Euan Semple's Blog, page 16

Deleting my social media accounts

I just posted this on Facebook and Linkedin

I was never a fan of people who announced their intention to quit blogging, preferring that they just go quietly.

But…

I am going to delete this account, along with my other social media accounts, in the next day or so and it would seem rude to leave without saying goodbye.

I have made, and kept it touch with, so many friends through these platforms but I have been spending less and less time on them recently and have been feeling better as a result.

Creating connections and having interesting conversations with smart people was what excited me about the internet from the start but sadly this morphed into being manipulated and data mined by huge social media platforms.

I never liked the phrase Social Media. The problem was always in the prioritisation of the word media over the word social. For me, at least, the time has come for disintermediation and I am currently enjoying Mastodon, however long that lasts.

You will always be able to find me through my blog though, whatever happens, so do stay in touch and take care of yourselves.

Opting out

Really interesting post from Janet Vertesi about why leaving the big social media platforms would be a good thing.

Words on the page.

Words, words, words. I write an awful lot of them. Think yourself lucky that you don’t get to see many of them.

Journaling

There is something about journaling that I am really drawn to. Whether it is books on journaling, blog posts about journaling, apps for journaling, adverts for notebooks for journaling, you name it each time I find a new one of any of these I get a little shot of adrenalin.

I have a room full of Field Notes and Moleskin notebooks filled with scribblings over many years. I have been using the wonderful journaling app DayOne for many years (and have 4,500 entries).

But to what end? I rarely go back and read my journal entries, and if I do they seem full of self pity over a depressingly small range of topics…

And yet, I still feel that tug every time I see the word “journal”

Weird eh?

Identity

It’s interesting watching the Mastodon convention of introducing yourself. “I am a…” posts that list labels that people apply to themselves.

We are so constrained by these labels, which are mostly inherited from the society around us and are used to pigeon hole us and make others feel comfortable. Once they have slapped a label on us they find us less challenging.

We should resist this process. I have no idea what I am. All I can be sure is that I am.

Twitter

As I teeter on the brink of deleting my Twitter account I thought I would look for the original tweet where I said “Corporations don’t tweet – people do”. The earliest instance I can find is 2009 but I don’t think that is the original as I had already changed it to Organisations Don’t Tweet, People Do (the of course bloody Wiley Americanised it for the book).

Oh well, it was a very long time ago whatever.

Memories

The Photos widget just served up this photo taken while flying over Manhattan and made me wonder if I’ll ever be there again.

Stumbling along

I am enjoying stumbling along in Mastodon. I don’t really understand all of the niceties of where I post and who sees it but I sort of don’t care.

It’s like life really, I am increasingly happy to see where it takes me and enjoy the ride rather than heading in a particular direction and pressuring myself to “arrive”.

Leo Laporte

I have loved listening to Leo’s podcasts for seventeen years, almost from the start, and thoroughly enjoyed this interview with him about his career, podcasting, and the tech industry generally.

I’ve learned so much from MacBreak Weekly over the years but quite honestly I could listen to Leo talking about paint drying and enjoy it!

Such a smart, nice, thoughtful guy.

Almost like being there

Fridays are good days because there is usually a new video to enjoy from Ken and Carol at Life Is Too Short. They make great videos of their travels in their campervan which is just like ours and are coming to the end of a long series of posts from northern France. Even if you aren’t into van life the sense of place they convey is lovely and relaxing.