I’ve had insomnia on and off for years and recently it’s been on. (Hence my delay on this assignment, for which I publicly apologize!) I don’t have a sleep tracker, so tracking my media had an interesting side benefit of forcing me to reckon with how few hours of my days and nights are “unmediated.”
My Netflix consumption over the course of the week all happened between the hours of 9 or 10 p.m. and … well, the wee hours of the morning. Most of it was The Office – it helps me fall asleep, the familiar lullaby of that jaunty keyboard intro. That show is something I chose, not something that was algorithmically supplied for me, in the sense that it’s something I knew of and liked in my pre-streaming life. However, other shows I watched this week – Grace & Frankie and Sex Education – are newer and I would not have known about them in the first place if Netflix hadn’t decided I was in their target audience. (Unrelated except for the genre title, do read “I Don’t Want to Be the Strong Female Lead.”)
I’d given up Twitter and Facebook first semester because doing so felt like a luxury which, given my job, would not be afforded to me again in the foreseeable future. But in January I allowed myself back on both platforms and I’ve been disappointed at how quickly it’s become habitual – and, yes, addictive – again.
I look at Twitter and Instagram primarily as I’m trying to wake up or go to sleep. As you can imagine, it’s more effective at one than the other. Facebook I look at sporadically throughout the day when I’m bored, anxious or looking for a brief escape. I put time limits on these three platforms (which I sometimes ignore). All three are algorithm driven. I primarily browse my feed rather than searching for something specific.
However, my internet use – whether by phone or laptop – is search driven. Mostly, this week it involved school work, although some if it included going down Zillow rabbit-holes as I fretted over where to move my family after this year.
I was pleasantly surprised by how much time I spent texting — which is almost exclusively social for me — and Slack, which is a mix of social and work that skews toward the former.
I decided to divide my media use up by who was reaching me:
- friends/family/real people I care about
- co-workers (many of whom are also friends, lines blur)
- strangers
- media (primarily news media)
Across the 10 platforms I tracked, news media came to me on all but two, Netflix and texting (while occasionally I receive news media via text, the primary form of media is personal photos/videos and gifs. Sometimes Laura Dern gifs are the only acceptable form of communication).
I only solicited news media on four of the eight platforms on which I received it, showing how heavily the algorithm is at play. I engaged with strangers on Twitter, Facebook and e-mail, although they weren’t my primary content providers on the latter two. I engaged with friends and co-workers on all social platforms. Consuming news media – either directly at the source, such as nytimes.com or the USA TODAY or Apple News apps, or through internet in the form of assignments for class, etc. – was a solitary activity.
My media consumption per day across these 10 platforms ranged from a low of 169 minutes to a high of 677 minutes. The median was 270.
I was thinking about how so much of my media consumption is so blended – in terms of time, platform and who’s reaching me. I wanted my visualization to show ombre or fading between colors to represent that, but I have no artistic skills. I also have no crafting skills, but that didn’t stop me from picking up my daughter’s yarn. I figured not only would it show the interwoven nature of these platforms into my life, but that it would show how dominant certain social strands and the news media are. It did. It also showed that I have no business braiding or weaving anything. But just consider the messier parts representative of more habitual or passive media use and the nice, tightly braided parts the intentional media seeking. 😊
First I made specific braids for each platform – one color for that platform and the other colors representing who is reaching me on that platform.
Who’s reaching me:
- friends/family/real people I care about – yellow yarn
- co-workers (many of whom are also friends, lines blur) – orange yarn
- strangers – brown yarn
- media (primarily news media) – red yarn
The platform:
- Twitter – light blue
- Facebook – dark blue
- Instagram – pink
- Slack – light green
- Texting – dark green
- Email – white
- Netflix – dark red
- Internet, mobile – lavender
- Internet, laptop – purple
- News directly – black
I cut the threads for each braid based on time spent. One inch is 10 minutes. Then I tried to braid all 10 strands back together. I haven’t made friendship bracelets since the ‘90s so please forgive me!
Peace out.