Believe it or not, I’m on social media a lot. I spend most of my day lurking on Twitter, and I check Facebook more regularly than I’d like myself too. The thing is, people could quite easily assume I’m actually never on social media because I hardly ever post anything.
Where I once used to Tweet throughout the day, with ‘funny’ observations about my day or to rant about Jade Goody, I can now go a fortnight without even thinking of anything interesting to say. And when I do think of something witty, I usually forget and remember a week later when it’s too late.
And on Facebook, I now only post links to other things I’ve done, such as this blog or my new photographs on my Flickr account. Whereas, I used to once be one of those people who posted every day, usually something unspecific about my feelings… Urgh! My Facebook memories make me cringe and wonder how I ever managed to drag myself out of bed every day.
On Instagram, to which I’m still relatively new, I can go 6 weeks and not post a single picture, because I’ve had a boring few weeks with nothing to show off, and then upload three images in a day because my life got briefly interesting.
The Social Media Addiction
So yes, I use social media unsocially. I’m there, loitering in the corner, finding out everything about you and keeping myself guarded at the same time. What am I feeling? What am I doing? Well, wouldn’t you like to know… Actually, you probably wouldn’t.
My Facebook timeline is actually really boring, and I like anything which resembles a ray of sunshine in an otherwise dingy corner of the internet. The reality is, Facebook is actually no longer people sharing things about themselves, and instead just tagging each other in memes, lists, quotes, and eyebrow-raising videos.
It’s not just me, it’s everyone who is unsocial on social media. The target now is to actually just get as many likes as possible, from people you’ll never know. Or for you and your best friend to forever tag each other in memes until one of you finally dies.
The only time people genuinely share stuff about themselves now is to show off something they’ve done, or where they are now. I spend hours on Facebook every day, and it’s boring.
Twitter is at least a bit more varied. It’s either people sharing a political viewpoint almost identical to my own, a few news updates, advertisements, and a stream of GIFs. When people do interact with each other on Twitter, they’re either ganging up on a particular topic or person, or acting alone to actually direct their dislike at the individual.
The thing is, in both instances, social media is becoming unsocial.
How To Win At Social Media
If you can’t muster up the emotional strength to share anything remotely about yourself and to actually engage in meaningful conversation, then this is for you. Or, in other words, if you can’t beat them, join them.
I’m going to help you create a shareable of you can fit in with your peers.
Share A Quote
It’s simple. Pick your favourite quote, something which is enlightening and inspiring, and create a graphic with it. I use Canva to create all of mine. The next thing is to them upload it to your favorite social media site.
Here’s mine:
You don’t even need to say anything with it because people don’t read writing anymore… *Gulp* Updates with graphics catch the eye as people scroll through their feed in the hope they find the end soon. That means writing gets ignored, and visuals catch the eye.
Create A Pointless List
So you want to make a list of names so when people see the name of their friend, they tag them. This will mean your post gets shared widely, giving you a sense of achievement, even though the reality is you didn’t achieve anything worthwhile.
Okay, if you’re sure. This isn’t hard to do either. Rather than plucking the names from your head, you’ll have a better success rate if you decide the age-range of the people you want to target, and then find a list of most popular baby names from their era.
For us millennials, I found a list of the most popular boys and girls names in the UK for 1994 and took the top 40 names (20 boys and 20 girls). Copy and paste them onto the graphic, give it a silly name such as ‘People least likely to wipe their arse’, and then upload it waiting for the magic to happen.
Here’s mine:
Create Your Own Meme
Now, of course, there are websites available which help you make them from their large library of common meme pictures. For example, that’s where I made the above one with Buzz and Woody from Toy Story.
However, it doesn’t give you much opportunity to be original, and as far as I can see, the pictures are technically not royalty-free and you leave yourself open to prosecution from the owner, if they so wished. You’re much better off making your own meme from scratch using pictures from a good royalty-free, free websites. Pixaby and Free Images are my favourites for both work and play.
You only have to look through a few pages and inspiration start to buzz into your mind. And a good piece of advice is to look through Animal and Wildlife categories first. Everyone loves animals given human qualities…
Here’s mine:
Of course, it is better if you find pictures with cats, but any animal will suffice.
And that’s it, that’s how you win at being unsocial on social media. You no longer have to feel obliged to tell Facebook what’s on your mind, or how you’re feeling, just churn out endless memes. When you have a library big enough, you no longer have to make new ones, just start sharing them again.
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