2024-12-30
Sites or Socials
Sometimes people use the word "believe" to mean "I have concluded" or "I have witnessed", and sometimes to mean something more like "I feel like". There are some things I've "believed" about tech and computers for a while, but lately those beliefs have started seeming more like the second kind than the first. In fact, I'm pretty sure I got into things like Linux and website-making at least partially because I thought they were "cool" or "based".
But I still feel like there's some genuine merit to these opinions, so I'm gonna be looking at some of them and seeing if I can find some actually good reasons for them, starting with one I don't think will be all that hard to validate: why do I like websites and dislike social media?
Why Socials Bad
[!!!NOTE FOR AUTHOR!!!: cut this down. simplify. we don't need five massive paragraphs of negativity. we've figured it out.]
Mainstream social media has been the object of my scorn and disdain for years now, but honestly I don't have that much experience with it; I barely ever used Twitter, I practically never used Facebook or Instagram, I don't actively use Reddit anymore, and the sites I do regularly use, Tumblr and Discord, I did little but lurk on until I stumbled into some small circles of users that I don't go far outside of. So I only have experience from the least social-media-y social media sites out there (along with Youtube and some second-hand Youtube Shorts), and then it's all outside perspective and hearsay from there. Still, there are some things I know.
To start, I'll say that there are some good things unique to social media, things I've enjoyed myself: there's more people there than any other sites on the web, more people to talk to, to share stuff with, and to get the attention of; there's more stuff there than anywhere else on the web, and some of it is really good; and it's very easy, once everything is set up, to find these people and things.
That said, let's get on with the bad. For one, I've seen that social medias stay afloat and aloft with ads, and that they're usually designed with ads as a priority, while it seems the actual good of the user is much less of a priority, if at all. Same with the people who make videos on sites like TikTok or Youtube, they make money from keeping your attention on the app, and for many of them, it seems like they don't care about making your life or even your day better. Social media, and much of whats on it, is designed to sell you stuff at the cost of your time, attention, and mental well-being.
Second, something I've personally experienced: social media is addictive. I find myself opening up Tumblr or whatever else whenever I'm bored, and nearly every time, I spend longer than I want to scrolling on, think about the things I need to get done, keep scrolling, and an hour or much, much more can pass before I get off, and I won't have even gotten much good out of it. It's frustrating, limiting. Maybe I'm weak-willed or I have an attention deficit, but it looks to me like a lot of people have this issue. Social media very easily becomes a bad habit that absorbs much of your time and attention.
I could ramble on a lot longer, like about how it's bad for people who make stuff, pushing them to be more people-pleasing for mostly shallow attention, or about how governments or corporations can use it to control people, but I believe (read: feel like) what I've talked about already validates my dislike of social media well enough. It's not pretensious to not want to be addicted to an advertising platform designed and filled with indifference to the content and the users' well being, even if there are good people and cool things on there.
Why Website Good
So if I don't like social media, why maintain a personal, static, hand-made website, instead of only talking and sharing stuff in Discord servers? Or on some small-scale web forums? Or just with people you actually know in-person? In fact, I do already do all those things at least a little, and I think I should do them more. So what's the point of this thing?
One thing I like about it: for the purpose of sharing things, a website is a place I can organize, categorize, stylize, and present however I want, and then show anyone I know from anywhere. Unlike a Discord server, I can seperate big projects from little doodles and stories and updates, and, unlike forums and face-to-face interaction, still have them all in one place, not needing to repeat myself.
Another one: for the purpose of communcation, a website is a thing anyone can read at any time to see what I'm up to, or even get to know me as a person (or at least see if we have common interests we may like to talk about). I've met and acquainted myself with total strangers because of their websites, so it's feasably a useful tool for that (definitely not a replacement for more personal, two-sided interactions, but still, useful.)
Back home