Participants were measurably happier and less anxious.
But, disappointingly, not by a huge margin:
Perhaps this is due to the fact a significant number of users switched to less harmful online platforms and didn’t stop using their phones.
Or perhaps there is actually something more sinister. My real concern with this study is the involvement of Meta.
We actually have evidence that Meta halted internal research about social media:
Would you study tobacco and have tobacco companies involved?
Would you study obesity and have Coca-Cola involved?
I don’t want to sound like a conspiracy theorist, but could Meta actually bully/bribe Stanford in order to change the figures?
That’s because they end up going to other social media sites thinking their experiences would be enriched. To truly be off from social media, you need to stop interacting in all of it. That includes places like Reddit and Lemmy.
Because you can’t say you’ve stopped social media just because you deleted your Facebook while turning around and still using Instagram or Lemmy or whatever. You’re still using it.
Now do a study on what it would be like if we weren’t all slaves to corporate America being exploited to death.
Man I wanna delete fb. But there is a HUGE amount of community events that are fb only. Thered be no other way to find them.
In this way, fb actually helps community. I have to block a fuck ton of bullshit spam, but its nbd.
If only I could get everyone back on myspace…
Or an idea I had, that anyone can please steal for a FOSS project called “Signpost” that allows users to post local events (akin to stapling a poster to a post) and others can interact with it. Thats really all I use fb for now.
Can attest. Dropped Facebook in like 2016 and am not on anything else aside from Lemmy. I constantly felt like I wasn’t measuring up to people’s perfect family pictures and exciting vacations, even though I knew intellectually that their pictures were posed and their lives were edited for social media. The world still sucks but at least I feel less inadequate.
Lemmy is the only platform I engage with. I closed down or abandoned all other platforms around the same time you did. My quality of life has greatly improved since, though I do still miss certain aspects sometimes.
I deleted my FB, Instagram, and Twitter when I joined the fediverse in June of 2023. So far the only thing I miss are FB event invites. Now my friends have to specially message me for events they put together. Otherwise it’s been a great change.
Yeah, those are the things I miss too. It feels like being a bit outside of a bubble looking in sometimes.
And then those early days of Facebook, where it was actually useful and engaging, I miss those days too. But the world is a different place now and the slippery slope is too slippery for me to feel comfortable getting anywhere close to that slope.
Only had FB but yes, if they want me to attend they have to reach out some other way. I also moved to another city so I can’t attend as much any more anyway but sometimes it is a bit lonely. No regrets however.
I did that over a decade ago… Should I re-sign up and quit again?
Only if you want to tell others like you to get off of it. This way people not like you have unfettered access to eyes an ears of younger generations who will eventually be in charge and have zero reference to any of the issues you care about but will know a tremendous number of views you oppose. That seems to be the pattern with a lot of us lately. Convincing each other to get offline. Big push for it. The future generation will be raised by TPUSA like we were all raised by school house rock
As someone else that isn’t part of the shirts here - do you also find it jarring when suddenly all these people you meet suddenly have all the same opinion about something?
Like. Even people you’ve known for a long time. Suddenly they care about this thing, and people you know that have never met each other suddenly feel the same way.
Why wouldn’t they? We all took ourselves offline. What other content would be left for them to be exposed to?
Not engaging will also impact the algorithm since it’s feeding off attention to sell advertising. If we all refuse to engage that will weigh it heavily towards the views of people left online who are spreading a different opinion which is to spread and engage with the online world. That’s how they get their information across.
I don’t want to sound like a conspiracy theorist, but could Meta actually bully/bribe Stanford to change the figures?
Asking questions about who’s paying for the study isn’t being a conspiracy theorist. Especially Meta, they’re evil af. They seem to be cautious as well.
This project is part of the U.S. 2020 Facebook and Instagram Election Study (Gonz´alez- Bail´on et al. 2023; Guess et al. 2023a,b; Nyhan et al. 2023; Allcott et al. 2024), a partnership between Meta researchers and unpaid independent academics. Under the terms of the collab- oration, the independent academic authors had final authority over the pre-analysis plan, data analysis, and manuscript text, and Meta could not block any results from being published. More details of this partnership are in Appendices E and F. We have posted answers to frequently asked questions online at this website.
The only reason why I started to doomscroll social media, is because I want to keep tabs on how close my nation is to having a civil war. If it is to happen, I don’t want to be completely surprised, and have some agency at my level.
… can’t you put a google alert on that?
The revolution will not be televised.
Ai content and gossip aren’t exactly facts.
“Hey Google, notify me when alpaca lips.”
I distrust Google and the mainstream media. It wouldn’t surprise me at all if they simply ally with the Trump Regime, and remain silent about ICE death squads seeking out Democrats or something along those lines.
I experienced this when I got rid of facebook (or more accurately, when I wouldn’t provide them with my ID to get my account unlocked).
But the other side of it is that a lot of the social groups that I was involved with, and a lot of my contact with my friends, was done through facebook, and my real world social life has been impacted by losing facebook.I still wouldn’t go back, but it’s a first hand example of just how wide the facebook network effect can reach.
This is why I opted for the keep messenger option when I deactivated my account. I have so many people even just from old jobs and while I can get a job pretty much anywhere I apply (that offers my specialty) and be working within a month, that comes with having to vet employers / weed out sketchy facilities.
