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I Quit Social Media for a Year

joshcsimmons.com

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Re: I Quit Social Media for a Year

#31

Post by danfang »

rolltiide wrote: post #19
criddell wrote: post #7

> the sole reason I have taken photos is to share them via social media That's quite a realization. I think it's true for a lot of people though and it's part of why people experience the best times of their life through a 6" display.

My experience is that rest of the world has moved on to group chats and sharing a lot there In the US my experience is that tail end millenials and gen Z are gravitating to group chats too. Pretty much just millenials and older and the subset of those with no international friends are the people stuck on the public oversharing train. And some women that could pass in a forever 21 catalogue.

Yeah I totally see this trend too. I think there's a reasonable hybrid model between private group chats and traditional social networking (i.e. photo albums, events, payments, posts, etc).

In fact, I've been working on this idea for a while now and just launched on HN a few hours ago! https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20933272. It's definitely a response to current trends of people leaving social media due to negative effects on social and mental health. I saw this happening to my friend groups first hand and knew something had to change.

Re: I Quit Social Media for a Year

#32

Post by kelnos »

I quit posting and checking Facebook roughly a year ago (I still have an account for event invitations, but I've disabled all other notifications and uninstalled the app). I still have an Instagram account, and page through the feed once or twice a week (in the past, it was usually a few times a day), but I haven't posted in about six months.

I'm less anxious and stressed out, and generally less annoyed at people around me. My initial reason for avoiding FB was because I was tired of being bombarded by rageful posts about politics and social justice issues (regardless of whether or not I agreed with those posts) day in and day out.

On occasion, after asking a friend a specific question about their life, they're surprised I don't know the answer already because they'd posted about it on FB. I then have to explain that I haven't checked FB (aside from events) in a year. No one has even come close to complaining about having to tell me something separately; people generally enjoy talking about themselves, especially when prompted, so that shouldn't be a surprise.

I still take a similar quantity of photos, even though I don't post them anywhere anymore. I do share photos taken during a group activity/trip/outing, but privately, through Google Photos, and only to the people who were there.

When I flip through Instagram, I'm definitely less engaged than I used to be. I don't really comment anymore unless I have something substantive to say/ask, and I usually don't bother to "like" anything.

I have several healthy in-person friend groups, and some remote ones. I hear about what's going on with my friends in person, or via smaller group chats or one-on-one texting. I certainly don't see all the other things my random FB "friends" (at ~1100, of course the majority of them are acquaintances at most) are posting about their lives, but I find I don't really miss it. While it might be a novelty to see what some random old high school or college classmate is doing day-to-day, I'd much rather turn that limited energy and brain space toward my closer friends.

Regarding news, I get a daily politics newsletter in my email inbox, so I can restrict that to a small chunk of time and only pursue things further if I want to. For other types of news, I have to seek it out specifically, which works well for me.

Re: I Quit Social Media for a Year

#33

Post by TallGuyShort »

neon_me wrote: post #11

Interesting, I have noticed ("excuse based") defensive mechanism when it comes to this topic ... most people I have witnessed start to use very poor arguments of why they want to stay on social networks ... very similar to people with "un-noticed" alcohol problem. But yes, nothing magical happend without it. Just maybe realization how stupid it is.

>> Just maybe realization how stupid it is.

This is me and cable TV.

I'm curious what arguments you've heard that you think are stupid.

I like having a way to contact old class-mates, etc. I've moved a lot and feel very sentimental about a lot of old friends. On the other hand, there are other people I'd just as soon never hear from again. I'm torn on this. But it doesn't require me being active on social media anyway - just maintaining the friends list and occasionally messaging people.

I like it as a convenient way to share photos with people who give a crap - siblings like to see their nieces & nephews growing up, and my wife uses ChatBooks heavily. And I get a lot of positive feedback on my humorous posts - which I continue to do for my own ego and because I know other people get value from it.

