How our social media data tells stories
What the TikTok ban tells us about our digital data and the memories they carry
Back in September, I tried reaching out to an estranged ex only to find his obituary from July.
Aside from some a brief email exchange in 2020, my ex and I hadn't spoke in eight years. The night I found his obituary, I tossed and turned throughout the night. I yearned for reconnection.
Restless during the early morning hours, I searched his name in my Facebook Messenger app. Since he deleted his Facebook account four months into our relationship, I didn't expect to find anything. Yet, there I found our Messenger conversations, text-based exchanges dating back as far back as August 2012. I have since downloaded my Facebook data (not just Chris and I's messages, but every message ever sent and received and more) and transferred the files to an external hard drive.
In mid-November, I deactivated my Twitter account and migrated to Bluesky along with millions of other former Twitter users. Right before, I downloaded my Twitter data. I uncovered forgotten photos and videos of my ex and I in that .zip folder. That’s only the brim to the memories and stories hidden inside those data files.
How our data tells stories
As a writer, social media data has uncovered artifacts critical to my memoir writing. Unearthing forgotten conversations have unlocked new perspectives and offered me unique insight into my grieving process.
Friend of Adryan's POV,
of , has her own Digital Archiving Project, inspired by her fascination with digital media and its impact on memory. While began by retrieving data from her various social media accounts, she has since paused on the project because of the emotions the process evoked:"I was so emotionally overwhelmed by my discovery. I'd found many videos of myself and my friends, from when leaving Photo Booth videos on each others' Facebook walls was the norm. There was one video in particular that left me completely brokenhearted. I spoke to a group of my friends (perhaps in a private group) in a hushed whisper, and my sadness was palpable. I'd deleted probably 99% of my photos from that time long ago, trying to erase my memories of that dark time. I felt embarrassed having my rock bottom documented at all, let alone publicly."
Social media data tells stories. Though our data harnesses storytelling, it's mediated on digital platforms created and moderated by for-profit tech corporations. Growing up as a millennial, it was common to hear that the internet was a place of permanence: "What your post online is forever." As these corporations dominate the digital media ecosystem, Tremaglio and I agree that couldn't be farther from the truth today.
"Now, though I know that sentiment [of 'what you post online is forever'] to be false, there are still some things I'd rather forget," Tremaglio added. "Will social media let me?"
The upcoming TikTok ban is a reminder that our data, and the stories they tell, are impermanent. Our data—and therefore, forgotten memories—are prone to a digital death just like the death of our loved ones offline.
Updates on the TikTok ban
When I first drafted this post over a week ago, I wrote the TikTok ban could happen, but unfortunately, it seems more and more likely it will happen. According to USA Today, a federal appeals court denied TikTok's petition for the Supreme Court to review legislation that could ban the video-based social media app in the U.S. TikTok's motion was an effort to pause the legislation that would ban its app if its China-based parent company, ByteDance, doesn't sell it to an American company by January 19, 2025 (just a day before Trump's inauguration).
of published an excellent podcast episode discussing how the ban will take effect, what downstream impact this will have on culture and the economy, and how this ban sets the stage for more government restrictions on free speech and expression. Check it out on YouTube below.How to save your TikTok data
In my earlier version of this post, I included simple step-by-step instructions to request your TikTok data from your account's Settings page. However, that was before I actually downloaded my own data. I was disappointed to find video content in the .zip folder included links to video files, rather than actual video file links. If the TikTok ban actually happens, I'm not hopeful that I'll be able to view video files hosted on the TikTok domain come January 20.
The only solution I can offer is downloading your video feed individually video by video within the app, which admittedly is pretty obvious and likely not to be helpful. For content creators with hundreds of original videos, this can be more than inconvenient but impossible. I have less than a hundred public videos and even for me, that sounds tedious. Forget about the handful the 3000+ videos I have bookmarked or the thousands of videos I've DM'd friends privately.
If anyone has better solutions, please comment or get in touch directly! I eventually (likely sooner-than-later) intend to download my TikTok data, because of how invaluable it can become in my memoir writing in the future. In the meantime, if you come across a video you love, download it (or screenrecord if you can't) to your phone—because it won't be there forever.