I quit Facebook about 5 years ago. My online influence has decreased to essentially zero and I'm wondering if I should start posting stuff on Facebook again, or tweeting stuff. It seems online friends are necessary these days. Any thoughts from the HN crowd?
A Facebook/Twitter account is basically an opportunity to publish your 'digital ego'.<p>Its the reason apps like Instagram exist- they allow you to polish your images so that you can basically tell the world, "hey look how much fun I'm having, and you're missing out"<p>Facebook/Twitter/ in fact a lot of these publishing platforms exist to weed out the mundane parts of your life so that what is public is the most exciting, jealousy inducing 'Cliffs Notes'.<p>Essentially, thanks to them, when you die, people will be able to look at your profile or your tweets and mourn, "that person lived such an interesting life."<p>Whatever you opine upon reading this is your answer to your question (as I see it)...
I don't think facebook is really worth it anymore(if it ever was).<p>As uniclaude said blogging is a great way to get out to an audience in your related niche. Get those people to interact with you on twitter as well and you have a good group of people.<p>I would stay away from most things more than that. Social media can take a very quick turn from building an online influence to wasting your time reading random things.
If it's only about your online influence, I highly doubt that "Facebooking" is worth it. I'd suggest blogging on your area of expertise, and yes, being active on twitter might be worth it.<p>If you're a developer, a few meaningful contributions on Github will be worth all the posts you can write on Facebook.