Media Dietary Paper Social Media

Media Diet Diary Form
Name:

[Delete the example in the first row; change the date of Day 1 to reflect when you actually started this assignment. Put dates for days 2 to 5.]

Day 1: Monday August 25th, 2014
Time (Start-Stop)
Channel
Device
Activities
Motivating Factors
Reflections
08:30-08:35
Facebook
Web
Logged in quick to see if anyone watched my airshow video I posted from a few days back.
Was just thinking about the owner of the company that had some aircraft in an airshow over the weekend and wanted to see if anyone had any relevant postings to what I shot that day.
I got in early and wanted a little break before I converted into full work mode for the day, so I just jumped on Facebook for a very brief time to check my profile, realized I am not much of an individual to follow due to my lack of posts, plus most people are probably sick of me posting things that relate to triathlon. I’m usually a hit or miss person. When I do post something, it is usually something of substance or has a wow factor to it, thus my lack of posts made me realize, it’s time to do something fun soon!
10:20-10:20
Facebook
Mobile
Looked a posting by a member of our triathlon team .
My phone buzzed due to the new posting about an event coming up.
This post made me realize how much I rely on my phone and how annoying it can be sometimes. I think to myself, “how do all of these people have so much time to research things and then post them during the day,” I wish I had extra time like they have.
12:10-12:02
Facebook
Mobile
Quick looked up a 5k race that was coming up that I had seen on Facebook, knew the time to sign up was ending soon, so wanted to make sure I knew the date.
Just a random thought in my head that somehow made its way there. I must have had a trigger, but just can’t recall what it was, might have been a coworker that I know runs 5k’s and she walked past me a few moments ago.
I always find it weird how I think of really odd things and it poises me to immediately gain gratification and find the answer to the question in my head at the time. Too many small questions arise during the day, if I don’t indulge immediately, I either lose my train of thought, or it continues to chew at me all day long.
1:30-1:40
Yammer
Web
Looked through a list of a few posts of people selling things on our enterprise social media platform.
Saw an email of someone posting something through a distribution list (the old way) which prompted me to look at the new site where employees are to be posting ad’s for items.
I have never sold anything to others through my organization. I have always thought it was tacky and it allowed others to see a bit into your personal space. People sell beds, televisions, tickets to sporting events, a full fledged craigslist for the most part. I have always chalked it up to people with too much time and not doing their job. Makes me wonder about how many times I sneak in a quick peek into Facebook when someone tags me or when another alert forces me to check the notification on my phone.
16:00-16:00
LinkedIn
Mobile
Looked at my phone notifications due to someone adding me to their LinkedIn network.
Phone notification and that urge to find out right away what it was for.
I get server alerts all day long and I can’t distinguish between the alerts on my phone, so I’m always checking what my phone is bugging me about. This one in general was a LinkedIn member asking for me to add them to my circles. I had no clue who the person was, but I did look further into their profile and determined they are in sales, so they are just fishing for people to add them. Of course later, I’m sure they would attempt a sales pitch or the like. Sales people seem to dominate LinkedIn, I think that is my biggest gripe about that site.
18:00-18:01
Facebook
Mobile
Looked at my triathlon team’s Facebook Group page to see what training activities were going on for the week.
Was at a really long well known traffic light and it was the first app that I looked at, so I opened it up and saw my triathlon page.
Began thinking about how many people use their phones during very brief downtime periods, like traffic lights. There is an abundant amount of information that has been posted during brief times like this. It is pushing productivity into small timeframes utilizing ever last drop of your day.
16:30-17:30
Waze
Mobile
Drove to my girlfriends house an hour away after checking in on a side job nearby. Wanted to use Waze, because I needed to know about traffic conditions and if there were any police ahead.
I needed a GPS and I always use my phone. Since I was going far, I figured Waze was the choice due to user input and police notifications.
I love Waze and swear I invented the technology way before it came out. It is so great to have the ability to send little updates about what’s ahead for other drivers behind you, plus reap the benefits from those that have driven the same stretch just a few minutes prior. My app kept freezing, but with a quick reboot, I was back in action. Even small things like that I can just overlook because the benefit of this app is so great, I could care less.

[Place your cursor in the last row, then right click to add more rows if needed]
End of Day 1 Reflection: Monday August 25th .
The end of day one of my first attempt ever, at logging my social media interactions. What have I learned from this? First, I have learned that it is really hard to log your interactions because interacting online is something that just happens during the day, just like quick conversations with fellow colleagues. I probably should have started my log over the weekend to allow my logging to be a bit easier on myself, but I know most of my interactions online occur during the week.

