Sunday 10 April 2011

I'm back, bitch: ranting about social media.

Wow... so it's been since January 7th that I've not posted on this blog for.... shameful!


In my defence A LOT has happened in the ol' game of life since then and I let this slide intentionally, but lately I've been wanting to come back and write some more blog posts, give my opinion, talk nonsense etc.


Twitter, Tumblr and Facebook give a snapshot of who I am, what I think and feel and I of course realise not many people give a shit about what I think, but here at least I have more than 140 characters and space than a status update to air my views.


My new job in January, especially at the beginning, came as a shock, going from 2 days to 5 days permanently in a brand new sector has not been a completely smooth transition and I knew that I couldn't blog like I used to so I decided to give up for a bit. I wanted to regain my passion for words and try Tumblr as a quicker, easier form of social media available as an app on the iPhone. 


I've come crawling back to Blogspot, so erm, please keep reading! I've decided to do assessment of my experience using different social media and please keep in my mind this is my personal opinion and I wrote this yesterday when I was angry (office move has had me on an tantrum bender for 4 days).


Facebook
I have a love/hate relationship with Facebook. Why can't I quit you?!


LOVE
I love that I can keep in touch with people that I don't get to see anymore on a regular basis, especially those people that live abroad, organising things with a large group of people seems to be easier using messages, music/fashion/media/companies I like are on Facebook and I like seeing their posts.


HATE
However the mun dainty of it 'xxxxx is really tired this morning', 'I'm going to KFC' or lately it's all baby related statuses 'My baby just burped, give him a purple heart medal' makes me want to rip out my heart and stamp on it. I have too many 'Hates' so I'll bullet point them:
  • Status updates - unless they are remotely interesting, don't bother. I've hidden many people simply because I cannot take anymore of their inane bullshit
  • People 'checking in'. I don't give a shit where you are
  • Friend suggestions - If I wanted to be their friend I'd already have added them
  • Poser photos - you are not Britain's Next Top Model
  • People with constant sickly couple profile pics or scans of unborn baby profile pics - YOU ARE YOUR OWN PERSON - I don't need to see a pic of you canoodling with your other half to know you're in love. Every baby scan looks the damn same
  • Chat - if you want to speak to me, pick up the damn phone!
  • Pressure - friend requests from people you can barely remember from school and work colleagues wanting to be your 'friend' - I don't know you, do one.
Tumblr


I joined Tumblr to really find out what the fuss was about, I knew a few celebrities/cool people that have Tumblr accounts and thought it would be easier to follow them on there. HitRecordJoe aka Joseph Gordon Levitt, Rich Sommer aka Harry from Mad Men, Terry Richardson and Oscar PR Girl are all people I follow on Twitter and admire.


What I like about Tumblr is the variety of pictures, audio, video, words that I see day in, day out relating to people and things that I like. I'm able to post very specific things about my likes and dislikes that don't involve words at all and then people respond to it. I'm always amazed when people like or reblog things that I've posted because in a way it's validation - it's ok for you to like/dislike this because other people do - which could be seen as negative but then I always look at the users who have responded to my posts and have found some really interesting people from all over the world.


I think my one dislike of Tumblr is that there does seem to be a lot of people who try to hard on there and on occasion it's too young. (I never liked Bebo either, ridden with emos/goths and 14 years olds who are 'like so not mainstream'. WAKE UP - we're all involved in mainstream culture, you are not that different to me).


Oh yes, I also got a death threat because I posted a photo of Christina Aguilera looking a state and mentioned that she looked like a crack whore - apparently they were going to slit my throat. Luckily I sleep with a machete under my pillow, so suck on that hater.


Twitter
Probably my favourite at the moment. Instant, relevant, informative, insightful and I love twit pics. My interests are best served here, it's where I feel most at home. 


The people/organisations I follow (on the whole - I have a few vices to lame things) are more interesting than anything posted on Facebook.


So from now on I will try and post on here when I have something real to say.


Love, SGS xoxo.