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Facebook Is the Junk Food of Socializing (2015)

nautil.us

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Re: Facebook Is the Junk Food of Socializing (2015)

#131

Post by jjeaff »

0xcde4c3db wrote: post #109
Top19 wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is an old joke that Wikipedia doesn’t work in theory but it does in reality. In the same way, Church’s don’t make a lot of sense but they’ve worked for thousands of years. I kind of think of it as a thing like the family, which also doesn’t make sense in some regards, but it’s proven its “value”. I hate using that argument because you could argue for a lot of stupid things that way, but it’s one way of looking…

I feel like you didn't answer the main question. What if I recognize the potential value in all of the things you mention, but don't believe in God and don't want to lie to people about it?

You don't have to lie to people. You can go to church and not believe. I know several people that do that.

So, I'm assuming that you also have some qualms about how Facebook or Google does business?

Does that mean you refuse to use Facebook or Google?

By using commercial services, you are actually supporting them financially. You can go to most any church without donating anything at all.

Re: Facebook Is the Junk Food of Socializing (2015)

#132

Post by Halladie7 »

jamesrcole wrote: post #126
caterama wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having quit Facebook some 4+ years ago, I think about these things too and have come to the conclusion that: a) I don't need to know about the project my distant friend is working on, or the food anyone is making or eating* . b) A solution that existed before Facebook were X-Mas cards. So, I think that's what I'll be doing when I no longer see my parents and close friends daily. * On a side note, my mom calls my gran…

> I don't need to know about ... Surely the question is not about what you absolutely need or not. You could strip you life back to only necessities. Some people might find that fulfilling, but I suspect many wouldn't. I think the question is more of cost/benefit. Do the benefits of something sufficiently outweigh their costs.

As long as you're willing to accept the burdens of using FB as a panopticon. You get the blatant ads, the furtive ads, the manipulative filtering, the spam, the agit-prop. Ma Bell never barged in with a jingle when I used to call my grandmother. There is no cost/benefit analysis here. You can't cast this in a positive light relative to any previous means of social connection. It's absolute shit.

I've come to the conclusion that this round of social media is possibly the worst incarnation of technology in the past 30 years. Hopefully the next version is less shitty.

Re: Facebook Is the Junk Food of Socializing (2015)

#133

Post by jamesrcole »

Halladie7 wrote: post #132
jamesrcole wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't need to know about ... Surely the question is not about what you absolutely need or not. You could strip you life back to only necessities. Some people might find that fulfilling, but I suspect many wouldn't. I think the question is more of cost/benefit. Do the benefits of something sufficiently outweigh their costs.

As long as you're willing to accept the burdens of using FB as a panopticon. You get the blatant ads, the furtive ads, the manipulative filtering, the spam, the agit-prop. Ma Bell never barged in with a jingle when I used to call my grandmother. There is no cost/benefit analysis here. You can't cast this in a positive light relative to any previous means of social connection. It's absolute shit. I've come to the conc…

> There is no cost/benefit analysis here.

You're literally doing a cost/benefit analysis.

You seem to be assuming that such an analysis implies there there has to be substantial benefits, or something like that. (I'm not commenting here on whether they do or don't exist in the case of Facebook)

Re: Facebook Is the Junk Food of Socializing (2015)

#134

Post by godot »

badestrand wrote: post #119
cletus wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately customizing your news feed takes some work. Frankly I'd like a setting that just says I'm not interested in any of the following: - Tag a friend who ... - Quizzes - Inspirational quotes of any kind - Social game results of any kind (or invites for that matter) In my own feed I had a few culprits who were largely responsible for this noise. I think only in one case did I have to resort to unfollow (altho…

> In the right group you may find more sense of community Interesting, but I am not even looking for a community, I just don't want to put a post out there that will be "unsuccessful". It doesn't bother me if I only get a few likes, it bothers me that all my friends see how my post is "failing". I am not in panic but it puts me off from posting. Am I the only one with those thoughts? Facebook without the like mechani…

Have you tried caring less about if you get likes or not, or whether your posts are "successful" or not, and just genuinely share things?

Whatever posts I make on Facebook are usually things I genuinely want to share, whether it's photos while I'm traveling, or link to an article that I find really meaningful. Some people will see it, they might even like it but not press Like, I don't really care. It's something that I wanted to share and I know it reached someone, and that's all I wanted to do. It could be an article that explains really well what Net Neutrality means and why people should care, or it could be an amazing waterfall in Iceland.

