I’m on Facebook currently because it’s brought me a lot of joy over the years. As a way to keep up with friends and as a resource for sharing the important things going on in my life. But recently, I’ve been trying to cut back. I think it’s clear there are serious mental health issues that come with all social media and in light of concerns over privacy and fake news, not being on Facebook as much is a good decision on my part. Still, I feel I can’t delete my account. Why?
My connections made on Facebook are valuable. I wish I could take them with me and go somewhere else, but I can’t. Hence, I’m still there. Not like I used to be mind you. Instead I use it to talk shit and get my political thinking out there. And I share some work stuff. As an independent designer, if you aren’t sharing the work you’re doing then most likely nobody else is.
So my focus is narrow. It’s not a place for a detailed timeline of my life. I use it to organize my events. I won’t use it for dating. True, I’m married but Mark Zuckerberg talking about their new “Tinderesque” dating feature is infuriating. When I heard that I thought to myself, “man, fuck that guy, who does he think he is?” It might be the thing that ultimately pushes me off Facebook is instead a person and his name is Mark Zuckerberg. Given his Congressional testimony, I certainly don’t have much confidence in him or the future of Facebook.
Their latest ad about getting back to the good old days of Facebook is stupid, too. Any forward-looking tech company should know that. They fucked up, they know it, and we’re not going to forget it.
It’s easy these days to hate Facebook. And that’s totally acceptable in this present moment. I guess we’ll have to wait for the future of the platform to shake out to see if I’m still on it in a year or two. Only timelines will tell.
