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Going old school: how I replaced Facebook with email

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Re: Going old school: how I replaced Facebook with email

#121

Post by rypskar »

Semaphor wrote: post #64
wyattpeak wrote: post #61

There's one aspect of Facebook which seems to always be ignored by these "deleting Facebook" posts and it confuses me. I've never really scrolled through the frontpage, I don't look at people's posts and photos, happy to message them through text or WhatsApp, but I absolutely need the events. Without them, I'd lose so much touch with all but my closest friends. People tend to respond to this concern with "if they don…

You (and me FWIW) both do this: > I've never really scrolled through the frontpage, I don't look at people's posts and photos Most people who tell everyone they are so happy they deleted facebook were for some reason or another not able to do that. For them, it was an addiction. So I'd guess getting rid of their addiction is simply more important than events. The problem is that those posts never come straight out an…

>The problem is that those posts never come straight out and say that they are about an addiction.

Good to see I'm not the only one thinking that. I have started to see posts with "here is how I quit Facebook and why you should to" as an alcoholic telling "here is how I quit drinking and why you should to". I like having a beer or two in the weekends and like to use 5-10 minutes in the mornings to scroll through the frontpage of Facebook, both of them are not harmful in any way. Getting problems because an addiction is something totally different and not a problem most have

Re: Going old school: how I replaced Facebook with email

#122

Post by paride5745 »

bashwizard wrote: post #115
wyattpeak wrote: post #61

There's one aspect of Facebook which seems to always be ignored by these "deleting Facebook" posts and it confuses me. I've never really scrolled through the frontpage, I don't look at people's posts and photos, happy to message them through text or WhatsApp, but I absolutely need the events. Without them, I'd lose so much touch with all but my closest friends. People tend to respond to this concern with "if they don…

I deleted facebook years ago and I haven't missed it since and I've never felt like I'm missing out on anything. I don't consider the hundreds of people that I had on facebook that I only met a couple of times a year to be my friends anymore. They're just acquaints at this point and I really have no interest in them or their lives or catching up with them just because we used to work together or used to hang out thro…

I deleted Facebook almost one year ago and I didn't have any issue either.

I made a few Telegram and Viber groups with people I want to stay in touch with, and we invite each other this way to evenings out or parties.

I have Twitter to keep up to date with musicians or news websites, and LinkedIn to keep in touch with ex-colleagues.

IMHO who says "if they don't write to you they are not your friends" is a bit lazy, as you can have groups on IMs (Telegram, Signal, Viber) and stay off Facebook property without too many issues.

Re: Going old school: how I replaced Facebook with email

#124

Post by giancarlostoro »

wyattpeak wrote: post #61

There's one aspect of Facebook which seems to always be ignored by these "deleting Facebook" posts and it confuses me. I've never really scrolled through the frontpage, I don't look at people's posts and photos, happy to message them through text or WhatsApp, but I absolutely need the events. Without them, I'd lose so much touch with all but my closest friends. People tend to respond to this concern with "if they don…

If you can get emails every time you get an event, you could cease logging into Facebook and have them email you. Of course if they ever get rid of such emails that'd be pretty damn horrible. I always hear this about events, I guess I'm not in such a circle, every time I get invited to an event through Facebook it's never something I actually want to go to or people I want to hang out with. I try to only add people I don't mind seeing in real life, and mostly family.

There's only ever been like one event I was interested in and I just didn't have time to go to it, and it wasn't by any of my friends.

I feel like this is a cultural thing too, I'm Puerto Rican, and we just start calling everybody over the phone left and right when we have events. When I got married, my mom RSVP'd everyone over the phone practically.

I really want to see a social media type of site that does what G+ tried to do unrelated to any major social networking company (or advertising firm) that lets you have "circles" and have events, but somehow makes money without ads or selling anybody's data.

I have deleted Facebook before, so it doesn't phase me to stop logging on to it, I only keep it for family, but I may find myself replacing it with my own personal blog, and letting everybody know if they need me they can email me and my life updates will be on my personal blog instead.

Re: Going old school: how I replaced Facebook with email

#125

Post by zapzupnz »

icebraining wrote: post #118
bigbugbag wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you aware that email is actually one of the early online mass social media ? and one of the few that actually deserves to be called social while other such as facebook and derivative are antisocial due to be based on exclusion for their closed nature.

I think the point is that they're trying to force communication patterns from FB into email. Just because they're both social media doesn't mean people wish to communicate the same way on both - different affordances lead to different behaviors.

Yep, and I'd say the masses, who only really came to the internet with the advent of web 2.0, only know how to do social media the new way, not the classic way.

