Today, I de-activated my Facebook account.
It was a long time coming. When I created this blog, I envisioned it as a place where I could write long thoughtful pieces for my own benefit, and maybe for the benefit of a handful of my friends who might happen to pass by. But what I have found is that as I kept posting quick throwaway rants on Facebook and kept getting instant validation and responses, my inclination to visit this blog and to write here kept diminishing.
Each time I would visit this blog every few months, a part of me would wish I could spend more time here, but another part of me would crave the interaction, and I would be back on Facebook. But in recent months, I found myself reaching some kind of interaction fatigue. It felt like I was sharing the same stories over and over, expressing the same outrage over the same kinds of events over and over, and increasingly, it felt like I was neither providing new insights, nor changing minds with my interactions there.
I recently came across this handy tool that contrasts "blue feed" and "red feed", and it finally sank in for me how insular interactions on Facebook were becoming. No wonder I was feeling the way I was. I don't want to dismiss this kind of insularity altogether, because historically persecuted groups who need safe spaces for their interactions may appreciate this kind of insularity immensely, and that is as it should be. But for relatively privileged people like me who can afford to take a look at the ugly side, I've started feeling that a less walled-off space might be better.
I've had many friends (in a similar situation) bemoan the loss of the long open interactions they used to enjoy on blogs before all interactions shifted to Facebook likes and shares. What I've noticed is that attempts by these friends to move away from Facebook always seem to fail because they find out once they come out of Facebook that the level of interaction that used to be there on the blogs is no longer there. So these friends end up sharing a link back on Facebook to their blog post about leaving Facebook, only to find that even a post bitching about Facebook gets a lot more comments on Facebook than on their blog. So they're back on Facebook again, and so it goes.
To avoid this fate, I'm thinking that the best approach is to completely halt seeking interaction and feedback altogether. So I've disabled comments, and have also removed my email address from the sidebar. Now, there's no way for anyone to interact back with me in response to anything that I write here.
This place is finally a place where all I can do is put my own thoughts down on "paper" for my own benefit, and maybe for the benefit of a handful of my friends who might happen to pass by.
It was a long time coming. When I created this blog, I envisioned it as a place where I could write long thoughtful pieces for my own benefit, and maybe for the benefit of a handful of my friends who might happen to pass by. But what I have found is that as I kept posting quick throwaway rants on Facebook and kept getting instant validation and responses, my inclination to visit this blog and to write here kept diminishing.
Each time I would visit this blog every few months, a part of me would wish I could spend more time here, but another part of me would crave the interaction, and I would be back on Facebook. But in recent months, I found myself reaching some kind of interaction fatigue. It felt like I was sharing the same stories over and over, expressing the same outrage over the same kinds of events over and over, and increasingly, it felt like I was neither providing new insights, nor changing minds with my interactions there.
I recently came across this handy tool that contrasts "blue feed" and "red feed", and it finally sank in for me how insular interactions on Facebook were becoming. No wonder I was feeling the way I was. I don't want to dismiss this kind of insularity altogether, because historically persecuted groups who need safe spaces for their interactions may appreciate this kind of insularity immensely, and that is as it should be. But for relatively privileged people like me who can afford to take a look at the ugly side, I've started feeling that a less walled-off space might be better.
I've had many friends (in a similar situation) bemoan the loss of the long open interactions they used to enjoy on blogs before all interactions shifted to Facebook likes and shares. What I've noticed is that attempts by these friends to move away from Facebook always seem to fail because they find out once they come out of Facebook that the level of interaction that used to be there on the blogs is no longer there. So these friends end up sharing a link back on Facebook to their blog post about leaving Facebook, only to find that even a post bitching about Facebook gets a lot more comments on Facebook than on their blog. So they're back on Facebook again, and so it goes.
To avoid this fate, I'm thinking that the best approach is to completely halt seeking interaction and feedback altogether. So I've disabled comments, and have also removed my email address from the sidebar. Now, there's no way for anyone to interact back with me in response to anything that I write here.
This place is finally a place where all I can do is put my own thoughts down on "paper" for my own benefit, and maybe for the benefit of a handful of my friends who might happen to pass by.
