Yes that's what lives pretty strong in that generation - and on social media in general, I have the impression. For some that goes really far, maybe too far, and people become unhappy or even depressed if they are not seen/approved by others.

Which is like in real life, but also at the same time not quite: in real life conversations etc you show a lot of yourself because it's impossible to hide. Facial expressions, body language, meeting pople early in the morning when you're not at your best, on one of those days where the whole world is against you, and so on. In virtual life however you try to make sure that side of you doesn't show. You could call it a lie. I'm not sure if that is good, bad or neither.

I was probably like that once, even though I think I wasn't. I remember everyone around me being concerned with being "liked."

More importantly, Mean Girls and Fast Times at Ridgemont High and Wonder Years all seem that way.

Who know with kids, they make no sense in any generation. :)

It was not that I was so vain - it just seemed like a reality to me. Reality seemed to be, you have to be cool like these guys / that guy / whoever or else you will never have a girlfriend and never have sex and die alone.

In hindsight, that's stupid, idiotic even. But back then that was my life. And it's still like that for teens now. Explains why I can talk to a teen and they seem like perfectly reasonable people, except 10 minutes later they go off and do something unimaginably stupid.

Maybe it's a sort of random mutation of our social genetic makeup - teens must do stupid, senseless stuff, and some, randomly, discover something great (while lots of others just embarrass or injure themselves).

Of course, I grew up with punk rock music, so when that happens, I just say F them and move on with my next un-liked post. (Then, the game is to see how many old friends I can repel)

And then, to me, the quality of the likes matter.

I recently posted 3 different links that were all about stuff very close to my heart - things I really care about. One was a 40 minute video. It got one like, but that like was from my father - I'd trade that for 100 friends likes. One was an article I loved; it got one like, but the guy loved it so much he shared it. And this is something - if I have reached one person's heart, it's a huge success. Another one, forget what that was, but it got likes from my brother and another person close to me.

If a post gets no likes, yeah, first of all, fuck them, and secondly only 10 people saw it thanks to Facebook's clever constant optimization algorithm so F Facebook, too.

Let's be honest, I have 300 friends, the likelihood that all 300 saw a post of mine and did NOT like it is pretty much zero. The only way I can get a post with no likes is if it was only shown to a small percentage of my friends. (or if I posted total crap but I'm not, I swear ;) )

But I also leave up posts that don't get as many likes or comments. If I'm posting something, it's because I've spent time working on the material. I think it's good regardless. But I do know acquaintances who will delete comments they don't like and have gone to post a comment on a post only to get a "post no longer exists" message. This is only from experience on Facebook, I don't really tweet that often anymore.

That's typical teenager behaviour. To the point that it's stereotipical.

However, I am sure there is some philosopher 200 or 100 years ago that has noticed the same phenomena with a different generational shift of technological and emotive labeling.

Keeping it Real Fake

Currently I use Facebook to see photos of my extended family, LinkedIn for work & sales, Instagram to keep up with my cooler friends, Twitter to see trending news, StockTwits to see investing ideas...

To me this is the future of social networking: many networks, each with a specialized purpose.

I use these services in different contexts.

When I'm relaxing and looking at Instagram, the last thing I want is a business article from LinkedIn or a political diatribe from Facebook.

In fact my primary problem with Facebook is that it tries to be everything to everyone.

Nilay Patel recently argued that Facebook is the new AOL, it's the portal of the 2010s. I think that is an apt description. I am using it yet also kind of just pining to drop it.

I also use it for groups and messaging. Somehow, Facebook groups are great. They're super simple, and they just work. The newsfeed on the other hand is completely broken.

You might not want one but "our generation" has been building them for some time. It's even Peter Thiel's mantra.

I think you might struggle to 'bring everyone over' to a better group service. Part of the draw of facebook is that is everyone is already 'over'.

For any given event, about 2/3 of the people will never respond to the invite, of the people who did respond it's a complete tossup who will show up, the stupid "maybe" answer which is essentially the same as not responding at all because it means "almost definitely not, but I technically could show up since I marked maybe". People often invite all their friends which includes everyone they have ever met, people that don't even live in the area or that they are close with anymore. Facebook gives you no intelligence whatsoever on the events, like "here are people you always invite" or "here are people you always invite but who never respond" etc, which would be easy to show and very helpful. There is no way to update people coming to the event on changes or anything other than posting on the event's wall, which most people will not be notified of unless they check facebook all the time, etc. etc. I could go on for so long about how shitty facebook events are, and it truly makes me sad, because really the purpose of these events is just to meet up with and have fun with friends, but the process is so frustrating I feel like it actually prevents this from happening in a lot of cases.

