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I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, and felt great since

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Re: I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, and felt great since

#81

Post by amanzi »

ccktlmazeltov wrote: post #53
amanzi wrote: post #28

I'm in a similar boat to the author and have also recently deleted my Facebook and Instagram account - although I'll note that the sneaky "to be deleted" state is now 30 days instead of just 7. But, similar to the author, I'm having more difficulty getting rid of WhatsApp. This is my primary means of communicating with friends and family all over the world. And for some of them I know it's just not an option to try g…

Why would anyone want to get rid of Whastapp.

Only because Facebook owns WhatsApp and people who dislike Facebook as a company do not want to use any of their products.

Re: I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, and felt great since

#82

Post by kilo_bravo_3 »

JMTQp8lwXL wrote: post #39
kilo_bravo_3 wrote: post #37

People who get sad looking at other people's lives on Instagram are likely so emotionally fragile that they'd probably get sad reading a book about other people's lives. Burn all books. "I burned my books, magazines, and eReaders and I FEEL FUCKING AMAZING OH MY GOD IF YOU COULD EXPERIENCE THIS LEVEL OF PURE UNADULTERATED JOY AND CONTENTMENT YOU WOULD SHIT YOURSELF."

False equivalence. Images and written text have different effects on the brain and emotions. You follow famous people on social media, who have 1,000x your wealth, travel all the time, get adequate sleep, meals, and exercise -- and it can chip away at your self-worth in a way books just can't.

>Images and written text have different effect on the brain and emotions.

You are right. I agree with you 100%. We are the same, you and me.

BAN ALL Pornography!!!!

Images and text have different effects on the brain and emotions. A young man looking at nudie mags who can't get his wicket bent will turn into a soul-less self-abusing sex-pervert.

Porn will chip away at your self-worth in a way books just can't.

See? Aren't you glad we all agree here, just one big happy family of consensus?

Everyone should stop looking at porn. It is dirty, nasty, stuff and the boobies will turn you into a listless, lazy, loser!

I threw away my Juggs, Fat Ass Weeklys, and Bronzed Bimbos in Bikinis magazines, and felt great since!

Please read this article about how subscribing to Penthouse Magazine is bad for you.

Re: I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, and felt great since

#83

Post by esperent »

teetertater wrote: post #70
amatecha wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't used FB regularly in about 3 years now (after being an early adopter and heavy user), and honestly the times I logged in to see all the "happy birthday!" notifications, I couldn't believe how far the platform had devolved since I last logged in. It's one of the biggest disappointments of modern technology for me. Such amazing unity of entire communities and families, worldwide, being turned into such an exp…

A measure that could significantly improve your Facebook experience (as it did mine) is to curate the content that you want to see. A few years ago I started actively clicking "not interested" on every type of content that I didn't want to see, and slowly but surely I managed to get rid of all memes, news, and uninteresting bits. Now I'm left with discussions about AI papers, local events that friends are attending,…

I went a step further and used a script to unfollow everything - all friends, pages, and groups. Once you do that the news feed is completely gone and Facebook becomes a much better experience. I left it this way for about six months and then re-followed my family and ten or so close friends.

Re: I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, and felt great since

#84

Post by ImaCake »

Whenever this topic comes up, there are always a lot of comments to the effect of "facebook isn't the problem, you are". Maybe it is best to think of facebook like sugary food. Many people have no trouble having one piece of chocolate and then leaving the rest for later. Many other people are unable to stop themselves from downing the whole 200g block.

I think these comments come from people who have no trouble engaging with facebook without any unhealthy habits forming. But there are people who are unable to engage with facebook in a healthy way. I personally struggle with facebook's newsfeed and have to put up some serious barriers to ensure I don't waste an hour of my day looking at it. Presumably many of the negative comments about how terrible facebook is come from people like me.

The first step to helping those who are impacted negatively is to acknowledge that there is a real problem here. The next is to attack the problem with various solutions. Some of them facebook will not like.

Re: I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, and felt great since

#85

Post by bigbugbag »

Scarbutt wrote: post #68
ccktlmazeltov wrote: post #51

Recently I went to Milan and remembered that I had a good friend there. I tried to reach out to him on Facebook and it turns out that he had deleted his account. I couldn't reach out to him again because I never knew his email, or really had much friends in common. It was pretty sad when I think about it. I'm happy that with Facebook I can still keep in touch with most of my friends that I made around the world trave…

Why didn't you ask him for his email?

Because he had his facebook.

When you outsource you usually lose in resiliency.

