what social medias do you consider to be "usable"?

[hellodreamymiku]

I've been thinking about the concept of Discord being categorized as social media. Unlike the typical social media platforms, my experience with Discord doesn't give me that draining doom scrolling feeling. Perhaps its straightforward focus on direct messaging contributes to this. This got me thinking, do others also have a collection of somewhat tolerable and actually usable social media sites they still use? Do you use some social medias because they remind you of the old internet? Do you feel safer in some social medias than the others?

For me as I consider Discord to be one of these acceptable social medias because its more customizable than a regular group chat, the servers are like mini forums and the interface is cool i guess. On top of this I also use linkedin, it's honestly one of those social medias that you can't really escape because they serve to you more than a site that you can share pictures and quotes with. I hate instagram every bit of my life as it took so much of my time but there only one more social media that is like instagram but it's just 10 times better in my opinion. Pinterest, pinterest is very straight forward and yes it lacks the social interaction but its an image/ideas site and it works really well for me, I go on and search up ideas for whatever I want to do and don't spend extra time on it unless I'm really bored.

I'm very curious to see what you guys would consider as sites that give old internet vibes? 

[Memory]

I was an early adopter of a lot of the big social media sites, and I think they were all GREAT in their early forms. They only started to lose their charm when algorithms, advertising, influencer culture, bots, and the -ists, -phobes and Nazis started overpowering moderation efforts.

I still have accounts with most of them, but only so I can follow friends. The only one I don't have is Twitter, even though it was my favourite right up until Musk took over. I replaced it with Mastdon, and that's the only social media I actively use these days.

I find Discord overwhelming, and I wonder if it's because I'm getting old or something, but it does seem like one of the better options for social interaction these days.

If it were up to me, everyone would just be on forums and MSN Messenger. 🤷🏻‍♀️

[CableCat]

the concept of Discord being categorized as social media

Oof, had a whole debate with a friend over whether or not Discord can be classified as "social media". I argued yes, it can be, and he argued that it is not social media!

I find Discord to be usable, too. Once I tried Hexchat, I learned how Discord is obviously modeled after IRC, and I think that contributes to its usability. I've wanted to try Mastodon, but I'm reluctant because I'm trying to detach from social media.

I grew up with social media, so I have accounts that are OLD. I still check in with my Facebook periodically. The only thing I find usable about it anymore is Marketplace! Marketplace is probably the only substantial reason I am keeping my Facebook for now. That, and I have elderly family members on there. I check in with the account so it doesn't get hacked, and I also don't want to delete my account and get stuck in the dang 30-day waiting period where my account could be vulnerable to being hacked. IF my account got hacked, it would be easy for someone to fool my elderly family members into clicking a disguised link.

That's also why I'm loathe to create more accounts that are tied to my email AND phone number. I don't want to have any more accounts that could potentially be hacker targets. I don't trust many big social media sites anymore to not collect and sell my data, either.

[Finel]

Is discord considered social media? I always seen it more as a chatting app, but considering the servers social spaces do form so maybe it is a social media, who am I to say otherwise. I see discord as different, there is no "feed", just servers I picked to join. usually it's just my friends or people I am working on a project with. I have the power to make it as I want it.
I do stay away from massive servers since they intimidate them an I find them overwhelming, they also kinda loss the charm for me when there is too many people and too much messages nonstop.

I deleted my facebook years ago (and only briefly reopened it when I was at uni and it was the best way to stay updated with events there), stopped using twitter, the only social medias I use is tumblr (where I go see posts about media I like) or Instagram (unfortunately).
Instagram is complicated to me, I hate it, not only it's run by meta, I also think it is anti user, and if I didn't need it I would call it unusable.
however, I need it to keep in touch with my friends, and it is also where my social presence as an artist is, without it I would make no connection with other local artists- something I value quite highly. I did start my website partially to make a portfolio so I won't have to use relay on Instagram for that but I doubt I will ever leave that place :/

Tumblr is silly, and kinda bad, I doubt it's intuitive to new users but I've been there for years and I don't hate it like most mainstream social media. While the staff loves making stupid and harmful changes to it, I still feel like overall I have the control over what it shows me, and I don't doom scroll on it so that is a big personal plus.

[Bugsbites]

I mainly use tumblr, but I also have instagram. I mostly keep using it because its nice to stay updated on whats going on with my friends. The implementation of reels makes me want to delete it though. I find it hard to avoid doomscrolling :(. If any social media is worth having, for me at least it would have to be tumblr. I could stand to use it less but I think a lot of the stuff posted there is pretty fun and the lack of algorithms still makes it a nice place to hang out online. Without tumblr I would have never discovered any of the indie web.

