The Beginning of the End
(NB: This is a post about leaving Facebook)
Up until recently I already had a limited relationship with Facebook. My news feed was muted, and I only occasionally visited feeds of groups of friends, to catch up on news.
In fact, its main purpose was two-fold:
- Actively manage/participate in Events
- Repost my Twitter feed onto Facebook
This automatic re-post used to mean when I logged onto Facebook, my notifications were invariably my friends not on Twitter, posting something in response to my Twitter thoughts. Often fun interactions (as on Twitter).
Facebook have stopped this happening.
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Whilst it would (selfishly) be ‘incredibly convenient’ for those of you that occasionally interact with my Twitter content via Facebook to sign-up to Twitter and follow me, I realise that is an unreasonable ask!
Though, if the urge takes you :D - @IAmNotYetDead
The other purpose I’ve been using Facebook for recently – Events – is a bit more tricky.
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Facebook’s events system is pretty damn good: Assuming the vast majority of your friends are still on Facebook (which, for me, they are), I can co-ordinate things pretty slickly, or be included in events I might be interested in at the click of a button, with no pressure to attend.
Most of these are organisation-driven events (Magic the Gathering local play, Poly social events) – but a significant minority are friends’ social gatherings; BBQs, wedding receptions, LAN parties, house warmings, birthday doodahs – all of these are great things to be invited to, and I fully agree that Facebook is one of the best mediums to co-ordinate these.
So in recent months – maybe a year now? – I’ve initially scaled back my Facebook interaction to basically ‘just events’, similarly helping run the CADS page on Facebook, and – admittedly – focussing my news feed on friend’s business pages I want to support, and posts by my girlfriend.
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Most of these are organisation-driven events (Magic the Gathering local play, Poly social events) – but a significant minority are friends’ social gatherings; BBQs, wedding receptions, LAN parties, house warmings, birthday doodahs – all of these are great things to be invited to, and I fully agree that Facebook is one of the best mediums to co-ordinate these.
So in recent months – maybe a year now? – I’ve initially scaled back my Facebook interaction to basically ‘just events’, similarly helping run the CADS page on Facebook, and – admittedly – focussing my news feed on friend’s business pages I want to support, and posts by my girlfriend.
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But two things that have happened recently are starting to change my mind.
Firstly, Facebook is an advertising/marketing machine – it is a dream gift to companies. I should know – I know how much the company I work for pays to Facebook (and Google – I must also acknowledge the evil I am in bed with) – it is insane.
And despite recent revelations of their data misuse; they are countering this with advertising themselves on UK TV and on billboards across the country, claiming not to be the very thing they are.
But by appealing to the nostalgia of days gone by, when Facebook innocently was about making connections and exploring friendships (okay, so Zuckerberg probably still had one eye on revenue even at the start – but fundamentally it was a force for social improvement) – Facebook are going to keep a lot of their long-term sources of ad-revenue still (psst-that’s you guys!).
Facebook is something that now needs to be ‘maintained’. Both behind-the-scenes – hence costs to run infrastructure via ad selling – but from the user’s perspective also:
Either you just automatically upload everything in your life there – thus making it nigh impossible to simply leave – or you have to constantly monitor your friend’s lives over FOMO, whilst at the same time ensuring your own status/posts doesn’t offend someone who you once met in a pub one time, and they take you out of context. Or something.
And yet people who are embedded into Facebook as part of their lives (and I’m looking at you too Instagram, YouTube, etc. also) will accept the Facebook advert’s version of the truth that ‘they are really looking out for our best interests/privacy etc.’. Which, obviously, is part of the spin.
-
Did you see how I cleverly missed out Twitter and Tumblr from that list? Or hid them away in the ‘etc.’?
Twitter and Tumblr have their own problems, which I don’t have brain space to delve into now.
But there are times when I need a comforting echo chamber, and – because I don’t live with all of my friends – Twitter (and to a lesser extent Tumblr) can give me that.
Twitter can also be my outward stream of consciousness and my way of presenting who I am to the world – without having to give a full anecdotal history of myself in every tweet. I am that person in that moment that made that tweet. I won’t be tomorrow.
I guess the way I look at them both is that because Twitter is just my stream of consciousness, it is my way of engaging with the here and now, without holding the pressure of it forming a complete picture of WHO I AM or WHAT I BELIEVE IN.
Now, I acknowledge that I get targeted advertising based on my tweets, but I can ignore these and keep talking with my followers on there, without feeling my whole existence is being pinned down and held to account.
*something something about the devil convincing the world he doesn’t exist*
Also, it’s not like someone is going to go back through my Twitter history one day, dig up some tweets out of temporal context, and tray and get me fired from an unrelated job, right??
Tumblr, on the other hand, is the very platform where I posted this original article. It is where all of my main thoughts sit; on a less-breachable blog platform than my previous blog used to be.
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Oh I said two things that have recently happened to change my mind about Facebook.
The second is my tweets are no longer cross-posting from Twitter to Facebook.
I’ve kinda covered why I’m okay with Twitter and Facebook feels superfluous to that – but to remove the mechanism for cross-platform communication just seems selfish on Facebook’s part and – I’m sure – profit-orientated in the long-term: They’ve got to maintain it’s current users base, as no-one younger is joining. And to be valued so high in a market they made up – they’ve got to convince their shareholders that people still use Facebook. So start by giving people FOMO. Make sure they post directly on Facebook, rather than allowing other media to cross-post. I’m sure Tumblr’s cross-posting will go next, if it hasn’t already.
