As a cranky mammy who got no sleep last night I might say this post should come with the warning, it is a bit cranky.
I know what you’re thinking already, you’re thinking, in a sea of annoying things about social media, and I’m concentrating on facebook here, she chose only five!
Well these are just my own personal favourites I’m sure you’ll have your own. The thing is I spend more time on facebook than I’d like for two reasons.
Reason the first. Facebook is the number one referral site for new people to the blog so that’s good and warrants an input on my part.
Reason the second. I work hard on my facebook page. I like to keep it looking sharp. I’m not posting a lot of original stuff outside my blog posts so to make up for that I try not to post things that are popping up everywhere. I like to have something different plus a good balance of articles, quotes, images and more. I love maintaining my page but it does mean I see a lot, really a LOT of things I’d rather never see.
Here we go…
- The modern day chain letter. ‘Most people will not put this on their page for even one hour will you?’ ‘Share this now and your health will improve or your wish will come true’. Hey whatever you’re into. It’s not for me
- The sick child posts. Usually involves a photo of a seriously ill child, often graphic and upsetting imagery, usually in a hospital bed with a caption like ‘Don’t turn away, show you care, like & share.‘ Or it may suggest your ‘like’ and ‘share’ will raise funds or say ‘how many likes for this great dad/nurse kissing child with cancer.‘ These photos have most likely been stolen and are doing the rounds without family consent. Even worse is some of the children have already died. Think about it, if your child was seriously ill in hospital would you share their photo around for likes and shares on facebook? You might like to follow ‘facecrooks’ on facebook for more guidelines or read about their ‘sick child hoax posts’ by clicking here.
- The Anti Women Posts. Everyday on facebook there’s a near constant stream of… ‘Ten photos of other women to make you feel better about yourself’ Uh, really? Then there’s all those posts about ‘real women’ that imply you need to be a certain size to qualify. Shaming goes both ways you know. On the one hand there is so much brilliant work being done around the world in the name of equal rights that is so vital and so awe inspiring. It makes you feel that things are really changing and then all this crap pops up and it is just so shallow. Much more shallow in my opinion than what the marketers are doing because it’s coming from women.
- Getting Personal The rules should be no commenting without reading and no abusing or attacking other people for their views, by all means respectfully disagree but name calling is nasty and getting personal is very uncool. It’s just another form of bullying.
Artwork by artist Lisa Congdon, click on image for link
5. I Can’t Get No Satisfaction. There’s something lacking in fb that’s hard to quantify. Fb stops just shy of being stimulating. It allows you to share but there’s still something missing. If you blog or have other creative outlets you might be appeased if you don’t it’s harder. I think it’s the lack of required or even of potential creativity, if that makes sense. I’ve long thought it would be cool if on fb people had more opportunity to really express their interests and individuality. Let’s just say there’s a ‘want’ that’s tangible or is that just me?
So what about you? What drives you crazy on fb and other social media? This year I’ve cut back my social media by turning off notifications and working to more stringent time slots (trying to)
Chat soon, Jane.
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Jane, I could have written every one of those too, drives me absolutely mad. Full moon=no sleep!!
If I don’t get some sleep soon I’ll be howling at it! No sooner had I the post written than I spotted one of the sick kid posts, maddening!
I can honestly say I’ve never seen those sick kids posts, thankfully, Nor the women ones. So I must have turned off the notifications on the right people. Your page is a work of art Jane. I only wish I knew how to get it into my feed? Do you know? I spend too much time now on Instagram. That’s where the creatives are getting their yayas out. I see your post notifications on Google+ but I’m not there. Not enough time.
Love Ya’ and get some rest darlin’,
Shalagh
Aah thank you Shalagh : ) To get the posts in your newsfeed just hover over the ‘liked’ button. A few options will pop up, choose ‘get notifications’ and that should do it! Also when you ‘like’ posts on a page you usually get more from that page in your newsfeed. Looking forward to seeing more of you! I only follow blogs via fb these days, the way posts just pop up under my nose works for me! I don’t know how you managed to avoid the sick kid posts but I’m impressed! Are you rarely on fb or is everyone you know just really fb savvy?
Totally agree with all of them Jane. Number 1 and 2 drive me crazy.
I have been exploring google+ and although my newbie learning curve is interesting I am liking it.
Still have to stay with fb as it does drive traffic but not impressed by the way only a small number of our overall followers get to see posts.
I get yours Jane and love the writing and pics.
Liz
Thanks Liz, I’m on google+ and twitter and probably do slightly more with twitter than google. For now at least I can’t justify any more time on social media. I guess I feel I’d have nothing to write about!
You know when you’re reading something and you agree with it SO much that you start shoutin YES, YES at the screen and gritting your teeth and you forgrt to breathe…….well thats what i’m at here. And that night last week I cursed the moon so much, i was afraid it’d put a hex on me , I never got a wink of sleep and 4 of 5 dogs, mad for the craic the whole night.The old lassie slept sound and she nearly annoyed me more than the ones who were awake cos she was so content and switched off while I was like something with no eyelids……….you’re spot on again Jane!!
Great comment Maggie thank you. Good to know I wasn’t the only one losing my sleep and my mind! Funny too because I sometimes think when I put these things down that people will read it and say ‘what the hell is she on about?’!!!
I have a post in mind about Facebook too, more about how much it has changed, I really miss the way it was at the start, and probably spend more time on twitter now as I find it more exciting - Facebook seems a bit ‘flat’ - I get the impression that you feel the same x