I recently embarked on reviewing my tech stack (read the first part) and as soon as I published the post, I realised the socials weren’t really covered and yet form a big part of my communications tech stack. So in this post, part II if you like, I’m going to focus on my social tech stack.
Now, I won’t be mentioning Twitter as I haven’t been active on there for a few years now, ever since I deleted my account. That won’t change. Enough said.
Professional social channels – Share, like, follow
I have some cross-over between personal and professional channels, but I try to avoid it wherever possible. It helps me stay offline more and helps folk reach me for work stuff via channels I am responsive to.
BlueSky
At the moment, BlueSky is my favourite social network, and probably where I interact the most with folk. Thanks to a lot of stirling work from folk in the education and edtech spaces creating lots of starter packs, I found finding folk I want to follow (apologies for the unintentional tongue twister) really easy. I love the vibe and the interactions, and I post a lot of updates there. Account: @marendeepwell.bsky.social
A lot of my work ends up being quite visual, and I love sharing it via images. Instagram is a platform I started using more over the past few years, and I find it really helpful to connect with coaching folk. Account: @marendeepwell
I should mention that I actively NEVER browse Instagram, and don’t use most of its features. I don’t produce video for it, and I don’t use or watch reels. My mute button is always on, so for me this is a quiet, static platform. I am not sure if it’s the luddite in me or simply my age, but I don’t crave more video in my life, hence Instagram stays mostly images and I don’t use TikTok. I did try it, and deleted it again after a day, which reflect my personal preferences as to how I like to engage with my online world.
I have a love/hate relationship with LinkedIn, and its user experience baffles me. I really dislike its automated emails, have switched off pretty much all notifications, and struggle with the general tone of much of the discourse, but it IS extremely useful to me and the largest network I have on any social network nowadays. Account
Mastodon
I use Mastodon mainly for keeping in touch and connecting with edtech/open ed folk, and I really appreciate the federated space it offers. Having learnt at least a little about what it takes to run these servers and keep them alive, I especially appreciate Mastodon, but the downside is that its activity level (at least for me, and in the way I can engage) is quite limited. Account: @marendeepwell
Threads
Threads is probably my least active federated social media app, and I don’t particularly enjoy using it. Many folk I interact with on Instagram don’t seem active on here. No strong feelings, but I don’t use it much. Next.
Podcast and Newsletter – Share, like, subscribe
In part I, I mentioned the podcast and newsletter already, but I wanted to revisit them here as a way to keep in touch and connect with folk.
Personal social channels – Family & friends
These are really only used for people I actually know in person.
Messaging Apps: Threema, WhatsApp, DMs
Confession time: I am not a big fan of group DM chats. I join none unless I really need to and I am currently in less than 3. Unlike many people I don’t live in WhatsApp. I delete messages and conversations regularly and I switch off whatever I can in terms of notifications, live status and so forth.
Also, I text in full sentences. With punctuation. And I am an old fashioned emoji user 🙂 . I don’t type with more than 2 fingers on my phone, mostly just one 😉
I have a few friends with whom I use specific apps/methods of communication that keep us in regular contact and I deeply value. But mostly it’s just sending letters by post.
Would prefer to leave. But can’t easily do so. But considering it. Sporadic usage. Sometimes useful.
My personal account is private and very small (around 50 folk). It’s where I share pictures of my dog Posey, pizza and my day to day home life. It’s the most unedited of my social media accounts. For better or for worse.