I deleted my social media accounts
Account Deletion vs Dormancy
- Many argue against deleting accounts: freed handles can be hijacked for impersonation or scams, especially on platforms that recycle usernames (Twitter/X discussed as ambiguous, with ex‑employee saying reuse was immediate at one point).
- Some recommend “hibernating” or minimally maintaining accounts, or leaving a final post stating you’re gone, to reduce confusion and impersonation risk.
- Others say social handles aren’t strong identity anyway: bad actors can impersonate you with similar names regardless.
- One legal angle: deleting accounts may loosen your ties to platform Terms of Service (arbitration/venue clauses) if you later want to sue over harms that occur after deletion.
Social Connection Tradeoffs
- Strong theme: quitting major platforms often means missing life updates, events, or even deaths, especially when acquaintances only broadcast on social.
- Some see this as acceptable or even positive: it filters out weak ties and encourages deeper one‑to‑one contact via calls, messaging, or in‑person meetups.
- Others emphasize cultural contexts where maintaining broad, loose networks (extended family, diaspora communities) is important; for them, leaving Facebook/Instagram is “not an option.”
- Debate over whether seeing updates in feeds truly maintains relationships or just creates an illusion of connection.
Addiction, Attention & Mental Health
- Many report significant well‑being gains from quitting or sharply limiting social media: less anxiety, more focus, more meaningful use of time.
- Others note that compulsive distraction simply migrates to other sites (HN, Reddit, YouTube); underlying habits must be addressed.
- Techniques mentioned: separate OS/browser profiles for work vs leisure, site‑specific browsers, blocking extensions, removing phone apps, learning to tolerate boredom.
Utility of Social Media
- Clear upsides acknowledged: professional visibility, recruiting, podcast invites, product marketing, local community groups, event discovery, Facebook Marketplace.
- Some use platforms in “write‑only” or highly filtered ways (e.g., friends‑only feeds, aggressive hide/unfollow, browser plugins) to keep benefits while cutting algorithmic slop.
Moderation, Misinformation & Regulation
- Sharp disagreement over fact‑checkers vs “community notes,” and over whether reducing moderation is good (less “censorship”) or bad (more scams, hate, and misinfo).
- Distinction drawn between “free speech” and “free reach”: several want limits on algorithmic amplification rather than on speaking itself.
- Meta’s loosening of hate‑speech rules and alignment with specific political actors is cited by some as a reason to quit; others see EU‑style regulation and fact‑checking as overreach.
Alternatives and “Owning Your Space”
- Many nostalgia‑points: personal blogs, RSS, email, forums, IRC, Mastodon, Bluesky, Nostr; recurring advice to “own your domain” and not build solely on corporate platforms.
- Others counter that blogs/RSS are too fragmented for casual users, and that large aggregators emerged because they solve real coordination problems.
Is Hacker News Social Media?
- Mixed views: some say yes by definition (user‑generated content, comments, voting); others say it’s closer to a forum/RSS feed due to lack of friends/followers, ads, and engagement‑maximizing algorithms.
- Even HN is acknowledged as potentially addictive, though generally seen as less toxic than mainstream feeds.