Ditching Social Media

Social media began as a fun, free and easy way to stay in touch and share information but now it is also a powerful tool with the ability to win or lose elections.

If you think that is a bit strong you have not been paying attention to world events.

Social Media and Me

I resisted social media for a long time. I used a personal computer and email at work and also at home but was not interested in social media.

However as a blogger sooner or later it became necessary to take the plunge.

My journey into social media was slow and small initially but it snowballed.

I began to cull followers on a regular basis, locked down my accounts and refused new friend requests but a couple of months ago with around 2,300 followers on Facebook and almost 6,000 on twitter I decided enough was enough and deactivated both accounts.

I now have new accounts on both these social media platforms and I intend to keep these accounts small.

Facebook groups and forums are a great place to interact and share links to your blogs but many are toxic.

Having created a group and been an admin on it for two years I can tell you it can be time consuming, hard work and depressing at times.

It will of course depend on what sort of forum, group or page you operate.

Political groups and forums can be a nightmare to administrate.

Keeping trolls out of the mix is far from easy. There are so many fake profiles and accounts on social media at times you have no idea who a follower really is.

With the best will in the world and a team of admins agent provocateurs, fakes and trolls will still make it into even the tightest knit group on social media.

Our group had almost 5,000 members when we decided to trim it down. That is a lot of members for a closed group with plenty of rules.

This summer part of my return to the real world was ditching this group too.

After a chat with admin team members they decided to keep the group going and we parted as friends.

But for me the black dog of depression was knocking at my door again and part of the problem was so-called social media.

Yes I hear you saying there are no groups and forums on Twitter but you are wrong.

If you have political affiliations you may find your following and followers lists full of like-minded people.

You may take part in tweetstorms which involve a group of tweeters flooding the platform with a message. The purpose is to get that message or rather its hashtag trending worldwide.

It is debatable how much impact tweetstorms have in the real world but they are often successful on social media.

Groups of people use the messaging facility of Twitter to form groups and organize campaigns.

With Instagram, linked in, WhatsApp, SnapChat and more the drag on your time can be huge. If you allow notifications to alert you when a person responds you may find you are online 24/7.

Do you really think that is good for your mental or physical health?

Do you use social media or does it use you?

Social media is designed to be addictive. The developers of social media want you to be online as much as possible. They want your personal information and survive on revenue you unwittingly supply.

Many social media users share far too much information online. Details of vacations must be useful for anyone wanting to break into your home.

Taking back control of your life may start with limiting your time online.

If you blog for a living it can be difficult to take social media out of the mix. We all need to share our blogs unless you write for unusual reasons.

There are tools though such as platforms that offer scheduled social media shares. Some of these however still take time to set up and need regular input.

I am back to enjoying life.

I pop on social media now and then and use it to stay in touch with family and friends.

I share the odd political post, plenty of funny videos and memes and the odd blog.

I still have a couple of pages on Facebook with followers where I share blogs too.

However I spend so much less time online I feel liberated.

I no longer have to interact with angry people, trolls and negativity and life is good.

Make sure social media does not take over your life!