Social media loses power when we build community in other places
Break the isolation and watch your creative roadblocks crumble
Social media rotted our brains on the instant gratification racket.
“I accept defeat,” I repeat after HINDZ from a recent video, “I accept that billion-dollar corporations have invested millions and millions of millions into the psychology and understanding how to keep me on these devices on their platforms, and it works.”
It’s not enough that social media gobbles up our attention - it tricks us into thinking we’re nothing without them.
This is made worse because “the creative status quo has made us lonely content machines.”
We are isolated, working on projects alone in our studios and rooms. We are so in our own heads that when we get together to discuss these things, we can cry.
We’re trying to figure this out on our own, thinking we’ll beat the tech bros with better-crafted hashtags, disguising our “link in bio” text, or churning out vertical videos to appease the social media overlords.
If we just read one more social media strategy guide, or watch more one more YouTube video then we’ll crack the code.
No, thanks.
I’d rather spend my time in deeper connection with good people.
As writers, we can work with our photographer friends (like
did here). Or the photographer who will make black and white landscape photos for “painter Brie Noel Taylor to paint over in color.”Cody Cook-Parrott hosts FLEXIBLE OFFICE, where amazing creative people gather on a video call to work on their projects together.
- made a zine called ‘How to keep your hobby from becoming a job’, and it’s brought a bunch of people together in the comment section and in real life - I handed a copy to my creative friend, and she loved it!
Start reaching out to fellow zine writers, artists, photographers, and designers - get on a phone call, plan a meetup, gather in secret in remote parks, commandeer several tables at the local Denny’s, plan your own hyper-niche flea market, write a short skit.
These are things made outside of isolation.
Spending more time around creative people will do us more good than if we just sit on our hands and wait to be saved by the next tech-bro platform to deliver us a new magical marketing machine.
Are we so powerless to change the current situation that we sit back and hope somebody else fixes everything?
And then what? That person will sell the company to a Nabisco+Tide hedge fund subsidiary, and we’ll be back where we started.
Maybe centralized kingdoms of power and influence aren’t the answer.
The answer is other people, community, and the exchange of ideas away from the supposed champions of our “creator economy,” which was here long before the silicon valley dorks showed up.
You can wait for things to change, but reaching your fans on social media will never get any easier. NEVER. I’ve been saying this since 2021.
Find some other weirdos, form your own band of misfits and start having the conversation about living in a post-social media world, ‘cuz baby it’s coming.
/// QUOTE UNQUOTE ///
“Getting paid to “do the thing you love” as a creative is not reality: it’s an unreal promise that the tech industry gave us, to exploit us before discarding us — and we’re at the end of that lifecycle.”
Via
“A really nice thing about a monthly habit is that, even if you’re busy – perhaps you’re a parent, a founder, an over-scheduler, or all three – you can still make time for once a month. There are, on average, over 30 nights in a month to pick from! And 30 days, to boot. 8-10 of which are weekend days. The month is your oyster.”
From Allen Pike
“Copying others helps you learn how they did what they did (technically, conceptually, practically) and encourages you to develop your own voice (unique style, techniques, preferences). They did it that way, what would happen if I did it this way?”
From
, inspired by a recent interview with Lynda Barry.“I see so many creators obsessing over the format and design of their newsletters, instead of publishing. I checked back in with one of the most successful and respected tech newsletters. Yep, it's still as basic as hell. It's been for around for almost 700 weekly issues. There are no excuses.”
From ‘Create like an Icelander’ by CJ Chilvers
I’m Seth Werkheiser, and I started this newsletter 874 days ago.
This is exactly why I love it here!! The community, the connections, being surrounded and supported by creatives!! Thank you so much for this, it reaffirms why I'm here doing what I do!!
Social media was meant to be a blessing and has turned out to be a downfall. I left Twitter in December because it was slowly destroying me. I was exhausted of campaigning against racism, fascism, anti-Semitism, Russian trolls and other filth.