But beyond that I find Facebook just makes me angry, and I rarely scan my feed and have unfollowed a lot of people who just post crap. I'm curious to hear other reasons I should use it less :)

Re: I Quit Social Media for a Year

#34

Post by muzani »

cm2012 wrote: post #26
muzani wrote: post #20

When I quit I ended up reading books and watching TV for entertainment. I literally read over a million words of fiction (Worm) in one month with the spare time. It was a lot more fulfilling, and I'll remember that time. While in contrast there are few social media moments I'll miss. I had to actually force myself to get back into social media. I'm not sure what the author here means by withdrawal; there was maybe a…

The web serial Worm is amazing. The sequel, Ward, is really far along now and is even better IMO. You can catch up on https://www.parahumans.net/ The HN crowd would probably really like Worm in general. Basically a sci-fi superhero story with realistic uses of powers and complex characters. The protagonist has the powers of insect control and scalable multitasking.

Yeah, I heard about it from HN and glad I did. Might quit Facebook to read Ward.

Re: I Quit Social Media for a Year

#35

Post by danfang »

mlthoughts2018 wrote: post #10

I think this posts discussion of “why do we take photos” is really great and deserves more consideration. I’ve not had any form of social media account for over 8 years and something I notice is that I just take waaay fewer photos than everyone else I know. A few on vacation or when I see something stupid I can turn into a pun or a joke. Seriously maybe 3-5 photos per month. I love living this way and consider it hea…

I actually think there are two main camps here: people who take photos to share to their followers, and people who take photos for their own recollection and to share with the people closest to them (e.g. family photo albums).

I totally agree that the former is toxic and damages our mental health in many ways, like a digital version of smoking and vaping.

I recently launched a tool for our generation to manage and maintain a healthy relationship with social media - it moves away from the current trend of superficiality that exists on FB and IG right now.

I'd super appreciate if you all checked it out and let me know what you think! https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20933272

Re: I Quit Social Media for a Year

#38

Post by denkmoon »

young_unixer wrote: post #27

I used to use Twitter. My country's political news and related commentary usually got me into a mental state of frustration and misanthropy. I deleted Twitter. Political news still frustrate me but I rarely see them anymore. Ignorance is bliss. I've effectively created a safe space where political idiocy can't cognitively harass me. Is it wrong to be so uninformed? I don't know. I think a lot about it and I haven't c…

I did the same, about 18 months ago. It's a definite improvement in my mental health.

I choose not to see it as uninformed, but informed in more focused ways. Most of the news we see doesn't actually matter, there is no action to be taken by the individual. By filtering that out you can focus on things important to you, where you can take action. Family, work, local community if you're inclined.

Re: I Quit Social Media for a Year

#39

Post by mlthoughts2018 »

danfang wrote: post #35
mlthoughts2018 wrote: post #10

I think this posts discussion of “why do we take photos” is really great and deserves more consideration. I’ve not had any form of social media account for over 8 years and something I notice is that I just take waaay fewer photos than everyone else I know. A few on vacation or when I see something stupid I can turn into a pun or a joke. Seriously maybe 3-5 photos per month. I love living this way and consider it hea…

I actually think there are two main camps here: people who take photos to share to their followers, and people who take photos for their own recollection and to share with the people closest to them (e.g. family photo albums). I totally agree that the former is toxic and damages our mental health in many ways, like a digital version of smoking and vaping. I recently launched a tool for our generation to manage and ma…

I think your tool is very cool and building tools for recreational image libraries is super neat. But I can’t agree with you that “a healthy relationship with social media” is a possible state of affairs apart from wholesale avoidance of social media. There is simply too much asymmetry information advantage for platform maintainers (even in decentralized cases) for it to be possible.

Re: I Quit Social Media for a Year

#40

Post by psyclobe »

I've been off Facebook for about a year now as well... Lets see the effects have been, a lot less options for dating, lost communication with a ton of various car parts companies and tuners (I was into a lot of car hobbies for a while), and overall I feel more alone then I did when I was on Facebook.

But this is an honest way to live, I used to just sit there and scroll through other peoples lives peering through them as if I was somehow a part of whatever they were doing. It was a fake reality.

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