, social media by its nature is going to be harmful. I disagree. Social media has never harmed me, I just realized it wasn't worth my time. I've never had issues with self-esteem, confidence, popularity, whatever. I used social media as a photo diary for myself, shared pictures and videos with friends, kept up with what my friends are doing. To this day I check in on social media once in a while just because it's more effective than texting 100+ people to see what they're up to. That being said, I don't think social media is worth more of my time than a few minutes every few weeks or months
      • cryptoz 5y ago
        > Social media has never harmed me How do you know that? This isn't something you can typically know for your self with any degree of confidence. > To this day I check in on social media once in a while You've got a lot of recent comments on HN for this to be true. I think you use social media a lot more than you think you do, and it could be impacting you in ways that you don't notice.
        • silicon2401 5y ago
          > You've got a lot of recent comments on HN for this to be true. I think you use social media a lot more than you think you do, and it could be impacting you in ways that you don't notice. Ah so you're that kind of user. Semantics. I don't consider HN social media, when I say social media I mean instagram, facebook, etc. I consider HN a forum like reddit or other places. My usage of forums is a way to kill time when I'm at work. > How do you know that? This isn't something you can typically know for your self with any degree of confidence. Speak for yourself. Maybe you can't typically know this for yourself, but I can. And more importantly, if you're not coming into this exchange in good faith and willing to trust my claims, then any chance of reasonable conversation is gone. I'll be wrapping up my end of our conversation here, thanks.
        • bserge 5y ago
          And why should you or I judge and decide on that? If their opinion is that it doesn't impact them, that's good enough.
    • shuntress 5y ago
      Do you drink coffee?
      • trutannus 5y ago
        Yep, and I can't wake up with out it, nor can I stop using it despite multiple attempts. Dependence is a harm of it's own.
        • xphx 5y ago
          There is a not so subtle implication of your comments being voted down that those claiming HN is not an instance of social media would be well-advised to reflect on.
      • drdeadringer 5y ago
        Do you eat food? Do you breathe air? Somehow coffee is completely different. Somehow coffee is on the same tier as tobacco or cocaine. It's not. Relax. Enjoy a cocoa.
        • shuntress 5y ago
          That is exactly my point. "I don't want to stop eating food, I just want food that is not going to harm me while I eat it" "I don't want to stop breathing air, I just want air that is not going to harm me while I breath it" I don't want to cease all contact with other people. I want to interact socially in non-harmful ways.
        • fortuna86 5y ago
          Food and air sustain your life, they don't create chemical dependencies.
  • mlang23 5y ago
    Haha.... Sounds like you want World Peace...
    • qaq 5y ago
      you misspelled WordPress :)
  • LightG 5y ago
    "You may say I'm a dreamer, But I'm not the only one, I hope someday you'll join us, And the world will live as one"
  • photochemsyn 5y ago
    Probably a walled city is the only way to achieve that. Such a setup is like a closed mailing list in which all participants have to pass an 'entrance exam' of some kind. This kind of setup imposes a cost for rude, nasty, aggressive and destructive behavior - since you can simply be excluded from the group in that case. This is how most of the world works on a day to day basis; you don't let random people into a corporate strategy meeting or an academic council meeting. You only admit people who agree to abide by civil society rules. Something like that can be incredibly useful, but it requires a lot of up-front organizing effort. Also, malicious types have been known to sneak into say, a closed mailing list, and leak the internal discussions to Twitter or whatever, so...
    • gilbetron 5y ago
      Facebook already has all that with groups. I think the issue is something more fundamental with humans.
      • elijaht 5y ago
        More optimistically- Facebook groups are great. They are the only reason I still look at Facebook and truly bring value to me
        • enos_feedler 5y ago
          Yes and Facebook Marketplace is great for me selling things. And I know for others its actually Facebook dating (surprisingly). Facebook is here to stay by filling out all these "jobs to be done" in our lives. Every one of these jobs is backed by a moat that is very hard to compete with, and it's all the same: reach and scale.
  • aaron-santos 5y ago
    I'm less and less confident that is possible, not necessarily because personal interactions and online spaces themselves form an inherent contradiction (though they might). But because the incentive, and ability to commodify, and capitalize these interactions are necessary and sufficient conditions for the creation of these destructive social systems. We're pretty bad at social systems level thinking, but this precise lack of skill is an opportunity for exploitation. In the same way that hobbyist day traders over-estimate their ability to turn a profit by not understanding the skill level of who they are losing against, social media participants over-estimate their ability to check out because they don't understand the skill level of players who want them to engage. This disparity in the games being played isn't spelled out and why would it be? At least there is hope in that social media systems while ubiquitous, are not yet hegemonic. As long as that holds, there is still hope.
  • 999900000999 5y ago
    Negative content flows upwards, the more negative or edgy you are the more upvotes you get. Users crave this fake validation to make up for other things that are lacking. Think about it this way, if you have a good job, fantastic relationships, and other great things going on are you really going to be arguing on Instagram with strangers ?
    • laurent92 5y ago
      I would say that the top driver to toxic online communication is wanting to convince others.
  • laurent92 5y ago
    > for interactions with other people in online spaces to be less destructive I have the exact opposite opinion, let’s confront them: real-life social spaces are toxic to me, and I seek refuge in computers, where you experience me. If we were a little less toxic to each others, maybe online wouldn’t be a high concentration of people retired from real life? - Real life has a dump of major problems that “social people” constantly refuse to fix. - And each time we bring them up, it’s the bane of your life, we get all the names, downvotes, exaggerations, parody, “we’re in $CURRENT_YEAR”, “Have you tried to man up?”, “You’re frustrated”, etc. - And the problem continues. Online, are you are just meeting with the people that are invisible to you in real life. The status of the scientific understanding today of gender imbalance in programming (excluding improper studies with doubtful scientific process) is that little boys end up in programming because it’s the only thing in the family which behaves expectedly, doesn’t sulk, calls mum, gets angry for expressing things as they are, retributes effort, etc. Making a little more room for boys in real life would also correct gender imbalance in IT. It may even make that fewer people in general go to IT and science in general, because they would be more satisfied with real-life interactions. Science would go slower, but people would be happier. It’s a tough path, but really one that upgrades the lives of millions. Do you want to take it?
• deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
• iammisc 5y ago
  Once the current regime let us go back to church, I deleted my Facebook. It's much better at church. Firstly, they feed me. Secondly, I can say what I think without being censored. It's not even that people all agree with me at church. It's that they treat you like a human being. Those who are unvaxxed are just some guy down the street, not someone who we are supposed to target in our hour of hate and wish death upon as the more uncivilized amongst the internet regularly do. I feel sorry for those who have to substitute something so vile for something so wholesome.
  • shredprez 5y ago
    If this weren't HN, I'd assume this comment is satire. Churches certainly aren't immune to censorship, hours of hate, death wishes (explicit or otherwise), or dehumanization. Social spaces are all vulnerable to the weaknesses of humanity. While I do think the mechanics of the medium play a role in how those weaknesses surface, the source is and will always be us.
    • iammisc 5y ago
      Absolutely, but the difference is that no one church is dominant in the United States. Even if we were to claim that Catholicism (the largest faction, although not a majority by any means) were the dominant one, within that church there is also a lot of diversity of thought. As an adult, you can realistically pick and choose with whom to associate at these churches, unlike say Twitter or Facebook where are beholden to whatever religion they follow.
  • selykg 5y ago
    Meanwhile, here you are using words like "regime" in your post here.
    • iammisc 5y ago
      What other word should I use to describe a de facto government of America that blatantly, and loudly, refuses to follow the American constitution? This is not my opinion. The courts have agreed with me that religious service is an essential activity, despite many governor's and the federal government's attempts to ban it. Moreover, the current federal regime has unequivocally said that although the Supreme Court itself has ruled its eviction moratoria illegal, it would enforce them anyway (despite the SC ruling unequivocally that this constituted a violation of the takings clause). That is a constitutonal crisis, that was only glossed over because the media decided it didn't exist. My use of the word regime befits the current US government. The American heritage dictionary says that regime means: A usually heavy-handed administration or group in charge of an organization. That is exactly what the current federal government and many state governments (including my own) are by the admissions of our own courts.
• taytus 5y ago
  TL;DR You don't need a reason. Just quit.
• tarr11 5y ago
  Isn’t HN social media?
  • betenoire 5y ago
    Isn't it a forum? It doesn't have friends, following, asking for your contacts, etc. I guess the line is subjective, this is just a plain old forum, managed very well, imo.
    • scarecrowbob 5y ago
      For what little it's worth, I've been online since Compuserve and personal local BBSs... I absolutely consider HN to be social media.
      • fjabre 5y ago
        Yes it is particularly social because it has the concept of Karma. It has tamed it by policy but vanity can never be tamed outright. It will always exist in some form on these networks and HN/Reddit style forums capitalize on humans’ vanity by appealing to it through Karma. Thus it ticks up the social-ness score a bit for sites like HN as opposed to some old forums like one would find on Yahoo or used to find on Compuserv. Karma and the wisdom of crowds gives way to herd mentality and vanity. It is what drives the form of discussion on these sites.
        • Minor49er 5y ago
          Is karma the line where the social-ness is drawn? I mean, I've been on here for a while and haven't even recognized anyone in any meaningful capacity by their handle. 100% of my interactions on here have been with strangers that have and will remain as strangers, as I am also a stranger to them.
          • fjabre 5y ago
            There is no line for online communities. They are all social to some extent. Karma simply makes them more so. We are no longer strangers. Social-ness has been engaged ;)
• clipradiowallet 5y ago
  I don't have(and never have had) any social media accounts...ie facebook, twitter, instagram, tiktok, etc. The closest would be an HN account. That said, could someone tell me what I might be missing? Ignorance is bliss, but it's also ignorance - is there any critical information or happiness that everyone else [who uses social media] enjoys that I do not?
  • klondike_klive 5y ago
    I detest talking on the phone. I also accept that there are some people who I'm just not going to get around to arranging a meetup with, as there are too many demands on my time. I don't look at Facebook any more but I follow a lot of illustrators and animators on instagram so my feed is usually full of their interesting stuff. There are few enough people that I can catch up easily if I don't check for a day or two. I also follow friends who've moved to different part of the country and can see how their kids are doing, although I have never posted a pic of my boy on social media (and never will until he can give informed consent).
  • hvs 5y ago
    No. People (like myself) are ultimately using it for a distraction from something more important or a dopamine rush when someone "likes" something you post. You're better off.
  • rjtavares 5y ago
    Social media is not fundamentally different from other ways of connecting with people online, like blogs and forums. The happiness you can enjoy from meeting people online is the same whether on a forum, on an online videogame, or on twitter.
  • bluGill 5y ago
    That depends on you. Social media should be a way to better connect to your friends and family. In particular distant ones that you don't see daily but still want to be in contact with. I haven't seen my 7th grade crush since high school, but I'm glad to see pictures of her kid's first day of college - as one example. Most people use social media instead for harmful things that do not help society. Left and Right wing conspiracy theorys abound. Pictures of some cat that you don't own.
• meristohm 5y ago
  > We hire social media to create a virtual representation of the life we want to live, but never actually live it. HN being the exception to my 2+ years hiatus from Twitter, Facebook, etc, I am careful to represent myself sincerely, in part because I’m assuming my little stories might help someone practice better mental and physical health (I have found some of your collective comments to be helpful—-thank you!). > We hire social media to observe the life we want, but never actually experience it. Today I read this post instead of reading further into a book. If I practice reaching for the book instead of HN I may thank myself later, as this forum post is satisfying to complete but otherwise has a low ROI (I tend not to check back soon enough to be part of any discussion). I generally enjoy the life I have, and one action that will make it more enjoyable is to be reading more often, as I find engaging with longer stories over days and weeks to be gratifying.
• Semaphor 5y ago
  I never had to quit social media. They quit me. I loved Facebook and Twitter when they were new, I connected to people that were way outside my normal group of friends and stayed in contact with people I knew who moved away, sometimes passively by reading their posts, sometimes actively. But both platforms started actively working against that kind of usage. Eventually I just had to stop as they became unusable, not using Twitter at all anymore, and only using FB for messenger.
