The Responsibility of Social Media Users'

Until recently I have been ignoring most social media channels. I didn't feel they offered anything interesting to me. As part of a course of Squared Online, a Digital Marketing course organised by Google, I have revised what social media is and could be about. This has resulted in me revising my original view on Social Media:

It is not social media's purpose to offer anything interesting to me, it is my responsibility to use it in an interesting way. How can I do so?

Looking at the nature of my posts, few and far between as they are, I have come to the conclusion that they are overall uninteresting to a general audience and not at all representative of my interests and personality.

Here is why:
 
1. I feel one has to be careful about what one shares with the wide world: write in haste, repent at leisure. That spontaneity gone out of my posts.
2. There not sequence or trail path between post, not even within the same social media channel, let along the whole spectrum. This disassociation makes impossible to have an idea of the person behind the posts.

 I felt really flat about it, so I checked what my friends and social media followers had been posting, just to see if I was the only one missing the point here. It was not a surprise to see that I was not the only one at all. Far from it, everyone seems to be suffering from the same problem.

Of course, I cannot change the way people use social media but I have started taking action on my part. Here is a summary of the steps I am taking:

1. De-clatter: I am getting rid of everyone who is not contributing anything interesting to the conversation. But I am not being pedantic and exclusive in the least:

• If you want to talk about your children, I care, because that's important to you, although I really don't care about children.
•  If you are sad or glad because your team lost or won, I care, because I feel I am more of your friend when you share your feelings with me.
• If you want to brag about your latest exploits, I also care. They are just one of the many reasons why I am proud of knowing you.

What I don't care about is the people who share endless links without adding comments that will help me understand why they care about them. In social media that's the equivalent of spamming.

2. Create lines of thought to help me friends know what I am talking about and also follow the thread of the conversation. In order words, use the # with a purpose.

3. Have fun, spread fun. Avoid anger.