A waste of time.
I’ve spent the past few days hitting my old Facebook account off and on with the stated purpose in a post that my motivation was to NOT shitpost copypasta or repost other’s copypasta, nor would I get involved in tribal, political debates with anyone. Or debates in general.
I posted a few poetry pieces, my last collaboration with Tara, and a couple of silly little comments about life in general that were meant to be funny.
I got almost no reaction on the serious stuff, but lots of thumbs up on the meaningless, stupid stuff. After over a year of posting intermittently “I’m not dead” or the equivalent (about four times total, I think) and one that said, “You’re fired”, one would think friends might be curious as to what I’ve been up to over the past 365 days and check out the serious stuff, maybe even support it. But no… Facebook is not for anything useful, meaningful, or truly thought provoking — this much I’ve now confirmed. Unless it is stupid/funny, outraged or involves pets, it doesn’t have a place on that platform.
Experimentation done, I’m probably returning my focus here 99.9% of the time or more.
It’s better this way.
LikeLiked by 4 people
I’m going to have to agree.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I conducted the same experiment about 6 years ago with the same results. It was a bummer that so many people I *felt* close to on FB weren’t willing to connect in person, but it was just the confirmation I needed to move on. I don’t miss it at all.
LikeLiked by 2 people
I’d taken a ten year break before deciding to “catch up” a few years back. Then, as coronavirus swept the nation, things got crazy and it was anything but enjoyable, so I signed off for a social media detox.
Looking at what’s there, I’m not missing anything. I lost a friend I’d known since kindergarten to lung failure and the lack of transplant candidates (not related to covid).
Aside from that? Nothing new.
LikeLike
Right on! Also FWIW, the FB algorithm is less likely to show serious posts in your friends’ feeds. If you really want certain people to see your words, you need another medium.
LikeLiked by 1 person
It was an experiment.
Plus, I don’t think people claiming to be my friends in the past were ever more than friends of convenience or via forced association (e.g. school), maybe as few as 5% really care about me as a writer or a person beyond increasing their friend count.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I can relate to that. I have a small group of people who keep tabs on my writing here on WordPress, and they’re very good at doing so. That makes me happy, whereas Facebook most definitely does not.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Well, I for one definitely enjoy reading what you write.
LikeLiked by 1 person
The feeling is mutual! Very glad to have connected via this route!
LikeLiked by 1 person
I can relate to this….FB ain’t good for poetry / writing….had similar experience….I closed my FB page 3 weeks back….WP & IG I stick to…
LikeLiked by 2 people
I can’t seem to get into the IG thing, but I can see it’s appeal.
I had come to the conclusion about FB back when I quit a year ago, I just thought that if I limited my posts to certain activities this time around, I could generate a modicum of interest.
I’ve gotten more response out of Twitter from absolute strangers than from friends on FB… That settled it for me.
LikeLiked by 1 person
The same experience on FB….I think family n friends would rather read quietly than to express if they liked or not….I feel it’s better to connect with strangers who have similar liking for poetry or any other form of art….
LikeLiked by 2 people
But one post was with TARA!
I mean… wow… ignoring that? How?
🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
What can I say….people would rather comment on cRap
LikeLiked by 1 person