The problem is not the platform as such, but how people use the platform and how it draws the user in.

I have an account which I use for research and it was immensely useful during my master's degree for contacting people in the war-torn Middle East - a lot of them don't have the luxury to care about ethical data issues, they just use whatever the hell they can when they can. I hardly ever log into the account though, it's currently once every few months.

So FB does have legitimate uses but the problem comes when the user starts logging into it daily and habitually. Without being carefully monitored by the user it will affect their relationships with friends, their significant other, their worldview, their bank balance and their happiness.

I applaud hitest for deleting his account. He may go through a few days of withdrawal but that will soon pass and be replaced with a sense of freedom.

It's also a great way of finding out who your friends really are. When I deleted by personal account in 2013 I had many friends say they would contact me over Skype and email but they didn't. Making an effort for others has been replaced by convenience. Many people will just not talk to you outside of Facebook because it's too much work.

I've never been on any of them: not FB, not Twitter, not Instagram....

What the heck is the point? We all need friends, but we need real friends not imaginary ones. A friend is someone who will put an arm around you when you feel low, not someone you've never met who clicks a button on a photo.

FB tried to redefine what having a friend meant, and they did, to an extent. Having a friend in the physical sense was appended by having a friend in the virtual space. Virtual friends can be exactly that - emotionally palpable but not physically so.

Forums like LQ are a form of social media, but they're just different to FB and Twitter in how they operate. In a way forums like LQ are 'more virtual' since most posters here don't know the identity of other users, let alone how they look or much about their personal lives.

One thing is for sure, I wouldn't contact anyone on FB at 1am if there was a personal problem. It's not for that. It's purely meant for showing off and lazily contacting people on the other side of the world [and grabbing data]. It's also very good for niche communities and cults. On that front, secret groups are where it's at. When I was on FB regularly years ago, I was astonished to find that FB, of all places, was where many of the occult communities [and many communities, one would imagine] congregated in approval-only groups which are invisible to most users.

Which is a good argument that the problem is indeed with the platform and how it has been designed and marketed.

The big platforms have monopolies. They snowballed, they have by far the most users, if someone defects to a minor platform, they leave their "friends" behind... that's a big part of how it ropes users in. The monopolies continue unchallenged.

That's how the likes of google and facebook have succeeded - by becoming "the internet" in most people's minds.
...and the site admins of course.

Nothing whatsoever published on those sites is truly private.

While I'm not liking this place to Facebook, etc in any way, the admin here can also access any part of the forum, including private messages and alike.

As I was saying in another thread; the real problem is people substituting "real life" for a "virtual life". As in: once upon a time, if you wanted to "hang out" with your friends, you would physically go and see them. Nowadays, the Internet has effectively "replaced" that, and Facebook and alike are the "means" to have that "virtual life". Because Facebook and alike without users would mean a dead platform.

It's similar to the old argument "guns don't kill people, people kill people". The only problem with that argument is that, if those people didn't have the means (in that case, a gun), then they wouldn't be able to use it. You could apply the same to the "social media" debate.

I'm told there are private groups for paedophiles too.

I only joined FB in the early days because I was genuinely trying to keep in touch with university friends who were all working in different locations. Then I moved abroad and wanted to keep in touch with various groups, so it did serve a good purpose. Now, I never log in unless I get a direct message, which is almost never. I realized after reading this thread that I had not had a meaningful interaction on it for over a year. For the sake of curiosity I thought I would have a look at what my friends had been posting and this was the gist of almost all of them:

Desired Perception: Look at my amazing life and all the amazing things I do - you wish you were me don't you?

Reality:
- Here are daily pictures of my dinner - I eat dinner every day.
- The sun is out today and there is a park nearby - things look nice in the sun.
- I have a dog/pet.
- I have a bike.
- I am drinking another coffee today.

Etc. You realize that people are just posting everyday life and really boring things and then 100 people like and say they are jealous of their life...!

What is the point indeed!

I completely agree!

Thanks, mate! I couldn't agree more, cynwulf!

Here are today's thoughts from my blog about digital addiction.

My Blog

Very interesting blog post, hitest. You will notice similar feelings to those who have lost or had to give up their smartphones.

I gave mine up a few years ago ago and I went through mild/moderate withdrawal. It was hard but I knew it was possible. After about two weeks I felt immense relief, mostly from the absence of pressure not to constantly check things. I felt in control.

These first few days will be difficult, but soon you'll know you've definitely made the right decision. FB controls its users, just like Instagram does, but by deleting it you have regained control. The next two weeks will be difficult because if you log back into your account, you will reinstate it. If you just hold off for those two weeks, it will be truly deleted [which means, in this case, inaccessible to you] and you will feel much better. You have taken a big step on the road to recovery.

Thanks, mate! I'm gritting my teeth today. I know this will get better.

If somebody, anybody, will be less likely to communicate with me because I will not use a platform started by a person who refers to those using it as "Dumb f++ks" and "B++ches" and who thinks nobody has any right to privacy then, well, they just defined themselves.
If you use Facebook the founder has better ways of describing you than I have.

Seriously, get on with living your life, educating yourself (and, sadly, making as much money as you can) and ignore "Social Media".

I stay away from it. Closest "social media" activity I have are forums, especially LQ, and a few blogs. If someone wants to communicate with me, they can call, email, send a text, or speak in person.

I have not looked into this and it could be just as bad, but it does come up in alot of search results... https://www.meetup.com/

but these things are not "social media" -- they are communication and are as anonymous as "a good chat in the line at Tesco". Or the many hackspaces out there.
Communication and community are not based upon sharing pictures of food and memes about televisio for the benefit of scum.

Exactly, I added "" for context.