Social media for the hopelessly out of touch…

[wildeabandon]

As some of you have seen, I've just created a new Facebook account. There are two reasons for this, one is that much as I love DW, it's easier to post quickly and frequently on a platform where shorter posts are more the norm, and since I'm going to be getting a lot less in person interaction with people I know well now that I'm living on my own, I think I might benefit from a slightly greater amount of undemanding online socialising than I've become used to. The second is that I'm probably about to start meeting lots of new people, and whilst I have mostly forgotten how one goes about making friends and building community, I seem to remember than having an online presence is pretty helpful, and I imagine that that is even more the case now than it used to be. I added a few people, but then Facebook seems to have decided I might be a spambot, and won't let me add any more for a while, so if you're on there and want to friend me, that'd be neat.

Having said that, I suspect that these days Facebook isn't actually where most peoples' online lives take place, and I suspect I might need some other accounts as well. I am, probably needless to say, not going back to Xwitter. I imagine I might want an Instagram account, although creating one seems to be more difficult than it ought to be, because apparently I did create then delete one at some point in the past, but now I can't recover it, but nor can I open a new one with the same email address. I'm sure I'll figure it out, although I’m not really sure what Instagram is for - is it basically like Facebook, but all posts start with a picture of some kind? I'm fairly sure that I don't want TikTok, or anything else that is primarily video based. And I don't really know what else is out there. I had a tumblr for a while, but the interface drove me batty. I've heard of Mastodon and Bluesky, but I don't really understand what they are. The answer might well be just to wait and see what sort of networks the people I meet tend to use, but maybe that would be weird, if I'm setting up new accounts to link with someone I just met?

Those of you who use social media that isn't DW or Facebook, what do you use, and what do you like and dislike about it? I am only really interested in using them to interact with people I already know in real life, or maybe encountering people whom I can then get to know in real life, rather than getting involved in primarily online communities, and I definitely want to limit my exposure to political discourse, because it tends to be really bad for my mental health.

Comments

[atreic]

Instagram is as you suggest Facebook but with pictures, but really it is just a different demographic, Loïs and my speed skaters use insta but don’t really use facebook. I’d expect insta to be useful for uni people (but maybe they are all the next next generation now! 🤣)

[bunnypip]

Also useful for keeping up with my daughter/your god daughter

[wildeabandon]

That is indeed one of the things that made me think Insta is where all the young people are these days :)

[sfred]

Oh, yes, I use it for keeping up with at least one of my stepchildren; sometimes two.