Another item that I realized was that at least my social media feed is filled with people that constantly are posting updates. I’ll dub those individuals “immersed.” These immersed individuals are those that “like” everything on Facebook immediately, strive to throw a quick comment in about a photo, or post really weird stuff online for no apparent reason. That is just one personality of Facebook individuals that I have grown to accept. We need these people, for if they were not our friends, our photos would never be viewed, nor immense threads be relished by them paving the way. As for myself, I have determined that I am more of a reactive social media person. I view more-so than submit material to the inter-webs. My reason for being this way, I guess is just that my life outside of social media is really busy. I am constantly on my phone so throughout this day, I was checking while on the go. Walking down the hall, before eating lunch, even in the car (not while driving) I found myself trying to capitalize on my “downtime” to fill in the gaps.

I would say my day was fairly typical with the usage of social media outlets. I may have pushed myself a little more than usual to post things, for fear of not having much content to show for. It was in my mind all day to think about items to check on the few social sites I use. One place I thought I would have looked more at, which I didn’t was Twitter. Like I mentioned before, there are good days and bad days with social media. I am really looking forward to abstinence from all social media sites.

End of Day 2 Reflection: Tuesday August 26th.

Today was the day, couldn’t wait and decided to just delete Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn from my mobile phone. It’s like having cash in your pocket. If you have it, you are probably going to find a reason to use it. The ole’ burning a hole in your pocket adage. I was really quite surprised how my day went. I was very busy at work, so I was very focused with some of the projects at hand. My mind didn’t drift, which I can associate to my phone being for the most part, SILENT. With my phone at my hip all day long, it is always buzzing and chirping. I feel as if I need to see what is going on each time it goes off. My time essentially is about 2-5 seconds of a quick glance at the notification to deem the message worth or unworthy of looking further. Typically, it never requires a response. Even if it does, I tend to forget about it until weeks later where I uncover it again.

I had no problems with tempting myself to peek at social feeds or see what others are posting. On the other hand (which I assumed beforehand) I also had no problems with not posting any content. I got home very late from working a side job, so sitting in front of a computer with extra time to kill was not something I had for the evening, which kept me at bay and prevented any cheating.

I have learned that as much as I think I need social media in my daily diet, I really wasn’t affected today with any particular urge, or reason to stray from abstaining from all interactions. There wasn’t any sort of coping that I did in order to direct my thinking in another direction, it was just a plain day with zero urge to check any items.

End of Day 3 Reflection: Wednesday August 27th.

Day 3, a bit more difficult with not having the opportunity to engage in social media. Today I knew I had triathlon training and part of my routine, I check our team’s Facebook page to ensure team members are going to be meeting up. Tonight I had triathlon yoga and just had to cheat, although a quick cheat. I needed to find out the time that everyone was meeting up and knew I could find the answer on our team Facebook page. So, I did, I glanced very quickly after having to login to a computer (since I deleted the app from my phone). Even after searching through my mobile device, it didn’t click until I scrolled through every page of my phone about 3 times, only then did I realize it was gone. I determined that I knew exactly where the app lived and on what page of my smartphone. It was almost muscle memory that my fingers used to navigate me to where the app should have been.

Although I only cheated once today to take the path of least resistance to find the answer I saught, I felt guilty and only later realized, if I would have tried harder, I could have called a team member or possibly searched through a thread of emails that may have led me to the same answer and what time everyone was meeting for practice. It is difficult when you get into a routine; breaking the routine no matter what it is can be hard. With knowledge a swipe and a tap a way, I felt as if it really put a bump in my day, by having to login the “harder” way though my desktop computer to seek information rather than using my mobile phone.

My conclusion is that I am a mobile person and most likely perform 90% of my social media on my phone. If I had to choose one item that I prefer to do with social media on my desktop rather than my phone, it would be uploading images. I think it is just because I understand the process better. Thus, by my changing the process by which I find information for tasks that are routine to me; this has proven difficult without the ability to use social media.

End of Day 4 Reflection: Thursday August 28th.

Being offline today (my final day) I had a chance to think about a few things in the car while driving to work. For some reason, my drifting mind led me to thinking about Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. Being silent on social media outlets for three days, I wondered what background processes occurred on those social media sites? Was there a timer that started; counting down until a trigger was met and then declared me dead? Are there other processes that were searching for me via GPS to see if I was on a trip and without mobile coverage? What about all of the advertisements that I missed? Did the ad agencies get notified that their page views dropped in my area? I’m not quite sure why my mind took me on this trail, but it really makes you wonder about big data. Technology and innovation are amazing things that produce wonderful tools, but the real juicy part is the data that is collected.

I went to my girlfriend house tonight and it was more or less focused on her, so I didn’t have any urge to check social media. I felt as if I was a smoker and I quit. The first day was a bit hard, the second day harder, but then it began to get easy. Today was an easy day. Keeping your mind occupied with other things is all you need to do. When I did have downtime today, I found myself visiting news websites to see what was going on in the world. Most of my news came from social media the week before. I’d have friends, family, and acquaintances commenting on news related items, maybe they would share an external link that I would click on. This was the way I absorbed my news. It was almost as if I was back in the early 2000’s and I was retreating to other outlets that I used in the past to satisfy my hunger for knowledge of today’s topics of interest.

Day 5 URL to Final Reflection Essay: Friday August 29th.

