At around 4 pm, yesterday, hundreds of thousands of people around the globe simultaneously began refreshing their social media feeds, restarting their Wifi routers and checking their internet plan subscriptions, before finding out that the Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram apps went down worldwide.
Users rushed to unaffected social media apps Including Twitter, Tiktok, Telegram and Snapchat to post about memes and conspiracies about the breakdown.
Twitter welcomed “the migration wave” of the damaged applications’ users to the blue bird app as Facebook, Instagram and Whatsapp’s own official Twitter accounts also started tweeting about the breakdown, offering updates and joining in on the memes and jokes.
“Apologies to everyone who hasn’t been able to use WhatsApp today. We’re starting to slowly and carefully get WhatsApp working again,” said Andy Stone, a Facebook spokeswoman in her Twitter approved account.
Facebook and WhatsApp have at least 2 billion monthly active users, while Instagram’s potential advertising reach is 1.386 billion monthly.
Abdelhay, a 24-year-old entrepreneur, editor and graphic designer, didn’t notice the breakdown till he and his team finished their work at 9 p.m. Bereft of social media platforms, Abdelhay joined a friendly conversation with the five members of his team, “it’s been a while since we have enjoyed a conversation without keep glancing on our phones checking social media notifications.” Abdelhay stated.
While some people may argue the disadvantages of social media’s use in our lives, the huge population of the Facebook’ empire represents a rich and unalike community where different languages, cultures and genders coexist, despite the disputes and arguments within them, where teachers, friends, classmates and business owners participate in the international network of communication.”
Abdelhafed, a 21 years old student stated to Hespress English, “I wasn’t really affected by the breakdown, since the blue bird was still working,” he continued, “if the bird app stopped, then I am going to panic, I spend a lot of time there, I can’t imagine my life without it, “ he stated to Hespress English.
Kaoutar, a journalism student, couldn’t’ have access to the WhatsApp class group where the Radio and audio course teacher shared important assignments that should be finished by the next day.
“I was unaware of the breakdown first, I found out after few hours that all my classmates face the same issues. We are used to communicating important information via Whatsapp, since it’s easy to use and provides a friendly ambiance between us,” Kaoutar stated.
The Facebook empire hosts many businesses owners who advertise their products only via Facebook and Instagram, while making a good income from their online projects thanks to the free policy of opening an account in the aforementioned applications.
The owner of the Instagram page, let’s art it, an online store of handmade and personally customized tote bags, shared with us her concerns over the social media breakdown, “I started with my friend this business amid the quarantine in 2020, as a part time job to help finance my studies,” she continued, “of course, the seven hours breakdown affected our business, because through Facebook and Instagram is how we get our orders and contact our customers.”
“Let’s art it” owner said if the breakdown lasted, she will reestablish her online store in another media platform, “it will be hard but it’s doable. However if all the social media broke down, it’s done for my business because I don’t have enough income to open a real store.”
Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp appeared to be partially reconnected to the global Internet late on Monday morning, nearly six hours into an outage that paralyzed the social media platforms, in what website monitoring group Downdetector said was the largest such failure it had ever seen, with 10.6 million problem reports globally.
The outage comes a day after a blockbuster “60 Minutes” report revealing a whistleblower accusing Facebook of dismantling guardrails protecting the public good, which fueled conspiracy theories around the reasons behind the breakdown.
Yesterday, people on Twitter were frustrated over the breakdown issues; however their jokes and comments were accompanied by a confidence of “the soon come back of social media.” The dystopian vision of a word without social media shocked many users who refused to believe the possibility of a world without social media.
Personally, i see this breakdown from two different angles. First, i can’t deny i suffered because i lost contact with my students,as being a teacher. Meanwhile, I have spent a peaceful moment being aloof of the social media. That reminds me of the quality times I used to enjoy during my childhood. Suddenly, I had enough time to complete other chores which were put off for a while. This breakdown is a curse and a boon at the same time i encourage the social media platforms to do so from time to time to give us some moments to breathe and reboot.