We started out using forum software to co-ordinate what we were doing but eventually (2008-ish) switched to Facebook as the president of the club pointed out "Alex, everyone is already on Facebook and the notifications from us are in the middle of the notifications for when the next party is" etc.

Fast forward to today and the club is rebooting again. I asked the current club president "What social network is everyone on these days?" His response: "Really there is no one place where everyone goes anymore." I then asked him how clubs share their info etc and he says "The bulletin board at the student center?"

While social media definitely has its downsides (echo chambers, extremism etc) I do feel like it's a bit of a net loss to not have a "commons". That model makes it super easy to start up new organizations, get the word out etc.

Part of me hopes that we got back to the late 1990s dedicated websites/forums. That seems to be the Discord model but let's see.

All my “social” life just moved to direct communication in WhatsApp (meta owned as well)

1) companies had a desire to grow everyone's networks. Early numbers said, people more connected have more engagement, and the larger a user's graph is, the better we can advertise to that user.

But at some point it also changes what you want to post, or if you want to post at all. Do I want my mom to see this joke? That party photo? What about that guy I met on exchange 10 years ago?

I have 1000 connections on Facebook, and all _their_ connections can be exposed to my post. It might as well be public.

2) Professionals are better at posting than amateurs. It turns out that we rather watch a funny update from a comedian we don't know, than an update from a friend trying to be funny. Social networks are not social anymore. They are mostly TV, but instead of channel surfing, you are doom-scrolling videos from professional creators, not updates from friends.

Social media allowed you to be in touch with people in a way that wasn't possible with phone calls, text messages, instant messaging, email, or domain-specific forums.

What I could do in Facebook in 2010 was stay "friends" with selected acquaintances such as old classmates with whom I never was in email terms, messaging terms, or any other terms except having known them in school (or at work or at a hobby or...) I could follow their life via their posts, and I could leave a comment, sometimes, without any expectation that we should ever talk, meet, chat, or become more than old classmates. I haven't sent email to anyone in my school that I didn't know outside of school, as a friend. I don't have their numbers and it would be awkward to even consider calling someone with whom we didn't necessarily even talk much in school. But it was perfectly okay to ask someone to be your friend on Facebook (like, Hey, I know you? and if he did remember he would accept) and follow their postings and maybe (re)kindle something with no pressure to grow it into anything more than that.

We had that. Now... we no longer do. Or we still have Facebook and we can send friend requests to old acquantainces that I'd like to follow but there's nothing to follow because they aren't posting and because Facebook wouldn't show me their posts. So we're back to the point where actually making contact with another person (on Facebook) basically requires sending them a message in Facebook. Which already goes beyond what's expected from an old acquantaince on Facebook.

I recall a site for classmates where you could register to your school years and see your classmates there. But that was before social media and there weren't any posts that you could comment. You could just see your classmates listed there, and one in ten might have written a few words in their profile. And that was classmates only, not ex-work colleagues or other people you've passed behind in your life. Facebook was really good at the time it became a thing.

We still have email, instant messaging, etc. but what's the platform today where I can keep in touch with people I'm not emailing or talking with? Is there one?

That seems to be the point where most communities and social sites I'm on lost a lot of their activity/enjoyment, and where people seemed to start fading away.

Of course, increasing polarisation, an increasingly aggressive/selfish population and worries about privacy probably hit hard too.

I think you get bad emotions when you have high expectations about social media and it is your main source of social life. Where positive happen when you have low expectations about social media and it is just addon to your life.

Example of gaps is being lonely, low self esteem, low self worth, no work network, no business network. So you stay glued to FB to build your life, to keep online friends, because you may have not many in life. Or you have no real work network so you need to stay current on LI because your next job is there.

Lately I feel more value in connecting with them personally, talking and letting them now, that I am still interested in what's going on for them.

my last post is from 2018, the last post I was tagged in is from 2020

6 years of nothing

That's why my only social media is WhatsApp, if that's a social media.

Now, it's just a weird performative stage. Even worse, the people who are awarded with attention often prove themselves to be utterly clueless and nothing more than a modern day cabaret performer.

So yeah, no wonder that social media is dying. People are just catching up to the fact that the best way not to lose is to just not play the game.