[Kallistero]

Facebook Events 

It shows you local places that you can go to in real life, and the people hosting the events post & maintain their own event pages. It's honestly something that dignifies having its own site, and it strikes at the core of why social media WAS a good idea but has lost touch with the principle that made it so: it's meant to SUPPLEMENT a person's real life instead of conspiring to become a replacement for it. That's some of the healthiest engagement one can have with a social media platform, and Facebook seems to be the ONLY one out of all of them that offers this kind of tool as an actual feature on the site.

Also, the people you interact with there are people you know in real life, which helps with it being a social supplement rather than a social replacement.

[Cele]

All social media is kind of poor if you're not hanging out with your friends, imo. But the problem with the shitty people is not fixed outside of social media, as they still very much operate even in this new "Old Web". (You do get less algorithm and advertising bs tho.)

Discord is a delight when you find likeminded people, and I definitely prefer it over others, although "social media" isn't the term I'd typically use about it. I am aware that Discord as a company has its flaws.

[hellodreamymiku]

But the problem with the shitty people is not fixed outside of social media, as they still very much operate even in this new "Old Web"

I haven't seen many shitty people outside of social media so far and I'm very happy for it, my only encounter was the flat earthers in gaia online but I'm not even sure if they're serious. I also want the net revival movement to grow so theres more active people to talk to because all forums and chatrooms feel like they've been deserted by people but I'm also kind of scared of people taking this movement and taking it back to exactly how social media works right now, I hope you're encounters were just one time things and those people changed T-T

[Cele]

I haven't seen many shitty people outside of social media so far and I'm very happy for it, my only encounter was the flat earthers in gaia online but I'm not even sure if they're serious. I also want the net revival movement to grow so theres more active people to talk to because all forums and chatrooms feel like they've been deserted by people but I'm also kind of scared of people taking this movement and taking it back to exactly how social media works right now, I hope you're encounters were just one time things and those people changed T-T

I would definitely like more forums or more activity on the ones that already exist. Forums were always my favourite type of internet. Having a personal website is fine and all, but it doesn't necessarily make it easy to befriend people if it's just that.

[debleb]

tumblr is quite good, although they're making a few worrying decisions and man do i not like the new desktop layout. also reddit isn't too bad user wise, mostly since you can curate your feed a lot

[starbreaker]

The only social media I really consider usable any longer is personal websites, RSS feeds, email, and web forums. Even the Fediverse feels like it's both too much and unnecessary at the same time. It would be nice if we could reclaim USENET as a discussion platform and not just a way to distribute bootleg movies, music, and pornography, but I'm not counting on it.

(Nevertheless, those who are curious about USENET can get free accounts on eternal-september.org. It's also possible to run one's own NNTP server and host newsgroups that aren't connected to USENET.)

[DiffydaDude]

those who are curious about USENET can get free accounts on eternal-september.org.

I tried to look up the site but it didnt pull up anything. Do i have to use another browser to view it?

[starbreaker]

I tried to look up the site but it didnt pull up anything. Do i have to use another browser to view it?

USENET isn't a website. It predates the Web. It even predates Gopher. It uses a protocol called NNTP, and you can get an account on https://eternal-september.org/.

[Memory]

Just got my first ever taste on the Usenet a couple of weeks ago.
So this is how computer communication was in the early 80s...

Protocol-wise, it's superior to every other communication platform in terms of efficency and freedom. The huge amount of incoming spam has to be dealt with by the user himself. Truely open discussions without borders are possible there. With the downside of getting a hint about the deep human abyss as well. Almost a darknet-like experience.

99% of discussions there were on a low level. Only tech topics were somewhat fruitful. So the Usenet developed back into the hub for computer freaks, as all the noobish Windows 95 (and newer) users moved on to more user-friendly technologies.

It didn't convince me enough to continue with Usenet, as the level of discussion is better in nearly every comment section on some news articles. And there are message boards that value freedom very high as well.

But damm, Usenet has lots of potential, would there be more well-mannered people...

[DiffydaDude]

USENET isn't a website. It predates the Web. It even predates Gopher. It uses a protocol called NNTP, and you can get an account on https://eternal-september.org/.

Sorry, i shouldve worded that better; I looked up what usenet was and I do know that its kinda like IRC where you need a client to view it. What I meant was that I couldnt access the eternal-september website. Is it an HTML website or a Usenet thing? Sorry ive never used this usenet thing before.