I don't usually post single photos, but sometimes I make exceptions. The nice thing is that when it happens, it also raises some thoughts that I like to throw out. I could've just dropped this to Instagram for the people who keep scrolling the feeds like crackheads. I would've maybe gotten couple likes and a short comment perhaps. Has anyone made personal connections in Instagram? I haven't actually used the app in a long time so what I'm saying might not apply anymore, but I don't think it happens often. After all it is meant to be consumed so that a profit can be extracted from you by stuffing you with ads and datamining your actions. This is the "cost" for using the application and many people have no problem with it – they get a nice product they enjoy. But how much does it improve the quality of the lives of the users? Will I get that girl to a date when I give her that precious like?
Right, likes ain't scarce outside of Steem...
There's financial gains in it only for those who sell or advertise some product on their photos or in the description of it. For others? An inflated sense of ego, but I would question if this is truly something that adds value to a person's life. It is giving up the control of your self-image to a corporation.
I don't think our personal sense of self-worth is ever going to be independent from any outside factors. It matters what is said about us. However, there's the danger that social media gets abused by creating a fake personality over which people idealize. It is unfortunate, and it wasn't the goal of Facebook either in the beginning – it was to keep in contact easily between college students.
That is the thing with new technology: an unexpected set of side effects will follow. Problems that didn't exist, become reality. Though I'm optimistic that people will learn how to avoid these pitfalls of the likes that have emerged from social media usage. Slightly ironic perhaps, but you can find a lot of knowledge about the dangers of social media, in social media. But that's where the people are, and that's where the knowledge is the easiest to pass on.
Right, I was going to say something about the photo, but got sidetracked... I spent a considerable time editing it and I was pleasantly surprised that I managed to pull some rain visible to the photo. (You can click the photo to view the full resolution version, btw.) My editing process is very simple: I fiddle with knobs and see what pleases my eye – that is how I found the raindrops. And I still discover new knobs that do something different. The fun thing is that my eye keeps evolving the more I do it and I start to get a sense of what every knob does. And then they start looking better – that's what my friends tell at least. Yes, they read my ramblings and watch my photos here even though they don't have Steem accounts, but if you, my dear friends, ever decide you want one, hit me up and I can do one in a minute, instead of waiting for weeks to get one confirmed by Steemit, Inc. You do your own decisions of course, but I'm just genuinely handing an opportunity that might get you somewhere you never thought you'd go – the picture above is only one of the proofs of it :)