So I need to be able to message old coworkers and be like “hey do you know anyone who’s worked at ___? That 10k sign on bonus is SUS” and have them be like “yeah 5 people got fired and 15 bailed after the state inspection. They were reusing paper iso gowns and billing for surgeries their sister hospital in the city was doing to get the Medicaid incentive for providing rural care.” Like WUT. Honestly me having a low social media presence is a plus for most employers especially in psychiatry, but I need to be able to get the tea on these people before I sign up for REAL shitshow instead of the lowkey kind I’m used to.
Were they your good friends to begin with?
Friends was probably the wrong word. What I was really referring to is community and social events. My good friends are still there in my life, but the broader queer community is now harder to connect with, and lots of social events and meetups that are happening in my city happen without me even knowing.
Yeah I got back on FB after a 10-year absence for my nonprofit, and then Insta. Went as far as downloading the apps to my phone. Within 1 week my mood and productivity had completely collapsed. I was just sitting there slumped into my chair, like I was hooked up to an IV drug or something. I used to do the same with Reddit to an extent, and being banned there was actually good for me. Now I am - well that nonprofit, I started with all the time I wasn’t wasting on Reddit. Fuck all that dopamine-addicted noise. I’m quitting weed this Christmas break, I want all my neurotransmitters back.
The problem with the tobacco analogy is that you can buy a pack of cigarettes and walk away, then study it at peace. You cannot run any kind of testing on the shithole systems of Meta without their permission and involvement. That’s how you know every such independent study will be tainted by Zuck’s dirty hands.
Damn! I’ve never had Instagram and i haven’t opened Facebook in five years. So why aren’t I happy?
I believe being on Lemmy causes unhappiness as well. We need to stop using all forms of social media. Today is my birthday and as a birthday present to myself I’m uninstalling all social media on my phone by midnight. I’m just getting my last few fixes in before I do it 😹
Congratulations! I hope you never read this!
Happy birthday ❤️
I don’t think the problem is social media but the curation of them. It is very rare to see something that shocks me on a bad way through my feed. Just like in our lives we need to build around us, the problem is that most social media won’t let us. Taking charge in life is very hard, capitalism profits a lot on convenience. Sometimes the means of change is taken from us, especially on the digital world (this is where the problem lies).
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That’s me, too.
I use Facebook twice a year and I don’t have accounts anywhere else but Lemmy. I don’t think I use this as Social Media in the usual sense. I’m not following individual people because I don’t care who y’all are. Only your content. I’m not posting stuff about myself because I’m boring as heck.
Cool but are you doomscrolling on lemmy?
I sure am! Not comparing myself to anybody on here, though.
Try going to maid cafe. It’s silly and endearing.
It could’ve been worse
I discovered this about a decade ago when I deleted all my socials. Now I only use Lemmy and follow topics I’m genuinely interested in!
Removing Facebook, Snapchat, Reddit, corpo-controlled media in general from my life was so freeing. Suddenly I wasn’t comparing myself to anyone else. Their lives weren’t in my faces all the fucking time.
Duh. I hope this was privately funded.
I deleted the apps. I don’t visit those sites in alternative ways but I crave it man. I miss doom scrolling and I ended up on yt shorts. Way less of the time and my field seems to avoid viral trends so I guess it’s my nicotine patch: I still do it’s just not that harmful I guess. How are you guys dealing with it? Do you consider lemmy as addictive/harmful as the mainstream socials?
Personally I find there to be less new daily content on lemmy, so it ends up self limiting as I see the same posts again. Might just be what I’m subbed to, and or how I sort. But I do end up spending less time here than I did reddit, or I currently do on youtube.
I think it comes down to an insufficient user base than is required to get the previous fix of social media.
This was a problem in the early days of Facebook as well…
Leechblock and unhook are required browser extensions for me.
YouTuber is extra tricky because I can easily convince myself that I’m not wasting time, I’m “learning”. Even though I doubt I’ll ever need to know how to build a mud hut with a secret swimming pool underneath…
In general, I found if I remove the addictive elements from YouTube or whatever, as opposed to blocking the website entirely, I’m more likely to stick to being sober. I treat my phone the same way, I use YAM Launcher to help remove distractions.
I struggle. I love social media. Lemmy adds to the depression because somehow every post is political and I get to see all the bad things the government is doing every day. I’m shutting it all down. If I need a social fix I can play an MMO lol
NGL. You had me till the last line.
Haha! That line is a special little tip only for me. I’m a hopeless EverQuest addict.
Do you consider lemmy **ass **addictive/harmful as the mainstream socials?
That’s a very funny typo. But also kinda relevant. Lemmy’s sorting “algorithm” is just a very basic sort. There’s no personal tuning, just basic “does this post have more activity than this other one” so it’s as un addictive as it can get really. Short of purposefully trying to be bad.
But yh it’s not being algorithmic that much is pretty much the reason why I don’t open it that often
Lol nooooooooooo I did not fckn meant to do that
Yes but since its users are mostly reposting from sites trained on said algorithms. There is certainly a “trickle down” effect.
Posts that weren’t popular on Reddit, or on the news website aren’t going to be seen and then posted here…
Lemmy is a lot less addictive for me than personalized algorithm-driven TikTok/Reels/Shorts type stuff and has better quality content, but there’s also a lot less content. I blocked internet access for Instagram and other apps on my phone and now I ended up on YT shorts on my computer also
Get yourself extensions to block youtube shorts and convert it to regular videos. Use phone apps to do the same, I believe revanced and grayjay both do this
