[EI] Micro-Project #7: A Day in the Life of Super Participation

Find out about what happened in our day here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/346254359199743/

My group and I decided to execute this micro-project on Tuesday. It started at 12am sharp and as usual, most ADM students were still wide awake at this hour. The things that were shared throughout the day included the food we ate, projects we worked on, and thoughts that we were having at the moment (this is the life of ADM students for you). Most of these things that were shared were mainly personal, trivial and light-hearted. Since I’m not close to these classmates of mine, it was interesting to catch a glimpse of their lives and get to know them a tad bit better through the things that they did over the day.

 

Check out my ‘wonderful’ feed!

I’ll be honest, I’m one of those people who use social media to ‘stalk’ others and don’t actually post anything myself. Hence, this experience was a rather big step out of my comfort zone for me because I’m a private person and don’t enjoy sharing anything online. The only social media platform that I’m somewhat active on is Snapchat, where I post snaps of things that I find hilarious. Even then, my Snapchat is only viewable for close friends of mine and not open to the public. Throughout the course of this micro-project, I couldn’t help but wonder if anybody actually cares about the things that I was up to, simply because they were so mundane and trivial. Since I wasn’t used to constantly updating my social media status, I had to constantly remember to update it.

However, I have seen my friends constantly update their social media and witness just how much they value the social media space. Often times when I hang out with them, I had to wait for them to get the ‘perfect shot’ for Instagram before we could move on with our day. “It’s for my memories, not for Instagram,” said my friend as she edited the photos on her phone before uploading them on Instagram with a cheesy caption. I believe that everyone can agree that in general, social media is the highlight reel of one’s life. Instagram especially is notorious for being highly curated and aesthetically. Many will share the positive experiences that they are going through, to showcase how contented and happy they are with life. Such positive experiences may include holiday trips, birthday posts dedications, meet-ups with friends, etc. I’m not saying that everyone on social media is putting on a facade because I believe that most of these moments that they choose to share are genuine and really meant a lot to them. However, we have to remember that just because we are used to seeing these happy faces on Instagram, that doesn’t mean that their lives are always blissful! There are many things that have been filtered out for the curated feed’s sake, or because they aren’t comfortable sharing online, and various other reasons.

However, this doesn’t mean that social media is bad because it makes people ‘fake’. There are many who share the difficulties that they are facing on social media too and I really applaud them for having the courage to share these difficult moments. It’s not easy putting oneself out there! It’s also nice to see others rallying around them to support them. So I guess social media can also act as a third space of comfort! Social media can also be a space for discussions and it helps us to broaden our outlook when we take in different opinions from different people.

I shall end off this post with this video which showcases the difference between what one chooses to share on social media and what actually happens in real life. Of course, it does not reflect social media accurately but it’s good to think about how we use social media!

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