The fractured state of online connections

I wrote a post on Bluesky this week about the impact that social media has on my well-being.

And that is totally true: I find myself going there while waiting for something to run.

And since logging out of Facebook on my Mac, I’ve noticed one thing: I instinctively go to that site-dot-com as a habit - the difference now is that I see the login screen. But the number of times I’ve seen that screen and gone “oh, wow, again?”. Yikes.

Definitely need something else to do.

Side note: thinking Rubik’s cube but have read some bad reviews of new ones. But that sort of thing might be good: open to ideas too!

But it did make me think about social media, connections and communities - especially in the tech world.

Tech communities are often quite distributed in location, and need a place to connect. Which is great, in theory.

The challenge is that each community has its own place where action, conversation and connection takes place.

And if you’re involved in multiple communities, that means multiple places.

These are categorised in to two areas -

1. social networks, and

2. tools/apps to connect.

There are so many now - from Facebook to X to Mastodon to Instagram to LinkedIn to Bluesky.

To be blunt, I don’t have capacity - neither time or energy - to deal with that list.

The world is already full of noise: I don’t need that.

I don’t have time to post the same message in different places. Or try to even grow (and maintain) an audience in so many places.

This does not bring me joy. At all. Which means it is obvious that it is not the right thing for me to spend my energy on.

I also don’t want to bombard my audience in multiple places: if I see the same post from someone in multiple places, to me it comes across as lazy. Sure, I could tweak it for each network, but now that’s more time spent.

But it makes it hard too, especially if you have these feelings of being invisible.

I have this constant feeling of being left out because I’m not present in places; and that’s not healthy either.

With so many choices for social networks, it means that I have two choices:

1. I invest time and energy to look at and maintain a presence in all of these places, or

2. find a place that does bring me joy.

I’ve opted for the second - and of course still have that feeling of missing out on one core community I’m in because I’m not on X.

And I doubt I’m alone here too.

So now I post more freely on Bluesky than I ever did on X. I often self-censored on X due to the games the algorithms played on people. I often would have thoughts of “who cares?” before posting, and would end up not posting.

And I’d not be seen. This snowballs that feeling of invisibility.

So now, I post some personal thoughts. Some nerdy ones. Try to interact with others in my timeline who post reputable content.

And I write content about a major piece of tech I work with - you’ll see it published here (yep, there’s an RSS and Atom feed available) plus posted on Bluesky.

It is just a shame that the bulk of the community for that tech is not on Bluesky.

And I’ll just need to mentally deal with that fractured nature.

Given the toxicity of X, its psychological games with its algorithms, promoting money-making content and the recent fascist behaviours of its ‘leader’, that is not a toxicity I want near me.

This fractured nature though is hurting social networks, and how users approach them. There’s just too many choices, too many options, too much work, and it’s exhausting.

And hurtful when you don’t get engagement - either a post just gets zero engagement, or you try to engage with someone else’s post and they just ignore you. That one is probably worse - and there are some high profile people in tech communities who love to only engage with their inner circle. This behaviour creates pretty horrible feelings for those on the outer. I know, it’s happened to me.

Which is why I am so appreciative when I get a like or a comment - and I reply, acknowledge and converse. Because it is a social network. And I want to be social.

This is not just about social media though. Social networks are where individuals post, but are not really communication tools. Sure there’s chat, but that’s still 1-on-1.

So enter tools like Slack and Discord.

These are two that are in my peripheral.

The challenge I have with Discord is following along: given audiences are now worldwide (which is awesome as connecting with like-minded folk around the world is epic), it also means that when I open it, I see so much to try to catch up on. But it turns in to chaotic noise due to the app’s disorganised approach to messages and threads. It’s like multiple conversations all taking place in one global thread, and trying to follow along completing the jigsaw in real-time.

But it is that necessary evil: it’s where the community connects.

And if I remove myself from Discord, as well as X mentioned above, I do become invisible to the bulk of the community.

That’s not an issue I can resolve without, well being there. And that is at times exhausting.

