The timing couldn’t have been better, or worse, when Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp went down around the world on Oct. 4.
The Wall Street Journal had just run a series of articles based on leaked internal memos that revealed Facebook was fully aware of how widely misinformation spread on its platform, and how Instagram adversely affected teens’ mental health.
The day before, Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen told CBS’ “60 Minutes” that the social media giant’s handling of “angry, hateful, polarizing content” was dangerous to society. And the outage set the stage for the following day, when she told Congress that Facebook needed more regulation and oversight.
“Facebook goes down,” went a familiar quip, “productivity and happiness go up.”
Even for avid users of Facebook and its acquired competitors Instagram and WhatsApp, there was good reason for worry. It was the second major crash in three years, and since the world still hasn’t emerged from the far end of the COVID-19 pandemic, people were more reliant on them than ever before.
The outage cost the company nearly $100 million, or $222,000 per minute, according to Fortune. But millions of businesses that depend on Facebook and Instagram to bring them customers were also hurt. And while WhatsApp is just one of many chat apps used in the West, it is critical communications technology for millions of people, the primary phone and chat service in more than a half-dozen countries.
If you live a life free of Facebook, congratulations. But some people like its services. And some people rely on them.
I’m often a naive idealist when it comes to the good things social media can do. I’m currently part of a Facebook pilot program to support more independent and local journalism and storytelling. Even so, I’ve written before about alternatives to Facebook (bit.ly/3lMKn02), and now is a good time to choose a backup plan in case business or political forces change the company’s fortunes.
What would you use to connect with friends, share photos and exchange messages with your family and friends without Facebook, Instagram or WhatsApp?
To make sure my advice wasn’t skewed toward the demographic that still reads newspapers, I convened a diverse focus group of millennials and Generation Z. Let’s call them my kids.
For semipublic social interaction, Twitter made a surprisingly strong showing. While Twitter has a reputation for being a politics-driven cesspool, it’s still a favorite platform of mine, too. And Twitter has taken far more concrete steps to minimize abuse and misinformation than its much bigger brother.
With a private profile and careful selection of friends and news sources, Twitter can be a lot of fun.
My daughter, the millennial, surprisingly gave LinkedIn a shoutout. Still maligned as the social network for hustlers and the newly unemployed, it has evolved quite a bit under Microsoft’s ownership to support more community and group interaction. There are fewer food and cat photos, and for some people that’s a major plus.
When it came to messaging, the answers varied, depending on which group of contacts or friends was involved. My youngest participates in several Discord chat servers. (I prefer Slack, like most elderly geeks.) My middle kid still uses Snapchat. My oldest exchanges DMs — direct messages — on Twitter.
The main alternatives to WhatsApp are Signal and Telegram, both of which gained millions of new users after Facebook’s latest outage. Apple’s Messages are a good option. Sadly, Google still hasn’t figured out which Android messaging platform is the main one.
My kids had no alternatives for simple photo sharing, which certainly illustrated Instagram’s dominance in the space. They said they would just post photos to Twitter, Discord or Snapchat.
I still use Flickr, the once-dominant social photo site that Yahoo! nearly killed, but more for backup than anything. Flickr is now owned by Smugmug, another solid photo host. My more artsy friends use 500px. Google Photos and iCloud both have generous (paid) photo storage options as well.
A final piece of advice for businesses: Have your own website. Setting up shop on Facebook and Instagram is like having a stall in the world’s busiest mall. It’s great, but you’re limited to the people who come in through a door that someone else controls.
Having options is always a good thing. I’ll still see you on Facebook, but also everywhere else.
Ryan Kawailani Ozawa publishes Hawaii Bulletin, a free email newsletter covering Hawaii science, tech, and innovation. Subscribe at hawaii.bulletin.com.