Even technical users seem to want to move away from email for more than office communication and password resets. A lot of projects move off mailing lists and on to forums, issue trackers, etc. because the affordances just match modern expectations.

Re: Going old school: how I replaced Facebook with email

#126

Post by agent008t »

kkarakk wrote: post #89
bigbugbag wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's how facebook onws you and keeps you from leaving: fear of missing out. AFAIK most people who removed facebook from their life got an improvement out of it and fromt he feedback some of them gave, they did miss a few of those events but it did not matter much to them and the others they got invited or learn about through their newly rebuilt social links and did not miss.

how to become a social recluse 101: miss a couple of these facebook events, start getting known as an awkward anti-social person because you went to someone's launch event but not to their birthday party(coz bday invites only go out on facebook,no email or other discussion except maybe a text asking you where you are day of,hour of when you can't re-schedule another commitment) Congrats, now you don't get invited to…

With 'friends' like that, being a recluse sounds like a far better option. They sound like the kind of people who would think they are going to these events to 'network'.

Re: Going old school: how I replaced Facebook with email

#127

Post by grecy »

a3n wrote: post #95

I once took a picture, and offered to email it to my younger co-worker. (I'm old.) He paused, and said "Email? I don't remember the last time I used email. Why don't you text it to me?" There are people who just don't use email, and not because they're not tech savvy.

Yep. I'm 36 and just hung out with a 26 year old.

When I said email is the best way to contact me he said "Wow, going old school".

When I asked him, he said "Whats App" all the way, never uses anything else!

Re: Going old school: how I replaced Facebook with email

#128

Post by mark_l_watson »

He has an interesting idea in using a free MailChimp account. I would have thought of just having a local email list but it seems very ‘tidy’ to use MailChimp instead. I have set up MailChimp for a customer but never used it for myself.

I just put on my TODO list to start 2 lists: one for family and friends and one for interesting tech.

I will never totally leave FB because I use it to pimp my books and open source projects, but I think spending more that 10 minutes a week engaging with FB is a waste of time. Opportunity Cost.

Re: Going old school: how I replaced Facebook with email

#129

Post by schnevets »

Gys wrote: post #11
gnicholas wrote: post #4

> My email list is broadcast-only but any replies go directly to me. This sort of mass-email is weirdly impersonal because it tells the recipient that you want them to know what you're up to, but you don't want to write a message just to them. Also, it would be very awkward to opt-out ("hey dude, um please don't send me your mass-email updates anymore."), unlike company emails which there's no awkwardness around unsu…

> weirdly impersonal because it tells the recipient that you want them to know what you're up to, but you don't want to write a message just to them. Also, it would be very awkward to opt-out ("hey dude, um please don't send me your mass-email updates anymore.") You mean, like a post on FB ? Or Tweeting ? Readable for all ‘friends’ or ‘followers’ ? Who very likely are not really interested in your message ?

I think this is the strangest appeal of social media - the devaluation of your message. I'm not inundating anyone if I take a lousy picture of fireworks; write an unremarkable status; or check in from my preferred, uninteresting eating establishment. It may show on a feed, or someone who visits my profile may see it, but it's a passive broadcast. An e-mail is intended to be read, a "post" is designed to be ignored.

Re: Going old school: how I replaced Facebook with email

#130

Post by zolthrowaway »

bashwizard wrote: post #115
wyattpeak wrote: post #61

There's one aspect of Facebook which seems to always be ignored by these "deleting Facebook" posts and it confuses me. I've never really scrolled through the frontpage, I don't look at people's posts and photos, happy to message them through text or WhatsApp, but I absolutely need the events. Without them, I'd lose so much touch with all but my closest friends. People tend to respond to this concern with "if they don…

I deleted facebook years ago and I haven't missed it since and I've never felt like I'm missing out on anything. I don't consider the hundreds of people that I had on facebook that I only met a couple of times a year to be my friends anymore. They're just acquaints at this point and I really have no interest in them or their lives or catching up with them just because we used to work together or used to hang out thro…

I agree with this and I think it has a lot to do with free time. In college, if I was asked to go to a party by an acquaintance, I'd probably say yes. Once I started working, getting into serious relationships, and adding more day responsibilities; the answer changed to no. I'm at capacity with how many relationships I can meaningfully maintain, but I'm happy with the ones I have. That's not to say the acquaintances don't have value or I don't like them. I'd just rather go to a tech talk or spend time on one of my hobbies than go to a social event without any of my core friends. It's not that I don't enjoy the social events, they just have fallen far lower on my list of priorities over the years.
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