The Real Price of Social Media, or Why I Am Addicted to Facebook

I want to share a secret about myself – I am addicted to Facebook.

Every morning, when I wake up, the first thing I do is I reach for my phone and open Facebook. I spend at least 15 min first of all checking how many likes I got on the last photo I posted and from whom. Secondly, I scroll through the news feed to see what other people posted - pictures of cute kids, cats, dogs, happy faces, weird faces, and sometimes very disturbing stuff.

Question – why do I keep doing this every morning when I know very well that it’s a waste of time?

I decided to do some research on this subject. Turns out, I am not the only one wasting my precious morning time. 80% of smartphone users do the same thing - they check the social apps on their phones before brushing their teeth.

We all know how Facebook started – as a social network site for students at Harvard. It had only 4,000 users at that time. Now it’s used by 1.6 billion people across the world.

Maybe it would never grow beyond the size of a student network if smart marketers didn’t figure how to take advantage of it.

Why do so many people use Facebook?

There is this type of people who post 5-6 selfies of themselves in a day. I used to do that too. “Hey, here is me, driving my brand new car to work”, “Me, working so hard at my desk”, “Gym time – Can you believe I just did 20 sit-ups? Look at my abs”. What else? A Duckface Selfie. The list goes on.

The success of social media is based on humans’ need for attention. People simply don’t get enough attention in their real life. It’s abnormal to seek constant attention in real life. But it’s absolutely normal in social media – everyone does it. Facebook and Instagram create an ideal environment for obsession with self-image. The popularity of one’s image in social media is measured by the number of “likes”, “followers” and comments. It becomes a competition - who'll get the most number of likes?

Guess what? It was all designed on purpose by some clever people who invented this “sharing” culture. They encourage us to tell more about our private lives. You open Facebook and the first question you see is “What’s on your mind?” or “Where are you right now?” or “Who are you with?”

All details of our personal life that we share through the social media is a goldmine for advertisers. They pay a lot of money to get access to that data. The more we share about ourselves the easier it is for them to market to us their goods.

We think it’s free to use social media. But the cost of this gigantic platform, the salaries of developers, the data centers space are all paid by the dollars we’ll spend later on movie tickets, clothes, restaurants and vacations advertised to us. That’s what makes the social media profitable and fuels its growth.

The second reason why social media is so popular is Curiosity… that killed the cat.

Nowadays humans’ attention span has become very short. In fact, a recent study found a goldfish has a longer attention span than humans. Why? It’s all thanks to smartphones and information overload.

Nobody wants to read a long article, especially if there are no big colorful pictures in it. No-one wants to watch a YouTube video if it's longer than two minutes or if it doesn't make us laugh or cry every 10 seconds.

And if you think about this, the content these days is not really about the message, it’s about the presentation.

Everything we see on social media is fascinating, exciting, eye-popping. The stories compete for our attention. Eventually we become satiated, desensitized. And we also very quickly forget everything we read or watched on social media.

Remember the photo of a dress that went viral? The dress that divided the entire planet? Half of the world was saying the dress was white and gold, and the other half claimed it was blue and black. Couples were breaking up because they couldn’t agree. Newspapers forgot about politics and focused on the dress. Scientists were doing studies about the dress color. The buzz around the dress lasted for a couple of weeks. And then everyone forgot about it.

What does this example teach us? The most viral content gets forgotten.

If I wake you up in the middle of a night and ask you what was the story of Romeo and Juliette all about, would you be able to tell me right away?

And if I wake you up in the middle of a night, and ask you to share with me any of the “45 incredibly amazing facts that you didn’t know can blow your mind” that you yesterday read about on Facebook, would you remember any of them?

Exactly.

The stories on social media are like fast food. They look, smell and taste really nice the moment we consume them. But do they leave those good nutrients in our system that make us happier and smarter?

Does the social media encourage us to explore the world, ponder, analyze, seek answers and finally create something of our own?

No, all it does is make us want more fun. Addictive fun.

And that is why I am addicted to Facebook.