  • jader201 5y ago
    I really don’t get the complaints with Twitter as a product, at least from my usage. But maybe that’s because I’ve exclusively been using Tweetbot for several years. But it basically does exactly what I want: when someone I follow posts something, it shows up in my feed. Which is what it’s been doing for years. Again, maybe this is a matter of the client, but Tweetbot lets me see exactly what I want, and nothing more.
    • AndrewBissell 5y ago
      Yeah I exclusively use lists for this reason. Any time I take a look at my main feed or the curated psyops in the "Trending" column it does strike me as a horrorshow though.
    • jonny_eh 5y ago
      > Again, maybe this is a matter of the client, but Tweetbot lets me see exactly what I want, and nothing more. The official Twitter client allows this again now too (but with ads). You need to select "See latest tweets instead" at the top of Home.
      • peakaboo 5y ago
        Your wording "allows" is exactly what people dont like about these tech companies. They are not real authorities on the Internet. If they left, the internet would improve a thousand times.
• zzzbra 5y ago
  I think part of the problem today with individuals trying to figure out how to moderate their social media usage is that it's not clear what specifically within social media constitutes harm. Is it the like/upvote mechanism? Hacker News would constitute harmful social media in that case. But what might be lost is a powerful lever for democratic input in terms of content curation and moderation. My vote for what's more harmful is the scroll. I have a web extension that just removes the scroll on my Facebook feed. A few months after setting it up I all but stopped using Facebook, checking in once maybe every two months to visit folks individually. I haven't done this for Twitter or IG, but then the quality of my main feed is such that I don't want to remove it outright and want that aggregation of content, somehow. I think that scrolling in general is harmful as a UX pattern, but the obvious alternative of pagination could create all kinds of complexities around deep-linking and fragmentation of content. All the same I'd love to see more platforms adopt this intentional cap on content associated with a given URL. It turns my engagement with content online from scanning to actual reading.
  • syshum 5y ago
    >>Is it the like/upvote mechanism? Yes. This is what created the validation feedback loop, and what generally causes the social harm The like button, and the variations on it is IMO the biggest problem with social media Forums and other discussion boards did not have these problems and while you could have "flame war" that involved actual argumentation back and forth not 1000's of passive visitors choosing to upvote, or downvote on a post with no argumentation
    • godshatter 5y ago
      I would place more emphasis on the downvote button causing most of the harm. If you post something, and it doesn't get up-voted, that's less of a hit than posting something and having it be actively downvoted. One is a statement that no one found it interesting enough to vote up, the other is a way of saying that kind of content isn't desired here. I'm guessing it's the downvotes that cause people to leave, leaving an echo chamber in their wake. Upvotes can lead to karma farming, and the need to see that number of likes go up can be a problem I admit. I just think the echo chamber effect is a worse problem. We've all dealt with fragile egos and boisterous idiots before. I miss the days where you weren't shunned for wrong-think, just argued with constantly if your opinion differed from the norm.
• harmeswoul12 5y ago
  I strictly use social media for only about 30 minutes. I divide them into three uses. In that way, I can check out what's happening with my friends and on the internet while not taking too much of our time.
• clircle 5y ago
  In reality, when people quit social media, they don't start using their time better, they mostly shift their time into different time waster websites. For example, people quit using facebook for 2 hours a day just start skimming reddit for 2 hours a day. They aren't going to start writing a book or bettering themselves in some way.
  • syshum 5y ago
    That has been my pattern, I will find a different time suck. Leave Reddit, come to HN, leave HN, play a new video game, stop playing a video game, binge watch a tv show. Never anything productive
    • tqi 5y ago
      I think that it is a trap to feel like all time needs to be productive. Not only is it an unachievable ideal, it also makes time spent doing "unproductive" stuff less restorative.
    • Igelau 5y ago
      I'd argue that's still an improvement. With the video game and the TV show your are focused on the appreciation of an art form. Granted, you're not strolling the halls of the Louvre or something, but it is art. Time doesn't have to be spent productively to be time well spent. When my third child was born and I took leave, I was spending a ton of time on Facebook. One day I put the phone down and realized I couldn't remember a single thing I'd been looking at the past two hours. If you can at least remember what you saw it's a major improvement.
    • giantrobot 5y ago
      If you enjoyed the things you did why the fuck do they need to be productive? No one needs to be "productive" 100% of the time.
    • thethethethe 5y ago
      This may be true, but being productive doesn't necessarily need to be your goal here. Maybe using social media as entertainment had negative effects on your mental health that playing a video game doesn't.
• deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
• enos_feedler 5y ago
  “ We persuade our minds that liking pictures and joining virtual groups gives us a sense of belonging. Connection with others” Except in many cases its not persuasion. Joining groups actually does give us these things. My gf is part of “bay area moms” group and the amount of useful tips she gets out of participating in that is significant. Or “bay area hikers” for me. Also, if i want to sell something, I hire facebook to find a buyer for my old ipad or iphone. Social media has caught on to the jobs framework. Jack Dorsey references it directly on Twitter earnings calls. He says we need to fill more jobs for more people. He constantly asks what can people hire twitter for? I think to reduce social media to some of the crappy jobs it does serve artificially diminishes what it can be.
  • dfmooreqqq 5y ago
    > I think to reduce social media to some of the crappy jobs it does serve artificially diminishes what it can be. I agree completely with this. The article takes two bad parts of social media and assumes that those are the only uses for it. You've mentioned more. There's also keeping connected in a group context with family and friends that are scattered across the globe. I have an active family group in which my family shares pictures of nephews/nieces, vacation, and more - all stuff that helps keep us close when we can't see each other for long periods of time. I have an active friend group with my college roommates that does the same - when one of them discovered that his spouse was having an affair, we could all support him together.
    • barbs 5y ago
      I agree as well. Those two use-cases for using Facebook don't seem to apply to me. Here's what I use it for: - Local community groups - I have a few groups localised for my suburb and surrounds, specifically "good karma" groups which are for people asking for/offering help. I'm also part of volunteer organisations and specific interest groups that post updates. - Buying/selling, both on the marketplace and groups specific for certain things. - Events. Useful for keeping up-to-date with event information, offering lifts to places and buying/selling tickets. - Chat. Both with my friends and certain chat groups and also being able to contact people within my network quickly and easily. I rarely if ever post anything on my profile, and I block the News Feed with plugins/extensions to avoid the infinite scroll. Granted, a lot of these things could be replaced with other services out there. I'm aware of the privacy concerns and the UI/UX is getting worse over time. I hate Facebook, but the community and people I want to access all use it, so I don't really have a choice if I want to keep in touch. To claim that people only use social media to seek validation or because your life is so mediocre that you need to consume the best moments of other people's lives, strikes me as a bit out-of-touch and arrogant.
