The reasons to leave Meta are piling up. I have been thinking about leaving Instagram and Facebook for a while and during my last retreat I made the decision and created the comic below. In this blogpost I explain my reasons.
Political aspects
The company and its policies are shifting to the right. With a more general view this shows in Zuckerberg being an active supporter of Trump. In the user experience on the Meta platforms it shows in more fake news and more hate speech: Metas fact checking program will be discontinued and the company will loosen their moderation policies and remove restrictions around the topics of “immigration, gender identity and gender”. A result of that is that it’s now allowed to post insults to the LGBTQ community.
The values of my business
As an individual and an entrepreneur I do not want to support this system with my attention, my creativity, artistic output or any other content. Nor do I want to encourage my clients or network to do so. I am aware that I am not the reason somebody uses or doesn’t use Instagram. Nevertheless, by posting on instagram I tell people on visit a platform whose values are diametrically opposed to my own. – Why would I do that?
Instagram as a marketing plattform
The only reason to post on instagram is that it’s the place where I can reach my audience. True. But given the current algorithm it would take a huge effort on my side to be shown to new people. I am not willing to make that effort. And regarding my followers: I care about these people! I wish them the absolute best! And the best right now is to get your head out of social media! Because even if I and some other people posted beautiful, informative and inspiring content, it’s technically impossible to consume it without being bombarded by a flood of other content that is at best distracting trash and at worst harmful and manipulating.
Why would I do that?! The effects that I am getting from that platform are just not worth the harm it is doing at large, for my community and for myself personally.
Metas impact on me
Which brings me to the main point: Metas impact on me. I am a super value-driven person and very dedicated to my own business and using it to bring positive change into the world. Therefore all of the points above are my reason to actually follow through and leave Meta. Underneath is the negative effect that the Metaverse has had on my own life. These effects have been obvious for a long time but I drew took the consequences. So now that there’s also a clear political reason to leave I am using that as a motivation for a step that I should have probably done a long time ago. I summed up my reasoning in the comic below:
My exit
I will leave Instagram and Facebook by May 1st 2025.
Why not today? Because I want to give my followers the chance to stay connected and to achieve that I will have to talk about my exit a lot for a while.
If you want to keep hearing form me sign up to my newsletter!
I am also happy to receive snailmail at my studio:
Gutenbergstraße 10 A, 22525 Hamburg, Germany.
Looking forward to a new chapter on the Outernet!