I have been slow to embrace social media. I initially resisted because I thought it was stupid. As I sit here writing this, I can't even remember how it started. MySpace, I think? Regardless, what was the point of putting your entire life on the internet for anyone and everyone to see. At a minimum, it was narcissistic. On the other extreme, it was potentially dangerous. For years, I mocked anyone with a social media account. I still remember mercilessly ridiculing the first friend I learned had a MySpace account. At that point, he also had a FaceBook account, because MySpace was going bye-bye, and FaceBook was taking over.
Eventually, at the behest of a dear friend who lives halfway around the world, I created a Facebook account. I did so because she, correctly, pointed out that we could stay in some contact through FaceBook. However, even after joining the social media horde, I was slow to embrace it. I think I initially grabbed a bunch of FaceBook friends and looked at their pages. I probably made a few initial posts in the first week or so. Then, I went dormant for long stretches of time. Kind of like this blog since the Sochi Olympics. It was interesting to re-connect with some old friends and see what they were up to. I also enjoyed the informal competition with The Wife over who had the most FaceBook friends. However, it still seemed kind of stupid and superficial. I found myself connecting with old acquaintances as well as friends and learned that many people enjoyed the competition about how many "friends" they have, and not in a friendly competition with their spouse. I actually started a blog post once entitled "Why I Hate FaceBook." Like several others, I never finished it.
As I re-connected with more people, I became a little more active. I usually checked in to see what my friends were doing, but never consistently posted about my life. That changed last summer, when I started posting for "Kill the Family Tour". The primary purpose, again, was to help someone half way around the world. We posted pictures of our experiences so O4C's mother could see them. Several close friends enjoyed the posts and pictures. It was a little intoxicating and a little addictive. Especially when we started getting "likes" from around the world. With O4C's return to home, my FaceBook posting became erratic again, until Kill the Family Tour 2.0.
I think it is safe to say that I fully embraced FaceBook sometime in the last couple of years. There are still things I really dislike, but in general, it serves a useful purpose. I particularly enjoy the fact that it has been taken over by my generation.
Despite my acceptance of FaceBook, I have been slow to adopt other social media sites. One of the prmary reasons is I don't understand the purpose of multiple social media platforms. Why is Twitter, with it's character limitation preferable to FaceBook? If you can post pictures on Twitter and FaceBook, what is the point of Instagram? What exactly is SnapChat? How do all of these things differ? Why do you need an account on all of them? And to prove that I am, in fact old, how many social media sites are there that I have never even hear of?
In the interest of learning answers to these questions, I went to the source...teenagers. I asked a few. What I can tell you is they don't have answers. I did get one to admit that FaceBook has lost some status because there are too many parents. I guess there is some appeal to the brevity of Twitter, but no one could really explain why there is a need for Twitter and Instagram. There was a lot of "it's just better" or something along those lines. #BeautyIsInTheEyeOfTheBeholder.
I did eventually join Twitter. I just looked and I joined about 2 years ago. I have tweeted 53 times. Some of them are actually kind of funny. As I re-read most of my 53 tweets, I remember that I was going to initially record funny things my boys said, such as "Do you know what is creepy about me?" from Middle. But I never followed through. I basically use Twitter to follow William and Mary sports. It is a good site to keep track of whatever relatively obscure thing you want to keep track of, because major news outlets won't tell me what is going on with the Tribe swim team.
This past weekend, I decided to take Twitter to a new level. I decided to tweet my way through an event. It seemed appropriate that the event was a One Direction concert. I was combining a specific site (Twitter) from an internet platform (social media) to record my observations of a concert from a boy band. All three of these things I was slow to embrace and even slower to admit I had embraced. Why was I at a One Direction concert. There are various reasons, but, I must admit, one reason was I actually like the band. You know, I am still even a little embarrassed to admit that, which is sad. But it is true, I enjoy One Direction, and they put on a hell of a show, even though Liam was a little under the weather.
I decided to truly embrace social media. I tweeted 13 times, including the initial warning that I was going to do it. I used the hashtag #DadAt1DConcert for each tweet, you know, so my musings could go viral. I would have tweeted many more times, but my phone battery died, because I couldn't charge it on the trip to Baltimore because someone (who shall remain nameless) was using my car charger. I admit 13 tweets isn't that much, but if you consider I did 13 tweets in about 10 hours, after 49 tweets in 2 years, it was pretty significant for me. I also was using multiple hashtags, because I have learned from multiple sources that cool kids use hashtags, and I want to be one of the #coolkids.
The concert was fun. My boys enjoyed it, although it was a little too much for Youngest and Middle refused to admit that he enjoyed it. Tweeting was fun. I can understand the appeal, much like I eventually understood the appeal of FaceBook. I probably won't become a big tweeter, I still think there is a little more life to live to spend time trying to record it, even at 120 characters or less. Is that right? 120? I have also opened an Instagram account, and there is no way I can do them all, but I'll do a little of each, here and there. FaceBook, the social media taken over by old people, will probably still be the most active for me. I have posted a few pictures on Instagram and re-tweeted something this morning, and learned to #toomanyhashtags things from time to time. Cuz I want to be one of the #coolkids.
I have learned a few things in my slow acceptance of social media. I generally refuse to sacrifice spelling and grammar, except when artistic license calls for it. Cool kids use hashtags. I still would rather bore you with a long essay on this blog, but I have even less time for that. And, most importantly, capital letters count. If you don't use capital letters, a brief concert by One Direction on Good Morning America can go from #1DonGMA to #1DongMa.
No comments:
Post a Comment