Some thoughts about generations, social media and love

Those of us born in 60-70s are sort of lucky.  The sociologists name us Generation X and claim that our childhood was one the best.

The major wars, hunger and depression were way behind us, and our grandparents (Baby Boomers) had built a new life that provided us with everything we needed to be healthy, happy and successful.

Our parents worked their tails off to enroll us in good colleges and universities and help us get on our feet. The teachers were tough and demanding. We had to keep our noses to the grindstone to get good marks at school.

We didn’t have smartphones and Lego, but we did read a lot of books. We spent more time outdoors, playing by ourselves, no adults watching us. Inspired by the first astronauts and Herbert Wells we dreamt of travelling to another galaxy and building our own time machine. We were always inventing, designing, creating something.

It was our generation that created Internet, PlayStation, TV shows about vampires, smartphones and of course, the social web.

Our children, the generations Y & Z, the so called Millennials, are victims of our inventions.

They spend most of their time playing computer games and watching TV.

They have a need to be constantly entertained but they don’t know how to entertain themselves. The endless animation series, the fast cutting scenes of computer games fill their heads with imagery and sounds leaving no space for creativity and slowing down their cognitive development.

Gen Y grew up with technology, so being connected and tech savvy is in their DNA. Equipped with the latest technology and gadgets Generation Y is online and connected 24/7, 365 days a year.

And here is the paradox! The Generation X is beginning to adopt the values and the lifestyle of the Generation Y. We are transforming into the social web addicts, dependent on our smartphones, showcasing our personal lives to the rest of the world and crafting our social web image.

For the last 5-6 years checking the Facebook news feed has been my usual morning routine. I’ve been spending anywhere from 15 min to half hour going through endless posts containing photos of family celebrations, vacations, weddings, absurd videos that went viral, meaningless jokes, political propaganda and moms’ groups discussions. I am not sure why I am so addicted to navigating through this infoglut.

Apparently, I am not the only one wasting my precious morning time. About 80% of smartphone users check their phones before brushing their teeth .

The social media has become the best source to stay informed on anything be it of utmost importance or absolute uselessness.

And that’s why it was meant to be a platform for crafting one’s “social image”.

Have you noticed how Facebook always shows you the shiniest moments of your friends’ life? It makes you think that their life is absolutely perfect and filled with endless fun. They seem to be always in a good mood -  enjoying themselves, going out, sitting on the beach, having drinks or eating delicious meals in restaurants.

For most of us who grew up before the Facebook era, having 50-100 Facebook friends seems sufficient. Facebook is just a convenient way to exchange photos with relatives and friends.  For Gen Xers, the social web is more than just a virtual photo album. It’s part of their lifestyle.

300 to 1000 friends on Facebook and probably even more on Instagram seems to be a norm for the Millenials. I recently learnt that 150 is the maximum number of social relationships a person can maintain ( according to Robyn Dunbar). So who are the rest 150-850?

They simply exist there as an invisible audience required for obsessions with self-image.

Researchers at Western Illinois University found that people who score highly on the Narcissistic Personality Inventory questionnaire had more friends on Facebook and updated their status updates more regularly comparing to the ones who scored fewer.

People who have a heightened need to feel good about themselves are more likely to “friend” anyone they know or barely know – from co-workers and ex-classmates to random people they met once, or had never even met (“accepting friend requests from strangers”)

Perhaps, you heard the term “image crafting” - the act of carefully and deliberately constructing one’s social media content to control the way others view their life.

No wonder most social media feeds read like a modern-day fairy tale, where every moment is wondrous, every interaction with friends is more precious than the last, and even the mundane (coffee with the girls! look at my lunch! stuck in traffic!) is a magical experience.

As this author writes “Americans have been obsessed with celebrity culture for decades, hence the unbelievable success of reality TV shows and TMZ. That obsession is driven by the natural human desire to feel special, to feel like you matter. Once social media, specifically Twitter and Instagram, opened the floodgates and let the general public not just peek behind the curtain, but walk around backstage and get a more intimate look at the lives of the celebrities they obsess over, the ability to pretend to be famous, became easier than ever..

