Social media rant

 I used to post quite a lot on Facebook. 

I generally took the time to try to create something that might make people chuckle. I got some nice feedback, and it became my 'something light' moment during some heavy times.

I was an early adopter. My use of social platforms from the early to mid-2000s sits at the core of how I got where I am in my career. I can't even remember the names of the funky social sites I used to frequent - and we're not talking Bebo or MySpace. Things were fun. Social media had yet to be actively monetised, and a lot of the activity was about being part of a user generated community. 

The bile and vitriol around Brexit stopped me from using that platform and, for me, highlighted how poisonous social media could be to society and individuals alike. It made me question the value of what I was doing with it and sent me down a road which led me to where I am now - seeing social media platforms, and Facebook in particular, as very much anti-social media. 

It's easy to look at this all in hindsight, and think "don't take it so seriously," but when I'm sitting next to my wife trying to enjoy a TV show with her, and she's paying more attention to Facebook than the TV or the kids in the background or anything I say to her, I can't help but regret being a part of the growth of this particular time-sink.

I think that this is what sits at the heart of my own depression. I worry, deeply, that society is genuinely becoming so ironically myopic through the global networks that allow individual similarities to become the foundation of a community. I worry that the differences that used to make communities such a strength of the human condition are being financed out of us through the insidious pervasiveness of social networking that is no longer about difference, or care, or fun. 

It's about monetisation. It’s about being seen to do the right thing. It’s about marketing. Perception. Visibility. Purpose. Identity. It’s about vulnerable people being marginalised. It’s about pan-global hatred and ease-of-access fundamentalism. It’s about not being able to have a conversation for fear of being identified as someone who doesn’t fit the right mould, and there are so many moulds out there. Everyone has an equal voice, and everyone can be heard - regardless of the value or truth of what they say. It’s judgement of the masses and a popularity contest that has one winner - the platform. It’s a poisonous summation of all that is bad in society and it echos it straight back at us, telling us it’s good. It’s invisible opinions driving hatred and bullying, and it’s all in your pocket.

I’m sure there’s good going on within the environs of these platforms, I’ve even seen it, but the platforms themselves are there for what they can get out of their relationship with their users. And they can scale that ‘extraction’ of value through automation and machine-learned algorithms.

OK. I’ll put the soap box away now. I’m not sure why today has driven the above out of me, but anyone that knows me will recognise the themes.