Incidentally, I subscribe to certain subreddits about hobby topics (like Dragon Ball Z), and whenever I make posts on them, I (irrationally) care more about how many upvotes (or worse, downvotes) my posts get than I care about my posts' "success" on Facebook. So maybe I do know what you mean, but I see Facebook differently (and more personally and less social-media-y) than everyone else does.

Re: Facebook Is the Junk Food of Socializing (2015)

#136

Post by rock_hard »

codingdave wrote: post #84
rayiner wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The average household in 1985 was watching 7 hours of television per day. I don't imagine that left much time for board games and bike rides.

Why did you ask what people did before Facebook, if your intent was simply try to discredit a genuine response with statistics? Do the math. 17 hours per day with the TV not turned on. And even the hours it was on doesn't mean the whole family was watching. Let also consider how many people watched the news every night, and stayed up for Carson. And an hour of TV after school was probably the norm. Soap operas also w…

Not if you discount 8h for sleeping!

Then you only got 16h left...minus 7h of watching TV leaves 9h...most people work 8h and in 1985 had a 40m or so commute to work...if you are still counting: we just hit about 0!

Sorry...that’s how statistics work. That not to discount cute edge cases of families playing cards with their neighbors and having ice cream...it’s just not the reality for the majority of the population :(

Re: Facebook Is the Junk Food of Socializing (2015)

#137

Post by onboardram »

danschumann wrote: post #78

Several times a day, I spend 5-15 minutes writing a facebook post, and 9/10 times I don't post them. They all seem like too "look at me", or I think the person won't think it's funny or clever. It's a giant waste of time, but I feel better than if I post them(or less bad). Help?

I used to do the same thing over and over, wasting extraordinary amount of time trying to come up with something memetic and charming that would somehow make other people think better of me. I have never been able to pin down why, how or in what way had I wanted them to "think better of me", it was like I had been made to believe in some mandatory social currency that everyone else had and I lacked which could only be gained on Facebook. Also, I was a socially-awkward 17 year old at that time so add in the usual teenage insecurities and vulnerability too.

The only solution I came up with was to quit cold turkey. Fortunately, I also moved to a different city at the same time; so, it was easy psychologically to say good bye to all those connections. It's been more than 5 years and I haven't used Facebook or Twitter since.

It might not be easy for you to do depending on your circumstances and honestly, some times it does lead to trouble when people use Facebook to plan or announce things that I get left out of. I did manage to find a few like minded friends though who don't use it either, so usually it's not that bad.

If you are really serious about this, quitting is the only solution I know of that works.

Re: Facebook Is the Junk Food of Socializing (2015)

#138

Post by kbart »

nordsieck wrote: post #125
morpheuskafka wrote: post #120

Anyone who choses to use FB is just not thinking. I could get joining Instagram, Snapchat, etc b/c of friends. But even if you don't care about privacy, don;t care about algorithms censoring human expression, and don't care about unauthorized physiological experiments to influence your emotions, why would you choose a platform with tons of ads, a terrible UI that fills up timelines with every time someone uploads a n…

> Anyone who choses to use FB is just not thinking. One of the answers to your implied question is events. I belong to one of many, many subcultures who organize almost exclusively through facebook. This one happens to be related to dancing. There are around 5 weekly events held regularly, along with a number regular of monthly-ish classes and around one special event per month held locally. Facebook is just way bett…

How it's better than email list? Getting an email event invitation once in a while looks way better than checking Facebook's spammy notifications every day to see if something is coming up.

Re: Facebook Is the Junk Food of Socializing (2015)

#139

Post by walterstucco »

rayiner wrote: post #42

These articles ignore people’s real alternatives. I’m in my 30s and have a small child. While I love to fly into Chicago or New York for a night of drinking with my still-single friends, that’s not really something I get to do more than once every couple of months. Seeing my wife’s extended family (3,000 miles away in the west coast) is a once every year thing, and seeing my extended family (7,000 miles away in Asia)…

[dead]

Re: Facebook Is the Junk Food of Socializing (2015)

#140

Post by jerrre »

kbart wrote: post #138
nordsieck wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Anyone who choses to use FB is just not thinking. One of the answers to your implied question is events. I belong to one of many, many subcultures who organize almost exclusively through facebook. This one happens to be related to dancing. There are around 5 weekly events held regularly, along with a number regular of monthly-ish classes and around one special event per month held locally. Facebook is just way bett…

How it's better than email list? Getting an email event invitation once in a while looks way better than checking Facebook's spammy notifications every day to see if something is coming up.

I think many people have a more spammy mailbox than their facebook notifications.
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