This was my experience - when I was in high school was right around the time that Facebook started to replace Myspace. Who you were friends with online and who/how many people liked your photos was a big deal, and it very much mirrored the actual IRL dynamics/relationships we had in school - what happened online was directly related to what happened in real life. Around 2013 it felt like that started to change as the social media sites shifted more towards algorithmically recommended content, like joke sites and videos, with some ads. At that time it was still fun to watch it and share it with friends, because it was so new.

I was in college at that time and I did not get this feeling in any possible way.

Instead I can remember online topic focused forum boards, of which some I had numerous daily interactions with the same people over years. These online forums made no pretense about replacing real life social dynamics and yet they were still so much better for real social experiences than the social media that replaced them at that time.

To me social media has always felt artificial for people who shout into a vortex hoping for attention.

Yeah - MySpace accurately mirrored high school circa 2004, and Facebook accurately mirrored college circa 2007 (complete with it being elitist where it was hard to get into when it first launched, just like real colleges).

But that was 20 years ago.

It's been downhill since FB removed pokes.

I was in high school when Facebook took off in my country (2008). And fair enough, first few years were maybe more “social-ish”. I left the platform by 2012 though.

Might also say more about me and my social behaviour than the social media platforms themselves, I never cared about it too much.