U.S. users are leaving Facebook by the millions, Edison Research says

For me personally, it's almost impossible to deal with. Way too many political posts from my friends and family.

It's probably best use for me is local events and an occasional major event from a friend/family member.

Still, I find myself going there less and less.

From a small business standpoint, it's just not worth the time, effort and money to advertise there. It's much more effective to focus on getting referrals with my current clients.

I really wish there was a paid social media service that everyone used. I would gladly pay $5-$10 a month for something that didn't sell my data.

Bingo, that's what's doing it for me.

Before the 2016 presidential election, Facebook was fun. It was also a great way to get news.

But now, what I'm finding is that a lot of people on Facebook just don't know how to behave in a public forum. It makes it painful, because someone always knows someone who's a jerk online.

I really don't know what changed, to be honest. Did Facebook change, or did too many people come to the party?

Facebook began as an exclusive social network for upper-class students. Gradually it grew to encompass not just all of America, but the entire world. It turns out, many of us well educated people don't really want to network or socialize with poorly educated people. Police started monitoring our activities, so the events all but disappeared.

The world changed, too. Facts used to matter; we read books and the newspaper, not 25 reasons to be an idiot on Buzzfeed. Truth used to matter; less of the nation was as polarized. It was easier to get along without people shoving their ignorant political ideas in your face. Then 2016 happened, with the Russian trolls and other psyops used against us, and some of us realized we'd fucked up by buying into and encouraging others to join this network and others like it.

I could probably go on for a lot longer, but that's the gist of it.