On that note, I am also very passively plotting out working on a better version, so if anyone is reading this and is also frustrated by facebook's crap events feel free to get in touch, hah.

So am I.

Drop a mail: [email protected]

> Super interesting take - it's as though they are posting not to show people stuff but to

Just an idea: This is a single individual; basically anecdata. I have a sister who is 44 years old and who does the same thing and has been doing it as long as she's been on the internet (she started by blogging and has deleted hundreds of posts in the same way, in addition to her current FB, Instagram, etc. posts). I do wonder if this could be reduced to psychological typology or self-image though.

Which is generally how the average westerner has behaved for generations. They don't acquire and desire clothes, music, books, movies, ideas, hair-styles and gadgets solely based on best personal fit. They acquire and desire based -- very heavily -- on the opinions of those tribes they admire.

(And while teenagers and young-adults are far more susceptible to this sort of "fashion", older folks are far from immune to it.)

I have a 21 year old friend, this is how she's using Facebook:

- Accept all friends requests. There are lots because she's cute. - Go through the feed relatively often, liking every single post. - Post stuff, see who likes it. Those friends who don't like her posts are unfriended.

Needless to say, she gets a lot of likes on her posts. It's absurd to do this, of course, but at the same time it's just taking what normal people do, and taking it to its logical extreme.

I am guessing if the Facebook engineers responsible for optimizing the news feed saw this they'd have a heart attack.

You are going to need significant value-add to convince people to bootstrap their identities and social graph all over again. Snapchat did it by piggybacking on "people who have each other's phone numbers." Tumblr did it by not doing it - the social network is deliberately separate, and you have to be much closer to someone for them to tell you their Tumblr URL.

I will never use your service if I have to sign up, confirm my email address, add friends, convince them to sign up and actually check it, etc. Decentralization is the surest way to destroy user experience. Facebook already knows me and everyone I know in real life. Why would I not just use it?

Isn't this exactly what snapchat did though - except with a phone number instead of email?

How? I've never heard this. Whatsapp is on your phone like texts.

Unless you meant they start using it with people other than you...

$1USD = 8mb ($2 MXN = 1 mb)

In context: Daily wage is $4 USD

Facebook really should create a whatsapp for System 30+ -- they would dominate that market.

Whatsapp is really important in some markets. Just because you don't know anyone using it doesn't make that less true.

(Also, I use it, so now you do know someone using it!)

Also understand that I am FULLY aware that I do not represent my age group nor do I represent even the "average" "young" person. I represent a small demographic but I wanted to give my views from that position.

I'm just saying, just because people with dumbphones or feature phones are clamoring for WhatsApp doesn't mean that people with smartphones care at all about the service.

I'm 35 and don't post what I'm doing or showing off who I'm with every 30 minutes, and if I occasionally post something and no one comments on it, I don't care and I sure don't delete it out of some kind of embarrassment.

Going to concerts now or looking around in bars everyone is more concerned with telling everyone electronically how cool they are more than anything else and this is the real problem.

If instead you immediately demand that everyone forget that you ever mentioned an uncool or not intensely popular thing, that seems more in line with "deleting the comment"

Of course, I'm over 30 so what do I know?

Deleting a post from Facebook/Instagram/etc doesn't delete it from the memory of the people who did see it. It just prevents more people from seeing it, or those people from seeing it again. So it's almost exactly like making an unpopular statement in conversation, and then abruptly changing the subject.

Young people now are way too concerned at impressing others and that is nothing new, but now they are able to do it 24/7 and it is an issue. They are not living their lives but have their phones shoved in their face every second vs actually interacting with others.

I am enjoying a few resturants etc enforcing a no phone policy, I wish it would become more prevalent in places where you are supposed to socially interact, with actual, real people in front of you.

Otherwise it feels like talking to a wall.

And if you do want to do that, then don't worry, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_walls is here to help.

https://plus.google.com/communities

The business reason for multi-billion dollar social media companies is for brands and celebrities to get "likes". The only social sites that don't operate that way, are one dude in his basement sites, not billion dollar sites, where all the useful content is anyway.

Anyway, that business reason is going to rub off on all the participants. IBM isn't going to post everything, they're going to post likable stuff. No surprise IBMs followers have similar habits.

Here's my longer form take on it: http://www.techdisruptive.com/2014/05/01/vanity-sells/

[Cue reply to me saying I'm only replying so that I can see other people pay attention to me and reply to my comment.]

Email? Works like a charm for my friends, and no vendor lock-in.

I don't think it's as simple as "please like me/please approve of this" but there's also a component of "Oh, you don't like this -- I won't bother anyone else with it, sorry about that!"