• milirera 5y ago
  Imagine how our life will look like with the extra hours we spend on social media? Maybe we can become productive enough and finish something that we always wanted.
• deleted 5y ago
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• bena 5y ago
  Man, the time before social media must have been glorious indeed. It seems that before social media people were engaged and productive and attentive and whatever. Wait. MySpace was founded in 2003, twitter in 2006, Facebook in 2004, etc. I was an adult by then. I grew up before social media. And yeah, people are more or less still people. Those 20 reasons are a wishlist. They're the same 20 things we always promise ourselves every single day after we spent the previous day failing to achieve those 20 things. I'm not saying there aren't problems with social media, but let's not pretend we'll all become ubermensch if we all log off of twitter.
• clepto 5y ago
  I have not used Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, etc etc for the last 10+ years. There wasn’t really an event or a moment where I said “I’m quitting social media”, rather I just sort of faded out of it. I do browse Reddit and occasionally comment on something, or here on HN, so I still see things like Twitter posts frequently and keep up with things through some of those channels. When I say I don’t use social media, I mean it directed more towards the kind of posting what I made for dinner so my friends can comment on it use case. I think our society is heavily focused on social media and it’s become an integral part of staying informed and up to date. For that reason, I do check on certain people’s Twitter from time to time, or look at some replies to a tweet that was linked to from an article or something, what’s troublesome to me is that I can’t do almost any of this without signing up. I have more of a problem with it in regards to Twitter, as that has seemingly become the nearly exclusive place for a lot of prominent figures(including elected officials, high profile CEOs, etc) to give updates. Creating this walled garden feels like an attempt to limit access to information that is intended to be publicly available, and at this point my unwillingness to create an account is stemming more from my disdain for this practice than my desire to “quit social media”.
• paulpauper 5y ago
  The biggest problem with twitter is low engagement. You can comment on popular stories and likely no one will see or engage at all. Same for sending direct messages or replying. Much of twitter is just a few thousand big accounts doing all the broadcasting.
• ahmaman 5y ago
  Good points and personally relate to some of these benefits. I try to keep my social media minimal. No Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Reddit, etc... At times has been difficult to use social media in moderation. Feels like I am competing with an Olympic champion in their own sport. With that said, here some things that I found helpful: - Never social media apps on my phone (no email either). - Only access social media via laptop/desktop. - Use services like Mailbrew to follow Youtube channels I want to follow (very few). - Never save my session, always enter the credentials every time I want to check social media. I do however follow Twitter & HN. More like a passive user.
  • ahmaman 5y ago
    For those of you who have successfully minimized social media in their life. Where does you go for real conversations on the internet? I sometimes use Twitter for that but feels like the ratio of noise vs. signal is too high!
  • jancsika 5y ago
    With that said, here some things that I found helpful: - Never do cocaine straight out of my pocket. - Only do cocaine in a restroom using the bag inside my valise, or on the mirrored table in my living room. - only buy cocaine from a dealer who I trust, or dealers who that dealer trusts. - when sharing cocaine with others in the restroom, don't tell them personal information about myself.
  • pknomad 5y ago
    I think COVID lockdown made keeping social media usage to a minimum really difficult. I noticed that I started to watch chatting streams on Twitch as a crutch for not being able to socialize outside. Socializing over a video call with your friends are also difficult because you're not left with much topics to talk about.
    • ahmaman 5y ago
      Indeed, for me it was podcasts…Found myself listening to way too many podcasts just to pass time!
• Igelau 5y ago
  11 seems like "I'm no longer addicted to smoking, but I do smoke sometimes".
  • wowaname 5y ago
    People can use things occasionally without having an addiction that impacts their lives.
• m1117 5y ago
  I think the best way to quit social media is to make people more social in real life.
• 8589934591 5y ago
  I have an account on Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Reddit, and many more, but I don't use them actively or passively. Maybe the occasional browsing. On facebook I made it a point to unfollow all friends so that my newsfeed is blank at any point of time. When I did this initially a few years back I felt.. weird. But I got used to it and now I visit once in a while for the facebook groups. After that I don't end up spending time on FB. For quora after I blocked a majority of tags/topics, the feed was cleaner, but it got boring to be a passive consumer. Similarly for Twitter, I blocked a lot of topics/tags/people and followed a certain few which has made it easier to scroll twitter once in a while. I have an app (StayFree) on android which calculates the time spent on each app. When I see it now for the last 7 months, I see I have used it for 185 hours, of which 40 hours are on reddit. With whatsapp at 11 hours, the rest of the apps are below 8 hours of usage. I also have trackercontrol which blocks the trackers in my phone. In my browser I have ActivityWatch which shows HN is my most visited apart from the occasional reddit. For me, the benefits of being a part of these social media comes after investing the time to filter and refine my experience. That does take time. Overall I feel my experience with social media has been better, I'm able to interact with people around the world and learn and ask questions. I dunno if I've turned these evil entities (social media) into my friends. Maybe off topic, does having an account on these social media sites / apps on phone be harmful in any way when you don't consume it that much? If yes then what sort of harm does it have? Is it mitigated by having trackercontrol? What evil happens if tracking my account gives these companies nothing but close to 0 activity? Are there others like me here?
  • nobody9999 5y ago
    >Maybe off topic, does having an account on these social media sites / apps on phone be harmful in any way when you don't consume it that much? For me, it's not about harm to me. It's that I despise the business models of those companies. So I voted with my (lack of) attention because I don't want to be responsible for generating any revenue for those rapacious scumbags. I certainly don't push others to get off those platforms, but I choose to live my values and don't support them. It was never about trying to limit my time on such websites (those phone apps are just poorly implemented interfaces to the existing web platform), rather it was about what sorts of businesses I (don't) wish to support. I'm glad you found your sweet spot with that. Mine is altogether elsewhere.
