In more than 25 years of being online I have figured out a few things about what it takes to get people to pay attention to you on the Internet even though I will never be able to make it work myself. The number one thing you have to do is be negative. Rant, swear, criticize... hate something. I have generally been positive. Certainly not always. No one is positive all the time and if they are it's 99% certain they're faking it.
I have always been mostly ignored and even though I know that's no different from the majority of people it still hurts. On the other hand, there are certain advantages. I am also mostly ignored by the trolls and that's a good thing.
After getting frustrated with blogging and several other social media things I found my place on Twitter. Still not popular but I got enough interaction with other people to make it satisfying. It's true what I considered my most "important" tweets have always been ignored but a few likes and replies every day is way better than I ever got blogging and, more important, I feel like I have a few actual friends there. But now a ridiculous billionaire man-child who never developed emotionally past the age of 3 years is wrecking it all because he, who is constantly in the spotlight, is somehow even more attention starved than I am.
So all the "cool" kids are moving to something called Mastodon. Why Mastodon? Why such a complicated and buggy platform? Maybe there are no other choices? Anyway, no one would follow me even if I knew of somewhere else to go so I follow the crowd. Or I would but Mastodon itself is blocking me from joining. I know it's just technical growing pains and it's stupid to take it personally but being ignored and left out for most of your life affects you that way.
I actually did sign up at Mastodon about six or seven months ago, fooled around with it for a bit but there was no one there I knew and not a lot of interesting activity so I stopped going there and of course I forgot my password. So I click on the Reset Password link and nothing happens. I try again. Nothing happens. I try several times a day for 3 days. Nothing. Someone suggested I create a new account. So I try that. I type in my email address and... it asks for my password. Not a new password but the password for my existing account! It knows my email address and will not let me create a new account without my old account password? What the hell?!
So I don't know. Maybe my online life is over. Maybe I give up on ever again hanging out with my online friends. And honestly, they probably don't like me as well as I like them. All the signs are there; I just never wanted to admit it. I'm annoying and boring.
I guess I'll stick with Twitter as long as it lasts then I don't know. Maybe do something useful with whatever's left of my life. Or more likely just veg out in front the TV steaming crappy movies on Tubi.
