On Meta & The Search for Human Connection

In the News

Like many, I have feelings about the recent headlines concerning Meta: from fact checking safeguard removal, to somewhat horrifying positions on language surrounding LGTBQA+ communities and women.

In another corner of the web, Matt Mullenberg has the Open Source Community questioning the future of WordPress – which I have used for decades, and learned programming on. Revelations of the wordpress.org being personally owned by him, the fight with WP Engine ultimately going to court and culminating in his company Automattic drastically slashing their commitment to maintaining wordpress.org, along with bizarre power moves holding the community hostage, deleting community leaders’ .org accounts… I wonder of the role of the individual on the internets.

Finding My Voice

I have been a background character for a lot of my life. I often will draft posts or responses only to delete them without posting. I think this stems from my early Facebook days when I posted personal thoughts on my left-leaning, rhizomatic anarchial thinking – which inevitably led to that classic internet-comments-section head-to-head with people I loved and respected that left me questioning the purpose of sharing one’s opinion in a sea of opinions.

The following years I went through a cycle of burnout and recovery, grappling with every person’s struggle with being your authentic self in a world where everything is monetized, yet that trickle-down promise proves empty as the wealth inequality, cost of living, and polarizing political divides keep growing.

My anxiety and depression often hold me hostage. I hold back my feelings in the moment, but I will process a situation by myself later on my own or with someone I trust. In conflict I tend to shut down and dissociate until it goes away, but it is not really resolved.

Yet here I am. I want to take an active role in my life. I want to cultivate space to discuss opposing ideas and still respect the other person. Hello internet. I’m here. I exist. And I have feelings about this.

The Digital Public Square

In this world of tech oligarchs that control a pseudo public space where the individual is the product, where your every move is tracked and sold to the highest bidder, where the “feed” is carefully curated with suggestions, ads, and posts from strangers – where is that connection with the people you first joined the platform for?

In this world where AI is here to stay, to take jobs and further exploit your humanity to get your money (as a side note: I love to play with AI. It’s immensely useful to rough out ideas and organize thoughts – I have concerns for the lack of systemic social support for the people in jobs it may replace, and the increase of wealth inequality).

What role does the individual play?

Nostalgia and Hope

I think back to the old days of the internet. I’m a 90s baby, so I wasn’t quite old enough for the very early days. I did experience the “Get off the phone, I need to use the internet!”, MSN messenger, yahoo pool, and when everyone had a blog. I think about the early dream for the internet: a space for human connection, access to knowledge and ideas, and a level playing field.

Who controls the public space? That ever elusive Third Space where you can just BE. That space where you can connect with people you know, and with people you don’t know yet. The big social media aren’t that anymore. Not when it is designed to keep your attention over connecting with your people. Not when every other post is an ad, where the reactionary posts get the most reach, further dividing us. Not when it is used as a destabilizing force around the world.

How could we let such an important space be in the hands of a singular person? Or a corporation?

Moving Forward

This individual is signing off – but not checking out. There are many projects in the works that seem to be community driven, privacy focused, ad-free, and open source. I am giving BlueSky, Signal, Mastodon, and Pixelfed a try. You can find me there – or connect over email or text (if you call, I will let it go to voicemail first).

I wrestle with complete removal of my Meta presence. As a small business owner, Legacy Tattoo Removal relies on social media for connecting with clients who need our services. Yet this perfectly illustrates the challenge many of us face – how do we balance reaching our communities with refusing to support platforms that compromise our values? For now, I’m choosing to maintain only the essential business presence while moving my personal pages and art to spaces that better align with my vision of what the internet could be.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this shift. How do you balance staying connected with maintaining your values online? Where do you find genuine community in digital spaces? You can continue this conversation with me on Mastodon, BlueSky, Signal, or Pixelfed, or reach out directly via email or text. Perhaps together we can help build the kind of online spaces we’ve been missing.