how hard is it to quit social media?

I have a facespace page/account/whatever that I haven't visited in four years. I have a twitter account but don't remember the password.

SJ is the only social media site I'm on regularly.

 

As much as it pains me to admit I share a personality trait with Bill Belichick, I'm not a big follower of "Snapface" and "Instachat," so there's no social-media addiction (although I do spend a lot of time on the internet otherwise). I have a Facebook account and use it occasionally to keep up and stay in touch with friends and a few former co-workers, but generally it gathers digital dust.

One of my brothers-in-law is trying (without much success so far) to curtail his social-media use. He kicked a pack-a-day smoking habit a few years back and says giving up cigarettes was much easier.

 

Zuck needs some device that will allow you to discard political posts.
Anything that will zap a post with Trump's name in the display would be so welcome.
I understand it's important for people to want to "discuss" this stuff ... but some simply aren't intelligent enough to be doing so.

 

If you can't just skip past those posts without worrying about them, you're not very smart.

 

I think it's more difficult for ex-journalists to kick the habit than others. That's why I'm on there. (And here.) To have a place to shoot the shit with people about news coverage and current events - and to still have some kind of voice, which I really miss. A lot of the other people who post on Facebook about politics - not memes and rants, but real discussion - are ex-journalists, too.

 

Sorry, when your feed is a literal wall of pancake makeup face, then there needs to be an option.
Zuck and his troops have always said they want Facebook to be as customizable as possible.

 

I launched our organization's social media platforms (FB and Twitter, anyway) a long, long time ago and as of last year I no longer have any involvement in their maintenance or upkeep. I'm exceedingly happy with that development.

 

Never used my Twitter account much, but I'm not going anywhere with the message board or Facebook.

To be honest, I'm not particularly busy in my office right now, between projects. So my way of keeping sane is bouncing between a handful of bookmarks: SJ.com, Facebook, Longform, Ringer and a couple local news sites.

If someone is going off the deep end with the political shit on FB, I simply unfollow them for a while.

 

Nuked my facebook profile early in 2013. I had gotten worn out by the Romney vs. Obama political season the year before, I can only imagine what it is like. Unfortunately for me I am expected to post to the company page, so I still visit the site a couple of times a week, but for no more than posting articles or a rare question or inquiry sent via message on there.

But being without a personal profile is liberating. Don't miss all the stupid things people would post to me, especially the chain bullshit.

Still am active on Twitter for my job and enjoy it a lot. But I have a far different philosophy than other some other journalists. I don't at all buy into that "you need to be a personality" bullshit. I post only news, facts, stats, live scores and pics, and only answer questions from people if it's a fact question (What time is the game tonight?), not an opinion (Isn't Podunk East so better than Podunk West?). May post or retweet something unrelated to my beat every few months. I'm approaching 2,000 followers for my small area, so I feel it works. I follow only people/accounts related to my beat, other news orgs, a few politicians and colleagues, so I pretty much filter out the hot air. Though I get some from following the athletes I do.

 

I ditched Facebook about 4 years ago; a huge time waster and IMHO seemed to perpetuate the "Look at me" persona; I'm just not into that and neither is my wife. We're perfectly happy doing it old school.

 

Do you know about Social Fixer?

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Sick of Politics on Facebook? Now You Can Filter Your News Feed. Here's How...

 

If you're out of hs, or maybe college, not that difficult.