At the risk of revealing my age, I’m part of that sub-group of Millennials who don’t identify as Millennials because I remember the days before cellphones.
If I wanted to see a friend, I didn’t WhatsApp them, I picked up the landline and made a plan.
The crazy thing is that I can’t imagine navigating the world now without my smartphone. We have all become so used to communicating via social media, that most people don’t even have a landline anymore.
Despite this, disenchantment with social media platforms like Facebook has led to a mass exodus as more and more people, old and young, delete both their account and the app from their phones.
This isn’t that surprising if you consider what Facebook has been getting up to. There was the Cambridge Analytica privacy scandal. Then they went ahead and patented technology that would allow them to use your phone’s microphone without you knowing. Oh, and there was that time they decided to start trying to predict when we would die, which wasn’t creepy at all…
Here’s The Verge with the latest on the mass exodus:
According to new data from Pew Research Center that sampled US Facebook users aged 18 and up, 4 in 10 (42 percent) of those surveyed have taken a break from the social network for “several weeks or more” in the last year; a quarter of respondents said they’ve deleted the mobile app entirely from their smartphones.
Pew conducted their survey over May and June this year, revealing that a majority of people aren’t too pleased with Facebook.
People have a bad taste in their mouths from Facebook after months hearing about privacy mishaps, election meddling, misinformation campaigns, and questionable moderation practices. Today, Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg is testifying before Congress regarding how foreign countries are wielding technology platforms to sow discord and unrest in the United States.
Data also revealed that the movement away from Facebook seems to be generational.
44 percent of users between 18 and 29 told Pew they deleted Facebook’s app versus the 20 percent of people aged 50–64 who did so. For users over 65, that number dropped to 12 percent. At a minimum, over half of the respondents said they’ve adjusted their privacy settings in the past 12 months, which Facebook has taken steps to make easier.
But this doesn’t just come down to politics. Pew found that “Republicans are no more likely than Democrats to have taken a break from Facebook or deleted the app from their phone in the past year.” The recent swell of criticism directed at Facebook, Twitter, and other social media platforms over supposed censorship came well after the Pew survey was conducted, so it may be a factor the next time around.
It’s interesting to see the older generation hanging onto their Facebook accounts. Then again, if you’ve mastered a piece of newish technology, I can understand why you’d want to stick with it.
Whatever is happening, Facebook had better watch out. One more misstep and they’ll be the retirement home of social media.
[source:theverge]
