After a lifetime against, I'm considering joining social media. Any advice?

DudeImMacGyver, 1 year ago

You’re on social media right now, but personally, I don’t care if there’s nothing when people look me up: Seems like a bonus, I barely get spam calls anymore.

BackOnMyBS, 1 year ago

I think that if you don’t want to have social media, you shouldn’t make it. If someone is giving you shit about it, then tell them to fuck off. You do you, Booboo.

If you insist on it, LinkedIn is barely social media since there’s limited interaction. It’s more of an unstated competition on who has the best resume/CV. Facebook is a bunch of people sharing updates and opinions no one cares for. Instagram is people sharing pictures no one would have asked to see.

lol. I’m on some bullshit today. Anyway, if you’re going to make a profile, set a limit to how much time you are going to spend on it. That stuff is designed to keep you hooked, so it might suck you in. Keep yourself to your own boundaries.

Bruncvik, 1 year ago

Unless you are expected to engage with others on social media, you can circumvent them by creating a blog under your name. Tailor your essays to the crowd you want to appeal to - family, friends, potential employers - and publish a few articles every year.

That’s essentially what I’ve been doing. I used to be on Facebook (left a while ago), and I’m still on LinkedIn (due to its toxic positivity, I’m not engaging there, just keeping my CV up to date). But if you googled my name, the first few pages of results would be my blog articles, my Flickr profile and a few other things not related to social media. This also gives me far more control over what I want people to know about me, and how that information is presented.

Zak, 1 year ago

I don’t think anyone can give you good advice without knowing the reasons you’d rather not get in to.

I can think of various scenarios where some sort of minimal internet presence under your real name would be useful for social or employment reasons, but exactly what it is you’re trying to accomplish makes a big difference in terms of what tools (including corporate platforms, federated microblogging like Mastodon, a blog, or a static website) will get you the results you want.

What’s popular where you live or in your professional field matters too. For some people, not using Facebook or Linkedin specifically is unusual, but we don’t have enough information to know if that’s true for you.

Resol, 1 year ago

You’re already using social media, the only difference is that you’re in the fediverse, not the metaverse.

FoxFairline, 1 year ago

Weird how no one recommended Mastodon yet.

You can switch your profile to public and follow some nice people and hashtags, if anyone wants to check your vibe. All with you real name. It has become the good version of twitter for me and at least in europe many people are starting to use it.

otter, 1 year ago (edited 11 months ago)

OP understands the risks, and they’re asking for tips on how to mitigate them if they have to make an account.

A lot of the comments here either missed or intentionally ignored the post body… Or the downvotes on the comment with a personal account saying how single women can feel safer if they can learn about a new person before meeting them.

People have different circumstances and perspectives :)

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My advice for the original post:

• Joining: You don’t have to join everything at once, figure out what you might need. This also depends on where you are because different platforms are popular in different places. LinkedIn is one of the few that are helpful in my area.
  • You can also start with Fediverse platforms if you prefer, but if you’re trying to connect with specific people that might not help
  • An alternative getting your name published on articles or blogs to fill up the search results
• Usage: Do spring cleaning constantly. It’s a big task if you try to clean your feed all at once, and it’ll be easier for you to do it from the start. When you don’t like something/someone, unfollow or mute. You can do it in a way that the other person won’t know, if that’s important. A lot of the problems of social media can be avoided if you maintain your feed.
• I’ll add more if I can think of them, good luck!

I think it can help to have some presence, even if it is to control what information comes up when someone looks you up.

WeLoveCastingSpellz, 1 year ago

I think more than the fediverse isn’t needed

pastermil, 1 year ago

Quite late for that. The fun time is in the past.

Jakdracula, 1 year ago

I turned off all social media almost 3 years ago. Reddit was the only thing that I subscribed to, and I got rid of that last June. I haven’t missed Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter or anything else for even one second. Don’t do it!

dojan, 1 year ago

Why are people looking you up?

cosmicrookie, 1 year ago

Don’t do it. I have stopped using Facebook and Instagram since November when they give me the choice to either pay a crazy amount or accept targeted ads.

The amount of time that I suddenly have is crazy. I have already read 7 books and Its been 20 years since I last had read a book!

Not to mention all the negativity and toxicity that I no longer get exposed to.

Its people own fault of they judge you by your being online of social media or not. That said, I don’t think you’d be any better if they did value you on what you do online.

Maybe you can create a website with your basic information a few pictures and a short descriptive text. It’s kind of a business card style website that will show up when people search your name on Google

pineapplelover, 1 year ago (edited 11 months ago)

About 7 years back I joined everything there was, Instagram, SnapChat, Facebook, Twitter. Then I started using Reddit, honestly the best social media at that time. Amazing repository for information (still is). I can tell you now that all those platforms are all garbage. They’re like 70% bot content and 20% reposts by actual people, maybe 10% are actual original posts. It’s so hard to find something that is authentic and new on the internet nowadays.

Lemmy, Mastadon, the Fediverse as a whole at this point in time, has some of the best content every. Although small and not vast, the content is top notch. I scroll everyday and very often find some of the most engaging discussions in any of the subs, AskLemmy for example.

Now, if you’re going to start using social media, I suggest you use it containerized (vm) or use a new computer with a burner cell number (redpocket is like $30/year on ebay). Just to see garbage for yourself.

Edit: oh yeah, at some point I did use TikTok. You can check it out on proxitok I think. That shit is poison. I personally sifted through and saw the shit for what it really is (spyware that is coated in social media). Dancing girls everywhere, reddit voiceovers, people pointing at things over original content, some of the most cringe content known to mankind.

solitaire, 1 year ago

LinkedIn isn’t a terrible idea if you just want to come up in search results. It’s quite useful for a lot of different professions for networking. You’d likely just make a profile and never look at it again.

Facebook can be almost mandatory depending on where you live. I currently live in a city where Facebook is the only meaningful source of networking, local news and information on events online. It’s not uncommon for businesses, even quite larger ones, to have their only media presence online be a Facebook page. The city is also kind of infamously hard to break into socially so you want any advantage you can get.

I don’t currently have any social media but it’s become a hindrance and I might need to reactivate. I end up using social media by proxy through family and friends anyway.

ares35, 1 year ago

if you have no desire to 'participate' on a social media platform, but want people to still be able to 'google' you, perhaps a personal web page on your own domain. with a brief bio, your cv, and perhaps some interesting tidbits from hobbies or work projects.