This site is most certainly a form of social media.
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I was just going to call it anti-social media, period. 
I went with no because to me social media was coined with Facebook, Instagram, Twitter etc. This to me is an old school web forum. And so many people that join arenāt social at all, just ask a question and never return.
As.many of you already said, I like how Forumosa isnāt curated nonsense that is algo driven or a hive mind like Reddit where one gets downvoted or banned for disagreeing. Actually most āsocial mediaā is a dumpster fire.
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Agreed. My personal definition of āsocial mediaā is an app or website that (1) curates content with an algorithm, in other words I canāt choose which discussions to view but instead the program decides what I will see, and/or (2) some kind of social ranking that includes pop-ups, likes, little demonstrations of approval from other social media users that create a sort of popularity contest (and which may determine which content you see, as in, more likes pushes a post to the top. Feels like social engineering to me).
Forumosa has some of these (hearts that we can click on, message notifications) but mostly acts like an old fashioned forum, bulletin board, or email list that predates Facebook and modern social media. On Forumosa I can still decide which posts interest me and ignore the other 99%. And I can search a couple decades worth of old posts which may be occassionally useful!
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I agree with those who say no, itās not social media. I stopped doing Facebook, Instagram, even Pinterest, which I formerly used to use all the time to come up with lesson plans, because all of them kept showing me things Iād already looked at before, because it thought I wanted to see that, rather than new content. It was purpose-defeating. I wanted new information, not confirmation bias. I come on here and I see a variety of topics, usually somewhat related to my life, being discussed. If I want to see what people have to say about a topic, I click on the link. If I have had it with a topic, I ignore it.
Also, is anyone trying to present a perfectly curated life on here? I donāt see anyone posting perfectly lit and staged photos of themselves with their spouses and perfect children while theyāre actually going through a messy divorce. Also, I donāt even have a profile picture. Iām not required per user standards to use my full, real name. Most peopleās profile pics are circa early 2000s avatars where you donāt let strangers know a lot about you on the internet. Social media is all about showing off your perfect life to others that you have at least met once (maybe). Forumosa is for ranting into the void to strangers about things you disagree with while also asking where to find whatever food from home that youāre missing.
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Good point. Thereās value in anonymity, because I can be honest in a forum like this without worrying about how my comments might affect my social relationships or standing in the community. I like some of the other posters but I donāt want to be friends with everyone! (Iām not THAT social!)
The modern forms of social media tend to serve the social media business more than they serve the users. In a forum like Forumosa, if I want to be āsocialā with someone Iāll send them a message, but I donāt have to invite all the other users into my life. This feels like the right balance.
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Add me already 
The Young Turks started off ok, but man they have really gone downhill!
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