how hard is it to quit social media?

Aren't message boards like this a form of social media? Maybe you're defeating the purpose by starting a thread about it?

 

Is that irony?

 

A little too ironic, don't you think?

 

This can be fixed, though. First, find a great Facebook page. I will provide an example:

Archway Cookies | Facebook

Then find the people giving out 1-star reviews and call them buttholes.

 

I have too many friends who I only contact through Facebook to give it up. I've pruned the hell out of the number of people I actually follow, though. Since the election it's gotten insane.

 

I eradicated everything political off my FB wall in August or September. Unfollowed all the groups, unfriended everybody overtly political. Posted on all my relatives' walls that I no longer intended to read or respond to anything political, of any stripe.

It's mostly worked. It cut down the traffic volume about 90%, but the aggravation factor is way down too.

In the end nobody will care. When the bombs drop.

 

Stay hot

 

Really? You're anonymous on your Facebook account? I was actually going to intially add that the reason i appreciate this board is that I'm more genuine here than Facebook or elsewhere

 

Well, I'm not particularly anonymous here and this can be as much of a "time suck" as FB of Twitter or Instagram. I think the better course of action for most people who profess to be burned out on social media is to get offline and go outside into the real world and do things and talk to actual people.

 

Since leaving the industry, it's been absolutely amazing how much of my life I feel like I've gotten back having lost access to company accounts and giving up my own personal accounts. I started ignoring Facebook about a year ago because I got tired about the political garbage, but then I deleted my Twitter and Instagram accounts and finally feel free.

The people who I want to interact with, I'll call or e-mail or, you know, talk to them in person. The others? If the only way I interacted with them was via these platforms, they must not have been that close to me in the first place.

It's funny, before outright deleting my personal accounts, I tried to find some kind of "replacement therapy" every time I'd pick up my phone to check Twitter. A lot of times, it involved going outside - go out on the deck and read a bit, or go for a jog, or merely go around the neighborhood with the dog. It's amazing how much I grew to like that. Made the separation so much easier.

 

Getting out of reporting last year when I took the desk chief job allowed me to scale back on a lot of social media I wasn't interested in.

FB, cut down to family only. I keep it extremely private and in a variation of my name. I have notifications turned on if anyone messages me.

Twitter, I have a few friends and we mostly post jokes. I don't post a lot, and I mostly follow only people or news sites that I'm interested in.

LinkedIn, I update my job info when appropraite and keep this strictly for business contacts.

SJ.com, I throw in my two cents occasionally on the Journalism side, rarely on the news board, mostly on Anything Goes, especially the movies or pro rasslin threads.

Instagram, I use it to follow female celebs or women rasslers to see hot pics. What can I say? I'm a pig.

All said, I use the notifications features a lot. Instead of random, time-wasting scrolling I can interact only when I really want. I've had a lot more time for watching movies/shows, reading books or PS4 games.

 

As I said on the Crossfit thread (and likely on a few others), I gave up social media about three years ago and it has been fantastic. I had just gotten to a point where I would more often be annoyed or frustrated by something I saw on Facebook or Twitter instead of enjoying it. Then I asked why I was doing it to myself. So I deactivated the accounts and deleted the apps.

It was definitely odd at first. Going to those apps had become such a routine that I would instinctively try to click where they used to be on my phone for a couple of weeks after I shut them down. And there was definitely an urge to go back and see what I was missing. But eventually, and it didn't really take long, I didn't miss them at all. I started replacing the time I would waste on them with things I found more productive or fulfilling. Instead of spending lunch scrolling through my newsfeed, I would read a book. Instead of checking Twitter while waiting to get my tires rotated, I would text or email a friend I hadn't spoken to in awhile. Now those things are the routine.

Being "off the grid," as my friends like to say of me, definitley makes keeping up with people more removed from your circle harder. I almost missed the funeral for an old college friend, who also happened to be my first SE, because I'm not on Facebook. Luckily, one of my friends tracked me down and filled me in on the details. And there definitely have been some "wait, he has how many kids now?" moments when talking about someone who I haven't seen in awhile. Despite that, I still don't feel like I'm missing out on too much. The people who I truly consider close to me, I keep up with in different, and in my opinion more genuine, ways. If I want to know how they are or what they have been up to, I have to actually reach out. I can't just go to their profile page.

That said, I've always been more of a Luddite. So it is a wonder I was ever on social media at all. It annoys me to no end when my girlfriend and I will be on the couch watching a movie and she will be scrolling through her Instagram instead of actually watching. But I enjoy seeing her naked, so I'll let it slide.