Is It Time to Rethink Your Social Media Strategy in a Politicized Digital World?
Will you stay and fight daily, be influenced by propaganda, or find new ways to create communities that work?
The time has come to reconsider social media.
For me, the time has come to reconsider using social media. In the past eighteen months, I have spent time on nearly all the platforms to gather how they work and what would work for me to establish a brand presence. Yes, this might sound vain, but I believe it is important to work on your brand, whether you have a business or a corporate job.
What once was an idea to form communities and discussions and share and gather insights from different perspectives so we could progress and move the world of knowledge forward has digressed into a toxic pool of news regurgitation, Ai regurgitation, Me vs You toxicity, and, just pure hatred and vitriol. I seldom see any enlightening discussions or decent disagreements. It is mostly people vomiting their emotions all over the place. Yes, I am and have been guilty of all of the above. It is human to feel, and to react, even when you know you should not jump into the pool of toxic opinions.
The other side of the coin is to say that I only post my work there, and these platforms are a pure distribution channel for my work and products. However, things have changed, haven’t they?
I am not here to discuss Democrat vs MAGA but to note that the owners of X, Google, Microsoft, META, Amazon, Washington Post, and TikTok are now openly aligned with Trump and his MAGA movement. The owners of these platforms are not hiding the fact that algorithms will change to support the right-wing view of life and that they will fall in line with what Trump says.
When the owners of these platforms openly embrace racist policies, openly mess with algorithms, and openly make Nazi salutes from behind the US President’s lectern, it is maybe time to question whether you will stand for this and carry on with your distribution channel usage, or will you leave.
Do you want to be associated with, e.g. X? Do you want people to see you have a social link to META and X on your website? What does that say about you and your brand?
You might say, “Stay, do not leave, and fight”, and that is certainly valid. But will fighting with and correcting extremists daily bring you joy or mental health? Could we unite on more decentralised platforms, such as Mastodon, where They cannot influence the algorithms?
I see these platforms (the centralised ones) more as cages or small little worlds now run by racist and politically motivated overlords. No matter what you do, you are now in their world, and they will pump out and prioritise the message they want you to see. They have the tech, money, and resources to get their message across. They will not stop.
If you noted all the above a few weeks ago, you might have appeared to be a conspiracy theorist. Now, to state that all the popular platforms are basically state media, including WAPO, is not fiction any more; it is reality. It has happened, and it happened in broad daylight for everyone to see.
So, do we stay and fight daily, maybe? Do we move to decentralised platforms and set up communities there? I think this is a viable alternative, although it is difficult to get people to move to, e.g. Mastodon.
Another option is, for your sanity, to move your daily reels, posts, video lessons, etc, to your website. Make use of email lists. Perhaps PATREON is a suitable alternative (only your fans will join). You should be doing some of this already. Set up a space where you are the party controlling things with your rules.
If you have the money, you could also move your fanbase to your own app, possibly with a group of like-minded creators on the same app.
As for me; I cancelled X, FB, and probably soon the rest of META. In the last two days, and for the first time, there were reposts of Trump rants from Truth Social, in my LinkedIn feed. I have never engaged in or posted anything political on LinkedIn — where is this coming from?
I would rather go the route of posting my thoughts and videos on my website, and share to MEDIUM (writing), and Mastodon (microblog).
Furthermore, I have also created a podcast. I feel this is a good medium to use with no algorithm (if there is, please let me know) — but at least it provides opportunities for like-minded people to get together without the unwanted elements pitching up in a comments section.
Please let me know how you will approach the current situation. No matter where you live — you are now affected and infected by the tech bro’s owning the media and, thereby, Trump owning what is now state media.
Look after yourself!