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Comment by metabagel | Hacker News Reader

I don't use Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or TikTok. I feel like people at least need to go on strike once in a while. Stop using those shitty services for a few days or a week so the landlords will make them slightly less shitty.

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For many people, those shitty services are the only way they stay in touch with friends and family.

People seem to forget about the phone function on their phones. Maybe this doesn't work across countries, but No Kings is only USA, right?

I do not care for phone calls

I miss out on all the big and little announcements. Sometimes, a family member will forward information to me about a death or a graduation. I find out about these things when I find out about them, just like we used to before the internet.

I dropped Facebook when I realized that their app was snooping on who I called and who called me.

>> I find out about these things when I find out about them, just like we used to before the internet.

How does that work? People post on FB or IG, AND THEN phone you / write a letter? doubtful...

I usually find out much later, and possibly never. This is how things were before the internet. We didn't know everything going on in everyone's life.

In the case of major events, my brother usually lets me know, for example the death of an aunt. Everyone close to me knows I don't use FB, so if they want me to be aware of something in particular, they can text or call me.

So you push your avoidance of FB to those that care about you to work harder to keep you informed? Not very nice.

>How does that work? People post on FB or IG, AND THEN phone you / write a letter? doubtful...

why is this doubtful?

i am also disconnected from fb/ig/etc. and that is exactly what happens. family or close friends make a post for something important, and i get a call or text. for smaller stuff i get caught up at some point whenever we next talk on the phone for a regular catch up.

The only one of those that allows you to stay in touch with somebody is Instagram. And only barely.

That's what it started out as, for sure. However, is it really "staying in touch" these days or is it simply reacting to and maybe adding a response to whatever status or content was placed in your feed.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not some anti-Facebook snob looking down on everyone else. But I have greatly reduced my use of the platform and only really use it for some groups I'm part of. While I do interact with family and friends, saying I use Facebook to "stay in touch" these days is a bit of a reach in most cases.

I think a lot of people feel like social media scratches the social itch they are feeling.

I think that is simply an illusion though. I have high social needs, and no amount of social media ever fed them in a healthy way.

Just because you are hungry, doesn't mean you should immediately reach for the bag of chips. It's important to reflect how often you do so, and whether that is getting you where you want to be in life. It's hard but really really important.

A lot of people say they are very lonely despite spending all their time on social media. They then change nothing.

It doesn't work

It doesn’t work for you. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t work for millions of others.

Frankly this kind of premature excuse making won't get us anywhere. People say they're concerned about the rise of fascism or oligarchy but when it comes to pushing back, even the smallest bit of inconvenience is too much.

The Montgomery bus boycott lasted 381 days. People walked miles and organized carpools to work for over a year.

Now we can't even imagine making the sacrifice to send our friends and family an SMS, let alone getting them to download Signal when they kinda don't want to.

My comment, "For many people, those shitty services are the only way they stay in touch with friends and family," is an observation, not an "excuse" (in your words). The fact is that most people don't even know someone who understands how bad social media is. Moreover, even if they did, as you suggest, download Signal, and even if they use it with the one person in their life who insists on it, they'll still be using Facebook for everyone else. Ingrained habits are hard to change, especially when they are carefully formulated addictions.

Hey metabagel! It's me, Mark Zuckerberg, please come back! Our Q4 earnings report will be due before you know it and our board will have my feet to the literal FIRE if you're not on our platform(s). Please reconsider!

This is, literally (with the politician's name and elections instead of Zuck and earnings), political ads. In big red font, with an accusatory or distraught image of the politician.

Seriously, Mark Zuckerburg doesn't really care that one person left his platform, but he actually would prefer you stay...because if enough do it will affect earnings. But you should leave Facebook not to upset Zuck, but to stop upsetting yourself with what's on there.

you must be fun at parties

In what sense are they shitty? They are actually usable by normal people. This is a big reason they are popular.

I don't like (most of) the content on those sites. This is not surprising. The content is aimed at people who can't use Signal. Such a person is different from me in many ways.

Facebook is cluttered with ads and distracting posts (not from your friends and family). If you use it often enough, you probably stop seeing how terrible it is. Try looking at it with fresh eyes sometime.

Twitter boosts Elon Musk and the things he is interested in.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2023/feb/15/elon-musk...

I don't have specific complaints about Instagram or TikTok, other than the algorithm is controlled by oligarchs.

>In what sense are they shitty?

Widespread algorithmic control and corporate spam spreads architecture?

>They are actually usable by normal people.

Usability is just one dimension. If your site is perfectly usable, yet steals your credit card number and sells it to the highest bidder, it is still a shitty site, just not in usability.

>This is a big reason they are popular.

Really FB/Meta became popular long before they were at their current level of shittiness. Really FB wrote the modern book on new levels of shittiness like selling social graphs and tracking people along with connecting all kinds of other data and stealing information from your phone with overly huge permissions and data gathering.

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