Is it voyeuristic to read and observe what people are broadcasting, either publicly or to a closed circle?
I dunno, if I don't want anyone to see the post I will not post it or limit its visibility, I am very much in the same camp as the person you're replying to.
People who I lost regular contact with but am totally happy to meet again once a year or every couple years. (Does not mean more often would be bad, just being realistic). Which we actually do, from time to time.
We also have a Slack with old colleagues form one company, but it's mostly a way to contact them or for the occasional tech question and chitchat, so it's even more closed off - but no different than broadcasting events, really.
But I'm also not arguing that it's strictly needed.
Maybe that's not the right word, it's too pejorative. What I mean is looking at someone's private life without them narrating it to you specifically and being aware in real time that you're looking at it. I'm not claiming anything negative about its ethics or similar. That's not my point at all. I'm just asking whether it is conducive to real social connection and whether it really produces and maintains the kind of ties that it supposedly maintains or if it's an illusion. Sure, it's nice to reconnect with a long lost classmate or "interesting" to see the baby pics of that one college friend you last talked to in 2012. But to what end exactly? If it actually leads to regular IRL hangouts that's great. Otherwise it's just some kind of nostalgia trap.
> if I don't want anyone to see the post I will not post it or limit its visibility
Yes, and nowadays people tend to share less. Exactly because in the 2000s these instincts were less sharp and then people realized that a wider circle of people is looking than they thought and things remain online for long.