-
So what is the point of this overly-dramatically-titled post?
Well, I’m leaving Facebook (duh!).
Or at least, I’m beginning that process.
Here’s the next steps:
Which, ironically, is a date in time when a new project I am working on begins {and may be harder to talk about without the sharing mechanism of Facebook!}. It will be unlike anything I have done before, and I don’t thin has been heard of either.
More on that later – though obviously, not on Facebook…
-
For those of you reading this on Facebook – I genuinely hope we can stay in touch somehow. But – if it isn’t to be, and this is the end of our journey – I wish you nothing but peace.
And here, for sentimental reasons; is an overly dramatic piece of music to close out this chapter.
If you would prefer something less melodramatic, I offer up this:
Peace out!
Firstly, Facebook is an advertising/marketing machine – it is a dream gift to companies. I should know – I know how much the company I work for pays to Facebook (and Google – I must also acknowledge the evil I am in bed with) – it is insane.
And despite recent revelations of their data misuse; they are countering this with advertising themselves on UK TV and on billboards across the country, claiming not to be the very thing they are.
But by appealing to the nostalgia of days gone by, when Facebook innocently was about making connections and exploring friendships (okay, so Zuckerberg probably still had one eye on revenue even at the start – but fundamentally it was a force for social improvement) – Facebook are going to keep a lot of their long-term sources of ad-revenue still (psst-that’s you guys!).
Facebook is something that now needs to be ‘maintained’. Both behind-the-scenes – hence costs to run infrastructure via ad selling – but from the user’s perspective also:
Either you just automatically upload everything in your life there – thus making it nigh impossible to simply leave – or you have to constantly monitor your friend’s lives over FOMO, whilst at the same time ensuring your own status/posts doesn’t offend someone who you once met in a pub one time, and they take you out of context. Or something.
And yet people who are embedded into Facebook as part of their lives (and I’m looking at you too Instagram, YouTube, etc. also) will accept the Facebook advert’s version of the truth that ‘they are really looking out for our best interests/privacy etc.’. Which, obviously, is part of the spin.
-
Did you see how I cleverly missed out Twitter and Tumblr from that list? Or hid them away in the ‘etc.’?
Twitter and Tumblr have their own problems, which I don’t have brain space to delve into now.
But there are times when I need a comforting echo chamber, and – because I don’t live with all of my friends – Twitter (and to a lesser extent Tumblr) can give me that.
Twitter can also be my outward stream of consciousness and my way of presenting who I am to the world – without having to give a full anecdotal history of myself in every tweet. I am that person in that moment that made that tweet. I won’t be tomorrow.
I guess the way I look at them both is that because Twitter is just my stream of consciousness, it is my way of engaging with the here and now, without holding the pressure of it forming a complete picture of WHO I AM or WHAT I BELIEVE IN.
Now, I acknowledge that I get targeted advertising based on my tweets, but I can ignore these and keep talking with my followers on there, without feeling my whole existence is being pinned down and held to account.
*something something about the devil convincing the world he doesn’t exist*
Also, it’s not like someone is going to go back through my Twitter history one day, dig up some tweets out of temporal context, and tray and get me fired from an unrelated job, right??
Tumblr, on the other hand, is the very platform where I posted this original article. It is where all of my main thoughts sit; on a less-breachable blog platform than my previous blog used to be.
-
Oh I said two things that have recently happened to change my mind about Facebook.
The second is my tweets are no longer cross-posting from Twitter to Facebook.
I’ve kinda covered why I’m okay with Twitter and Facebook feels superfluous to that – but to remove the mechanism for cross-platform communication just seems selfish on Facebook’s part and – I’m sure – profit-orientated in the long-term: They’ve got to maintain it’s current users base, as no-one younger is joining. And to be valued so high in a market they made up – they’ve got to convince their shareholders that people still use Facebook. So start by giving people FOMO. Make sure they post directly on Facebook, rather than allowing other media to cross-post. I’m sure Tumblr’s cross-posting will go next, if it hasn’t already.
-
So what is the point of this overly-dramatically-titled post?
Well, I’m leaving Facebook (duh!).
Or at least, I’m beginning that process.
Here’s the next steps:
- Note down all my Facebook friends and make sure I have a way of staying in touch, and – if reciprocated – offer an alternative method of contact
- Stop replying to events on Facebook and find an alternative mechanism to confirm attendance (or give my apologies)
- Ensure the CADS Facebook presence can be maintained in my absence
- Remove all personal information on Facebook
- Delete my profile
Which, ironically, is a date in time when a new project I am working on begins {and may be harder to talk about without the sharing mechanism of Facebook!}. It will be unlike anything I have done before, and I don’t thin has been heard of either.
More on that later – though obviously, not on Facebook…
-
For those of you reading this on Facebook – I genuinely hope we can stay in touch somehow. But – if it isn’t to be, and this is the end of our journey – I wish you nothing but peace.
And here, for sentimental reasons; is an overly dramatic piece of music to close out this chapter.
If you would prefer something less melodramatic, I offer up this:
Peace out!
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