Authenticity on social media is no more.
Here's why I opted out... and chose a more private strategy...
Social media feels like its no longer about being social.
Entertainment > Connection.
Education > Connection.
Money > Connection.
Perhaps I’m naive, but I believed in the potential of social media for a long time. When whistleblowers exposed Facebook’s data stealing ways I just laughed… and when documentaries were realized focusing on how harmful the algorithms are, I responded by going live for 24 hours on a row on LinkedIn and bringing a ton of people together for no reason except for….
Connection.
This was the foundation for everything I enjoyed on social media.
Business and friends. Humor and pleasure. Whisky and pizza…
(if u know u know)
I ran a free Discord community before it was cool and charged $0.
In fact I gave away a pizza and prizes weekly with meme battles and GIF power rankings and silly wild live streams…
It was all during lockdowns and I just leaned into the connection that social media brought and the power of creating work just by getting to know a lot of random people.
However it was during covid that I began to experience the consequences of an online following and speaking your mind…
I got banned for this post…
This was one of over 10 bans that I have experienced on social media (LinkedIn specifically) since 2020. I survived many cancellation attempts and each time found a way back to the platform thanks to a great community and well no life at all and a lot of obsession…
Anyways…
It wasn’t just counter cultural opinions and posts that got me banned…
It was posts about whisky, pizza giveaways, livestream trolling, playful banter and a host of other silly reported comments and posts…
After a ban where LinkedIn Staff threatened to ban me for good if it happened again I cleaned up my act….
No trolling.
No counter cultural posts.
Very little rants and honest takes…
I focused on AI writing, marketing and how to grow on LinkedIn and my account boomed and business did too… But as I scaled and worked hard on growing faster, bigger and broader I had to narrow my voice and narrow my authenticity…
I full accepted that most folks didn’t want to hear my truth.
They just wanted to be sold hope.
They wanted me to tell them it was possible.
They just wanted fast clout, the attention and the money..
It didn’t matter if the growth guides worked, or the AI tools were good, or that the engagement was 90% from the third world, or that the strategies didn’t work unless u have a lot of time or a lot of money…
I felt disheartened n well….
I didn’t have a solution so I faded into the shadows….
The game wasn’t mine.
That journey continued this summer as I began to unwind my online footprint and found my new obsession and fight…
And more importantly…
Solutions that actually worked for the creator economy…
Sign up to see what I’ve found!
The fact that I was there through all the cool things you did makes me happy haha!
But seriously, you knew exactly how to build connections and like you say - do the "unscalable" things that help you grow - no one cares about that any longer, sadly.
And I think your pivot is timely.
I recently wanted to purchase cloud storage and even though google is cheaper, I think I'm going to stick with Proton instead because of the privacy and no data mining!
I'm definitely in for digital minimalism and keeping my AI creations...mine.
You hit a nerve that AI (and, ultimately, these platforms) cannot truly provide: connection.
It seems counterintuitive, but you lay the groundwork for all of it.
Social media as it currently exists stokes the desire for connection, yet the performative authenticity combined with AI slop create environments where we are consistently disappointed.
Creating spaces and opportunities for real connection are primed for all who dare to provide leadership and spaces for true transformation.