Julie's Web Journal

Excuse me for having one.

And yet, this is my journal, and I'll opine if I want to! So there, X!

My two readers will  notice the ever-growing sidebar (or bottom block if you're on a mobile device) of social media. I feel like I'm drowning in the stuff, shouting into a void because I don't have the cash to boost my posts so two more people can see them. 

Some sites frustrate me more than others, and there's this feeling of urgency that if I don't post everywhere, people will forget me. They've already forgotten me on Twitter and Facebook. The algorithms at those places aren't meant to help out average people. And Ghu help you if you're a non-profit. The one I work with used to be able to get the word out on social media. Now we're not rich enough or pretty enough, or whatever, to get traction. 

Social media demands our eyes and our ears. It demands our opinions and our time. But what do they give us in return? It used to be a place to go for an exchange of ideas. People bought blue checkmarks on the site formerly known as Twitter because they could be verified as a real person or business. Now, any troll with eight bucks can buy a checkmark. And they're begging people to buy checkmarks. Okay, they call it a subscription, but it seems like a bait and switch to use a symbol meant to say "verified" to denote a subscriber with a few bucks a month to spare. 

Cory Doctrow calls what's happening with social media enshittification. (His language, not mine, though I have stronger words.) It's as though someone sees they have a good thing and turn around to milk that good thing for all the cash they can get while strangling the very thing that made it good. Hey, I'm not against subscriptions or ads. Developers need to be paid. Hosting and cloud storage need to be acquired, along with all the basic things that go along with it like offices, benefits for employees, etc. (These are things being dismantled at the site formerly known as Twitter.)

Of the platforms I'm the most active on, they all have their good and bad points:

Facebook is going down the algorithm rabbit hole. I have a business page there, and I refuse to boost my posts because I know I won't get more engagement. Our non-profit has benefited from boosts in the past, but they have a more broad appeal. Their algorithm is broken. I don't see posts from my family members. Most of us have family in other cities or states, and it's a way to keep in touch. I'd deal with an extra ad or two if I could prioritize family members. Of course, if I did that, Facebook would use that to shove even more ads in my face. How do we win? We don't.

Mastodon is interesting, but I have yet to get the "hang" of it. And the self-verification process on the instance I use is broken. But hey, I'm a nobody anyway, so it probably doesn't matter.

Threads is new, and it's the Wild West over there. That's good and bad. I'm finding new and interesting people, but there are also people who troll for new followers every hour. And some of them post rules for follows and boosts. It would be fine if those were general rules, but they come across as condescending. I'm sure there are improvements on the way, but I come away from there feeling as I've been hit in the face with a firehose.

Ko-fi: I've tried to use that. I have one subscriber. I know I'm not doing it right. I try to keep up with it, but as I said above, I feel like I'm drowning. Also, that I'm not good enough for suppport.

So there you have it. I'm off to do some work. I have an art show in a couple of weeks (see the other side/bottom block for details), but no one knows I'm doing it or seems to care.