Re: I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, and felt great since

#86

Post by kilo_bravo_3 »

ImaCake wrote: post #80
kilo_bravo_3 wrote: post #37

People who get sad looking at other people's lives on Instagram are likely so emotionally fragile that they'd probably get sad reading a book about other people's lives. Burn all books. "I burned my books, magazines, and eReaders and I FEEL FUCKING AMAZING OH MY GOD IF YOU COULD EXPERIENCE THIS LEVEL OF PURE UNADULTERATED JOY AND CONTENTMENT YOU WOULD SHIT YOURSELF."

This is incredibly callous and ignorant. Anyone who isn't a sociopath is subject to their emotions being manipulated by the content they view. Puppies make them happy. Dead people make them sad. Same with basically anything in between (but harder to measure small effects). The reason to stop browsing curated feeds designed to deliver advertisements is because these will effect you, and they are likely doing so in a w…

I agree with you.

Why is everyone responding like I was being sarcastic or facetious? ;-)

You and me are peas in a pod.

"The reason to stop browsing curated feeds designed to deliver advertisements is because these will effect you, and they are likely doing so in a way that is not in your best interest."

That's why you're joining my crusade to get people to stop reading newspapers and magazines, right?

You're so smart, seeing that newspapers and magazines are also "curated feeds designed to deliver advertising likely doing so in a way that is not in your best interest."

Opinion Brothers (or Siblings!)

*high five

Re: I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, and felt great since

#87

Post by SkyMarshal »

ericol wrote: post #14

I lived in Spain for 5 years and then I returned to my country 13 years ago. Some 8 years ago, Facebook was something that I really enjoyed using. I left way too many friends, close friends, and well, lovers behind. Facebook allowed me to have a healthy relationship with them, even if at a distance. I went back to Spain on 2010 for the wedding of a close friend, and it was like I've been out of the country for 2 mont…

> Instagram, on the other side, is a different beast. Even with the strong push by FB in order to monetize the network, I think that fact that people can't easily share other people's post, and are kind of forced to post their own material still makes it an interesting place.

>As long as instagram does not allow reposting, I think it'll maintain a certain degree of quality.

This is a fascinating insight I never considered. Disabling reposting results in higher quality, higher-effort discourse. Trashy memes and fake news can’t spread as rapidly or at all without the ability to easily, mindlessly repost them millions of times. It’s like a circuit breaker to our lizard brain, forcing us to actually think about what we’re doing instead of thoughtlessly queuing up another dopamine hit with a quick repost.

Re: I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, and felt great since

#88

Post by bigbugbag »

ccktlmazeltov wrote: post #51

Recently I went to Milan and remembered that I had a good friend there. I tried to reach out to him on Facebook and it turns out that he had deleted his account. I couldn't reach out to him again because I never knew his email, or really had much friends in common. It was pretty sad when I think about it. I'm happy that with Facebook I can still keep in touch with most of my friends that I made around the world trave…

As someone who clearly saw the shortcomings of facebook from the get go and as a consequence never bother to register, I wonder what are the upsides you mention.

Facebook is mostly a birthday reminder feature hidden in a glorified walled garden email, its whole point is vacuuming personal data and find ways to make as much profit as possible with it.

IMHO email is vastly superior to facebook as it is open and offers interoperability.

Re: I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, and felt great since

#89

Post by blondin »

amanzi wrote: post #32
rvz wrote: post #2

Very insightful blogpost and good for the author. It shows its possible to get away from Facebook's social network drug store which they purposefully make it hard for you to quit or delete your profile(s). With Facebook, there's no such thing as 'privacy' and 'account deletion'. I hope that everyone else isn't addicted to another drug that is called 'Twitter' which one of its side-effects is 'getting the worst out of…

This may sound overly-dramatic, but I think Twitter is to blame for many of the problems in the world. The "cancel culture" and lack of real debate that stems from Twitter is all due to a race-to-the-bottom environment with people competing to get the most blunt/sarcastic/outlandish statement distilled into a tiny soundbite to try increase their engagement. So many important topics are "discussed" on Twitter with the…

> It's impossible to adequately to condense these complex issues into 240 characters.

it is possible. it's even more so when you there is a picture or a video with a caption.

Re: I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, and felt great since

#90

Post by bigbugbag »

stickfigure wrote: post #31

"I use Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram, and I feel fine!" -- most of the planet, but you'd never know it by reading HN

"I'm used by Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram, and I feel down!"

-- most of the planet.

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