I am guilty of this—I remember livejournal falling by the wayside as everyone went their separate ways, or the various 90's instant messengers just being left on the side of the road for pickup. Sometimes I just didn't like the vibe anymore, and moved on.
Either way, it sucks ass.
Someone said "You should write this up" and frankly it just feels self-indulgent, it really doesn't help to hear "Oh, I've been there before." when you're in the middle of going through it. Instead, here's a post about why everyone else is losing their shit, and why you gotta be a little more patient.
Moving social networks isn't like moving house, it's like moving to a new city. Everything's different, you don't really know anyone there, and the feelings of isolation intensity as you find out everyone else is having a good time without you—be it in your old home or new one.
For a lot of twitter evacuees, it's also their first time having their social space wrecked by capitalism. I can sigh and mumble, "Ah shit, here we go again", but I know my experiences don't necessarily make other people's problems any easier to solve.
For example: I joined cohost back in April, and it was a bit of a tumbleweed town. I checked in every now and then, added new friends, and waited patiently for a critical mass. It took a few months, but there's enough old faces kicking around here for me to feel at home.
Meanwhile, for a lot of people, they aren't after a "fourth website" but a wholesale replacement for their online life. There are still people in the queue, waiting to grab a username, unready to discover that no-one else they know is on the website, and feeling even more lost than before.
It's why i'm sympathetic to the impatience i'm seeing with the queue—they aren't looking to try a new thing, they're desperate to evacuate—they don't want to drag the evacuation out.
It really does feel like the party is over, or that the vibes are off. People no longer feel confident that the other website is going to be around next week—like a local punk house under constant threat of eviction, or at the end of a flat party where everyone's checking how to get home, and trying not to outstay their welcome.
At least I've had a few practice runs, watching online communities evaporate over a few years. Still, it really isn't the same when you've spent more than a decade somewhere and have to rebuild. Once again, let me be clear: It sucks ass.
Unfortunately, there isn't any good advice to give. You have to poke your friends to find out who is around on another website, you have to check in every now and again to see if things have changed, and you gotta make new friends the hard way, slowly and awkwardly. You gotta be patient, and once again, it sucks ass.
You gotta be patient with the people going through it for the first time, too. Boasting about going through the shit-show before doesn't help one bit. Meanwhile, cohost is still very young, very small, and it just isn't as easy to find people here as it is on other sites. Not yet, anyway.
Maybe in a year, things will be better. Other people will be more settled. More of my distinct social groups will have found new spaces, and maybe I'll have a few more tabs to check, but for now it's just a bit of a sad swansong as I watch another online acquaintance fall into the ether and hope we bump into each other again.
I don't think this the post my friend suggested I write. I think they hoped I'd be more reassuring about the impermanence of life, rather than jaded and bitter and very tired of it all.