…Now we’re all sitting around judging each other, and, more importantly, ourselves, based on how many likes or retweets or double-taps we get. It’s insane.”

Sadly, people’s real lives are so much far away from being that perfect the way social web projects them. In reality our existence is filled with daily chores, struggles and miseries. But “friends” are not supposed to know about them, they should only see the bright side.

 

(From “Why Generation Y Yuppies Are Unhappy”)

What happens as a result? It harms people's perception of reality.

Comparison is a dangerous thing. Constantly comparing oneself against a carefully crafted ideal is a sure recipe for jealousy, disappointment, and malcontent with your own life. Nobody’s life is that perfect, but everyone’s collective image crafting makes it hard for society as a whole to develop and project more authentic expectations.

Because of our image crafting, we lose the opportunity to connect authentically with those we love. Relationships become as fake as your feed: “How’s your job? Amazing! How are the kids? Amazing! How are your workouts going? Let me guess… Amazing!” No one shares the hard things, the real things, and your relationships never progress past the amazing fairy tale recitations for fear of disturbing the image you have so carefully constructed.

….

The 50 shades of the modern love

I often hear from both men and women how hard it is nowadays to find a partner for a long term relationship. If women instinctively know that marriage is an important milestone that needs to be reached one way or another, men are not in a hurry to get married. Most men in their 30s feel that they haven’t grown up yet, that their best time of life just begins, and marriage is a necessary evil that can wait for a while.

“Friends with benefits” or “no strings attached” is a very common style of relationship amongst Generation-Yers. They go out, have fun, make love and then get back to their lives like nothing happened. They don’t talk much about their feelings or plans for the future.

Building a career is the reason number one why marriage is given less and less importance. Establishing oneself in a business world can take quite a while depending on individual preferences and goals. Some aim to land an executive job in a fast growing corporation, others won’t stop until they build a successful business of their own. All are busy and value their time more than anything. Walks under the moon, three hour conversations about meaning of life would be a complete waste of time for them.

Millennials are not interested in the romantic aspects of love. They do, however, get excited about abnormal, exotic forms of sexuality. I always wondered why “50 shades of grey” was so popular amongst the youth.  Could it be giving them the same kind of thrill they get from alcohol and drugs? Or maybe, it’s just a quick and easy recipe to fill in the emptiness of the inner world? Same as Facebook and Instagram, or marihuana.

Humans have a need for love, and if there is no love, then the soul is empty and looking for something to fill in that emptiness. This is why I put social media and TV on par with drugs and booze. They are just artificial ingredients that replace a real life experience.

Nowadays a lot of people have become very health-conscious and strive to eat organic products, free of hormones, antibiotics and GMO. So why not take the same care of your soul?

Another reason why the modern generation is losing the ability to love is the pop culture they grew up with. They learnt everything about love from Hollywood movies and not from Shakespeare or Tolstoy.  The problem with the pop culture is that it creates unrealistic expectations. Expectations that leave people disappointed and confused at the end, because they are so used to the idea that any love story should have a happy ending.

“We’ve been fooled into believing perfection is attainable.

It’s not. Never has been, never will be, and yet, we are all looking for that perfect individual. We are all looking to become that perfect individual. Sadly, we’re all going to fail, and it’s going to suck. No matter how unrealistic our expectations are, the disappointment we feel when they aren’t achieved is very real.

The grass always seems greener on the other side. But who the hell told you to look for greener grass?” (“10 Reasons Why This Generation Is Losing The Ability To Be In Love”)

“

 The western economy created a world where everything and anything can be easily and instantly accessible, be it news, food, entertainment or pleasure.

What does this do to humans? It makes them lazy. A habit that tends to seep into their love lives.

I like to compare the pop culture and social media with fast food. It looks, smells and tastes really good, but does it make you healthy?

Does it stimulate your brain in such a way that you would want to explore the world, ponder, analyze, seek answers and finally create something of your own?

No, all it does is make you want more fun. Addictive fun.