For context when I say Mainstream, I mean Reddit, FB, IG, Twitter, etc.
With privacy and data concerns mounting more and the change of things in the general overall and day to day, I have started to rethink the use of mainstream Social Media and begin to make the migration away from it.
So far I have taken to the Fediverse with Lemmy, Pixelfed, and Mastodon. This is after Reddit just just shooting itself in the foot and blowing the damn thing right off. Twitter after Elon also just started the using a platform for his pissing context with Zuck. Instagram, I have no real use for now as it has become so hard to get any actual engagement beyond “likes”.
My issues with Facebook come from constantly changing how the timeline works and it got to a point to ONLY seeing pages I had liked and ads and not even seeing posts from anyone on my friends list. I was able to take the time and clean it up, but compared to the alternative of moving away from Facebook, it got old real fast. I continue to use Facebook primarily for the messenger functionality, but even there now everyone who I would talk to on the regular is either via text message or some other platform.
Eventually, potentially by the end of this year, I can see myself completely closing out my Twitter, Facebook, and Reddit so long as I like what I see here on Lemmy. That’s not so say Lemmy isn’t good, but IMO a I’ll has some ways to go.
The ONLY reason I can see keeping an Instagram is because there are some accounts I do find entertaining and have some good bits of information(Costco/Target finds, etc).
I don’t expect for these platforms to be replacements for the mainstream. And I hope they don’t become that, because that’s what making it special right now. The communities are small, instances make things close knit and that’s nice. Oh and also, not seeing ads after every post post is always nice as well.
So the TL;DR here is I plan on migrating away from Mainstream Social Media Platforms completely by the end of 2023 and wondering what everyone else’s game plan is or if they plan on keeping both the Fediverse/decentralized platforms and the Mainstream.
This is such a shame too. Facebook was genuinely a good service for those of us who only had real life friends and family in our friends list. It helped us stay in touch long distance and keep up with each other’s lives. Now, despite the fact that I’ve never “liked” a single public account, group, or page, never subscribed to one, and actively block them, I can hardly see any of my friends and family posts. I’ll see like one post from a friend and then it’s 15 posts from random groups that I have no interest in, and don’t want to see. You can’t block enough of them to get your feed back either. For every one you block there are 1000 more just like it, waiting to take its place. Zuckerberg has taken what was a great product for friends and family and turned it into a junk yard that we have zero control over. There’s a Facebook Purity plugin for Firefox that did allow you to regain control of your feed, but Facebook just broke it again recently. I don’t even go there anymore. It’s just a constant onslaught of ads and trash. What a fucking shame.
So as I had mentioned, I did go through the trouble of “unliking” every single page I had liked and did regain my Newsfeed considerably. There is another section that has influence over the newsfeed that I could go through and take care of, but after all of the work I just did I am not sure I have the motivation to do so AND do I really want to spend time doing it.
They’ve changed it to where now they just force it upon you. Like I said, I’ve never liked or subscribed to any of this stuff.
Oh yeah, they’ve absolutely made it harder. One of the main reasons for leaving it. The content that is thrown in your face that ISN’T what you want to see is just not tolerable anymore.