• m0ngr31 5y ago
  I have quit all social media except for HN and Reddit. Although on Reddit I just use a burner account for comments and I have a cron job that deletes all my comments/submissions at 5PM every day so I'm not providing any value to the site. Has helped me wean off of just endless scrolling. I only use it about 15 minutes a day now.
  • devmunchies 5y ago
    I found reddit worse than twitter as far as self esteem and group think. Reddit's downvoting is used as punishment for not being "bubbly" (don't know how else to describe the reddit vibe) enough. I do think a feed of programming posts would be nice but I don't want to visit that site.
    • m0ngr31 5y ago
      I haven't experienced self esteem issues on Reddit, but the group think problem is one of the biggest issues I have with the platform.
  • fossuser 5y ago
    Yeah - the lack of retention control on these platforms makes me hesitant to use them. For Twitter there are third party sites that make it easy to remove old tweets, but it's nearly impossible to remove likes (you have to start a process with their DPO office and then manually remove them in 3k batches and they have to reload them after each). Reddit is tedious in that you have to do it one by one, there are some scripts to assist (if you edit and clear first it actually removes the comment content they have saved in their DB, but I didn't know this at the time). FB was also extremely tedious - there's a third party plugin that removes things one by one from the UI of the activity log, but the activity log barely works and fails to load often. It took months of rerunning it to clear out the history. I get why a forum like reddit or HN doesn't want to allow deletion since it removes value from the forum, but FB should really make it easier. In theory account deletion removes it, but I'm not sure what that looks like on the backend. You can request the data from FB and see it (including details about what profiles you looked at, images you loaded, etc.). I've reduced down to HN, reddit (a bit), and Twitter without likes. I reject new social apps where I don't have control over my content.
• devmunchies 5y ago
  many of these are problems social media on smart phones. the convenience and presence of an internet device is an irresistible entrapment.
  • Saptarishi 5y ago
    Agree with this. Smartphones have enabled profligation of low effort posts and comments, emotional outbursts and mood based content. This sort of direct or indirect attention grabbing content which is more often than not extremely unhealthy for society gets pushed up by people, because it satisfies our primal dopamine instincts. As communities get larger and harder to moderate, more and more people assume it is the status quo to create such unhealthy content, and because of smartphones, it is extremely easy to push up such content, and those who werent originally into this also get dragged in. On an aside, is it really ethical for a company to make insane amounts of profit for being a platform which enables people to bicker, fight and create echo chambers? Agreed that not all social media communities are like this, but even so, is it fair?
• sailorganymede 5y ago
  Personally, I use social media as a way for inspiration. As an artist, I’m always curious about a new style or something I’ve never seen before. Social media does a good job curating it so I can explore my hobby more . Don’t feel that this is covered well here.
• hourislate 5y ago
  The mindset of someone who would willingly engage in social media (reddit, insta, FB, TikTok, etc) is the real crux of all of this. The need for attention, validation, to fit in, and be seen fitting it. It encourages the worst traits of old internet forums. The upvote system is a compounding factor on all of this because it gives direct feedback. Violating the group think is instantly punished. Conforming to the group think is instantly rewarded. They are thereby programmed to attempt to appease the group constantly. They live for the rush of validation and dopamine when the upvotes start ticking. This shit becomes such a powerful feedback loop that they really have no grasp on reality at all. I've had the misfortune of talking to some IRL hardcore redditors face to face. They're socially inept in an entirely unique way. They're capable of basic social graces that an actual mentally ill people aren't, but they still lack critical self awareness. They don't know how to differentiate between the internet and real life. They're gullible and will believe anything even if it's half way agreeable to them. Its tragic, they're virtually lobotomized. Genuine NPCs.
• sneak 5y ago
  Quitting social media is more than unfollowing: it's deleting your accounts on the social media services so you are uncontactable via them.
• jensensbutton 5y ago
  Honestly this seems like an argument to quit everything _except_ facebook. For me, fb is the only social media built to enhance relationships with your real friends.
  • skadamat 5y ago
    Messaging apps maybe, but Facebook? I think once FB started to put news and content from people you don't know alongside content from people you know / care about, IMO they stopped making this a priority
• kyle-rb 5y ago
  Maybe I'm not the typical user here, but I don't have most of the problems described in this post. I use Twitter somewhat heavily, but I just use it to post jokes, and mostly follow people who use Twitter the same way. It's definitely a time-sink, and to some degree the "fake sense of belonging", so I'm being less social irl. But I don't think I can blame the second point entirely on Twitter, and I think I'm ok with the tradeoff of Twitter being a time-sink in exchange for the entertainment it provides me. So imo, the solution to around 30% of these problems is just not to follow the "Jim just purchased a BMW" people.
  • anaphor 5y ago
    They're presenting a bit of a false dichotomy. You can use social media and still be sane, you just have to have some amount of self awareness so the troubling aspects don't affect you as much.
• Qi_ 5y ago
  I have a problem with the way the author frames social media. I seem to not clearly fall into either the observer or validator camp. I generally use social media as a way to try to add value to others through comments. I care less about the actual content and more about the discussion around the content. Thus, a lot of the author’s points are irrelevant to me because I see social media as an uplifting, positive thing. Why would I then want it gone from my life?
• cblconfederate 5y ago
  I think the eternal september has become so deep that social media lose its value. Pure mobs don't work, and regulated mobs don't scale. People can get addicted to counting their 'likes' for so long, after that they realize it's a rigged, impossible game. Upvotes are not the way forward, and that puts an end to social media based on pure popularity.
• dhosek 5y ago
  One of the arguments for social media is that it keeps you in touch with friends you've lost touch with. Except, that there's probably a good reason you've lost touch with a lot of those people. What Facebook showed me was how racist and vulgar most of the people I went to school with are. Better to just see them once every ten years at a reunion event where people are on their best behavior than to have to face it every day.
• OliverJones 5y ago
  Here's another reason to quit social media: the lords of the engagement economy make money off "mimetic desire" -- off your envy of me and my envy of you. The more anxious they can make me and you about measuring up to each other, the more money they make. That's evil. Some might say it's demonic. Here's a writeup. https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v39/n16/john-lanchester/you-are-the-product https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v39/n16/john-lanchester/you-... (Said he, writing on the Hacker News social media network :-)
• goofballlogic 5y ago
  I enjoy social media and use it to exchange information, observe trends in culture, and as a communication channel when convenient.
