The uprising of social media platform users is determined to achieve “social media revolution, reclaim platform,” overthrow social media hegemony and knock Zuckerberg’s power down.

First and foremost, the users are unhappy with the self-censorship of Facebook and Instagram, which delete posts and ban users as they please. Then they also move away from WhatsApp in protest of censorship. YouTube, which belongs to Google, is also a hegemony. It bullies users and deletes videos sometimes without reason. Also, Twitter shows it is also a hegemony by blocking even the account of the U.S. president. When monopolization became a reality, moving away becomes our duty.

Secondly, hegemony has not just monopolized, but it also sells our personal information and destroys our privacy. This is indeed an open secret. When you send a message about the Great Bay area on WhatsApp, you will soon see a Great Bay area property advertisement on Facebook. This is like you have been stalked by a ghost and cannot be rid of it.

With these two valid reasons, many people are keen to motivate everyone to move to MeWe and Signal. Signal uses its watertight security as a selling point. MeWe claims to be against Facebook and emphasizes data privacy. The definition of hate on Facebook is too wide too ambiguous, with the most serious case involving my relative. The Tai Po group was removed overnight as if a city has been bloodily massacred. How can anyone with conscience tolerate such brutality? The migration wave to MeWe has given us some strength while we are feeling helpless on the protests. Once again, we have a centripetal force.

When this migration wave really takes its momentum and freezes giant enterprises like Facebook and Instagram, the latest hotspot for the social gathering will also become a giant enterprise. Be it MeWe or Weme, Youwe, Maskbook, the giant enterprise will grow bigger and form another new monopoly, or it will be big and attractive enough to be bought by a giant enterprise like Google buying YouTube. When many people gather on any platform and conduct “social activities,” it would create a power that guides public opinion. Those in power could make use of this opinion, or they could make use of each other. This kind of uprising might just be a transfer of interests to another platform by using the power of those who do not have power.

A humorous user said, having social activities on a platform is like hanging your underwear on the balcony. You openly show off the lazy, sexy moment of you and your loved one, unconditionally provide information on your three daily meals to all the strangers, you even share your window seal’s leaking situation. You are so generous to the public with your private information. You hide nothing, and a private rendezvous becomes a public banquet.

When you are so open with your own privacy, how dare you saying you want to move away and blasting the platform for selling your privacy? To that, I can only respond, “I see. So you are complaining you are being watched at home, but then moving house, completely naked?”

(Albert Leung is an award-winning lyricist and writer.)

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