If Social Media Apps Had “Channels” (like Cable TV)

You’re sitting there at no particular time during the day, or night. You go to pick up your phone by habit and touch the Instagram app (Or Facebook, or X, or insert your favorite one here). The feed comes on and you see something. Something good, or something “whatever.” Either way, you scroll. And scroll.

Image created by author, Matthew Desotell, using Midjourney.

How much time goes by is not considered.

What you’re even looking for is not considered.

There you are. Scrolling. Gently passing a finger almost effortlessly along a smooth screen, over a downpour of almost anything and everything in the range of content.

A chuckle here. An internal “wow” there.

A spot of envy.

A touch of jealousy.

A spark of inspiration.

A consideration for a product in an ad.

A moment of education.

A jolt of horror or dismay.

All within minutes. 8? Maybe 18? Who knows? No one’s counting. Well, no one in this room. The platform is auditing, counting, learning. Making some minor adjustments before the next time you tap in. It knows you better because of what you lingered on.

And you do this, we do this, how many times a day? A week? Don’t even want to think about adding up all that time over the course of a year. Could’ve gotten a degree in that time or learned a new language. Read one of the great American novels. Fuck.

I think about the line from the late, great Betty White in an SNL monologue. “I didn’t know what Facebook was, and now that I do know what it is, I have to say, it sounds like a huge waste of time.”

I see all the great things about social media. It’s easy to see.

I see all the messed up stuff too. It’s easy to see.

It’s all easy to see.

It’s all there.

It’s all always there and always a touch away.

This isn’t about “pro” or “no” social media apps. This idea here is about…

Habits and Time.

Habits take your Time.

It’s really about Your Time.

Ideally, I think we want to spend time consciously. On whatever we choose.

Mindful consumption can be time well spent. Mindless consumption is just time spent. We all know time is precious but we spend it in 28 minute chunks here and there like it’ll never run out.

If we saw the NUMBER OF HOURS per year we spent on social media and combined that sum with a question like: What did you really get out of it? What did you learn? What did you feel, mostly? What do you remember?

I wonder if it would look like this: 8,762 hours per year. And, “Not much.” Or, “Hard to say.”

It is hard to say what you get out of it as a net sum experience. It’s different from other experiences and mediums like a movie, a book, or a show, where you can say “It sucked,” or “It was an incredibly moving experience that made me rethink life.”

Social media has potential for those net feelings but with one major difference. Intention.

It lacks it.

Also, it never ends. Unlike a movie, a show, or an article, there is no end to the activity you’re engaged in.

But, Intention.

When you watch a movie, or read an article or a book, you've seen something about it ahead of time. A title. A trailer. A thumbnail. A friend talked about it. Something. And you enter into that experience by deciding to.

It’s different with a social media app.

Think about it. What are you going into it for? What are you looking for exactly? What do you want to see, learn, or discover?

We don’t fucking know, cause we’re not thinking about it.

Sometimes after an award show, or a game, you wanna see what people are saying about the event. Or after your friend’s wedding, you wanna see how you look in the pictures they posted.

Sure, but then you encounter THE FEED.

This motherfucker has everything in it. The good, the bad, the ugly. It’s Oz behind the green curtain pulling on levers with everything it’s got.

It knows.

It guesses.

It’s dazzling.

It’s shocking.

It’s Truth.

It’s Lies.

It lies.

It’s propaganda.

It’s advertising.

It’s influencing.

It’s suggesting.

It’s prompting.

It’s alluring.

It’s annoying.

It’s…

Wait. What are we here for again?

Oh, right. The NBA finals and my friend’s wedding. Shit. Let me go find that…

But, if there were CHANNELS.

Channels for “categorizing” content you want to see, like cable TV or the content hub on your smart TV. And these are ones you create and program accounts and content into. Just like TV networks do. Channels like: SPORTS, FASHION, FITNESS, FRIENDS, FOOD.

Now, you could tap into an app and choose the content you wanted to see at that moment and “channel surf” if you want.

Now, you get to be INTENTIONAL. And if you’re not, that’s on you.

In this way, before you go to your phone and touch that app, you can make a decision. Just like when you decide to watch a show or read a book or listen to music. You can be selective with your time and what interests you want to spend it on.

All content categories would be a touch away and because “social” media has become mainly just media now, you can group a professional financial analyst talking about crypto, with your buddy from school who also started an account talking about crypto, both, in your FINANCE or CRYPTO channel.

Your foodie-health-nut friend and Padma Lakshmi, can both go in your FOOD channel. And that same friend can also be added to your FRIENDS & FAMILY channel too. And because Padma is so many things, she might go into a FAVORITES channel, and still be in FOOD or FASHION or “CELEBS.”

You name it.

You can tap into your SPORTS channel and see ESPN’s content right there with the NBA’s, The Timberwolves’ and your high school friend who’s now the mascot for the Timberwolves. All bundled in there that channel when you decide to watch and in which you can remove and add creators or publishers when you want, just like media companies do on their networks or streaming platforms.

Why wouldn’t this be better?

Answer to 99 out of 100 questions: Money.

So, if we follow it…

Advertisers should love this because… Wait — A food brand can now place an ad for their new hot sauce into the feed of someone’s FOOD category?! Yummy.

The advertiser's content can be in front of an audience with built in interests. And if Advertisers love it, the Platforms- which function like huge media companies that don’t have to pay to produce content but get millions and billions in ad revenue, should be cool with it. A win, win, win for the brands + the people + the platforms.

The most important win, or win-back, in my eyes, is for the "user," the people, the audience. They get the thing that is most valuable and, unlike money, can never truly be saved - TIME.

"Channels" can help us be intentional about how we watch content instead of easily, mindlessly spending unaccounted for time on whatever heartwarming, politically charged, inspirational, or envy-conjuring content that's sliding down the feed like a never ending waterfall of information and entertainment. How much time we spend is up to us.

Even now, with or without channels- we can decide before we reach for the phone. How do we want to spend these next 28 minutes of our lives or what we're actually going there for?

Better with channels, I think. And better is better.

And if we don't see channels staring back at us in the user interface soon, will it be because they don't actually want to give us a moment to decide?

— M.

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