  • thehappypm 5y ago
    Same. I like it for the funny memes, learning news, seeing what my friends are up to. I don't see it as particularly sinister or anything. I certainly don't think of it as an escape from a "mediocre" life.
  • quest88 5y ago
    Agreed. I curated my friends and family and who I follow and now it's more pleasant to use.
• risedotmoe 5y ago
  I’ve limited my social media to a group chat with friends, an entertainment website with discussion, and an informative website with discussion (HN) I’m no longer absorbed in sensationalist media and I’m no longer angry about some flavor of the week topic. I don’t see ads anymore and I’ve been a lot happier since. Now I can work towards minimizing other unproductive and unfulfilling screen time.
• nrvn 5y ago
  I have a question: before “social” “media” became a thing we* all had been using various irc chats, forums and theme websites of all kinds. There has always been all kinds of drama, addiction, obsession, love and hatred. But I can’t stop thinking that modern websites just monetize by growing the userbase. This model kills creativity and we are juste cattle for them to feed us with some bullshit. And some random guy nowadays instead of registering a domain name and creating a bunch of html pages to share his thoughts and observations no matter how weird and awkward or enlightening they are, just a small comfort zone in the neverending blizzard of data traffic - this guy will go create a facebook/instagram/youtube/etc. page, get all sorts of rage and ignorance, get kicked by violating some stupid ToC rule of the bespoke “social” “media”. Long gone the times when internet was a place where you could stumble upon something really touching. There are nice places to visit but google favors to show crap on its first couple of search results pages nowadays * Well, by “we” I mean to say people born before 1990 probably
  • mulmen 5y ago
    Social media is one more day in the Eternal September. I disagree you can’t stumble on great content though. This website itself is an example. There’s more crap being published but the Internet has been too big to consume in it’s entirety for decades now. You have to learn to filter.
• secondcoming 5y ago
  Social media is addictive but dangerous. I retire my username every couple of months or so. Internet points don't matter.
• pelagicAustral 5y ago
  I was reluctant but, since quitting all traditional social media other than imageboards I feel like my online life is much less toxic. Which is ironic considering the type of verbal abuse one is to tolerate from said websites...
• spentrent 5y ago
  #3: Your old-ass relatives are on Facebook and they want to see your kids. Def feel a validation dopamine fix from engagement...but it's not the only factor. (This is why I love Tinybeans and hope it rockets. It's like Instagram but for sharing family pics.)
  • wintermutestwin 5y ago
    Funny that you can join Tinybeans through FB. They say they don't sell your data, but I couldn't figure out the monetization strategy.
    • deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
  • kkodaxeroo 5y ago
    I am worried about the babies who show up on Tinybeans. Indoctrinated into Instagram culture from the instant of their birth, from before they even knew how to think or talk. Later on they'll be able to see thousands and thousands of pictures of themselves as a baby, which will surely do something warped to their young fragile egos. "The Internet? Why yes, I know all about it --- that is where all the pictures of ME are stored!" Wasn't there some big reason that children under thirteen weren't allowed to have a Facebook account?
• EasyTiger_ 5y ago
  Firmly believe what’s ruined social media is special interest groups and the rest parading as people like you and me. My evidence for this is the overnight take-over of r/politics in 2016 and the subsequent introduction of extremely divisive talking points which eventually transformed it into the glorified hate-site it is today. YES I’m bitter, Reddit before then got me through some tough times.
  • deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  • poisonarena 5y ago
    I also noticed this. I recommend /r/geopolitics its heavily modded to prevent this kind of stuff
  • bserge 5y ago
    Well, judging by the extremely racist and most often dumb as hell /r/Europe, the racist and self-hating r/ukpolitics and the racist, smug and self-important r/germany, it's people who ruined social media. And the Internet, for that matter. Let in too many idiots and everything turns into Idiocracy.
    • jhpankow 5y ago
      The eternal September continues.
    • rootusrootus 5y ago
      While it is not conducive to monetizing a platform, maybe we should have forums which are arbitrarily limited to a manageable number of people. r/politics claims to have 7.7M subscribers. That defies common sense. And 30K people online right now. Even if these numbers are inflated, they're completely nuts. It seems inevitable that when you put that many people in a room, the crazy ones take over.
      • bserge 5y ago
        I actually entertain a similar idea often. A service with a limited number of customers/clients/subscribers. Enough for the developer(s) to make a living and provide quality. It very much goes against common business sense, though.
• whiddershins 5y ago
  Social media allows lobbyist groups and foreign powers (not to mention domestic intelligence agencies) to continually modulate public discussion, opinion, and perception. The Overton Window is completely influenceable by these groups. What a truly terrible idea.
• rpmisms 5y ago
  Quitting Facebook has been one of the most positive experiences of my life. I still use Instagram, Snapchat, and Twitter, but the mildly anonymous aspects of those platforms mean that I use them for what I want to use them for, not as an extension of my life. HN is social media too, lest you forget.
  • fortuna86 5y ago
    > HN is social media too, lest you forget. Is it if you don't know a single person here? That's more a message board, no?
• butterfi 5y ago
  I checked out after the first few paragraphs because his viewpoint is so b&w. I'm either using social media for validation or as an observer, because apparently I'm shallow and needy. This is such a broad generalization that I don't feel the need to read further, even though I generally agree that social media is a problem. Cynicism isn't how to start that conversation.
• ALittleLight 5y ago
  I'm sure there are reasons to quit social media but this essay seems hyperbolic. I use social media because I like to see photos and read updates about my friends and family. That strikes me as a pretty normal and healthy use for it. My wife's Instagram account is a collection of all the cookies and cakes she's baked. She follows other Instagramers who do they the same thing and they inspire each other to make different kinds of things or with different ingredients. Again, seems like a perfectly valid use of social media (though probably not healthy for me). The author also seems to look down on people with "average lives" like that was a bad thing. Assuming life quality is a normal distribution, most people will lead average-ish lives. Many people will lead worse than average lives. There's nothing wrong with that.