For those of us that have taken the plunge into social media, no matter what outlet we have chosen, I have determined that it is impossible to reverse your decision to partake in at least a piece of the interaction, even if you want to remove yourself completely. You may say to yourself, “I can quit social media, see, look here, if I click this button, cancel account, my interactions are over.” True, your interactions may cease, but what is still going on in your mind? Do you think you can handle that decision, will it eat at you?

We all have our own use for using social media. I’ll choose my favorite for a few examples, Facebook. This platform is addictive in nature and there is a niche for every type of user. There are a few categories I would place individuals into, but I may leave this theory of mine for a later time. With so many capabilities of the Facebook platform we are sucked into a voyeuristic place where we can see friends, family and acquaintances interactions, how their lives play out, and just satisfy our urge to stack our lives up against others. As you go deeper down the rabbit hole, you as a user will find yourself creating second world for your online presence; posting photos, engaging with others and creating new relationships. If you meet a person you want to reconnect with, the last thing you may say to them before you leave your face-to-face interaction might be, “friend me on Facebook.” By developing all of these relationships, your life begins to take shape on-line and specifically on the platform of your choice.

After taking part in my full on interaction of each social media outlet I participate in, then abstaining for three days, I have learned a few things, but most importantly; once you create an online presence and a place of self, you must continue to engage until the trend shifts to a new technology or alternative communication method / platform. I would go about supporting my statement by providing an example. As a member of a triathlon club, our team has created a presence online by establishing a Facebook group. All of our interactions occur online, we praise each other and our accomplishments by posting messages or photos. We also leverage our scheduling of training activities via Facebook. In order for me to participate in the triathlon club, I’m required to interact online to: check times for events, view race results, on-board new members, and provide feedback to those with questions regarding the club. I am removed from having a choice. Once I joined the club and decided to participate online, I am tethered to Facebook for the duration of my participation in the triathlon club. Removing myself from the Facebook group would remove me from the club and it’s information. Removing my club status would prevent me from training with the club, thus put me in a position of being unprepared for the next triathlon race. I understand my thinking is a bit strong for making a point about something as simple as a training group, but it just reaffirms my belief that you can never truly walk away from social media once the presence is established.

I just finished arranging my 16 year high school reunion (yes, we missed our 15). During this time, we leveraged social media specifically Facebook to reach our classmates. With 175 out of 468 classmates actively subscribed to a Facebook group, we figured it would be the best channel to take to get our message across. After posting our intentions, securing the date and offering tickets for purchase. We found that 56 members viewed our post about the reunion, but no one purchased a ticket. So, how does this work into my thought process for not being able to remove yourself from interacting once you establish a presence? Well, we assumed that those individuals that created a place of self on our reunion group were active members and wanted to engage with us throughout their lifetime. As the reunion committee, we placed our faith in the group and the reliability of those individuals being active and participating members, but we assumed wrong. Being the committee, we felt that we had reachability to those individuals in our group and possibly reachability to classmates not in the group through the proximity of those that were members. Assuming that everyone keeps their online presence is a fault that we made in trying to establish communication to them. We wanted to believe that we were reaching all 175 members with a simple post and that each user was engaged and checking their online social feeds on a daily or weekly basis.

We as a society have begun to rely on the communication channels provided by social media, almost to a parallel you can draw with owning a telephone line. If your phone number is in the phone book, then by calling that number I should be able to speak with you. Knowing that Facebook is an online address book, we believe that we should be able to reach you. Instead of leaving a voicemail or answering machine message if the person is not at home during the phone call, we should be able to leave a similar electronic message that should be viewed at a later date. Important messages are delivered via phone and messages are recorded for such interactions like doctors diagnoses, tasks to perform, and news from people we know. It is our unwritten responsibility to act on these messages. Wouldn’t we do the same for an electronic message delivered to an inbox or posted to a timeline? Electronic mail has just about gotten to the point where we are held responsible for responding to those who have interacted with you and await a prompt reply. I feel social media is nearing the tipping point where accountability is coming to light just the way we expect reciprocal communication from a phone call or e-mail.

Upon the conclusion of my social media experience abstinence, I have concluded that there are two ways in which we cannot exclude ourselves from any fraction of social media. The first being, we have grown to know how to find the path of least resistance to the information we require. The information is locked into social media outlets and we much participate in order to unlock the answer to what we seek. If you have participated on any platform before, you will have to retreat back to the same platform to find what you are looking for until there is an exact replacement for what you know that includes the same information. Secondly, outsiders have established trust in your online presence and take weight in the fact that you are accessible via this method, so you must remain present on your platform in order to prevent disconnection from your relationships.

This project has reaffirmed my decision that I will always and forever continue my online presence in order to put trust into the relationships I form with others and that I can be trusted as a reliable source for those that communicate with me. As more conversations take place electronically, our social presence increases and the reliability of our online selves take shape. The future of social media will continue to expand and will attempt to trap us by requiring our undivided commitment.