Slack is another: yes, lots of businesses use Slack as their internal communication tool. But also, lots don’t. But to be involved in this community, I feel I need to be there. I’ve missed vital information about upcoming events because I didn’t look at Slack fast enough.

Slack doesn’t fit in to my day-to-day work. I don’t connect with clients on it, and don’t use it for internal communications. This makes it an extra step in the “getting involved” process. But this step, because it is not front of mind, becomes a barrier to making it feel organic.

And because of this, I don’t have it open day-to-day.

Getting involved at times feels like a chore - especially when you already feel on the outside. And so I find it easier to just not get involved. The feelings of being ignored, invisible and excluded can’t happen when you self-exclude. Right?

What all of this means though is that if I want to feel included, I need to have multiple apps. Plus whatever apps I need for my day-to-day work. Add social media to the mix and that number of apps increases.

Suddenly it becomes a time-consuming process to keep on top of all of these apps.

I even talked about it in my “The Invisible Developer” talk (21:42), when referencing Death Stranding, with those quote by Hideo Kojima.

We’re in an era of individualism. Everyone is fractured. Even on the internet. It’s all connected, all around the world, but everyone is fighting each other.

Here, Kojima (Time) is referencing the lack of humanity that social media has created, and suggests that users have forgotten about the human impact of the other side of their message.

And I wholeheartedly agree. From interaction, to concern, to body language, to physical interactions, to listening, to simply being present, social media has created fractures with how people and communities connect.

With more and more social networks and apps coming to market, the sense of fracture will continue to expand. But that just amplifies those feelings of invisibility and loneliness online.

Leaders in these communities need to ensure that they don’t rely on a specific social network or app to reach their audience.

This level of arrogance of expecting people to use product or platform this or that is showing shortsighted ignorance, and creating personal hurt, feelings of exclusion, and fractures in your community.

Let’s take social media out of the equation - it very much is a case of if you’re not there to see it when it was posted, you may miss out on the message.

Community apps is another avenue, but forces people to use a specific tech - and that doesn’t always fit in with everyone’s day-to-day presence or work.

I plan and host the Statamic AU/NZ online meetups (and would like to try to create and host some in-person ones too, as the community grows), and consciously consider how my community can hear about events.

The prospect of in-person excites me because it removes these technical barriers for connection with people. You get body language, you get nuances in vocal delivery, and you get to have a realtime conversation with others (hopefully) with their focus and attention (and without multi-tasking).

For the online meetups, sure, you need to jump on a Teams call, but that does work on all devices, both with and without an app, but that is the only requirement I place on my community. After all, we need to meet somewhere.

But to send the message of upcoming meetings, there are three places I post the message:

1. Statamic’s Discord, because there is an Australia/Oceania channel, and is the biggest connection point for the Statamic community,

2. Mity Digital’s own website, and, my favourite

3. email

That last one is the most powerful one. And the one that offers the least barriers.

People don’t need to use a specific app, or remember to visit Mity’s website, but instead get a message directly in their inbox with the date and time details of the next meetup.

I never send anything else to that mailing list except for notifications of the next meetup, and a reminder closer to the date that it’s about to happen.

I treat my audience here with respect. I don’t want to add unnecessary noise. I don’t want to be a burden or a nuisance. But I want them to have clear communication and notice of the happenings within the community.

While this may make me sound like a dinosaur, I do feel that email beats any social network. Basically everyone online uses email, and mends the fracture that social media has created. And the purpose of a community is to be together - so why try to navigate a fractured social landscape?

Social media is not going to go anywhere - and my personal feelings and issues with it, plus the mental health concerns that come from it, are for me to review and work through. For some, social media brings joy. For others, like myself, not so much.

One of my aims for 2025 is “good selfish”. I’m being selfish in ways that will help look after myself, but most importantly, not at the cost of others. Find tech where I am happy is paramount. Finding like-minded people to connect with is critical. And last year’s move to Adelaide has already unearthed quality connections.

With greater mental clarity, it has allowed me to stand back and see the fracture state of social media - and what challenges that presents for communities and connections. There’s no perfect answer to solve these challenges - every community is different - but awareness and consideration of them (and the impact of your audience) for your community is the first step to helping mend those fractures.