Don’t Like What You See? Fix It

Over the last little while I’ve seen numerous people complaining about how some social media tools are becoming “too mainstream” for their liking. For them, as more and more people join services like Facebook and Twitter, they lose their relevance and usefulness.

My response: Social media tools are opt-in, so if you don’t like what you see, fix it.

Recently, I mentioned that I wasn’t a fan of the high volume of automated Alltop tweets in Guy Kawasaki’s Twitter stream… so I don’t follow him. It’s nothing personal; just me controlling what I want to see in my stream. You can apply a similar principle across your social media toolkit. You don’t need to bail completely out of using these tools just because of the way people are using them.

• If you don’t like the large number of new people signing up for Twitter, don’t follow them.
• If your Twitter stream is too populated for your liking, cull it.
• If you don’t want to connect to that long-lost high-school boyfriend/girlfriend on Facebook, don’t.
• If someone’s blog has shifted focus and you no longer like it, don’t subscribe.

This doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t give feedback to others, or that other people should disregard that feedback. That’s still important.

It does mean that you have the power to control your online experience… so quit complaining and do it.