• nonbirithm 5y ago
  > After the habit of scrolling and liking wears off, you suddenly find yourself in a joyful place. A quieter, calmer, less demanding place where you don’t want to know what others are doing. You focus on what you want to do. But what if you don't know what you want to do? I feel like this post was written from the perspective of someone who already has their own life goals sorted out, and social media was clearly acting as an obstacle to accomplishing those well-defined goals, so they dropped social media. But when you're on your own, it is not a given that you have everything figured out and all you need to do is give yourself a lot of free time and just do what you want. The void that remains is exactly the kind that social media is designed to fill for many people. That kind of feeling almost legitimizes the concept of FOMO, because at a certain point you cannot imagine how anything you're doing could be more interesting than the things that other people are moving forward with in their lives. You want to aspire to be something, and looking for someone else to copy would mean you at least have some kind of aspiration to work towards, instead of nothing at all. Social media is a net negative overall, but once it's out of the picture you have to work on yourself, and in that domain there are no easy answers.
  • ipaddr 5y ago
    That void is important because it allows you to find what you really want. Social media is better than drinking.
    • eloff 5y ago
      It's not a void though. It's a distraction. And as much as I dislike the evils that come with alcohol (not in a religious sense, just the problems it causes), at least you get out and interact with real people.
  • verisimi 5y ago
    "you have to work on yourself, and in that domain there are no easy answers." I couldn't agree more. But, if you step back, its a pretty easy resolution.. Do you want to be endlessly troughing at stupid cat pictures, or do you want to make the attempt to understand what you want, why you are here, and what you need to do? Most people won't take the first step, ever.
• mark_l_watson 5y ago
  While in principle I agree with so much that the author has said,I think they miss a large advantage of social media,at least for my digital life: I am an author and I use social media to advertise my writing. I also run across cool tech, and I share that. I also use Twitter as a source of links to reading material and open source projects. I use https://freedom.to https://freedom.to to only allow access to social media during a few short pre-specified times during the day.
• wowaname 5y ago
  Your site blocks read-only access via Tor with a CAPTCHA.
• mark_l_watson 5y ago
  I don't much like sharing personal fun life events with pictures and a lot of detail on social media. As an example, my family just went on a cruise to celebrate my Dad's 100th birthday (yay Dad!). I posted a very short text message on Facebook and Twitter after the fact. What I did do was create a private photo and video slideshow that I shared with about 15 family members and about 25 friends. In comparison my Brother was frequently posting pictures and text to Facebook during the trip. To be honest, a few friends in real life mentioned that they liked seeing pictures of my wife and I that my brother posted. Anyway, to me, sharing means more when done directly, and instead of getting Facebook likes and a few comments, I had about 15 people respond with more meaningful emails, with a few private conversations starting.
  • nso95 5y ago
    This is why Google+ Circles were cool
• andreyk 5y ago
  All things in moderation! As others on here have said, I think social media use has various benefits - I've discovered lots of interesting papers and researchers on Twitter, come across life updates on FB, scroll through cool photos on Instagram. Yes it can be bad, so like many other things that can be bad, it's a matter of using it mindfully. This binary use/don't use mentality seems rather simplistic to me.
• not2b 5y ago
  This article seems to miss that a number of people use groups on social media to organize activities in real life and keep in touch with family, and the nontechnical friends and family aren't up to the task of building their own solutions for this. For these uses it isn't a substitute for a fulfilling life but rather a help. And unfortunately network effects often mean that the only effective option is to use a service that most people are on.
• mmaunder 5y ago
  I've written a few posts of my own like this. My biggest win in terms of SM strategy has been to actually get back on to SM to build an audience, and to schedule posts. I use Hootsuite to schedule Instagram posts over a month in advance. It's transformative in terms of user experience. I totally forget I have an SM presence because it's on autopilot. And when I do post, I don't have the constant engagement hooks confronting me that Instagram has. Instead I'm using the hootsuite calendar to just schedule stuff, and then leave it alone. I don't work for Hootsuite and I'm sure there are plenty of other options. Also, it's not free, so there's that. But it works for me.
• fungiblecog 5y ago
  "Or, the tendency to avoid fixing your unpleasant reality by doing something about it instead of participating in the fantasy world of social media." The reality is that a lot of people don't have the wherewithal to "fix their unpleasant reality". Hence drugs and alcohol, daytime TV, and various other kinds of destructive escapes from reality exist. Social media is just the latest one.
• filmgirlcw 5y ago
  I would take this more seriously if this person wasn’t hocking a $150 a year book summary service and a twice-monthly newsletter. I’m not shading the hustle, you do you, but it just feels weird to advocate cutting out social media in your life, yet actively asking people to pay you with their attention and money to hear your thoughts and feelings. His first theoretical reason for using social media, for validation, seems to be what he’s after with his summary service and newsletter. Like, why write this blog at all if you aren’t after the validation? There is nothing wrong with wanting to connect with others, and this idea that only in-person connections and friendships matter is really absurd. If social media or anything else is causing more harm than good, I say stop doing it. Even if quitting is hard. Don’t invest more into something than you get out of it, is something I firmly support. I have essentially stopped using Facebook because of that, but I recognize that for many people, quitting Facebook would have a negative impact on their life because they get more out of it than they put into it. Still, I can’t get behind the whole “you should quit becusss x, y, z” thing. Like, as much as I like to rip on social media (especially Twitter), my life has been changed and enhanced and is demonstrably and unquestionably better because of social media. I realize that isn’t the case for everyone, but for me, it is. I use what has a positive impact on my life and don’t use what doesn’t, the same as with anything else.
  • 3grdlurker 5y ago
    Technically what you’re doing is ad hominem—invalidating the arguments of the post by attacking what the author does for a living. It’s not even necessary that someone who makes (possibly extra) money publishing insights is out for validation—there really are just people who are willing to pay for insights and he’s simply fulfilling a demand. Anything else beyond seeing what he does as simply business is pure speculation.
    • filmgirlcw 5y ago
      I disagree. It’s not an ad hominem because I’m not attacking what he does for money, as a side hustle or otherwise, or him as a person. I hope he is successful. What I am doing is pointing out the hypocrisy in an argument that puts all social media usage into two buckets (with zero nuance), with one of them being about validation, in a post and in a platform where the author is seeking validation himself. The critique is squarely at the argument, not the person.
