Long and Deep Instead of Short and Shallow

Yesterday Tim said something in the midst of our conversation that made me decide to officially join Reddit.  

I signed up and started joining various communities. 

I suspected I was joining too many and would be overwhelmed.

I checked the app a few times during the day and sure enough, I was overwhelmed.  With each community, there are usually new posts and with each post, there are comments, and with each comment, there are often comments on the comment.  

This morning I checked Reddit again and after a few minutes, I decided I would probably quit or greatly reduce my time on there.

Reddit was way too overwhelming for me.

I had already figured that out about TikTok.  

Instagram has been my favorite social media for the last several months, but I greatly cut back from that for personal drama/psychological reasons.  I've gone back on it a few times for very short visits and I end up feeling more on the depressed, anxious, lonely side rather than the happy, excited, comforted, invigorated side.  

I've decided that, for me, personally, I am better off with quantity in terms of the length of the individual content rather than quantity in terms of variety of content.  

Instead of spending  a chunk of time looking at many short videos on TikTok, I'd rather read a book, watch a movie or TV show, listen to a podcast, read a blog post, or watch a medium-to-long video on YouTube.    

Now...this could all backfire if I end up subscribing to too many channels, podcasts, etc...AND if I spend too much time reading comments, then it will end up being as overwhelming and potentially as toxic as social media.  

In terms of toxicity.  I don't think any platform is inherently toxic.  It's really about what you personally pay attention to and how you engage with it.  

One thing I am thinking is that being a follower of someone on social media rather than reading their books, listening to their podcasts, watching their longer videos, etc.... 

Well....

It's kind of like watching a lot of movie and TV trailers instead of the actual movies or TV shows.

Recently, I started following yet another two podcasts.

My four podcasts I'm subscribed to. I'm going to try hard NOT to follow anymore.

I learned about Living Autistically via their YouTube channel which I learned about , weeks ago, via Instagram.

And I actually found Disney Time during my visit to Reddit this morning.

So that's one thing social media IS helpful with—connecting us to longer forms of media.  But I think in most cases, we're too busy scrolling, liking, and commenting to have the time to seek out longer forms of media.

When I first started becoming super-interested in autism, I began compulsively following a lot of autistic accounts on Instagram.  It was too many.  And it's just a lot of little pieces. Little pieces that mesh together into one confusing blob.

I've come to realize I'd rather hear/read/see in-depth stories of a few autistic people than memes and quick images from many autistic people.

And the same goes for my other interests like Disney and politics.

I'd rather read a full editorial in the Washington Post rather than the journalist's quick, witty opinions on Twitter (plus all the comments (zingers) in response to their Tweets and the responses to the responses and....it can go on and on and on and on).  

I got a lot out of various infograms and memes about anti-racism.  But I gained a LOT more by spending close to 14 hours listening to the audio book of Beverly Daniel Tatum's Why Are All the Black Kids Siting Together in the Cafeteria?  

I have enjoyed watching random strangers sing and or dance in viral videos, but watching the wedding dance today in the finale of The Mindy Project was much more meaningful, because these are characters that I've followed for six seasons.  

Also in terms of my own content, I think someone who reads my blog or talks to me one on one is going to know me MUCH more than someone who follows me on Instagram, Twitter, or TikTok.  

There have been times that I've become more active on social media FOR the intent of promoting/networking...hoping that people will notice me and then come to my blog or novel. But from what I see from Statcounter and Google Analytics, that very rarely happens.  I don't think it's necessarily that I'm so incredibly not-interesting and not-appealing.  I think it's that people are so busy scrolling and struggling to keep up, it's hard to find the time to look at profiles, click on the links, and then actually read/watch/listen to the content. 

Anyway....

For anyone reading this and up for answering a few questions.  Do you prefer longer or shorter content?  If you use social media a lot, how do you keep from being overwhelmed? Whether it's longer or shorter content, are you like me in that you subscribe/follow too many accounts?  Or are you better at keeping things at a manageable level?

If you’re a content creator who pays attention to analytics or sales, have you found that social media brings you a significant percentage of your traffic?  In terms of consuming content, have you ever found a beloved blog, podcast, video channel, etc. by clicking on a link in a profile or a self-promotion post?  Or have you ever had a situation where you were a fan of someone, started following them on social media, and now know them more for their social media persona than their actual creative work?