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A few thoughts on social networks
Jan. 9th, 2025 11:55 amOne of the most fundamental differences between social media sites is whether posts have comments, or do you use other posts to reply to them.
Facebook and Dreamwidth both let you make posts and then control who can leave comments on them, and will let you moderate those comments. This allows you to build community and deal with abusive/unpleasant passers-by.
Twitter/BlueSky/Mastodon/Threads don't have comments - instead they let you make new posts in reply to other posts. This design tends to mean your discussion circles get larger - by default it's easier for people to drop in and join in any discussions they fancy, and conversations are a lot less structured. While you can choose to make your own posts friends-only it's not really designed for that, and most people don't. Mostly it's one massive conversation with millions of people in it that you then filter to see the bits/people you're interested in.
I think that both options have value. I like being able to have conversations with my friends, and I've gotten a huge amount out of building a place where I can discuss things with friends without awful people leaving drive-by abuse - the Facebook/Dreamwidth model works better for that. But I also like being able to encounter previously-unknown people writing about all sorts of interesting topics, and the Twitter model works better for that.
I have stopped using X so much, because I was seeing more and more unpleasantness, and it felt less and less welcoming. But I could easily transition to BlueSky, where I felt there was a very similar kind of discussion, but less trolling and abuse (although still some, obviously). I even have Mastodon to fall back on (which is fine for chatting to people I know, but doesn't do nearly as good a job at surfacing interesting discussions).
However, Facebook are now saying that they're just fine with appalling behaviour - and that's pushing some people away without there being a great alternative to it. Dreamwidth lets you manage discussions in a similar way, but it's missing one of the other things Facebook does differently - Real Names. And, despite thinking that in many ways real name policies are terrible (great post about that here) they are key for a large chunk of society. Because while my aunts, cousins, and most other people who aren't terminally online are willing to have their uncle John Smith as a friend and vaguely keep up with their updates of their life, they aren't going to add a bunch of people called things like "GreatFire1666", and then try and keep track of who they are in real life, and how they know them. It's a layer of overhead that drives them away.
And so unless an alternative comes along that lets people both see what their real-life friends are up to, in a way that lets them keep their discussions "safe" by letting them keep control of who is in/out of them, I don't see people moving to it. I suspect that they're more likely to just slowly stop using Facebook. Which would be a shame, as I have nearly 20 years of history on it, and I rather like looking back to see what I was up to over the years, and keeping up with what some of my old friends are up to now.
Facebook and Dreamwidth both let you make posts and then control who can leave comments on them, and will let you moderate those comments. This allows you to build community and deal with abusive/unpleasant passers-by.
Twitter/BlueSky/Mastodon/Threads don't have comments - instead they let you make new posts in reply to other posts. This design tends to mean your discussion circles get larger - by default it's easier for people to drop in and join in any discussions they fancy, and conversations are a lot less structured. While you can choose to make your own posts friends-only it's not really designed for that, and most people don't. Mostly it's one massive conversation with millions of people in it that you then filter to see the bits/people you're interested in.
I think that both options have value. I like being able to have conversations with my friends, and I've gotten a huge amount out of building a place where I can discuss things with friends without awful people leaving drive-by abuse - the Facebook/Dreamwidth model works better for that. But I also like being able to encounter previously-unknown people writing about all sorts of interesting topics, and the Twitter model works better for that.
I have stopped using X so much, because I was seeing more and more unpleasantness, and it felt less and less welcoming. But I could easily transition to BlueSky, where I felt there was a very similar kind of discussion, but less trolling and abuse (although still some, obviously). I even have Mastodon to fall back on (which is fine for chatting to people I know, but doesn't do nearly as good a job at surfacing interesting discussions).
However, Facebook are now saying that they're just fine with appalling behaviour - and that's pushing some people away without there being a great alternative to it. Dreamwidth lets you manage discussions in a similar way, but it's missing one of the other things Facebook does differently - Real Names. And, despite thinking that in many ways real name policies are terrible (great post about that here) they are key for a large chunk of society. Because while my aunts, cousins, and most other people who aren't terminally online are willing to have their uncle John Smith as a friend and vaguely keep up with their updates of their life, they aren't going to add a bunch of people called things like "GreatFire1666", and then try and keep track of who they are in real life, and how they know them. It's a layer of overhead that drives them away.
And so unless an alternative comes along that lets people both see what their real-life friends are up to, in a way that lets them keep their discussions "safe" by letting them keep control of who is in/out of them, I don't see people moving to it. I suspect that they're more likely to just slowly stop using Facebook. Which would be a shame, as I have nearly 20 years of history on it, and I rather like looking back to see what I was up to over the years, and keeping up with what some of my old friends are up to now.
