modern social media sucks for fandom

[memorizingthedigitsofpi]

Sometimes you just need to make a bulleted list.

• all posts are public, leading to epic levels of wank
• people reply at different points in the conversation, also leading to wank but more importantly, obscuring parts of the conversation and also making the full conversation only viewable to the initial poster
• sharing anything automatically shares it with everyone you know on that platform because you can't have subgroups for your content unless you make multiple accounts
• real fucking names
• constantly changing usernames (looking at you tumblr) makes it impossible to know who you're even following/who's following you. it also makes it hard to keep track of friends
• platforms are maximized for "engagement" not for community, so it's all about getting the likes and shares and who cares about deep diving anything
• priority is mostly given to short form content which makes nuance difficult
• everything moves so fast that it's difficult to have a follow up conversation on anything you post because people can't find the initial thought
• everything is presented without the context of the posts that came before and after them - especially on sites that don't give you a date/timestamp
• tags are communal rather than personal, so you never really know what you'll find in there. Everyone wants to organize their own space, but the items they put in their containers might be something you're allergic to (to stretch a metaphor)

I can't do twitter. Tumblr makes me feel more like either a spectator or a performer. Tiktok is every social media experience I've ever had, played through at 100x speed. No option is perfect, but some are way less perfect than others. At least for me.

Comments

Re: Ramble-y Thoughts

[mekare]

Two things: Go you for making original stuff! At least something good came out of your negative fandom experiences. Though it always makes me sad to hear about fans being driven away from what they liked.

Oops, I rambled again;

That is what Dreamwidth and other journal style sites are for! I think spending time on sites like Twitter and Tumblr makes you forget (I’m including myself in this) that rambling can be a good thing. Just writing your thoughts down (without the goal of needing it to be a structured essay on a certain topic) feels freeing.

Re: Ramble-y Thoughts

[justapotatowriter]

I'm also very sad that fandom doesn't inspire me as much anymore. It's like, even if I still watch the show, I'll have reservations about the fandom and other fans.

And it really is freeing! Taking thoughts out of your head and putting them down somewhere where you still can see them and think about them later if you want is such an awesome thing to have (especially when I forget things pretty easily)! I'm starting to think of DW like I do of my physical journal, except I can choose who sees it. I think it's the absence of 'notes' on posts. With tumblr, you can't help but notice when something hasn't been interacted with. But here it's just a post in a journal.

Re: Ramble-y Thoughts

[mekare]

I mean, I do notice when an entry I made here has no comments at all. And I rarely post stuff where I really don‘t want people to interact with it (mainly locked posts with rants and or personal stuff). The fannish stuff is always meant to be read. But since there is no kudos button or like feature I know that there are lurkers who still read but are invisible. I used to be one of them after all. ;-)

Re: Ramble-y Thoughts

[justapotatowriter]

I guess it varies from one person to another. (I'm pretty much a lurker, mainly because I often don't know what to say. XD)