I'm not trying to be combative, but that still seems like a very weak reason. And it's one that I used to use, not just with FB, but Twitter, IG and LinkedIn. They all held the same promise and failed to deliver it.
The idea that we need to be constantly networking is overblown, to say the least. When you step back and have an honest conversation with yourself about how much having access to these people you occasionally talk to benefits your life, it seems to be negligible at best. Certainly not something worth sticking around for, encouraging more and more privacy encroachment, targeted advertising, etc, adding undo stress and annoyance to your experience online and off.
Are we sure that we are not using the "stay connected" excuse to hide the fact that these things were designed to be addictive and we got sucked in by it? The only people benefiting from continued use are not users, but the advertisers and platform owners? Is there really anyone on that list where your life would be worse off for not ever interacting with them again? Are there other ways of making yourself just as accessible on the off chance a stranger wants to collaborate with you on something, such as a contact email in a GitHub profile or personal webpage that would satisfy whatever net positive you think you are getting from doing the same on FB? These are not easy questions to answer, but when we start drilling down, our excuses for sticking around start to fall apart and our control for being their gets exposed in ways that we maybe don't like.
I should had clarified my case a bit better. I am a writer. People that I don't know (or know very little about) contact me to invite me to book festivals, propose collaboration on some presentation, reach out to ask stuff about what I write, inform me about updates that I need to follow, coverage that I am included in or interviews that they would like me to give. There is no other way to facilitate this communication other than to have an easily discoverable profile on a social media platform. Could I do it any other way? Sure, I could print my email on my books or leave it to people to reach out to my publisher to get my contact info. But that adds friction. I could create a webpage for my work, but that means people have to visit it to stay up to date. I could create a newsletter, that I would have to keep up to date and that people would never check, alongside the other hundreds of newsletter mail they don't check.
On top of that I also follow other people's work, festivals, book fairs, interviews, publications etc. They also post everything on Facebook (some on Instagram as well). There is no other option to stay in touch with this circle of people if you are not on social media.
I dislike Meta and I agree that the social media have deteriorated considerably from what they supposedly promise to offer. But they are still better than the alternatives.
People got used to a passive “push” model for staying in touch that they forget the norm used to be “pull”.
Now you just passively absorb updates from people to stay factually informed but don’t directly engage with one another.
With email/sms, you can just ask somebody “hey what’s up?” And get their big updates. It’s more active and requires some more investment but that’s a good thing for making stronger relationships.
And for all those distant connections that you follow on FB but don’t want to talk to… you can ask your real friends “hey, have you anything about so-and-so?”
Those models don't work for distant friends. I should call my mom more often. However nobody would call someone they were distant friends with 20 years ago to talk about their kids sports game - but 10 seconds to see those pictures on Facebook is still appreciated. When that is what Facebook does it is valuable.
what's the point in seeing photos of a kids sports game if you are so uninterested in maintaining a relationship that you'd never consider chatting with the person? at that point, it may as well be a parasocial relationship with a celebrity where you look at photos of their life and say "wow, i'm so glad i've connected with them".
there's a difference between being informed about the goings-on in somebody's life (which social media browsing/posting can help with) and actually having relationships with people.
The point is to have something to talk about at the next reunion. It won't be for several more years, but I do plan on connecting again. Remember these pictures take only seconds to view, but they ensure when I next meet that person we have some place to start from when talking.
Your argument holds a weight only if you already think that “Facebook/IG is bad for keeping in touch”. For almost any average person, that just doesn’t matter. Privacy, targeted ads, “benefits of networking for your future” are things that only us, extremely fringe group of people, care about. My parents? Never. My non-techie friends? I don’t think they know what “targeted ads” even mean.
Your reasons are even weaker. We don't need to be constantly networking but for better or worse, Meta platforms have become the only remaining effective ways to get updates from a large group of extended family and friends spread out all over the world. Like if my second cousin in Indiana has a baby I'd like to know, and I didn't think they're going to announce it via email.
The idea that we need to be constantly networking is overblown, to say the least. When you step back and have an honest conversation with yourself about how much having access to these people you occasionally talk to benefits your life, it seems to be negligible at best. Certainly not something worth sticking around for, encouraging more and more privacy encroachment, targeted advertising, etc, adding undo stress and annoyance to your experience online and off.
Are we sure that we are not using the "stay connected" excuse to hide the fact that these things were designed to be addictive and we got sucked in by it? The only people benefiting from continued use are not users, but the advertisers and platform owners? Is there really anyone on that list where your life would be worse off for not ever interacting with them again? Are there other ways of making yourself just as accessible on the off chance a stranger wants to collaborate with you on something, such as a contact email in a GitHub profile or personal webpage that would satisfy whatever net positive you think you are getting from doing the same on FB? These are not easy questions to answer, but when we start drilling down, our excuses for sticking around start to fall apart and our control for being their gets exposed in ways that we maybe don't like.
edit: fixed some autocorrect errors from mobile