Is This Thing On

Over the past few weeks I've been a lot more active on Facebook than I have been. This is mostly due to me spending more time on Facebook Marketplace, checking out the competition as it were.

It's Been 84 Years

Facebook has changed a lot, and not for the better. I would spend maybe ten minutes a week scrolling through the feed and being completely disappointed by the results. Posts from accounts I never followed, ads aplenty, more posts from pages and groups I couldn't care less about, and the occasional post from an account I actually follow.

If I wanted to see items only from those followed accounts, I would have to go on an adventure through menus a few layers deep. Now this was all through the browser view since I had deleted the app from my phone years ago. Something I wouldn't be doing again in order to get a better user experience, since the app is one click away from viewing your followed feed.

AI Slop As Far As The Eye Can See

Just like everywhere else, AI imagery has infected every facet of social media. This is even more evident with advertising from local, small businesses. What I can only imagine is someone who started a computer repair business and couldn't spend two minutes taking a picture of their work, opting instead to use things that don't exist in reality. Their page is filled to the brim with Sora creations and nothing of their customers' builds or anything else. This led me to believe that it's just a spam page with no actual benefits to the local community.

This wasn't the only example. An ad for an upcoming car show also utilized AI images while having a misspelled word in large font at the top of the ad. Now I get that spelling mistakes happen a lot, and I'm stating I am guilty of this on many occasions. It's something that I'm sure (or hoping) the copy went through a few passes to make sure everything looked good before getting posted.

Joining The Chaos

I didn't want this post to be just me going on and on about AI slop, but more about branching out to experiment with a Facebook page and how to utilize its potential for gathering more views to my site.

Giving it a shot to see how it works out in the long term is a potential avenue of advertising without spending any money, knowing that Facebook is notorious for requiring you to spend money within their ad market if you want any real reach.

I'm not holding my breath for overnight success here. Facebook's algorithm isn't exactly known for being generous to unpaid content creators. But experimenting costs me nothing except time, and if even a handful of people find their way to my site through this channel, it'll be worth the effort. At the very least, I'll have a better understanding of whether Facebook still has any relevance for driving traffic in 2026, or if it's just become another graveyard of AI-generated nonsense and pay-to-play advertising. I'll report back on how this experiment goes. Wish me luck.

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