The dangers of overexposure to social media
Social media keep us glued to the screen of our device for hours on end, completely cutting us off from the reality around us and also significantly altering our perception of time. For many people, it is now normal to get up in the morning and first check our Instagram profile, looking for new messages or reactions to our posts, as if our happiness essentially depended on our popularity on a virtual platform for sharing photos and short videos. Social networks are also our inseparable companions during the idle hours we spend on the train, on the underground or in traffic, when we don’t know exactly what to do or where to look, in those fateful moments when our gaze, instead of naturally wandering through the sky or following the beautiful profile of some building, fixes on the sterile updates published by the people we follow, on insignificant posts depicting people engaged in amusing activities, or in any case worthy of being published on a social media. The activities that do not fall into the latter category are now very few: sleep, perhaps, or intimate moments while in the shower. Everything else – including meals – inevitably ends up in the swirling vortex of social media, which mercilessly grind everything up and present it again and again, always the same, like an obsessive and morbid tale that always starts over, never ending.
The passive use of new media
The problem with social media is not so much in the average level of their content, but in the fact that for the last fifteen years or so they seem to have taken over people’s time, their daily routines, absorbing almost all their attention and diverting them from far more profitable activities. Very few of us know how much time we spend on social media. For some, the passive viewing of social message boards has become an integral part of their day, as if it were a real commitment that cannot be renounced. These people usually just observe from the outside, without creating many posts and restricting their action to a mere contemplation of what is posted by others. Compared to the creators, who at least use their intellect to create valuable content, passive observers represent an extremely problematic category of individuals, because they do not even seem to realise the amount of time they devote every day to lazily scrolling through social walls.
These latter individuals, moreover, are also perfectly recognisable by their posture and their gaze (almost always fixed or lost in the void): they are usually seated in a dishevelled manner in some public place, with their head tilted to one side and their eyes fixed on the screen. If it weren’t for their thumbs, constantly poking up and down to scroll through social message boards on mobile phone screens, they would be mistaken for realistic wax figures. Without realising it, these people can spend up to one or two hours in a row, so immersed in social content that they do not even notice what is happening around them. Some even forget to eat, drink or rest, spending hours and hours with their eyes glued to the screen watching content that will never be useful to them.
Untapped potential
To behave in this way not only means neglecting the immense potential offered by the place where we live (and in Boca Raton, there is a lot of it), but also entails the serious risk of excluding all that is really useful that could be found online, outside of social media, and that could give us truly unforgettable moments. That social media is only one of the many galaxies comprised in the network universe: another is that of video games, which can at least offer every gamer a safe source of entertainment and a concrete method of keeping the mind busy, with the opportunity to meet people from all over the world. Another is that of specialised gambling portals such as VegasSlotsOnline, which has one of the largest assortments of free slots on the net, as well as offering an impressive number of casino games to suit all tastes. This portal has taken advantage of its online presence to offer revolutionary services and gaming modes, such as the live dealer casino, thanks to which one can interact in real-time with a live dealer, even from the comfort of one’s sofa at home, as if one were in a real casino.
Don’t let social media like Facebook stop you from seeing all the wonders of the net: try to get out of your favourite platform and explore what lies beyond it. You may discover true wonders you never even suspected existed.
