The feed eats the weekend

After a long week of work and managing my family’s schedule, I woke up on a Saturday morning, relieved that I did not need to rush my kids out the door that day. With an energy drink in hand, I sat down in our breakfast nook and decided to go on social media to figure out whether there was anything fun going on that weekend that I could bring my family to. A short clip caught my attention - a stand-up comic. I love stand-up comedy, especially comedians who focus on family and parenting life. The unfortunate thing is that there are many such comedians. Forty minutes of scrolling through an endless stream of short clips later, I was interrupted by my youngest child asking me whether they could have something for breakfast. I stopped my mindless scrolling and got my youngest some cereal with milk, and realized that once again, I had not actually found the information I was intending to find on social media, and my weekend was still unplanned. Instead, I had once again spent 40 minutes doing something that did not bring me much fulfillment (it did introduce me to a few new comedians that I would love to watch in person though). For some reason, even though it was mildly entertaining, it did not feel like a real break.

I have gone through many cycles of deactivating my social media account whenever I feel like it is negatively affecting my life, and reactivating it when I convince myself that I need it to answer a question. Each time I tell myself that I am only going back on social media to access the trove of community-sourced knowledge, such as recommendations for local businesses and niche products. But without fail, within a week, I am back to spending too much time watching short-form videos recommended on my feed - videos built to keep me hooked, based on what the app already knows about me. As an engineer, I fully understand how this works, and yet, that does not make me immune to it. I think it would have been fine if watching those videos actually added value to my life. However, I have learned that I don’t actually get much relaxation or fulfillment from scrolling through those videos, and yet I keep going back.

The truth is, I don’t think social media is all bad. When I am able to stay on task, there is a wealth of crowd-sourced knowledge in there that is hard to find elsewhere. I have found great value in the recommendations provided by our local social media group and the advice given by community members in a niche support group. In addition, I have been able to reconnect with old friends through social media in a way that I am not sure I would have been able to without.

For now, I am back on social media and this time, I am trying my best to beat the algorithm. I keep it off my phone and make sure I log off after each use on my laptop. I figured that the more barriers to accessing it, the less likely I am to be captured by the attention-grabbing algorithm. As for my Saturday mornings, I have decided that they will be social-media-free. There are ways to plan my weekend without relying on social media.