Social media stuff

[briantrumpet]

This might well be me talking to myself, but hey ho... nothing new there. I'll admit I spend quite a lot of time on social media, not least here. I don't do any newspapers apart from Private Eye (previous papers from childhood were Telegraph, Times, Independent – delivered every day for about 20 years – and then the Graun online as a fairly main news source. I've given up on that in the past year or so.

Online news: I got into Twitter pre-Musk, and that was good for a slightly anarchic but lightning-fast news source. Musk destroyed it by promoting paid-for blue ticks and putting his finger on the scales. Now I do Bluesky, having tried Threads (it was rubbish), and even if it's not as good as old Twitter by quite a margin, it's got things going for it (not least that you can 'curate' your own feeds pretty comprehensively).

Political forums: was on Cake Stop, obviously, and even more obviously am on here now.

The online news and political forums, I guess I use to help form my political views, both in general stances and specific topics. I remember Rick Chasey on Cake Stop saying he used CS to argue in order to try out different angles on arguments: I don't do that, but I do think that if you have a vaguely cogent and substantiated POV, you should be able to defend it reasonably robustly. If it falls apart if challenged, it's probably needs modifying.

Other social media: started with MSN in the days when staff and students were in the same social media space (and a lot of them are still friends 26 years later) and ended up with Facebook from about 2007. Since 2018 I've had the French Facebook Page which seems to attract middle-aged (and older) French women, and brings in a tiny amount of money. These days I pretty much avoid all politics on Facebook: the private profile is for friends, and the Page is all sorts, and neither group do I want to fall out with over political disagreements. FB really I do just for being social, and having a bit of a giggle.

I'm still interested in the death of post.news, and the failure of Bluesky to knock the Nazi Muskian X off its perch. I still wonder what's going on with Bluesky, and if it survives, what it will be. (More thoughts on that later, as it was what prompted me to start this thread.)

Anyway, I'd be quite interested, if anyone else is interested, what social and other news media habits people have, and how you use them... entertainment, trying out ideas, trolling, having-a-dump time, etc.

Otherwise, I'll talk to myself for a while, then get bored.

 

[PurplePenguin]

Reddit has something for everyone

 

[briantrumpet]

Reddit has something for everyone

Yeah, maybe in retirement I need to branch out more as I get more retired. I've got an account, initially to try and resolve the FB lock-out issue, and it does seems like an interesting place. Is it a slightly sprawling anarchy?

 

[briantrumpet]

Oh, I forgot to add I've got an Instagram log-in, but I've still no idea what Instagram is supposed to do that Facebook doesn't do better.

 

[briantrumpet]

Quite apart from the stuff about wasting time, having a bit of a giggle with friends, and trying to help refine political views, I do actually find the phenomenon interesting to observe, both in the wider social aspects (e.g. its malevolent use by bad actors and immoral SM companies, as much as its addictiveness for horny older French women), but how individuals interact on various 'vectors'.

If you, as a group, want to have a warm feeling, I didn't think the Cake Stop community would be easily replaced, but NCAP does a jolly good job, thanks all. That said, I'm also happy that most of the CS crowd ended up here: I've never met a single one of them in person (unlike NCAP), but 15 years of twatting around with people online does leave its mark.

 

[PurplePenguin]

Yeah, maybe in retirement I need to branch out more as I get more retired. I've got an account, initially to try and resolve the FB lock-out issue, and it does seems like an interesting place. Is it a slightly sprawling anarchy?

Well r/trumpet has people talking about trumpets. r/penguin has people talking about penguins.

Whether it is anarchy depends on the moderators and the rules they impose, so different subreddits have different philosophies. For example, if you post something critical of Israel on r/worldnews you are likely to be banned.

 

[secretsqirrel]

I come here for curated 2nd hand social media. Thank you Trumpet and Pinno etc.

I have never done FB, Twitter/X, Insta, etc.

I use YT as a resource for Clarinet, Saxophone, running stuff, other interests and info, and wallowing in my own comfortable political echo chamber. I prefer audio podcasts.
I have ventured into GB News out of curiosity, and Dan Wootton Outspoken . It reminds me that THEY exist and are out there.

My YT algos sometimes throws up stuff that I would never watch in a million years because of those occasional ambles into the dark side. I have discovered that when this happens I can selected ‘not interested‘ because ‘I don’t like’, and it goes away.

 

[AndyRM]

Social media is what you make it, or allow it to be.

And part of that comes down to how a person is able to parse it.

The issue is when it becomes manipulated, or tedious.

 

[briantrumpet]

Well r/trumpet has people talking about trumpets. r/penguin has people talking about penguins.

Whether it is anarchy depends on the moderators and the rules they impose, so different subreddits have different philosophies. For example, if you post something critical of Israel on r/worldnews you are likely to be banned.

Thanks Mr 🐧

Not sure if I'm ready for a Reddit trumpet forum, but will have a look from behind the sofa when I'm feeling brave.

 

[briantrumpet]

I come here for curated 2nd hand social media. Thank you Trumpet and Pinno etc.

I have never done FB, Twitter/X, Insta, etc.

I use YT as a resource for Clarinet, Saxophone, running stuff, other interests and info, and wallowing in my own comfortable political echo chamber. I prefer audio podcasts.
I have ventured into GB News out of curiosity, and Dan Wootton Outspoken . It reminds me that THEY exist and are out there.

My YT algos sometimes throws up stuff that I would never watch in a million years because of those occasional ambles into the dark side. I have discovered that when this happens I can selected ‘not interested‘ because ‘I don’t like’, and it goes away.

My brother does lots of podcasts and YT channels (as Pinno knows, I haven't got the patience for either most of the time), but he doesn't do any of the social media stuff I do (which is a relief, given some of his apparent sympathies and views). Suffice to say his political views are rather hybrid, and I can see the horseshoe phenomenon at play.

 

[AndyRM]

I have a grand theory about the internet.

Just turn the f*cker off for a couple of weeks.

Nowt would change l really, but it'd be a fun experiment.

 

[briantrumpet]

I have a grand theory about the internet.

Just turn the f*cker off for a couple of weeks.

Nowt would change l really, but it'd be a fun experiment.

A couple of times at a previous place of educational work (a very large state establishment), the entire network went down for an afternoon, and it was absolute bliss. People turned into humans again.

 

[Psamathe]

But in joining and being active you help the prople like Musk get richer. Maybe in a small way but the entire basis of these planforms is lot of small increments.

 

[briantrumpet]

But in joining and being active you help the prople like Musk get richer. Maybe in a small way but the entire basis of these planforms is lot of small increments.

Indeed so. Partly why I left X (and wish more people would do so), but I take Zuckerberg's shilling, as it does a good job for what I want it to do. So yes, I'm a hypocrite, at least to some extent.

 

[icowden]

For me, I've never really been into newspapers. I did occasionally read bits of the Mail and Express when I was a teen (this was back in the days when they were both actually newspapers) as my parents got them daily.

Once I got a modem I found Compuserve and frequented the forums there, particularly the MENSA forum. I was active there for several years. Once that died, I lost the bug for forum messaging although picked it up again when I found a local forum for my area. Became interested in Twitter, particularly because I love comedy and I found a huge number of the comedians I like were posting there.

I pretty much stuck to Twitter, reading comedy and current affairs until it became X and Musk killed it. A lot of comics tried out Threads, but most of the ones I was following seemed to be going to Bluesky which I now read regularly. I think many comics went back to X because in the end it's down to audience reach and despite Musk, they still have followers there.

I do have the book of faces but that's more for friends and family. I don't post there.