Twitter and Facebook Thoughts

[imoldernu]

Serious question.
I have never gone to Twitter, and am not sure if I have been on Facebook, though I think I signed up under an assumed identity a few years ago, and occasionally get an email to my regular account.

Though I go to a number of forums, they are places for discussions and reasoning... agree or not. Tweeting appears (to me) to be a place for shallow thinking and incomplete reasoning. Facebook looks (to me) to be a place where privacy does not exist, and where one's life is exposed to the world, warts and all... forever.

I expect that I'm missing a lot, as it looks as if everyone tweets.

Your thoughts... and reasoning. Maybe it's time for a senile old man to dip a toe in to "Today".

(Will get into Pokemon Go in 2017, if I and It is still around)

 

[LakeRat1]

I enjoy FB, good way to connect with people that share your same interest .....

 

[easysurfer]

No Twitter for me but do have a FB account. Was feeling too out of the loop as friends and family would talk about topics that I was oblivious ("I was not aware of that!"..as in Wayne's World ) to. I do limit my FB profile and posts so I'm not an open book.

 

[MichaelB]

Twitter

I expect that I'm missing a lot, as it looks as if everyone tweets.

Your thoughts... and reasoning. Maybe it's time for a senile old man to dip a toe in to "Today".

Not everyone.

Twitter is mostly unfiltered, so anyone can post anything. A unique amalgamation of wit, gossip, news and crazy sh!t. Many people use it as an alternative source to follow current events not otherwise reported.

I stay away from Twitter because of it's uncurated content. DW uses it to follow some areas of interest not widely reported elsewhere.

 

[big-papa]

I use FB quite a bit. Learned early on how to set the privacy settings so that nobody can post to my wall except in response to something I've already posted. Only friends can see my posts. No game requests, either. And nobody can find my account via a google search. There are more and they're worth looking at.


I originally got on there to keep track of my extended family to know what's going on in their lives, etc. I've kept accepting friend requests from coworkers, former high school friends, etc. at a minimum. I'm not interested in political discourse on my facebook page and will hide or unfriend people if they start that.

 

[EastWest Gal]

Facebook has helped me reconnect to long lost friends. It also has been a place to publicize events such as concerts. I am pretty careful though. I mostly avoid politics and I post interesting travel photos when I return.

I have a Twitter account but can't figure out how to use it. Do I comment on the day's news? As if my opinion is unique? No thanks. I don't care to "follow" anyone either.

My DH has found music work through Facebook. He belongs to a group of musical theater directors and regularly sees posts for last minute substitute musicians. Most of them are in NYC though and get filled by people who live there, since there are so many people there.


Sent from my iPhone using Early Retirement Forum

 

[Tallman4123]

Many people have a strong need - for better or worse - to be seen and/or heard. Both Twitter and FB provide a platform for that; perceived and real. To each their own. Me, given my introvert leanings, not so much. I prefer to control my environment: who I speak with, where I get my news, who knows my business. Does this limit my world view? Maybe, but I rely on my intellectual curiosity to guide me. Besides, it's my world and I get to decide!

That being said, I've never used Twitter, although a business colleague of mine once described it as "screaming within a large, dark and empty room." I AM on Facebook, and early on I enthusiastically added "friends", getting to more than 300 at one point. But now I have less than 40 and as others have said, I have made it as private as I know how to make it. Just family and close friends. I mostly enjoy it for the photos of the young ones in my extended family.

 

[MRG]

Twitter, not a chance. Too many idiots for me. FB I avoided for years. Then odd circumstances brought me there.
A friend had lost his DW at a young age and took his grief to FB. Another person helped me to understand I would be beneficial to this person. After a year I'm glad I did. I've reconnected with many old friends and family. Great to see what's going on all over the world.

I have learned to eliminate the folks on FB who say crap I don't like. By blocking some groups and a few sites I've managed to get the posts down to things I can tolerate.

 

[H2ODude]

Don't use either for the reasons already mentioned. I have been tempted to try FB to reconnect with past friends but keep waiting until my DIL is around to coach me through all the setup. Like others, I really want it minimalist.

