In the past few weeks, I have become tired of seeing my mind work like a FaceBook post. I actually started noticing this on the 2009 Stencil Nation tour in Europe. As Pod and I wandered around Vienna, Austria, we realized that every city we toured, the word “FaceBook” kept showing up in random places. And we both realized that we were beginning to think as posts to FaceBook. “Woah, that’s funny. I should share that on FaceBook.” I didn’t have a phone in the EU and Pod’s phone was a cheap “dumb” phone, so we couldn’t go from thought to FB in a matter of seconds.
Beyond the concept of having a huge corporation enter my brain as a way to express myself, I have begun to worry about the content that I post on FB. Google just changed the way they gather user information. I’m sure you saw the ads all over the place telling you about Google’s plan to consolidate their user experience, and thus their user’s thoughts. Buddhist ads have begun to appear on FB. I don’t want to buy any buddha t-shirts, but FB thinks I do. As the FTC mulls a “do not track” rule, and Google and other companies get busted for accessing too much user data, I’m beginning to wonder if my already slim profile on FB (and Google+, which I rarely post to), is a bit too much. And as FB changes their format (and user agreements) every 3 months, I am growing tired of the overflow of information. I hear this FB burnout from other people as well, and I think that the FB OD is one reason Google+ just isn’t happening. Most people appear to be thinking “You mean I have to go to yet another website to post my life?!”
I do not tweet because of my desire to have a slim online profile. I have not set up a LinkedIn, even though I get email blasts from people telling me I need to do so. I am posting on two FB pages already (one is for CELL) so have no desire to create a “Stencil Archive” page (and YET another place to post to). I post to Stencil Archive, cellspace.org, and tweet for CELL, but have gotten tired of all of this (and wonder who leaves the FaceBookiverse to go exploring beyond anything that is connected through that site or Google).
Which brings me back to the title of this post: THE MONTH OF BLOG. Thanks to all this social media, I have not been thinking past a few sentences while in front of a computer. Thanks to all the contractual agreements that I have agreed to to join FaceBook, I do not like the idea of putting my life and all my content on their site. I was happy a few years back, posting to two sites: Stencil Archive and Happyfeet Travels. You know, before everyone jumped on the MySpace train. I haven’t been able to get HappyFt to connect to FaceBook and am now wondering if I want it to. Sure it’ll drive traffic, but so what!?
Recently, I’ve been getting into local SF blogs that cover neighborhoods. There’s Mission Loc@l, Haighteration, and Local Addition (for the Western Addition). I feel like I’m getting micro-newscasts from the hoods where I live the most. My friend Devin and I have recently discussed his starting a blog. He has some extremely creative ideas about how to bring his unique voice to one corner of the millions upon millions of personal sites. And he wants a place to write that ISN’T FaceBook.I completely understand.
Recently, I feel like I have nothing to say that would be interesting, so I haven’t really posted any political rants on this site. But I started to miss my blogging a few months ago. I could only pull myself away from social media long enough to do about 5 days worth of posts. And then there would be 4 weeks of emptiness. My history cal on the left column has very few squares of content around those dates. Happy Feet is a desert of space most of the time.
Yet… I have become inspired enough to commit to a month of blog posts. I may announce this on FB, but I will not repost or connect every post to FB. There will be at least one post a day through all over April. As I write this (March 26), I am even 3 days ahead of myself! Call it cushion space.
I want FaceBook out of my brain! I want to own my own content! I want to post a nipple photo and not have to worry about some fascist bot swooping in and deleting the image. I don’t want all my content to be put on a site ran by a huge corporation. Have you even read the contract that you “sign” when you sign up for FaceBook?
Here in San Francisco (also posted on FaceBook), someone has randomly wheat pasted posters of FaceBook as a cigarette package. The message with the pack says “Because you crave it”. I see people hitting it on their phones like mice hit drugs in a maze. As I feel more connected to the world (FB can be a useful tool after all), I feel eerily dys-connected to the world. And thanks to FB’s newest look, I have a main feed, a small feed on the right side of the screen, an email feed, and a feed for everything else! Enough!
Take a break from the crack pipe and drop in on Happy Feet for a visit during my MONTH OF BLOG. Old is new again. More is less. And you’ll understand why I’m not hitting the rock over at the FaceBookiverse as much this April. I’ll be over here on my good ole’ site, squeezing my brain like a sponge to get the damn “I need to post that on FaceBook” out of there.
See you soon 🙂