• watertom 5y ago
  I didn’t know there was a reason to be on social media.
• iambozdar 5y ago
  He is co-founder of a baby boy. Those who are not, must be feeling unworthy now. He is a professional "book summarizer" too. I feel like a professional commentator now.
• ggm 5y ago
  Is HN "social media" ?
  • deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
• b0tzzzzzzman 5y ago
  Quit. But does HN qualify as social media?
• TedShiller 5y ago
  It would be easier to make a list of why NOT TO QUIT social media, because it would be a much shorter (or even empty) list.
• dredmorbius 5y ago
  An interesting list, though I feel it omits the elephant in the room: In becoming the largest single media platform ever, operating at fantastic scope, speed, and with the ability to selectively filter and focus attention, today's social media platform monopolies have also become the heart of epistemic warfare. This isn't simply a room with a few friends, it is a substantial fraction of everyone (2--3 billion-with-a-B monthly average users) on the same place at more or less the same time. The Facebook logo is among the most reproduced and seen icons anywhere, rivaling the Cross, the Crescent, the Dollar, and the Yuan. As my friend Wooze pointed out a few years ago: Our present epistemic systems are undergoing kind of the same shock that the online community underwent when transitioning from BBSs and Usenet to the commercial web to social media. We were used to a very high content-to-BS ratio because it took a certain amount of intelligence and intense domain-interest for people to be there in the first place -- and we've now transitioned to a situation where many people are there more or less accidentally and (the worst part), because of a high percentage of the population being present, there is now substantial power to be had by influencing the discussions that take place. https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/5wg0hp/when_epistemic_systems_gain_social_and_political/ https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/5wg0hp/when_ep... This is far more the case than any lunchroom, cafe, street corner, agora, or meeting hall. Assembled audiences have value, and that value is in manipulating them. Usually not in their own interest. And usually by multiple different third parties, each with its own motives. That resulting dissonance is itself mind-warping in is effects. It also has profoundly dislocating and disruptive effects, in the worst possible way, on entire nations and cultures. A related question is "What makes an information regime oppressive vs. liberalising?" https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/6b32jo/what_makes_an_information_regime_oppressive_vs/ https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/6b32jo/what_ma...
• siljon 5y ago
  I actively block out content and tell social media platforms what I'm interested in and what I'm not interested in. This have improved my feed a lot and my social media have become a lot more enjoyable. I have considered building a twitter filter program. Where instead of scrolling through endlessly content, where 90% of them isn't even good. I could just ask my twitter filter program to show me the most retweeted content, show person X last tweets, show me the most liked tweets of the people that I follow... etc. This will prevent me from scrolling endlessly, and speed up the process of information gather. Social media if used correctly can have a lot of benefits. But takes some time to build up a good feed.
• winternett 5y ago
  I actually use Social Media to promote my music... The things platforms don't understand is that there are multiple potential uses for social sites. That is why the one script or narrative they create and impose on their user base to manage everyone is severely flawed from the "one platform fits all: model. That's also why tightening moderation and introducing complex protocols for success/productivity/satisfaction/merit/growth over a large user base drives people off of platforms and kills a user base quickly... It's better for social apps to stay relatively small and tight knit. They all grow and wither as monopolies, with no way of returning to the past success as far as I've seen thus far.
• basisword 5y ago
  I find that social media has went in a direction that makes it impossible to curate a 'healthy' feed. The thing that ruins it for me is the constant negativity. Everybody is upset about something. Often, rightly so, but everybody is also extreme in their views. There is never nuance or healthy discussion. Only anger. Even in innocuous things. For example, follow the official account for a sport on Instagram. If you ever wade into the comments it's a cesspit of anger and negativity. Even if you never get involved (I don't ever comment) it effects how you feel. Twitter is the worst offender. I can curate a feed of people I enjoy seeing content from. This should be enough, but these people can retweet things I don't want to see. Fortunately Twitter allows you to disable retweets for people. But...Twitter populates your feed with tweets people you follow have liked or tweets Twitter thinks you might like. The majority of the time these are things I don't want to see that cause negative emotions. It makes Twitter unusable without customisation via Chrome extensions or third party apps. When I look around at my friends, the people that have the least negative outlook on life and seem to be most outgoing and happy are the people that don't actively use social media or who never even signed up. They're the people who don't know what's happening in the news unless there is a major crisis that might actually effect them. It's always hard to know from sure looking in but these people seem to have the right idea. When I look at it objectively, I get absolutely nothing beneficial out of the most popular social media companies (or reading the news constantly). There is something about it all though that makes it really hard to step away. It's FOMO more than addiction. I never last more than a few days, but they're always better days.
  • croutonwagon 5y ago
    > They're the people who don't know what's happening in the news unless there is a major crisis that might actually effect them. To that end its increasingly hard to stay informed and sift through the negativity, even in Journalism. While I havent been on Facebook since 2008 or so, and never signed up for Twitter, i have been on reddit since basically launch and digg before that. I use them less and less becuase, as you point out, it directly correlates to my moods. But moreover, my long term method of staying informed, a highly curated list of RSS feeds, is also hard to maintain and keep a good mood. I find this method preferable because I am less influenced by "popular" talking points and free to make my own assessment. But just the writing is now so biased and negative I find myself cynically reading multiple sources on a single issue and intrinsically distrusting what almost any of them say at their face unless its backed up or said in another source. At the end of the day its time consuming. And I waver between just watching a nightly news that i KNOW is extremely biased or sifting through the trash to "find" what i feel is a more accurate depiction. Of course, this waivers depending on what is occurring. During relative "quiet" times ill watch the news, when large events like the Floyd protests or Afghanistan withdrawal occurs, Ill key into RSS feeds to try and suss out a better picture. That said....there almost always seems to be some major event these days.
• bob229 5y ago
  delete your social media accounts now, twitter facebook et al are a cancer and are destroying humanity
• chkaloon 5y ago
  I've also done the "no-follow" approach. I have a Twitter bookmark folder and a Facebook bookmark folder with bookmarks directly to people or groups I do want to check on. No news feed. Also no ads it turns out!