“Well maybe it is you, a little bit.”
After everything that’s been unraveling about Facebook and Cambridge Analytica (which I ironically found out about on Facebook) a few of my friends were soon using the hashtag #deletefacebook in protest as they said their goodbyes online. It made me think about my own relationship with Facebook and social media in general, wondering where the evolution in social media will take us next.
Our history...
I reluctantly joined Facebook in 2007 after being pestered by family and friends, all saying that it was the most amazing way to keep in touch. I was away filming for several months at the time, and was using group emails, yahoo messenger, and Skype as my main methods of contact with loved ones at home. I still had a MySpace account and used Photobucket when my email couldn’t handle the large photo attachments. I finally caved and joined Facebook, and well, over ten years later here I am writing about my on/off relationship with it.
“It’s complicated…”
Now, over the years I’ve had a complicated relationship with Facebook; I love it and hate it simultaneously, and I’m pretty certain that others can relate to this too. I’ve had several “breaks” from it, never quite being able to permanently delete my account (which those cheeky chaps have made very difficult to even do!), often posting a pretentious status update to inform my friends that, “I’m having a Facebook detox, please email or call me if you want to get in touch.” But when I go through these detoxes I tend to swing from enjoying the peace and quiet, to suffering moments of severe FoMO. Then the inevitable happens, and I reactivate my account with a big, “Hi guys, guess who’s back?!” puke - and I like, I comment, I LOL, I share, I cry, and repeat. It doesn’t take long for me to be reminded about why we needed to go on a break in the first place; I’m friends with certain people whose posts I choose to hide instead of just unfriending them because it’s less complicated. I have different privacy settings for different groups of friends because some of them are more like work colleagues who I don’t actually know that well, and don’t really keep in touch with once the job’s over. I feel pressured to “like” certain posts because I know that they’ll see my other activity in my timeline and will feel offended that I chose to ignore their video of their child being super cute. Never has social networking been so complicated!
“Where do we stand?”
This latest data breach is a biggie, there’s no denying that, and part of me would like to see masses of Facebook users jump ship, waving their middle fingers in the air and shouting, “F*** YOOOoouuuuu!” But I just can’t see this ever happening, and the people that do follow through with deleting Facebook will hardly make a dent in the whole big scheme of things. Facebook is a unique monster, and for the time being at least, I see no other viable alternative. Other existing social media sites, whilst also providing a unique experience in their own right, just don’t offer the same type of interaction. I also have accounts with Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat, but Facebook is my “private” form of contact with only family and friends being privy to my posts. Some of the older members of my family (uncles, aunts, and even my own mother), aren’t on any of the other networks, and have also admitted to finding them confusing. So until a viable alternative presents itself to the mainstream, I don’t think this Frankenstein is going anywhere.
“Maybe we could try an open relationship, y’know, see other people.”
I recently signed up to be an Alpha tester for Howdoo, one of the latest blockchain powered social media sites offering an alternative to Facebook, ”combining all the best features of your existing social media apps.” And I am also exploring the Mithril platform (Lit), which so far looks like a slick alternative to Instagram, ”a Stories platform that rewards users’ content value.” I can't say much else about these apps yet as I’m still in the process of creating my accounts, but I definitely will be sharing my feedback once I’ve dived in and taken a proper gander! One thing's for sure - the race is awwwn for the next (decentralised) social media giant to rise. Many will come, many will try, some will fall by the waste sides, and few will be truly victorious. It’ll be interesting to see how this all pans out.
“So what is our relationship status?”
I’m still teetering on the edge of jumping ship, knowing full well that if I do, I’ll lose touch with some family and friends, and will then have to deal with the FoMO. Although the more I think about it, the more I believe that breaking up (like, for real this time) would feel so liberating.
Facebook is going to survive this storm; I think a lot of people are truly outraged by it, but the rest either don’t really care or feel like they need to pretend to be outraged. If and when I decide to end this relationship, it’ll honestly be because of our long history of love and hate, not because of the data misuse. I look back on the good old days of yore, and wish that we could all return to sending and receiving long emails, with maybe a photo (or two) attached. Life was a lot less complicated back then.
Because my first photo sucked, see it on my introduction post, lol!
