Stepping away from ‘big’ social

I’m not planning to attempt a dramatic exit with a grand flourish, but I’ve noticed myself gradually stepping away from ‘big’ social. The changes to Twitter post-Musk are fairly noticeable and well documented, but I’ve grown increasingly tired of the constant baiting and absolutistism on all social networks. Even if I’m increasingly resisting the urge to reply, it’s hard to ignore the deluge of rubbish piling up in each scroll through social feeds.

Attention is money when you’re largely funded by advertising or paywalls. And it’s much easier to inspire anger and outrage, especially when you’re panding to a large audience of strangers.

From politics and religion, to the era of mass media, it’s always held true. There was a brief blip when the internet was niche enough that many people were more grateful to find like-minded geeks, than interested in notoriety and fame. Which meant a lower proportion of annoyance on a daily basis. But as mainstream adoption arrived, that changed.

It’s not about everyone agreeing with my particular world view, or beliefs. I enjoy respectfully debating with friends and contacts who have different perspectives, and hopefully learning things from each other, even if we’ll never find a middle ground that pleases everyone.

What gets to me is seeing people sharing blatant rubbish, dog whistles, and being offensive for the sake of it. There’s a different between being provocative for a reason, and running around like a toddler who has discovered swearing for the first time. And boosting your follower numbers isn’t a good reason.

I’ve always wondered why people needed to comment on things that were irrelevant to them. There are lots of TV shows, sports and hobbies that don’t interest me, so I don’t watch them or take part. But I’ve never felt any need to pursue their fans around, telling them why their personal choices are rubbish.

Which is probably good, seeing as they’d be armed with cricket bats and golf clubs. Both of which seem like a waste of a nice afternoon to me. But I can understand why people feel passionately about them, and would likely wonder why I’m happy standing on a grassy bank watching cars or motorcycles drive in circles.

But there’s another reason for stepping away. Social networks offer a similar promise to reality TV, with fame and potential earnings if you’re noticeable enough. And that means constantly striving to be in the top 1%, with the money dropping off pretty steeply towards the middle ground. Most of us will be average, by definition. So what’s the point in chasing a big view count or follower number?

The best projects and communities I’ve been part of all had fairly small networks of people working together for a common aim. Whether it was the editorial forum producing the Disposable Media PDF mag in the early 2000s, the team that came together for DPiP and Peterborough STEM Festival, the times when the MCN website was being run by just a few people largely ignored by the rest of the company, or Absolute Radio was launching new apps and tech every week as an upstart outsider. Or the Team ORD sim racing squad on Discord.

And the final reason is fairly simple. Sharing my thoughts online will probably never make me rich or famous. But when I share them here, they last for as long as the domain and hosting are running. And any benefits from notoriety, advertising, email sign-ups or connections will pass my way, rather than to Musk or Zuckerberg (or their investors and shareholders).

I’ll still use Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn etc, but mainly for private messages and discussions with people who have interesting opinions or views that I’ll respect even if I don’t agree with. I’m wary of sites in the midde ground of popularity, with the constant risk that they’ll be acquired and disappear overnight (like Ello). And I’ll continue to explore new options, like the federated networks which include Mastodon and Pixelfeed (I’m currently sharing my virtual sim racing photography on Pxlmo for example).

But from now on, I’m intending to focus on sharing more on my own sites, including the half-formed random ramblings like this. Or simple tweet or toot-length observations which ignore all SEO advice. And contributing in small communities with positive purposes and targets, whether that’s to help the local community, improve healthcare for marginalised groups or just get better at sim racing.