|
Post by penguy on Jun 3, 2021 3:15:24 GMT
I have been on A World of Snail Mail's Facebook page and it seems that there are a lot of people who have become members on Facebook but don't migrate to this website. Sounds like there would be some interesting people to get to know. I'm wondering if the month's 5 Questions could be posted on Facebook but Facebook group members would have to come to this website to connect up for addresses. Of course they would also have to register and become members here before they could PM a member for an address, a way to grow our group!
|
|
|
Post by distractedmom on Jun 3, 2021 15:20:02 GMT
I’ve been wondering about the the number of people on FB vs. here. Hmmmm. I am going to ponder ways to lure people here.
|
|
|
Post by Catida on Jun 4, 2021 9:57:52 GMT
I think penguy's suggestion sounds very clever!
|
|
|
Post by Mia on Jun 4, 2021 11:59:23 GMT
I can post the nutshell thread to Facebook
|
|
|
Post by Mia on Jun 22, 2021 11:09:39 GMT
I can post the nutshell thread to Facebook Nutshell thread posted in the files there.
|
|
|
Post by Mia on Sept 11, 2022 17:54:10 GMT
I've been having trouble with Facebook. I've been doing a welcome post tagging the new members, but in the group feed, these posts have disappeared, even tried the search function there to no avail. Checking "my own activity" there, the posts are there but I can't access them in group. Argh. It is annoying - I'm not ignoring the new members there, it is FB being a complete [insert your own choice of words].
|
|
|
Post by Mia on Oct 9, 2022 13:41:01 GMT
I check FB less regularly now (and even Instagram) - they keep trying to fix things that aren't broken.
Some people are on FB only - just the one log in and they can go into as many groups at they/the moderators want. And that is fine until something happens and FB says NO (an online acquaintance from another hobby had trouble getting his account back). Also, the mobile apps allow FB to look at least OK on the screen... The mobile view of forums though misses out things (no shoutbox, for starters), even via tapatalk.
|
|
|
Post by Mia on Apr 8, 2024 13:50:56 GMT
I will be closing the Facebook group and page for the forum at some point within the next month or two. I'm not entirely happy with Facebook (seems to be an increase in the number of scams, especially via the paid accounts, and marketplace scams, though not seen one for a while faking the Royal Mail stamp shop). Not sure when I'll pull the plug, but if you want to save any of your posts... now is your chance.
|
|
|
Post by distractedmom on Apr 8, 2024 14:53:34 GMT
Facebook is frustrating, for sure.
|
|
|
Post by Mia on Apr 19, 2024 14:54:46 GMT
Ugh, the process for deleting the group is... well, members have to be removed first, then no other members, I leave the group and it vanishes...
|
|
|
Post by Mia on Apr 19, 2024 19:09:14 GMT
And gone.
|
|
|
Post by ginny on Apr 20, 2024 13:09:33 GMT
Does this make you feel better, Mia, or does it make you feel sad?
I have no idea how good / not good Facebook is these days since I left the platform almost 6 years ago (and I have zero regrets). What was it in particular that annoyed you? Just curious. Feel free to send me a private message if you don't want to elaborate on here.
On a general note, I ran a reading group there for a while, and I belonged to a few other groups, but for my own group, it was getting so cumbersome to get people into talking (which is something I've noticed a lot over the past years - it seems like nobody really wants to talk anymore! Folks react to posts, if you're lucky, but rarely ever initiate a conversation, and as an administrator / owner, you have to jump through hoops to make people respond with more than one word). I have a book-related group on another site (groups.io), and there it's the same thing - if you want 'traffic', you must initiate it. I blame that on the general 'content consumerism' that's supported by social media - that's definitely an ongoing trend that has become worse over the past years - and people's increasingly shorter attention spans. The latter also might be the reason why blogging and reading blogs has become less popular. People don't have the patience for that anymore.
