Social media is currently a high-investment lifestyle/hobby, essentialism massively sucks

Using a platform to post content which isn't explicitly creatively distinct (digital art, music promotion) or controversial (inflammatory political commentary) has a high learning curve and is also incredibly time consuming if one really wishes to make a dent.

Social media also generally requires that you have a pre-established circle before using it, otherwise slaving to the algorithm in order to network is necessary.

Artists using social media: logical, good for business and networking, great place for people to appreciate something 

Political commentators: clout for their video essays and whatever else, perfect to engage with other users and find examples of varying perspectives to represent in said videos

But even for the above groups who are the best suited to use social media, how often do they put out things in exhaustion to keep their audience or the algorithm pleased, knowing how short of a shelf life their posts have?

I have seen plenty of artists make humor centered around this, or openly discuss how drawing certain characters is "good for promotion" and while some of them seem fine with it, many also seem very tired. If they're fine with it, that's cool but expecting the average user to perform constantly like that is genuinely insane and hardly even transactional.

People who do fuck-all and just want to have a fun time and maybe make connections but not melt their brains with pointless inflammatory posts/gossip have essentially no use for the platforms.

"It's just a way to collect and share stuff you think is nice" 

That makes sense if you're decently sentimental but not everyone really feels that way, not to mention you still have to find a niche enough for the "sharing" part of that to even be effective?

Moreover, what are you actually getting out of it in the first place? You put things out there, usually at a specific time, multiple times a week or even day, for what could be hours and hours, playing a game of chance wondering if anyone will actually see it or not and think it has worth.

And if they do, you then have to ask yourself how much this often parasocial praise and approval actually means to you. For those who like group/general social approval maybe this is a big deal. But otherwise, how long do you have to pursue these bare minimum interactions before it turns into something like a conversation 1 on 1, or a collaborative work?

It has become normalized to pass judgment on people who don't have socials, sometimes as far as active socials, but you'd look like a deranged asswipe if you told someone they should spend hours upon hours reading over a game wiki or crocheting numerous scarves for everyone they know. The question is, how is social media any different? Why is it an ESSENTIAL hobby despite being highly specific to a certain type of person and heavily time consuming? 

The very concept of social media is: social concepts turned into CONSUMABLE MEDIA. Essentially, being a content creator which inherently means commentator, comedian, public figure, artist, etc. Do you want to be any of those things? No? Then why should you be expected to make an account and spend hours of your life there, aimlessly?

"You don't have to"

I'll await the day there's any substantial alternatives to using social media when it comes to making any human connections physically distant or otherwise. Some people are physically ill and thus unable to work and network easily, the same applies to those who are either not taking college courses on campus or do not live on campus.

The lack of authentically driven interaction is no doubt due to the corporatization of the social media landscape. It's not about being social, it's about being cheap entertainment for others, becoming a self-made brand/micro-celebrity. Companies no longer have to produce oddly specific content for you, everyone is plugged into a system that generates its own controversies, it's own trends, etc.

You are CONTENT. You are not a PERSON.