Self-portrait with iPhone | westvirginiaville.com
So, I went and iced my Facebook account last night for the month of September, taking my second Facebook Fast of 2012 (here was the first). This will mean several things for me personally and this site. As Facebook — essentially, a massive communal micro-blogging site — has denuded the audience for blogs, there will be a serious decline in drop-by visitors to the Independent Republic of WestVirginiaVille. A significant portion of the significantly small, yet occasionally devoted, audience for this blogazine comes from links to posts posted to Facebook.
So, I will become even less famous then I already am.
Plus, many people appear now to communicate chiefly through Facebook messaging. I have idled my FB lifeline. Ergo, many friends and acquaintances — unless they seek me out here or via Twitter or e-mail — will think I have died or de-friended them, if they did not read my official Facebook Fast Farewell. So goes life in 2012, the status of your whole existence mediated by whether or not you bob up and down in the flotsam and jetsum of the Facebook ecosystem.
On the other hand, I have more time to write, which is the point of FB-fasting for me. To think. To take walks with an imaginary Golden Retriever named Buck. (My daughter once tried to put a leash on one of our cats and take it for a walk. The feline objected, flopping onto her side upon the sidewalk. So, my daughter tried tugging her. This became her legendary attempt to take the cat for a drag.)
I estimate that within the last 30 days I have checked my FB status, via iPhone, laptop or desktop computer, approximately, oh — 3,456 times? Sometimes — yes, stupidly, but it’s like a heroin addiction — while driving down the road at 70 mph. Really, that wild guess number may be in the ballpark, I don’t know. Maybe higher. I’d be checking it right now, likely enough, were I not in a state of Deactivation. Instead, while no great shakes writing-wise, at least I am writing this post, without FB waving its hands at me, or whispering in my ear: ‘Hey! Hey, man! Check this out!’
I am not compelled — with Facebook open on my browser while I work — to see who had just liked me, verifying I am indeed likable and not some sorry human specimen with dead-end DNA, who really should just get out of the gene pool. Or to eagerly see who had commented with wit, encouragement, irony or cranky conservative objection to some quote, cartoon, bon mot, link or cranky liberal objection which I had just posted. And so a whole new conversation and comment thread develops, a trickle turning into a stream as servers upload and collate responses from around the country and world.
Instead, I have wandered out into the barren hills and fields of Minor Blogistan. It’s kind of quiet here. No one’s liking me. No one’s commenting. Is anyone out there? Omigod, to quote David Byrne in “Once in a Lifetime:”
“What have I done?”
September 2, 2012 at 9:32 pm
So, after a Facebook post or, receiving a WVville email, I have to click on WVville, enter my name, enter my email, then type my “comment.” It sure is easier on Facebook. It sure is confusing for the blogosphere where “is anyone out there” is a way of life.
Then, when I add a post to my own website I have to go there, log in, format it, post it, send out a Mail Chimp announcement vs a quick post to Facebook.
Where the hell IS this facebookwebsiteblogingthingandalltheotheroptions.com thing going? Will my website become an archive for my Facebook life?
I hope that your Facebook fast gives you some insight.
Oh, now I see I have to click “Notify me of follow up comments by email” down below.
And, I will have to cut and paste this comment into my journal if I want to keep it. Damn. Did I miss anything?
September 2, 2012 at 10:03 pm
Life is hard on the bleeding edge, eh? I dunno the answer to your cosmic questions. All I know is that Facebook, while extremely satisfying in a fast-food meal sort of way, often leaves me feeling hungry again. Or worn out from all the quick repartee and identical-sounding posts and reactions.
On the other hand, that’s where the party is. Over here in Minor Blogistan, you can shout and here your echo bouncing off the digital cows in the distance. On the third hand, I get to make pretty layouts and act as if I am a real web magazine. Can’t do that on Facebook (thought a lively streaming Timeline is akin to a magazine in motion). FB may have dealt a body blow to most blogs, it’s true. And you certainly get more verification that you are, like, alive, with its instant feedback loop of ‘likes’ and commentary.
Seriously, I have come to view this blog as a showcase for longer thoughts and more involved presentations. I use Facebook (when not fasting) as a way to direct attention to those inclined to click on the links. Few do. But the ones who do are generally visitors I value. But if you type a link to WestViginiaVille.com in 6 months and you get a 404 Error page, you will know Facebook has won and euthanized yet another idiosyncratic blog.
Meanwhile, life in Minor Blogistan goes on. Got to go till the fields and turn the compost!
September 3, 2012 at 12:49 pm
I am very glad you are back on the blog. I am going from here to link to you on my own blog homepage, as you have so kindly done for me. Never give up on WestVirginiaVille!!
September 3, 2012 at 1:15 pm
Deal. Ms. Damewood. And I direct you to her lively blog, dear denizens of WestVirginiaVille: http://essediemblog.com