If you are here there is no doubt you are aware of all the social media changes. Twitter switching into Elon Musk’s Hellscape “X”. TikTok will it, won’t it US ban. And the wonderful 180 done by Zurk to the META machine (sarcasm). There is a lot to unpack here, especially what this all could mean for “Ello Felicia” and all the social media attached.
First, let’s start with “X”…you know what, Musk likes to deadname so I’m going to deadname…Twitter. We all saw that Twitter was going down once it was rumored to be purchased by him. And, boy, did that ever so quickly become a MAGA dumpster fire of an app! All the speculation of what it could mean for the app was spot on. It was so quickly clear to be an unsafe app, especially for those in the LGBTQ+ community. Any place that was ok with J.K. Rowling to run her mouth, was definitely not a place for us.
With all that said, that was never my app of choice, it wasn’t really the blog’s strong suit either. I was rarely on there other than an occasional blog post share or to gather event information, so it wasn’t heartbreak when I deactivated the account instead of just letting it float on in inactive mode.
The problem though lies in the switchover.
A lot of people were doing well with the Threads migration. Unfortunately, as of late, Threads, Instagram, Facebook, and even WhatsApp, all under the METAverse sphere will be up for potentially turning into the same trainwreck. Or maybe this will be more like a train on a track being unsupervised, instead of a guided train on the rail for purposeful destruction. (I can explain.)
If you have been on any of the META-controlled apps as a minority, plus-sized, female, LGBTQ+ person, or anyone outside of sterotypical hetro-cis norms odds are you have run into some form of hate speech. You probably had even attempted (*note, I said “attempted”) to get it flagged, removed, or banned. And let me guess, nearly all attempts were met with, “We do not see this as a violation… We will not be taking it down…”. I cannot even recall one instance where the METAbots ever sided with me. So Mark Zuckerberg coming out to say the quiet things out loud and walking back his “protections” and fact checking was no shock to me and was honestly a downright joke.
I see why some will need to protect their space and mental health, feeling the need to leave, but to me, it just seems like another day. As of now, I do intend to stay. BUT, if I go dark it will be along the lines of the META protests scheduled or I was forced to go quiet, which will not be my first time. They have never been a fan of my blog content, political or queer, so I nothing will be new to me. I have been threatened and called a G—–r plenty of times. My own posts reported. Sadly, this is just my reality until we all collectively figure out some better alternatives.
SPEAKING OF APP ALTERNATIVES!
If you see a new app, drop it in the comments below. Odds are I am on there, just check for “Ello_Felicia” or a “ElloFelicia,” I try to keep it all really easy to locate me as everyone is hoping around.
In fact, I even went ahead and gave my “Chinese Spy” my information and jumped on the REDnote app. So far it looks like TikTok has found an extension with President Biden’s last acts. Just in case I wanted to reserve my name. Who knows what this will mean for long term. Plus, maybe our REDnote numbers will be enough to get Congress or the Supreme Court to realize that they are fighting a fight that they will lose.
Let’s be real, our data is all over the place! We all know it, changing from TikTok won’t change it. Did you see the automatic updates Apple installed? Let’s talk about data spying… At least the apps have the gull to let us know, where Apply just does what it wants silently.
I do want to point out, no app is perfect or safe right now. Bluesky is great and all, but that app can’t replace them all. Some creators are better in different formats. Let’s be real, my content isn’t really embraced in spaces like REDnote, so we’ll see if I can even post there. It really is one big mess right now. The Wild West of Social Media. I just hope you continue to find me.
Oh and hey, don’t forget if nothing else, at least I have an email blast here. *I promise, it’s not spammy.* Do what you have to for your safety and sanity, but I hope we see each other again.
