First things first, what’s the difference?
Curate: “select, organize, and present (online content, merchandise, information, etc.), typically using professional or expert knowledge:”
Create: “to produce through imaginative skill”
This post came about following a conversation I had where someone was complaining about their Facebook feed, in that everything they see annoys them. They then asked me if I’ve seen these same posts, or have you seen all of these posts about xyz. My simple response was no, because my feeds, thanks to the way algorithms work, is curated differently to others.
So, should you do more of one or the other? In my opinion, and from I’m personally practicing this year, it’s a bit of both, however I’m curating more with the intention that it will give me new ideas for creating content. So they pretty much go hand in hand. Without curation, you might not find that topic to create, but without creating and sharing, your social media feeds won’t give you new ideas and you’ll end up with repeat content.
During the middle of 2022 I started to, like everyone else it seemed, fall away from Instagram. It was then that I decided to be ruthless and unfollow everyone (you can read about that here). I then took December off all social media and came back to the hell hole that Twitter appeared to have turned into.
I’m now starting to do the same with Twitter. However because of the amount of tweets I’ve sent over a few years, and conversations I’ve had, this one will take longer. First though I’m unfollowing old dead accounts.
My theory with this is that it will allow me to clean up my feed, which means I’ll actually see what I consider good content and will be able to spend less time there, allowing me to be more productive in my own content creation.
So what’s your take on curating your feeds, and content creation? Will it be something you look at more deeply, or are you already in that happy content place where you know you’ll like everything you see?