What happened to social media?

I had a recent interaction with a long-time photography friend. After I reorganized my photographs, I found a photograph of my friend with a group that we had met up with (organized) on a photo walk. It was a fun afternoon of learning and exchanging ideas. We all met through social media and online forums.

In the past few years, however, it has become clear that social media has changed and not necessarily for the better. I often refer to myself as a photographic artist, because create and share an emotion for a scene rather than just work to re-create reality (whatever that means since we all have a different version of reality). Nowadays, I am often fearful of sharing certain works as it often brings out the “haters”. These people are often hiding behind the keyboard, rarely, if ever, showing any of their own work. It often, appears to me, to be more about competition than cooperation and inspiration. I’m one that likes to help and hopefully by helping others I learn new things or better techniques. Now it has become a race for likes rather than meaningful dialog and discussion.

Hopefully, things will change soon. One of the reasons I write my blog now is because I want to encourage people to be creative and to support creativity in others.