Cutting down on Facebook, Instagram and Youtube

Byrichard
Reading Time: 3 minutes

The Issue

For a while Facebook was the network to keep in contact with university friends after we all graduated and then it was the network to keep in contact with colleagues. Eventually it became the network where people shared news without engaging with others. It has become a network where you scroll through dozens of irrelevant posts in the hope of finding something personal, and failing.

Instagram used to be the network where we could share images with friends and see what they were sharing. After Facebook bought Instagram it grew out of favour with people sharing between friends. Now when I use facebook I need to scroll by an advert from the second post onwards. They have flooded Instagram with so many adverts that it has become unusable.

When youtube was young we were able to look through 30-60 videos and find some that were of interest. We would need to wait for videos to buffer and then watch the desired content. Today we no longer need to wait for videos to buffer, we need to wait for adverts to pre-roll the obligatory five seconds before clicking to content we want to watch.

The Solution

It’s 2019 and I have reduced the amount of time I spend on Facebook favouring news websites, Twitter and other web portals. When Yahoo and other companies were still young we called them web portals. Facebook has shifted from being a social network to being a web portal. It has undermined person to person communication. It has undermined its unique selling point. If I want to browse through news or information websites I can use newsreader apps, web portals or visit worpdress.com

In its hayday Instagram was unique because it downscaled and uploaded images in the time it took for us to prepare the text that went with an image and we could share it despite little bandwidth. Today it has become yet another multimedia sharing option with the drawback of having to flick through adverts. They have degraded the experience so much that I have uninstalled the app from at least one of my phones. I decided that I would pay, at least for now, to preserve the thirty six thousand images on Flickr. I also paid because I want to move away from the Facebook monopoly. On Flickr I am the client, rather than advertisers.

On multiple occasions I have binge-watched content by youtube creators, sometimes for hours at a time. The issue that I have with youtube now is that they have made it challenging to find new and interesting content. This is because they have reduced the amount and diversity of videos that we can see on the home screen. It is also due to the amount of pre-roll that we have to sit through before the video starts. I often give up before the pre-roll videos have ended. The reason I gave up on YouTube content watching is the request for us to pay 20 CHF per month in Switzerland to watch content without adverts. That is more expensive than Netflix, Curiosity Stream and the same price as I would pay for a telecom provider’s various content packages. I wouldn’t mind if this content was paid for and produced by youtube and if youtube creators such as myself could monetise content, but we have been demonetised.

That’s why I stopped using Youtube. For Video On demand, I have Netflix for general interest content. I have CuriosityStream for documentaries and I have Swisscom TV for random content that is “broadcast” when I am watching television.

Conclusion

By blogging I am developing my creativity and writing skills. By sharing images on Flickr and other services I am contributing to communities where people are sharing images because they love photography rather than to become web celebrities. Finally I want to cut down on YouTube because browsing is no longer straight-forward.

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Of live video streams and Paleo

Byrichard

I really enjoyed what Nicholas of K had to say in the interview we did last night for Musicorama.tv. He spoke about projects and how we can achieve anything we want as long as our mind is in the right place. I’ll let you know when that interview is online.

This year Paleo has been a different experience from previous years because I went as a “radio/TV” person as opposed to a collaborator (work for free, get free food and free non alcoholic drinks as well as invites for friends), in the latter case you sleep so little it’s not unusual to take a week to recover.

I enjoyed myself. I enjoyed seeing all the live acts and I streamed quite a few events, from Iam, The Justice, The goose, Massive Attack and more.

We also had interviews with BB Brunes, K, The DO, The Dodoz, Marvin, Girls in Hawai and Caribou if I remember all of them.

Here are some of the Live streams

Listen as the people realise what song it is. listen to the crowd roar 🙂

Tikan Jah Fakoly was good too. Nice relaxed evening. He was playing before Manu Chao

Manu Chao played for over two hours but I had work the next day so I left early.

Why I Won’t Pay 20 USD Per Month For Twitter and FaceBook

Why I Won’t Pay 20 USD Per Month For Twitter and FaceBook

Byrichard

In 2006-2007 I would have payed for Twitter and/or facebook, but not now. Both of them say “pay, to prove that you’re a human being”. For as long as I have been on Facebook I have used my real name. I authenticated myself by using my university e-mail address. Back then you need an educational e-mail address to be verified. it’s only with time that the barriers to entry collapsed.


With twitter I started as anonymous but after plenty of tweetups I used my real name. It’s only during the pandemic that I felt the need to hide my identity. Specifically I hid my identity and changed my name when two or three women tried to start flame wars against me due to misunderstandings.


Before those attempts at flame wars Twitter was a network of friends, and when you’re in a network of friends you behave. Everyone knows everyone and there is the expectation that we meet in person after a few weeks or months of conversations. Not anymore. That’s where thinks become less pleasant.


The true reason for which I would not pay for FB and Twitter is that both social networks offer very little flexibility. For 8-11 USD per month you can setup your own Mastodon instance, with friends and family, or either one or the other. For five dollars per month you can setup a Linode server and build your own blog based community using WordPress if you want the little to no code solution, or other content management systems. If you’re going to pay to be part of a community, make it personal, make it local, or make it professional.


The golden age of social media has been and gone. Now Social media companies that forget that ROI, for their users was important, are penny pinching where they can. If you pay for Twitter, Facebook and other social networks you end up paying hundreds of francs, or dollars, per year, for algorithms that make you invisible, to reach friends that have better things to do. I don’t see what we’re actually paying for.

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It’s a question of Gravity – Twitter on S60

Byrichard

Gravity is a twitter client for the s60 and I recently installed it on my N95 and so far I’m very happy with it. With an intuitive interface it makes being logged in to two twitter accounts and one identica account very easy. What is especially nice is that you select which account you want to look at and by scrolling left and right you see the friend’s timeline, the replies, your tweets, your DM and finally searches if you want. That’s automatic and for every account.

It’s far better than the other twitter clients for s60 that I’ve tried so for the moment that is one twitter client I would recommend you use.

I know what I’m talking about. I tweet from anywhere without it slowing down my social life.

Also if you pay for this app after the ten day trial period you’re helping demonstrate that it’s not just the iphone which has people willing to pay for the applications

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Reactions – What if Twitter died

Byrichard

You can tell when someone joins a social network by what they think the network is for. I joined twitter in 2006. No one knew what the network was best at, eventually everyone decided to use it as a conversation tool. When people understood how dynamic conversations could be the network grew. The author of “What if Twitter Died“wrote this:

“it can’t seem to stretch beyond its celebrity, celebrity follower and tech roots. If you aren’t into celebrities or the tech industry, Twitter just isn’t that appealing, especially given all the other options for online social interactions.”

It is clear from this writer’s post that he has not been with twitter since it’s earliest days. His twitter profile indicated that he arrived in 2010. That’s up to two years after the golden age of twitter ended. My previous posts have explored this topic in depth.

While social media focus on marketers and public relations professionals I will keep blogging. It allows me to express myself without providing content for platforms that have destroyed the social dimension.

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A really good conversation from TWiM

Byrichard

This Week in Media 85 is an interesting conversation about media news for the past week with a technological slant. This week’s interesting is particularly interesting as it explored the future of television and how people consume media. From the PVR and the ability for people to discuss the content they enjoy to machines that talk to each other they cover many topics.

They also discussed computer literacy and whether the youth of today are as computer litterate as previous generations. That’s an interesting point. The idea is not whether someone can get a computer to do what they want but rather whether they know how to set it up. Think of Linux. Would you be able to setup a linux box.

It’s the type of discussion that’s good to follow to give you a number of points of view.

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