As mentioned in the intro post, I have recently watched through the Netflix Documentary 'Social_Animals' and this is a movie which follows three teens through their experiences with social media in the USA. Now, I know for a start that the US always does things bigger than the UK, so the issues, use etc. is blown more out of proportion over the pond so don't expect such drama over here.
I started my foray into social media a long, long time ago, even then I believe I was late to the game among my peers. I believe it started with a probably long forgotten website called Bebo. I honestly don't remember a huge amount about this website or my goings on (memories are a wonderful by elusive thing it would seem), but it should shed some light on the fact that I am from that generation which has literally grown up alongside social media. I was pretty much there from the early years of the craze.
Bebo didn't last long before Myspace popped around and took the world by storm. It was the must have thing, and not only did you have to have the usual (lots of friends, likes, comments etc.) but you had to have the best, most interactive or customized background with the coolest music embedded into your site. I have fond memories of Myspace, not only was it a place which you could express yourself in many many ways, but it was a place to find new music which, before Youtube was about, was only really able to be done by word of mouth, or magazines with free CDs in.
Then Zuckerberg came about and brought in Facebook. Suddenly is wasn't ok to have Myspace anymore and you had to reinvent yourself in a much more basic tone for Facebook. Facebook is now the main bit of social media I have. I've played about with Twitter, Instagram etc. but to someone who isn't keen to broadcast much publicly about their lives, the new guise of social media is not something I really get involved with.
How I use social media goes against pretty much everything that is 'cool' or 'popular'. I am not one of those glitzy girls who posts countless selfies or photos of little clothing in a alluring pose, neither am I one of the guys who posts pictures or their muscles and boasting about their gym exploits. I am not a hipster who is not content with a dinner or plate of food unless it is pictured and posted on their many accounts prior to the plate of food actually fulfilling its main purpose of providing the body with fuel. I don't have countless 'friends' and don't post pictures for the sole purpose for getting likes.
I literally have just the people I know on Facebook. You know, the likes of old school friends, university friends, old colleagues I have moved on from and wanted to stay in contact and friends of the spouse. Although there are often friend requests from others I see little point in accepting random people into what is pretty much a documentary of my life.
I post photos of my experiences, days out with friends, holidays, sport events I have been to and wonderful sights I want to remember. I post the odd selfie of my spouse and I of date nights or others times we go out and about from our abode. The posts and pictures held on my account our memories of my life, nicely set out in date order and of which Facebook now reminds me with a nice set of memories from each day. These memories, be it photos or status updates are there for one purpose only, and that is for my own pleasure. I do not care what others think of my page, posts or pictures and luckily I have never been part of the world of horrid comments which shows that the world seems to reciprocate those feelings.
There are some embarrassing photos up on the page of my early days, my haircuts are shameful and my years in university with shoulder length hair are beyond horrific. But they are my life events and are what made me, me. They are the sort of pictures you look through and laugh about with friends, loved ones and one day maybe the kids. I see it as the modern day photo albums, like the ones my parents pull out with baby pictures of me so the spouse could laugh at them.
I am in the point of my life where I am beginning to take stock of my life and where I am. I am beginning to realize I do not want nor need attention from random people on the internet and am perfectly happy in my life without the stress of the online community of trolls and keyboard warriors. I have had a youtube channel set up for a while and am one of those small time channels ~1000 subs and I take the approach with the comment section where if the comment has no context or is just plain rude it will not be accepted and I delete it without any further thoughts about it.
But, having said all this, it seems that I am in the minority with this sort of thinking. In the modern world going on out there without me, this beast of Social Media is running amok.
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