I was an early adopter of Facebook, joining sometime around 2007. In its early days, I appreciated the value it brought to my life – connectivity, networking, posting pictures for friends and family, engaging in shared interest groups, finding local deals on their marketplace, etc.
But over the past several years, I discovered that though Facebook still provided a certain level of value to my everyday life, the associated costs and downsides had outweighed the value. So I quit Facebook, X, and Instagram. And when I say, ‘quit,’ I mean that I permanently deleted my accounts (after successfully downloading the files of ALL my data from those accounts).
What do I mean by costs and downsides? Before I list those, let me say a disclaimer: this is my own story and experience. Yours might be totally different. You might find more value than the costs, and that’s great. This is simply how I perceive the role of Facebook (and X and Instagram) in my life before and after quitting them. And I can say that three months in, I have no regrets. In fact, I believe my life has been more enjoyable, simple, and joyful since I quit those big three. If you’re wondering, I never had SnapChat or TikTok in the first place. I do have a YouTube account, which gives me a place to post my videos for my juggling show. But I don’t really use it in a traditional social media account way.
Costs and Downsides (in no particular order)
- Sponsored Posts – These got out of hand for me. I know the social media companies need to make money somehow to provide users with free social media. I really do get that. But we as users get to decide when the commercials are too much and can just walk if it’s not worth it to us (that’s what I chose to do).
- The Algorithms – This is the secret sauce that the social media companies do not want us to know. They want engagement. Why? So they can sell ads to their customers at higher prices. How do they increase engagement? They generate content feeds that they believe will keep our eyes on the screens for as long as possible. That might mean prioritizing things on our feed that really don’t interest us. Yes, I know we can toggle about with what we like and don’t like and can block people and so on. But in the end, the social media company is still dictating what I see and what I don’t see on their feeds. What if I want to simply see the most recent post that any of my friends posted? That might happen. But I can’t count on it.
- We Are the Product – Speaking of ads and customers, I once heard someone on a radio interview (I’m sorry I cannot recall who) say that we are not social media customers (unless you’re a business account), but rather “We are the product.” You see, everything we post, like, subscribe to, etc, the social media company harvests that data in order to create a very specific profile of us for the sake of selling targeted ads to their business customers. We are exchanging our personal information and data for the opportunity to connect with others on social media. Sorry, it’s not worth it to me anymore. I’ll just send pictures of my children and vacation highlights directly to those closest to me via text (and I’ll know that they will see them).
- Lost Time – When I’m 80 years old, I’m not going to look back on my life and say, “I wish I would have spent more time on social media.”
- Losing Our Minds – More often than not, I see posts or discussion threads that quickly descend into arguments and shouting matches where people are simply shouting past one another. When we are not in the flesh as humans (like online conversations), I believe we tend to say and do things that we would otherwise not say/do in the flesh. That means people say really crazy things online without careful thought. And oftentimes those voices are amplified in ways that are not commensurate to thoughtfulness of the conversation. You may say that is a subjective statement, and it is. Who gets to decide what gets amplified or not in these environments? The social media platform, not us.
- Tending to Conversations that Take Me Away From Real Life – I was tired of keeping up with conversations in the social media environment. It’s like tending a garden. It’s work to say things, listen to others, respond to others, and have fruitful conversations in life. I’d rather invest more time and energy into real-life dialogues and conversations.
- Fakebook – We all know the flashy photos on social media depict one slice of life of all of us. We all like to post our best and happiest. But that is a facade. I don’t want to live in a world of facades. At it’s core, I believe social media is more facade than truth. It is a lot of context-less images and sound bites. The platforms are not giving us free social connectivity online out of the goodness of their own hearts. They are in this for the money. And I have chosen to take my data elsewhere.
Have you quit/deleted social media? If so, why? Are you a big fan of social media? Do you believe it provides more value than cost to your own life?
