To Add to My Facebook Disappearance

It’s been a few days since I’ve deleted my Facebook and I haven’t missed it actually. Mostly because, if I want to return, it would be for contact information. I can sneak in there and get it stealthily and then deactivate the goddamn thing again.

But this isn’t what I’m writing about. I’m reading “Marshall McLuhan: You Know Nothing Of My Work”, a Douglas Coupland biography of the legend. Coupland should do way more biographies, given his style! I’m really enjoying them. Or I’m enjoying McLuhan’s interesting life. Because he was such an intellectual, you know

Here is a quote.

The Maelstrom

Marshall loved Edgar Allan Poe’s 1841 short story, “A Descent into the Maelström,” and I love him for introducing me to it. In Poe’s tale, a young man sits at the top of a Norwegian mountain, beside the narrator, a seemingly old man of the sea. However, it turns out that the old man is, in fact, young—he had been prematurely aged by a storm a few years before that had led to a massive vortex in the ocean into which the man and his two brothers were swept. The younger brothers held on to large fragments of the ship and were swallowed. The narrator, though, noticed that heavy objects went down first; he held on to a barrel and managed to avoid his brothers’ fate. It ends with the narrator knowing darn well that the younger person could care less about his story of survival.

As nearly all those who try to relate McLuhan to the internet have noted, this maelstrom is a marvellous metaphor for the way to keep one’s head above water in a changing world. Rather than be sucked into a yawning, gaping mess, be nimble and analyze the broader scope of what’s going on. Don’t hang on to something that’s going to drag you down. You may not like your environment, but don’t allow it to overtake you or drown you.

I immediately thought of my decision to abandon a technology that I personally find burdensome and massive in that Yahoo-versus-Google-search-engine-homepage way.

In my profession (interactive advertising), I need to be nimble and I need to know about all the technologies. But I don’t have to use them all if I don’t like them. I finally understand why more senior strategists don’t bother with some tools. But boy am i happy when they bother with Twitter & Instagram (my current faves).

PS. Blogging from the iPad. Could this be it? Blogging more? Taking the time to formulate thoughts and sharing them once in a while instead of getting drowned in Facebook nonsense?

Why I am Deleting My Personal Facebook Account

I am no stranger to social networking. My first foray into it manifested in the form of the LoveHate.ru forum, where you simply write what you hate and what you love. “Simply” is an understatement. I had my first taste of Internet drama there. But it was fun social experience. I had a LiveJournal blog for the longest time, and nothing can replace that type of blogging. I did a stint on MySpace. I never had Friendster. WordPress is too public for my liking. I don’t like Tumblr. I have Pinterest. I have enjoyed Twitter for the 5 years that I’ve had it and Instagram is fantastic for the visual self. I understand social networking. Heck, my job requires me to, and I like it. I have a dummy Facebook account to perform work duties and research, when needed.

But I am deleting my personal Facebook account because I have not been enjoying using the service for the past two years. Why should I continue using the service that I don’t like? I’m not getting anything out of it. I have not used it to express myself to the fullest extent. Yes, I have reconnected with a couple of people from the past, and guess what? I’m taking down their emails and Skype names and phone numbers before I depart.

On Facebook I have a mishmash of close friends, acquaintances, coworkers, people I don’t even remember and classmates I don’t talk to anymore. I haven’t taken the time, nor will, to organize my contacts into complicated groups just so I could curate my content better. I’d rather use LinkedIn for business purposes. Do I even need to be up to the minute on everyone? I don’t think so. Time is precious. I talk to my closest friends on other channels anyway, and I never took Facebook messages seriously (EMAIL, FOLKS).

I have gained way more from my follow list on Twitter – I consume more interesting content on Twitter than I ever did on Facebook. I like the fact that Twitter doesn’t own any photo that I share on it. I don’t like that some arrogant psychopath obsessed with “connecting the whole world” (the whole world doesn’t need to be connected, in my opinion, you Zuck) has access to so much of my data just so he could serve crappy ads to me. The ever-changing privacy settings are getting to me too. I also don’t want someone’s extended family coming up in my friend recommendations. These two New York Times articles have added to my confusion too: Facebook is Using You and Death of the Cyberflaneur.

I don’t mind missing a few Vice parties and other du jour crap because I now won’t get the Facebook invite. Those who care enough will invite me in person. I can reach my close and not so close friends on other networks if I want to. I prefer to catch up one-on-one anyway, over homemade dinner and a good glass of wine. I want to spend more time on smart blogs, interesting publications, educational videos and what not. Yes, I may miss some opportunities to gain more traffic to my articles on The Genteel, but what can I do? I’m not happy using Facebook. But I am always happy to catch up in person. I’m still going to be around. A lot. Maybe I’ll even start blogging.

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