I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, and felt great since

Re:I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, ... by amatecha on Wednesday June 24, 2020 @08:48PM (#23635585)

I haven't used FB regularly in about 3 years now (after being an early adopter and heavy user), and honestly the times I logged in to see all the "happy birthday!" notifications, I couldn't believe how far the platform had devolved since I last logged in. It's one of the biggest disappointments of modern technology for me. Such amazing unity of entire communities and families, worldwide, being turned into such an exploitative and IMO harmful platform. There's a bit of signal in the noise (in the form of actual worthwhile friend/family/community posts), but unfortunately for me it's simply not worth the effort of wading through an endless supply of ragebait, propaganda and straight-up misinformation.

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Re:I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, ... by teetertater on Wednesday June 24, 2020 @09:26PM (#23635863)

A measure that could significantly improve your Facebook experience (as it did mine) is to curate the content that you want to see.

A few years ago I started actively clicking "not interested" on every type of content that I didn't want to see, and slowly but surely I managed to get rid of all memes, news, and uninteresting bits.

Now I'm left with discussions about AI papers, local events that friends are attending, and updates from friends in other countries. And even then, my feed is so uninteresting that I'm not tempted to scroll through it every day. Of course, this doesn't remove the million other issues with Facebook but at least it doesn't mess with my happiness

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Re:I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, ... by jsinai on Thursday June 25, 2020 @02:44AM (#23637584)

I have to do a “not interested” purge on my Instagram about once every 4 weeks. That’s how long it takes the Instagram Explore algorithm to devolve into degenerate memes and echo chambers regardless of my interests.

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Re:I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, ... by bmarquez on Thursday June 25, 2020 @12:10AM (#23636815)

The best feature that improved my use of Facebook is the "snooze" button.

Whenever someone posts something annoying, like a string of recycled memes or bad political arguments, I hit that snooze button and they disappear from my feed for 30 days.

In 30 days they've usually calmed down.

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Re:I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, ... by esperent on Wednesday June 24, 2020 @10:09PM (#23636152)

I went a step further and used a script to unfollow everything - all friends, pages, and groups. Once you do that the news feed is completely gone and Facebook becomes a much better experience. I left it this way for about six months and then re-followed my family and ten or so close friends.

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Re:I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, ... by zhoujianfu on Wednesday June 24, 2020 @10:51PM (#23636387)

Yeah, I manually unfollow all my “friends” that I don’t really know that well/care about the first time they post something annoying. Done!

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Re:I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, ... by klipt on Wednesday June 24, 2020 @09:11PM (#23635772)

The way the social media hivemind works these days, it seems halfway to China's "social credit" system, where people can be fired for liking the "wrong" kind of tweet. For now it's safe to just ignore the noise, but I wonder how long before people will be fired for not liking the "right" kind of tweet.

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Re:I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, ... by crakenzak on Wednesday June 24, 2020 @11:47PM (#23636703)

Already happening, received two angry messages from people I know for not reposting BLM/SJW posts on my instagram story, even though I had already donated to ACLU & signed petitions I agree with in private.

What worries me is this is just the start. Wonder how social interactions will be in 50 years...

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Re:I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, ... by 54thr on Thursday June 25, 2020 @04:40PM (#23645434)

I don't think that people will be leaving their houses much in 50 years, assuming we still have "people" and "houses". The singularity is on the horizon and we are running full-speed toward it.

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Re:I deleted my Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram accounts, ... by muzani on Wednesday June 24, 2020 @11:47PM (#23636706)

Yes, I think this is the sad thing with a lot of modern tech. They aim to make 0.5% more ad revenue quarter after quarter and by the time they realise it, it's a big mess.

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