 

[kcowan]

I signed up for both. I could never find a use for Twitter. I can express opinions to people I don't know! Why would I do that?

FB serves some use but as others have noted, it requires management to make it work for me. If anyone posts pictures of pets, food, games, surveys or politics, I unfollow the topics or the people.

 

[GrayHare]

In my brief looks at FB its user interface is so obscure it could be written in a foreign language. Guess they don't want people like me.

 

[Souschef]

That being said, I've never used Twitter, although a business colleague of mine once described it as "screaming within a large, dark and empty room." I AM on Facebook, and early on I enthusiastically added "friends", getting to more than 300 at one point. But now I have less than 40 and as others have said, I have made it as private as I know how to make it. Just family and close friends. I mostly enjoy it for the photos of the young ones in my extended family.

I love the quote about Twitter. As far as having 300 "friends" on Facebook, any time one of them posts, it goes to your account. Who has time to read the posts from 300 people?

 

[HFWR]

I signed up for both. I could never find a use for Twitter. I can express opinions to people I don't know! Why would I do that?

FB serves some use but as others have noted, it requires management to make it work for me. If anyone posts pictures of pets, food, games, surveys or politics, I unfollow the topics or the people.

Same Twitter use as me. Think I've tweeted once...

Actually, FB posts about pets or food are a refreshing change from all the political misinformation posts, which I hide as much as possible...

 

[Aerides]

Facebook: Where I have 100 "friends" that I met years ago, barely remember, and don't really care to keep up with.

Twitter: Where I have 100 friends that I've never met, but would like to.

On twitter it's all about who you pick to follow. Journalist or blogger you like? News links? Political updates? Crafting/hobby experts? The good thing about Twitter is you can avoid the idiots, and follow only those you want to without ever doing anything. You can also unfollow without the angst of "omg you unfriended me?"

Any breaking news event will show up in twitter before almost anywhere else.

 

[dixonge]

My FB usage is pretty much down to sharing photos with family/friends. General 'status updates' and other such things are unlikely to be seen by more than 20% of my friends, thanks to Facebook's constant mucking with the algorithms. I'm tired of feeding my life to companies so they can track me on every web site and bombard me with ads.

 

[Meadbh]

I love the quote about Twitter. As far as having 300 "friends" on Facebook, any time one of them posts, it goes to your account. Who has time to read the posts from 300 people?

You can unfollow them.

 

[frayne]

Don't twitter but Facebook primarily to keep in touch with friends and family. Great place for posting family pics. With that said too many people use it to document almost every aspect of their mundane lives to let everyone know how wonderful life is. It doesn't take long to figure out how to block those people's posts.

 

[kcowan]

You can unfollow them.

Unfollow can apply to the topic, or the friend and is different than unfriending them. I unfollow anyone who posts too much. I still get notifications of their activity if they are my friend.

 

[Midpack]

I use both, but neither in the way Millenials used to. They've long since moved on to newer, hipper apps. Twitter and especially Facebook is mostly middle aged and older folks and businesses these days. I don't follow people as much as businesses and organizations.

Twitter is a great way to follow a bunch of news and information sources like magazines, newspapers, webzines, TV networks, and groups of special interest, etc. It's a very handy summary of all the websites I'd like to see. Each organization will tweet links with each new online article they post. I follow 40-50 Twitter feeds. Instead of opening 40-50 websites (eg, Atlantic, Mother Jones, Time, WSJ, NYT, etc.) individually to see if there is anything of interest, I simply open my Twitter account and it gives a brief content description and a link for the latest items for all 40-50. I can click on any links of interest. Very efficient way to find and read info in my view.

As for Facebook, I don't much care about all the personal posts. But again I follow 40-50 businesses and organizations to see what they're up to all in one place - way more efficient than opening 40-50 individual websites, many will nothing of interest to me on a given day. But more importantly, many small/local business use Facebook as their primary means of communicating. They no longer keep their websites current, some don't even keep websites - Facebook only.

So Twitter and Facebook are great tools IMO, but I could care less about using either for sharing personal pictures, where I am or what I am doing.

