Sounds super spooky, right? LOL.
I was working on a post for my business page for my full time job when I was kicked out of my account. It kept throwing an error when I tried to log in. It would let me log in, and then kick me back out immediately. My first thought was that I was in a race with a hacker. I was instantly worried that they would have access to all 4 business pages plus my messenger account. (My sister's messenger was previously hacked and they sent crude messages to everyone in her recents... not something I wanted to deal with!) So here I am, trying to click and type as quickly as I can, trying to reset my password to keep the hacker out, soon realizing that I had lost the battle. Then to messenger- no access. I quickly went to my boss to ask if his Facebook was acting up. It was. Thank goodness it wasn't just mine. I created a group text to ask my girls (which usually would have been our group on messenger) if their accounts were acting up- they were. It was calming knowing I wasn't the only one but also mind boggling wondering how we would engage in the community without this overpopulated app.
If there's one thing that came out of this- other than everyone reevaluating their facebook passwords- Its that we all realized how much we navigate our bored minds toward that 'f' icon. Without even thinking about it, our minds scroll us to the page on our phone and click it to start the mindless scrolling and taking up of time. Usually we don't eve realize this is happening but yesterday- oooh yesterday. How many times did you click it just to be annoyed that there was an error? How many times did you not realize you were clicking it, and your muscle memory took over only to be 'woken up' by the dull. grey error screen?
I have realized this a few months ago, that I would randomly end up on facebook and then realize what the heck am I doing? I have things I's supposed to be doing right now! To this, I deleted the shortcut to the app from my home screens. It is also a wake up call to have your fingers scrolling to the app and then snapping out of the facebook trans when the icon isn't there to be clicked.
I have long thought about completely deleting my facebook page, however a few things have stopped me. I enjoy seeing my friend's posts. Life is busy and its growing harder to be able to keep in touch 1-1 or to find time in busy schedules to meet up. Facebook is a great way to stay in touch with the community via different groups and the events tabs. Most events I find are those that were shared on facebook. Where do you even go to find local events anymore? Where can you post to ask a question to a generalized area? Roads shut down- go to the county events page to see whats up. Power is out- check if anyone else is out or if its just you. We have become so accustom to instant answers that even this 30 minute lapse in connection threw most people into a panic. (Myself included!)
The realization that we are dependent on social media to cure our boredom, communicate and to share our small businesses was definitley brought to attention yesterday. How do we fix this? Where do we go from here? What other implications can we make to accomodate these reliances if another, more permanent occurance like this happens? I don't know the answers to these questions, but I will sureley be more focused in the upcoming weeks on a few things thanks to this crash-
Spending less time scrolling, and being more aware of the time spent on social media apps (most phone settings have access to view how much time is spent on each app)
Looking into other ways of advertising and promoting
Making sure I'm reaching out to my friends on a more regular basis and making a bigger effort to schedule time for them.
Making sure I have their phone numbers! My main form of communication is facebook messenger, so I really felt like I was stranded yesterday! Even on my business pages, I need to make sure I have secondary contact information.
Ensuring I will not be reliant on any 1 platform- Meta controls so much of various aspects of my life- I have my personal FB account PLUS 4 business accounts. (This is where most of the panic came from. I did not want the business pages being hacked from my account, resulting in reprocussions at work). Meta controls messenger (my main form of contact) as well as an app called Workplace which I manage. It is basically like a private facebook for all of our employees, which is important because most of our drivers are in different states majority of the time. This is our main form of communication to ensure we are all on the same page.
Anyway- This is my mind dump on the crash. What did you experience when you got the error messages? Do you have solutions to the issues addressed in this blog? Let me know! I'd love to read your thoughts and comments.
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