Death of social media?

[birdysong]

Just read an interesting article in Grazia about social media use on the decline.
I find myself feeling irritated when I scroll on Instagram and have deleted my account. Wondered do others feel the same?
I find Social media draining and addictive and I ger annoyed with myself for wasting time on it and I never feel good after scrolling.

Yeah, same. I have some old friends and extended family on facebook who I would otherwise not hear from, but if it wasn't for them I think I'd have chucked it by now. So much spammy content and advertising, and angry people in comments, I do think I'd be better off walking away. I miss the days when it was just my family and friends sharing their lives.

I get the same jaded exhaustion from Mumsnet quite often too. I left this place for years and didn't miss it, but I've recently been here much more often and I regret it. Less chat, less advice, more snippy intolerance, it's not fun.

The best thing that could happen to the Facebooks, Instagrams, Tick-tocks and Twitters of this world, is for them to die a very swift death.

The world would be a better place for it.

But what about the cat videos? 😭

Yeah! Apart from cat videos.

“Influencing” has ruined social media, it’s now one big advertising platform full of self absorbed shallow dickheads trying to out do each other for attention.

I use Facebook for a niche community of like-minded women around the world, and finding tradesmen.
Mt TikTok algorithm is perfect for me, I see videos of exactly what I like, and have learned new recipes and crafts.

If I was just following local idiots, and pointless celebrities it would be rubbish.

I was listening to a news report on radio 1.... the only thing that stuck out was the person making comment said something along the lines of today's generation using X, Instagram etc and the older generation using faceache..... older generation, im 45!!!

But in terms of your actual post, I deleted the apps beginning of last month and havent really missed it..... I still post to my stories for the wider family but would say I am not really an active SM user these days.

Facebook is full of absolute garbage these days, it’s just one big advert. I browse marketplace occasionally and that’s it.

I use Facebook and Insta to interact with people I want to interact with, about stuff that I am interested in or like. I ignore anything else, so all the comments about trolls, angry idiots and so on simply don't apply, as I don't see them 🤷
I love using Facebook, and through it I've found work, renewed old friendships and made them real world friendships again, engaged in voluntary work, rekindled a love affair from 35 years ago (which was beautiful for us both, though we had to call time, sadly) and bought a car, bought artwork, clothes and other stuff.
The bad side of it has never been an issue for me.

My Facebook is gone years
kept Instagram for a good while

but it was getting irritating and I was spending too long doom scrolling - I was on maternity leave and would scroll late at night up feeding the baby

I was annoyed at myself as it felt a waste of time - and thought I could be listening to audio books or podcasts instead Al- so I deleted it for a bit off my phone and now it’s been a year and I never downloaded it again.

I’ve never had FB, Instagram or Tik Tok. I get that some people use it to connect with family and that certain niche groups may be valuable. What I think it’s done though is give platforms to the ill-informed who’ve been able to spout their rubbish, have others telling them they're right and thereby creating a sense of validation for opinions that were unlikely to have been heard outside of social media. Then you’ve got the ridiculously named “influencers” who just create unhappiness in the vulnerable. It’s changed the world beyond recognition and not in a good way. Most of it’s an open sewer

I still spend a lot of time on tiktok but barely use Facebook anymore, no longer have Instagram, Snapchat, x etc.

I use it for what it was intended for (initially) looking at friends pics and vice verse. Never see any influencers or anything that would make me feel like shit so I enjoy it still

@birdysong If it wasn’t for MN I’d never be online 🙈

The only thing I want to use FB for now is local groups, so I deleted my proper account and set up a new one with no picture and no friends just for that. But even so, as nobody really uses it anymore it's of limited value; I'm trying to find good tradespeople at the moment but whereas once you'd have loads of people recommending people they'd used, now it's just companies advertising themselves. Which I could find by googling. At least I still see people complaining about fireworks, roadworks and the new Aldi. Needless to say, I don't waste much time on it anymore! Now I'm just here instead...

I use Facebook for local groups but never post anything personal on it, in fact I only have a couple of friends who still use it regularly. I've never had Instagram or tik tok etc and even pick my posts carefully on here, there's soon many full of crap stories!!

It’s not social media anymore. It’s endless propaganda and AI slop.

I’ve kept my Facebook account as the local groups can be useful and sometimes old posts pop up on my memories. They were great. Updates from actual friends. Nice comments. Sometimes some banter. They had a good product that enhanced social interactions and have completely trashed it.

Yeah, I think people will collectively come to the conclusion that the downsides outweigh the upsides and that social media has fallen prey to Enshittification.

I disagree.

In the past couple of weeks what is happening in Meneapolis, Iran and with the Eipstein files have reminded how important it is to have alternative platforms where people can share content that the mainstream media are too cowardly or to compromised to cover.

For all it the issues with its current owner if it was not for X many of these stories would be buried.

I've discovered on my FB app there's a button that just shows me stuff from my friends. It has its uses but it's not what it was.

I have an insta account but dont use it. I used to have twitter but deleted it when it really turned nasty on there. I have never had a tiktok account. The only one I really use is facebook and that is locked down strictly to family and friends and has the highest security settings on it. I use facebook a lot but if it went, I would have to email or WhatsApp family more with photos etc.....

OK I admit I'm older, not that it matters.... I only use FB to follow reports from the US. I follow a guy called Aaron Parnas, and another satirical, cynical and from the hip observer of things as they are going on now Alex Scuby. I am brushing up my French so I use it to watch certain pages from France obv in French! And I follow different pages depending on where I'm going on a trip abroad. I don't use FB to post my photos or keep in touch with anyone. There's whatsapp for that.

No insta, tik tok, X or anything else.

I have a very targeted Linked-In that I use purely to connect with my specific sector. I ignore all the ‘brand building’ crap and have notifications turned off.

I come on MN most days for 10-20 mins.

Thats it.

Came off Facebook 12 years ago. All the endless photos of peoples kids and complete disregard for privacy started to freak me out.

Hated Twitter/X from the outset and joined then left within a year (years ago). Childish, toxic commentary that added nothing to my life.

I can’t imagine any reason I’d want to use Instagram.

When I watch people scrolling TikTok and Insta on their phones on my commute it seems so weird. Watching the eye and hand movements - scroll, pause, scroll, pause. Just so, so odd.

I honestly think all the ‘we use social media to connect with each other’ stuff is a thing most people tell themselves that is not really true. People are wasting time - hours and hours of life - looking at screens and getting sucked into addictive behaviour that stops them using their amazing brains to do so many other useful, wonderful things they could be doing. It makes me angry for young people. I really do believe this has become harmful to society.

I still have my facebook but never use it - for years I've been meaning to download all my photos off it and and delete it as I never actually use it - and the feed is just absolute garbage. I still have Instagram but rarely use it and yes when I scroll it I find myself annoyed and irritated. The way people dey to drive engagement like have a video that you need to hunt for part 2 and it turns out it was three weeks ago and there isn't actually a part two - who can be fucked with that any more. Even the 'backlash' against influencers is being driven by other influencers. Its so tedious. Its also an absolute time suck.

I'm a member of a forum that I've been on since I was about 19 in all its various guises and the slow-ish moving conversation style with a core group of members is still the best 'social media' format.

I remember when I first joined facebook there were a lot of the old-style memes that often involved cats (and were actually funny - my gen alpha daughter was showing me memes the other day that didn't even make sense).