Keeping in contact

The subtext to the last post was that earlier this year I was trying to figure out social media alternatives.

This was largely because there were some people expressing frustration with social media. That is a common occurrence, but I get it.

For one thing, the engagement algorithms are getting more aggressive. I had been watching Reels a lot then took a break; suddenly they are offering completely different content. A suggested item came up about Star Trek that I read and now my timeline is flooded with more suggestions relating to science fiction television shows. I clicked on one bat item because I was trying to share it with a friend; bat merchandise is being thrown all over my feed.

I am on social media to keep in touch with people, so it failing in that would be reason enough to consider alternatives. As it is, it has gotten so much worse about trying to dominate my attention and package and market me that it ratchets up my irritation.

Back at the beginning of the year my goals were still mainly thinking about how to keep in touch with people who were not going to be on social media. That vision probably included me staying, but I did not rule out leaving because of how much I hate Mark Zuckerberg.

I was thinking about things like round robin letters or e-mail chains. 

One of the great things about Facebook is that despite the increase in effort required to see how your friends are doing, updating how you are doing is incredibly easy. That would not be true with other forms. You have to think about what you want to say and then say it, a process that has caused anguish for many people with annual Christmas letters.

The way a lot of round robin letters work is that each person puts in a letter of their own, reading others and then sending it on. When it gets back to you, you remove your old one and then write a new one.

I have gotten a lot better, but I signed up for many pen pals in school, who all eventually faded due to neglect. That was usually mutual -- we were kids -- but if the success of the round robin is only as strong as the most procrastinating member, that can be a problem.

It was also complicated by some concerns about the end of a functioning society. 

I had read things about how Trump could turn off the internet. I didn't think it was likely, but there are in fact ways to do that. 

I was also worried about mail. So many conservatives have wanted to kill the postal service, turning it over to for-profits like UPS and FedEx, not thinking what that would do to rural areas. For now, our mail is still reliable, but it did just get more expensive.

Ultimately, I did not start anything, though it is still something I think about. As it is, the person I thought most likely to leave Facebook is still there and still posting so far.

I suppose that's anticlimactic, but there are two reasons that I write about this.

If you want to try and make changes, you need to be willing to lose. Things can go terribly wrong because you miscalculated or because the timing wasn't right or because other people suck or the government collapses, but you have to be able to know that you can't control everything and still be willing to try and do good things.

The other reason is that people matter. 

There are so many forces fighting against that one, but it's still true.