In any event, I hope you're happy with your decision. I'm definitely more of a 'forum person', and as I said, I've been off FB for several years already, so as far as I'm concerned, it's all good
|
|
|
Post by Mia on Apr 20, 2024 18:31:02 GMT
It is FB. I swear I don't see most of the posts my FB friends/family post, but FB shows me tons of sponsored posts (some are of mischievous/malicious intent). A while back, there were a few links to websites selling "stamps" in the sponsored/paid posts - however, not genuine stamps (and pretending to be USPS or Royal Mail).
As for the group - there were quite a few people there who hadn't joined the forum. Also, a couple of people who tried to join were more for snails (the creatures) rather than snail mail! There had been some discussions a while back, but mostly there wasn't much conversation. Gary S shared pictures from his LetterMo most days in Feb, and that was great. LetterMo is also on Facebook but last posts sometime around mid-March. Actual discussion on LM's FB and own forum has been quiet too.
FB groups are not the easiest thing to navigate, especially to threads you wanted time to compose a reply (days or more later) - yes, can "save" the posts or use the search box for it, and then for any comments/threads in the group, the algorithm decides what is relevant (argh!) by default.
Snail-mail can be quite a personal thing, the friendships created are. I suppose that also makes it difficult to share some issues/discussions publicly.
I'll still keep FB for now (got family far away on it), and there's a couple of groups I browse a few times a week, and a silly game only connected via FB...
|
|
|
Post by Gary S on Apr 21, 2024 9:57:53 GMT
In prior years my postings of my outbound February mail sparked a tiny bit of discussion and posts of other members mailings but not so much this year. I'm not one to post a lot of commentary so pics of what I'm sending is likely the best I'll ever offer. This year was really off as far as participation during the writing challenges and I don't really understand why. Maybe folks are just through with the whole Covid isolationism and interacting in person rather than through letters but whatever the case, or cause, it has led to one of the least active writing challenges I've ever been involved in. Facebook itself is distracting in my opinion although I use it to show my sent mail items during the challenges but outside of February I rarely post any updates or activities at all. Not even photos of vacations which I write about endlessly in my outgoing letters. I'm more about the stories of trips than the actual visuals of places we've visited. We do take a few photos but if my wife doesn't post them then they never see the light of day. I prefer to recall them in my mind and with words on paper. It was no big deal to me to take myself out of the Facebook group so Mia didn't need to feel like she was booting me from the group kicking and screaming.
|
|
|
Post by ginny on Apr 21, 2024 13:13:27 GMT
I remember that the FB groups were hard to navigate already years ago - I suppose that didn't improve then. Groups are probably not FB's main concern...
In hindsight, I have to say that I dithered too long about leaving the platform - I had felt uncomfortable there for a while already, but didn't want to lose the connections that I thought I had on there.
Eventually, it was a change of my work situation that made me think a bit more about it, and I figured I'd try and deactivate my account for a while and see where that leads me. During the summer following that change, I met one of my online friends in person while I was on holidays, and she told me about a very, very unpleasant incident she had experienced and that had its source on Facebook. I remember that on the way back to our accommodation I said to my SO 'I don't think I want to be part of that system any longer'.
I let that sit for a while, and then almost a year after I had deactivated my profile, I decided to leave for good, and I re-activated my account for exactly 3 weeks to let people know I was leaving so they could pass on their current contact details if they were interested to keep in touch. I did 'lose' a few people along the way - but looking back, I don't feel there was much connection, anyway. I can certainly live without the obligatory 'Happy Birthday' once a year or the very occasional 'like' or 'smile' or whatever - if there's no real conversation, where's the point!
I reckon I'm one of the very few people whose family is not on FB at all. I admit that made it a lot easier for me to leave. I'd have thought twice if FB had been the main connection I'd have to faraway family members / relatives.
Don't get me wrong, I don't think that FB in itself is evil. It's a tool, and a lot depends on how we (and others) use it.
|
|