It was early last month when I joined steemit after a friend spent months trying to convince me to use it. I just didn't see the appeal, posts, pictures and articles, It didn't seem different from Facebook. And despite hating Facebook I never felt like leaving it, after all my friends were there, family members were contacting me through it. But it was less than a month on steem it that convinced me of finally pulling the trigger. So why would I leave a site/app I've been using for over 8 years?
1- Repetitiveness: The repetitiveness on Facebook is unbearable, Like how many times can a joke about Trump being Hitler be considered funny ? Repetitiveness kills my motive to live through the hour let alone finishing the day. A joke or an educated opinion or a stupid video calling people racists, sexists, Islamophobic, bigots etc... circulates around and spreads like a plague in Europe in the 1800s.
2- Lack of Tolerance: And this is not coming from me as an Iraqi "Oh, they're so racist to me and all Arabs" because one guy said something. But it comes from the so called "Open minded" people who are not willing to have another opinion that disagrees with theirs said without throwing the negative labels "sexists, racists, bigots" at whoever said, I'm actually afraid of posting because the last time I have there I was called names in the comment section and people went as far as message me personally to call me names. I'm not saying I am one, but how can a person learn more about something or whether what he said was wrong if the other side won't let up with the insults and the name calling and no actual discussion. there seems to be a rule out there that in every conversation there has a devil, it just can't be two people who disagree talking . Like I don't like Trump but do we have to call whoever voted for him all those names, can't they just be people with different view ? seems not. In person I'm socially awkward and can't say two full sentences without stumbling on my words so Facebook was my only to talk about stuff happening in the world, basically real conversations. Even If I'm not the one commenting I'd love to see conversations happening in front of me that educate me.
3- Originality: Facebook almost entirely lacks that, people always follow one source or a video they've seen and then rephrase it in a post. There's never an original though in there, no engagement whatsoever. also Plagiarism I actually saw a man copying a post I wrote and post it as their own and that got shares and likes, people just don't bother doing original works on Facebook, and to make it worse they don't encourage those who do (More on that next point)
4- Craft Killing: Now this the point that I find displeasing the most about Facebook, despite always sharing, and buying famous people's work be it on Youtube or whatever. they just won't do the same for their own friends and people they know. The reason this bother me is I've been doing comedy for over 6 years now, I even created a comedy group in Qatar and we were the only ones and I remember it till today, we just needed two more people to pre-book our event and we'd be set to perform a stand up comedy show in one of Qatar's main stages, and I didn't get a single share despite begging people and pages to share. We ended up cancelling the event and it was heart breaking. I spent 6 years doing stand up comedy shows, opening for comedians coming from outside of Qatar (Russell Peters and Gabriel Iglesias to name a few), I did charities, restaurants, bars and all of that for free in an attempt to get over, in the last two weeks on steemit I've been able to make more money writing jokes and doing one lousy video for @ComedyOpenMic and I was overwhelmed with moral and monetary support, My friend Ahmed has been rapping since he was 14 (He's 25 now) and hasn't made a single cent while having people proudly sharing and posting about shows that they paid hundreds of dollars to attend. Here on steemit I'm finally able to start and work on my dream of writing and doing comedy works and make a living out of it.
5- Big community my hairy @$$: Facebook always pride itself as being a big community that connects people, if that's the case then why do I feel like I'm further and further away from my family and friends each we're on it, how come people on Facebook always about how much stuff they do yet when you message them "What's going on with you?" The answer is almost always "Not much". The fact is Facebook isn't a big community it just does a very good job at making it appear like it is. 'Oh here are stuff from 3 years ago", "Oh it's so and so's birthday" and the constant nagging from notifications, Steemit doesn't force the interaction, you simply want it, it doesn't play the next video automatically trying to just keep you on it. there are not notifications forcing to keep a conversation or following up on a post. you just do it because you want to. Facebook is just one big prison that I tried leaving so many times but now I'm finally able to thanks to steemit.
So those are some of my reasons for leaving, some general, some specific. have you left Facebook? if you have I'm interested in knowing the story why and maybe have a conversation about it, and don't worry this is not Facebook you can leave the conversation whenever you want :)