Social Media Escape Club
“You absolutely do not have to be online. Do you know how many people still thrive in the real world? I speak to so many authors and artists who make so many more sales in the real world.”
Amie McNee
https://amiemcnee.substack.com/p/i-wanted-to-be-a-writer-not-a-content
We’re playing and creating together in real-time. Not only that, we have to work, and it’s this effortful, again, can’t-quite-put-your-finger-to-it thing of having to give of yourself, that creates a strong community.
"We can still build places rooted in clarity and care and connection. I just think that exists in real life. We can still build places that are transformative and more transformative than performative. If we don’t imagine something better and abandon the space, a future will be built for us digitally, completely without our consent, against our interests, and against our human nature. That is a digital pollution theory, you guys."
Engagement is the new uniques. The traffic era of publishing has ended. Nobody brags about their ComScore uniques anymore; engagement is the new North Star.
As we are fed more content, we are pushed deeper into algorithmic niches. In return, we are encouraged to engage with more extreme and polarizing identifiers because it is more labelable, more indexable by the machine — the creation of the “Island". On this island, the slang, in-jokes, and archetypes which emerge as a community develops in... See more
The best spokesperson for any endeavor is not the one who has the most polish, the longest tenure, or the "right" credentials. It’s the person who holds the secret knowledge upon which the enterprise is built, the person who can not only describe the idea but, in the face of inevitable opposition, fight for it and win.
“The internet, as we have known it, has evolved from a quaint, quirky place to a social utopia, and then to an algorithmic reality. In this reality, the primary task of these platforms is not about idealism or even entertainment — it is about extracting as much revenue as possible from human vanity, avarice, and narcissism.”
Quick Links for Wednesday, January 3
People in my profession say all the time that they can't do their jobs without Twitter, and it drives me so crazy because I think most of them are worse at their jobs because of Twitter. The reason is that Twitter, as do other forms of social media, gets you to lose control of what you care about. You lose that intentionality with your own... See more