Michelle and social networks

[msagara]

I've been absent. I've been productively absent, but I've been absent. I'm also staring at a spider doing a little air dance six inches above my keyboard as I type, which is not as alarming as it sounds, because it's a very tiny spider. I've been trying to read LJ--often in catch up mode, so I miss things--but I haven't been writing very much.

So this is possibly not the right post to put up after such a long absence. But, ummm.



1. Twitter. I have grown to like Twitter because I use it more or less the way I would use Facebook, absent messages and the hundred millions of apps postings (yes, I've turned them off in Facebook. No, it doesn't help because there are always new apps.)

I follow some people on Twitter. Most of those people will be writers I know, or people I know in real life; some will be people I don't know in real life, but who are posting about things I read when I'm ideally supposed to be working. Nathan Fillion is of course an exception, but, ummm. Funny. And he posts maybe three times a day on a busy day. I sometimes follow publishers in the hope that I will find out more information about books that are not yet published, but will be in future (like, say, Megan Whalen Turner's CONSPIRACY OF KINGS).

Some of the people I don't follow are active, friendly, very nice people -- but they post so often, or they RT so often, or they ask me to follow people I don't know and have never heard of so often that my entire Twitter homepage would be nothing but. I feel slightly guilty about this, but if I 'follow' everyone, I will essentially end up reading none of them, because people Tweet far, far more than they update their status on Facebook.

2. Facebook. I don't have a personal Facebook account in any meaningful sense of the word. If you friend me on Facebook, I'll respond to the request. I post similar things to Facebook and Twitter, but I tend to post different things to either place because it's only a sentence. Or two. Or three. I try to keep up with Facebook postings, but this is actually harder than keeping up with Twitter.

3. LiveJournal, which I've neglected posting to for ages, for which I apologize! I friend people I'm reading, or who I think I'll read or be able to contribute to in the future. I like reading reviews of books, I (obviously) like some writing process discussions, and I have an irrational fondness for people who've done the bookstore slog, or are doing it now.

In theory, I read more people on LJ than on Twitter. In practice, many of those people post very infrequently.

I understand that much of what I say will be of little interest to other people; conversely, much of what they say might be of little interest to me. It doesn't reflect on them, or hopefully on me. I occasionally feel that having an obsessive compulsion toward writing, while also writing for a living, means I think of nothing else. Sadly, this is mostly true.

I am happy to be friended on LJ, because it means that people are interested in what I'm writing at the moment; I don't assume that it means more than that, and there is no way to offend me by friending or unfriending me.

------

I am happy, in any of the venues I frequent (and frequent is a very loose word when the writing deadlines are a bit more pressing), to have people comment, ask questions, introduce themselves, etc. I sort of think it's the point of being on-line at all. I try to be reasoned in my responses.

Comments

[qiihoskeh]

Hi!
For technical reasons, I'm not on either Facebook or Twitter. But I was wondering if tweeting has had any effect on your writing style .... :)

[kateelliott.livejournal.com]

I rather like Twitter -- I follow more people on Facebook because of the nature of friending there, but god I hate all those games; I've turned off what I can, but there are always more. They clog up the board and obscure the posts I actually want to read. While some of the retweeting can go overboard, it's must easier to deal with.

[manga-crow.livejournal.com]

I don't know; Facebook, and even moreso for Twitter just feel like the internet version of smalltalk - something I dread. Only with those two things it's (at least in theory) an all the time thing.

I vastly prefer LJ, where I feel like I get to say something more than "yo, how's it hanging?"

As usual though, it's probably just personal neuroses.

(But yay for hearing from you, and that things are at least productive =)

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

Glad to see you back!

[http://users.livejournal.com/la_marquise_de_/]

Nice to see you here again, even if en passant.
Edit: I cannot type today. Sigh.

[mmarques.livejournal.com]

If you want to stick with FB status updates, when you go to FaceBook, in the left nav bar, click Friends, then Status Updates. You'll miss the links, photos, and notes, but also all the apps. At one time you were able to make this your default view, but no longer. At least it's a mere 2 clicks away.

Nice to get a lifesign here too, not just on your website blog

[estara.livejournal.com]

seconding, thirding and fourthing manga_crow, sartorias and la_marquise_de

[kiviuq.livejournal.com]

I'm on the same social networks as you (and Tumblr, which I prefer over all of them, but people just haven't caught up to it but I think if people did they'd love it too) and I basically...just use Twitter 'frequently'...I think I'd rather hear a writer say they're writing rather than being on social networks a lot. Because that means MORE BOOKS BY YOU.

[holmes44.livejournal.com]

i just got cast in chaos and am about 1/4 way through it.fantastic.

[holmes44.livejournal.com]

i am happy i am the first,yeah.