My Elegy for Facebook by Jude Hopkins, 4/19/2026

This week I—long an ardent Facebook user—decided to post on a limited basis for the indefinite future.

Oh, it was time. Past time, in fact. My posts, dealing mostly with books and words and writing, weren't engaging the majority of folks on my friends' list. Only when I posted a photo my sister had taken of a cute animal or a photo of myself from a time when I was more daring did I get any reaction.

My conclusion? What interests me no longer has an audience on Facebook, even though I haven't changed the tenor of my postings.

Regardless, social media should be social. And when it isn't, it's pretty much over.

Yet, Facebook is far from dead. According to increv.com, Facebook still has over 3 billion users who check in at least monthly, making it the largest social media platform globally. The United States has the second-largest number of users, almost 200 million, with millennials comprising the largest group of Facebookers, beating baby boomers by over 10 percentage points.

But Facebook is different now than it was when I joined in 2014. Back then, I could post a poem or info about a writer and get comments from a number of my friends; now, such a post garners a few sentences from one or two fellow English majors. That's all. A photo of a dead deer would elicit more interest. The emphasis back then was on connection and community; now the reduced number of personal posts overall is interspersed with a lot of ads and curated content based on algorithms. The so-called scrapbook that was the original model for Facebook is now a commercial highway.

Even with the plethora of ads on the platform, I shouldn't be surprised by users' clear erosion of interest. Facebook has lost its new car smell. What was once a platform that showcased those things and thoughts that defined us—our hobbies and passions, trips we took, old and new photos, personal observations or insights—is now a graveyard where our pals can comment by not commenting; that is, they can register their lack of interest by scrolling by without any interaction.

Apathy happens—and not just on social media. When it debuted 20 years ago, American Idol was hotter than any show on the air. Recent statistics show it has lost about 2 million viewers since then, but is still considered a top-performer. People got tired of the format, which was also tired. Has it turned out any superstars like Kelly Clarkson, Fantasia, or Carrie Underwood lately? The last few winners—Jamal Roberts, Abi Carter, Iam Tongi—may have achieved some limited success after their anointing, but they're hardly household names like the earlier ones.

Newer apps like YouTube, Instagram and TikTok have superseded Facebook among the young. According to Pew Research, adults under 30 are more likely than older adults to use these platforms.

So even though Facebook rolls along, other apps requiring less reading and more passive watching are gaining steam, like the aforementioned.

So what happened? Why have we become so disenchanted with Facebook other than our disgust with the ads and created content? Unlike giving a hoot about American Idol winners, shouldn't we still care about what makes our friends tick as set forth in their posts, reduced in frequency though they be?

"Our brains crave novelty," Rohan Gayen writes in the article "Why Do Trends Fade Away So Quickly." Gayen says that "something new—like a viral song or a must-have gadget—grabs our attention at first. But the more we see it, the less it stands out. Our brains adapt. The excitement fades. And just like that, it's old news."

That could be why one of the least appreciated features on Facebook, from my observation, is repeating memory posts, along with already seen photos.

What works instead, when it does work, are recent or never-before seen photos, something personal. Reports of a poster's achievements are usually accepted well (again, new information of substance) or posts that fellow users can identify with. Original visuals or photos are appreciated more than recycled memes. If Facebook could talk, it would say, "Ho-hum" to repeated copy.

In my opinion, planned obsolescence shouldn't be part of a friendship, even digitally based ones. Planned obsolescence, by the way, is a business strategy, according to one journal article, described as "the obsolescence (the process of becoming obsolete, that is, unfashionable or no longer usable) of a product [that] is planned and built into it from its conception, by the manufacturer. This is done so that, in the future, the consumer feels a need to purchase new products and services that the manufacturer brings out as replacements for the old ones."

Hence, the public's consensus on most friends' Facebook posts becomes analogous to discontinued McDonald's products: the McRib, McSalad Shakers—even McSpaghetti!

When did friendship become a product? A discontinued commodity? I guess in today's world, that's entirely possible. Besides seeking novelty, having lower attention spans, and being over stimulated, we're comfortable ignoring friends' posts because, after all, there are newer, better friends out there for us—or the same ones on a different platform presented in a fresh, usually shortened, visual manner. The old friends--or their Facebook manifestations--can then be ignored or deemed unworthy of being a stop on the perpetual scroll that is social media without a shred of guilt. It's all about what we find interesting (or not). And showing it.

I suppose such apathy is part of being human. Even love can grow stale. The 50 percent divorce rate indicates there's little compunction on the part of at least one-half of the couple when their romantic, lust-filled passion segues into either comfortable and familiar companionship or divorce.

How many songs and poems and stories have chronicled such transformations? In her poem "After Love," Sara Teasdale writes this:

Thomas Hardy's poem "Neutral Tones" memorably describes the jilted lover looking at his ex-love and remarking, "The smile on your mouth was the deadest thing /Alive enough to have strength to die."

Ouch.

Should we let our desire for novelty or even our lack of attention for anything that isn't fast, fresh, flashy or familiar take precedence over our effort to sustain a connection with our faraway friends? Should we not pause and read or comment on a post that our friends thought important enough to share with Facebook buddies? Because friendship shouldn't be fungible, shouldn't we make the effort to read and engage in something of a personal nature that our friends share and support them by a measly "like'? Or do we, for whatever reason, prefer to scroll by, without a like or a comment, because it makes us feel something that's comparable to a smug sniff or eye roll?

There's something to be said for friendships, even ones nurtured in cyberspace. Maybe some friends don't lead exciting lives, but their observations and remarks are still worthy of our attention if we truly care about them. They may not be posting sensational news about their lives, but we still need to give a damn about them because, well, they are our friends. And presumably we love them.

Perhaps poet Wendy Cope said it best in one of her poems: "If you ask me 'What's new?' I have nothing to say / Except that the garden is growing. / I had a slight cold but it's better today. / I'm content with the way things are going...If you’re after excitement, steer well clear of me, / I want to go on being boring."

"Boring" doesn't necessarily mean insubstantial, dull or unworthy. Instead, "boring" can indicate qualities like steadfastness, loyalty and stability. If you ask me, those are three of the most-desired indicators of a good friend—even if they're not Facebook friendly.