 

[easysurfer]

Unfollow can apply to the topic, or the friend and is different than unfriending them. I unfollow anyone who posts too much. I still get notifications of their activity if they are my friend.

Some friends and relatives that post too much day to day stuff (what they had for breakfast, lunch and dinner...you get the idea), have a potty mouth, or too much politics, I've moved them as an "acquaintance" in FB. I don't drop them totally as I still sometimes see what they are up to, but at the same time like some control over my feed instead.

I also set up the "tags" so they need my pre-approval before going to my timeline as I have a brother who goes tag crazy.

 

[Ronstar]

I use Facebook, not Twitter. I follow the antics of my friends and relatives, and follow a lot of woodworking and photography sites. I very seldom post.

 

[Options]

Social media to me is the new television, "chewing gum for the mind", as Brian Tracy would say. The best way to be mediocre is to embrace the fad of the day without having given conscious thought to its utility. This is not meant in any way to be a judgment, and if that's the way you want to live your life, by all means go for it.

Personally, I haven't found a single better way to improve, enhance and expand my qualitative and quantitative life than to read the best non-fiction books I can find. Charlie Munger, for example, has said his children chide him regarding how much he reads, calling him a book with two legs. He states he and Warren Buffet spend something like 70% of their time reading, which contributes a great deal to their success.

I also read blogs, commentary, and anything from the smartest people I can find, wishing to adopt their success habits (successful habits in business can almost always be extrapolated to success in life--see anything by Benjamin Franklin). Time wasted on social media isn't one of those habits (their social media accounts, if they have them, are for business purposes, and are usually maintained by professional PR people or something similar).

 

[HFWR]

Social media to me is the new television, "chewing gum for the mind", as Brian Tracy would say. The best way to be mediocre is to embrace the fad of the day without having given conscious thought to its utility. This is not meant in any way to be a judgment, and if that's the way you want to live your life, by all means go for it.

Personally, I haven't found a single better way to improve, enhance and expand my qualitative and quantitative life than to read the best non-fiction books I can find. Charlie Munger, for example, has said his children chide him regarding how much he reads, calling him a book with two legs. He states he and Warren Buffet spend something like 70% of their time reading, which contributes a great deal to their success.

I also read blogs, commentary, and anything from the smartest people I can find, wishing to adopt their success habits (successful habits in business can almost always be extrapolated to success in life--see anything by Benjamin Franklin). Time wasted on social media isn't one of those habits (their social media accounts, if they have them, are for business purposes, and are usually maintained by professional PR people or something similar).

Definitely a lot of chewing gum, or some other substance that one hates to have on their shoe...

However, with a ruthless eye to culling the "dead branches", they (social media) can be reasonably useful tools. I discover new music, find interesting things to read, explore new ideas, get varying opinions. Again, though, the BS must be kicked to the curb, early and often.

 

[ponyboy]

People still use thefacebook.com? lol

I ditched that train wreck 7 years ago. Havent been back since. What a waste. I dont have a twitter account but will look up some accounts once or twice a week.

I prefer twitter over facebook. It was really neat in facebook getting bombarded with posts about someone farming their crops and raising purple chickens. Boy that facebook sure is good for the human race.

 

[Cobra9777]

I don't use Twitter. I set up an account years ago, but I just don't "get it." Haven't invested much effort either.

I use Facebook, mainly to keep up with extended family that I don't see very often. I love watching all the kids grow up, just like I was there on a daily basis. Also like staying in touch with a few really close friends from high school and college. Without Facebook, they would likely be distant fading memories. I get lots of friend requests that I ignore, mostly friends of friends from high school. I keep it very small, very private, and very secure. All but a small handful of my friends do the same, so I rarely see the negative political ranting that people often talk about. I'll do a status post maybe once per month, but I interact via comments and "likes" at least a couple times per week.

I don't see this as "chewing gum for the mind" unless you let yourself get sucked into the muck, which is quite simple to avoid. There's no reason I can't read great non-fiction books AND use the latest technology to keep up with distant family and friends.