3 Alt Social Media Platforms You Need To Try
Protect your data from snooping social media platforms
Social media consumes a large part of our time online. According to Broad Band Search people on the North American continent spend an average of 2 hours and 6 minutes on social media. That is 2 hours of time spent consuming content on platforms that scrape your data. I am sure many of you reading this post are fairly familiar with the fact that the biggest social media platforms scrape your data. I certainly am uncomfortable with that. It is for that reason I isolate where I access my social media but I have also started using some alt social media platforms.
These alt social media platforms are largely more secure than the biggest social media platforms of our era. My three favorite are:
Minds
Mind is a decentralized, secure social media platform. Decentralization means that it is not run in a central place. Which reduces the amount of control of your data. The security is also a nice bonus. Facebook and Twitter have a long track record of data breaches, but I have found no records on Minds. Granted it is a newer platform but the security features reduce the impacts a breach could have on Minds.
Minds also pays your for your time on the platform. You get tokens which you can convert to crypto or cash. I have had some difficulties in understanding how this works. A number of sources I have read all say it comes for free but I do believe you have to pay for a Minds subscription in order for that to happen. This came from examining the website. Don’t quote me on that though. I have had an enjoyable time using the platform though. The interface is almost exactly like Twitter’s, so there will be little confusion if you are a Twitter user. If you want to follow me on there you can go to my profile here: https://www.minds.com/twistedcircuits/.
Mastodon
Mastodon is a another Twitter alternative that is completely decentralized. A pleasant feature about how Mastodon was created are the spaces it is separated into. A standard social media platform more or less forces you into one community and you connect with like minded individuals that happen to be there. Mastodon is different. You can connect with like-minded people in spaces you choose to join. Each space is moderated by a team from the community. Mastodon has no say. All of these servers are decentralized with no control from the central command of Mastodon. The decentralization and the open-source design results in increased security for the user.
Pixelfed
Instagram has gained a rep as a photo sharing platform. A problem has popped up with it though. Instagram is not a private platform. They mine your data, your personal info is not very secure. This is where Pixelfed comes in. Pixelfed is a decentralized, private, and open-source platform for posting your pictures. An extremely wonderful part of this platform is its ad-free commitment. You can scroll those cute puppy pictures without getting ads about those dog care products.
On a side note, this platform does look similar to Instagram which will result in a pleasant switch for those coming over from Instagram. If you are not switching over then you are in luck. You have not had to deal with a platform that mines your data, kudos to you.
Data privacy is incredibly important. Social media contains a lot of our private information. Get on the wrong platform and you can have all your private data exposed. If you want to keep your data secure while still posting your vacations pictures online I highly recommend those social media platforms I mentioned above. Lord Voldemort once said, “Don’t be a fool and suffer a horrific death.” Don’t make a mistake and suffer the internet version of that, a data breach.