Its been 6 months without social media. I didn't missed any news or update that really matters to me.
I deleted my social media accounts
211–220 of 500 posts
Re: I deleted my social media accounts
#212Does hacker news count as social media?
'n' -> [chrome or firefox autocomplete] -> news.ycombinator.com
I have often been thinking about what this reflex does to my mind.
Re: I deleted my social media accounts
#213Earlier quoted context omitted.
>> For example, if a parent died... and yet people died quite often before social media; what did we do then? If the realtionship is built upon the foundation of social media, it's actually not that strong, absent social media. We'll be fine.
Obituaries were published in newspapers. The news spread to local strangers, not just friends of friends of the deceased.
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Re: I deleted my social media accounts
#214Is this text AI generated?
Re: I deleted my social media accounts
#215Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Turns out that a lot of people I knew posted huge life updates that I completely missed out on This doesn't really seem that important if your only method of knowing this was a post blasted to hundreds (or thousands) of people. Or, to put it another way: if you mattered, you would've gotten a direct message or call from them. I'd argue that social media has normalized keeping up with people who aren't supposed to b…
>if you mattered, you would've gotten a direct message or call from them. That ignores the asymmetry of a lot of life events. For example, if a parent died, I'm not going to call everyone in my life to tell them, I would have more important stuff on my mind. I might post it on social media and then the onus is on other people to reach out to me. And if someone doesn't reach out, it will hurt the relationship a little…
also in the old days, your friend bob would have told cory, "hey, did you hear alice's dad died? we should all go out for drinks". but we live in the bowling alone era, where we're increasingly isolated.
quitting social media is not, on its own, going to fix your social life. and being on social media can make you more connected, or more miserable. the responsibility is yours
Re: I deleted my social media accounts
#216Earlier quoted context omitted.
> This doesn't really seem that important if your only method of knowing this was a post The landscape of human relationships is deep and broad an varied, and if making bold assumptions about what other people should value is your starting point, you're liable to miss a lot of potential connections.
>you're liable to miss a lot of potential connections. are you really? If you only notice that it's Bob's birthday because you get a FB reminder and the only form of communication is a post on their timeline once a year that's not a connection, that's like talking to your neighbor about the weather out of courtesy because it's awkward to say nothing at all. The reason a lot of people miss out on life nowadays is not…
Free for 8 years-ish. Yeah. its hard to look people up. Oh im in this town, yeah wonder what happened to xyz, no chance of finding them or shooting them a message. FB connections are so low key and keeping people around makes them easier to find and stay in touch with, IMO.
But there's also lots of upsides. I guess I dont know one way or the other.
Re: I deleted my social media accounts
#217This advice to quit social media is always a hit on HN. When I was 10 years younger I read the same thing on HN, was thoroughly convinced and quit social media. I even followed the advice of trying to stay in touch by email. Sure. Turns out that a lot of people I knew posted huge life updates that I completely missed out on. I asked them why they didn’t tell me and they were confused. They said the posted it on socia…
Lots of other replies already so apologies for adding to the clutter, but this sort of message always appears and it feels super dated. Like, 2003-era sentiment about the Facebook heyday. Facebook is like a ghost town now from the "social" and family perspective. I imagine some circles might be strong on it, but from every time this comes up it's clear that the vast majority of normal people have largely abandoned it…
You can easily replace FB with Instagram in this context. Nobody I know personally posts very much on Facebook, but they do post their updates on Instagram stories.
Facebook's last hook on me is groups - small town community groups especially. If you live in an area with its own group, there's a high likelihood that it's going to be on Facebook.
I don't really have the time to campaign to non tech-savvy retiring gen Xers and their parents that I don't want to use Facebook to know what's happening in my area, find services, etc.
Re: I deleted my social media accounts
#218This advice to quit social media is always a hit on HN. When I was 10 years younger I read the same thing on HN, was thoroughly convinced and quit social media. I even followed the advice of trying to stay in touch by email. Sure. Turns out that a lot of people I knew posted huge life updates that I completely missed out on. I asked them why they didn’t tell me and they were confused. They said the posted it on socia…
I do think this trade off is real. I came off most of social media for a few years and was the happiest I’ve been in a long time. It is however a bit isolating. I stayed in touch with friends, but lots of acquaintances slipped away without an easy way to keep in touch.
Re: I deleted my social media accounts
#219for me is not the daily use that is useful, but from time to time, I need to buy or sell something and Facebook marketplace is good for that. Or I need to find the contact information of someone and it is also useful for that (Facebook). And for twitter, before I didn't even need to create an account I just use it for seeing updates of government officials or app/services updates
Re: I deleted my social media accounts
#220Earlier quoted context omitted.
>if you mattered, you would've gotten a direct message or call from them. That ignores the asymmetry of a lot of life events. For example, if a parent died, I'm not going to call everyone in my life to tell them, I would have more important stuff on my mind. I might post it on social media and then the onus is on other people to reach out to me. And if someone doesn't reach out, it will hurt the relationship a little…
also in the old days, your friend bob would have told cory, "hey, did you hear alice's dad died? we should all go out for drinks". but we live in the bowling alone era, where we're increasingly isolated. quitting social media is not, on its own, going to fix your social life. and being on social media can make you more connected, or more miserable. the responsibility is yours
I'm a firm believer being loosely connected to so many people isn't the fix many seem to think it is. I find shallow connections, which is about all social media can support IMO, are worthless at best and detrimental at worst.
YMMV, but my quality of life increased in ways I can't even begin to describe by severing all the dozens or perhaps hundreds of shallow connections social media was encouraging me to cling to.
With the saved time and energy, I've been able to cultivate far fewer-- but much deeper and more (mutually) fulfilling-- connections with those who are _actually_ important.