https://qz.com/1295240/the-future-of-social-media-feels-a-lot-like-the-past/

If you were a Western child born in the 1980s or early 1990s, you probably ran home after school to chat with your friends (who you literally were just talking to in person) on AOL Instant Messenger, or MSN Messenger, depending on your locale. Both were great at letting users know when their friends were online, and letting them write status updates, which were supposed to say where they were, but were usually just emo band lyrics ~iN WeiRD cASiNg~.

But then, as Facebook said in its recent non-apology video, something happened. The way we communicated on the internet shifted wildly with the advent of social media. Messaging became more asynchronous, where we drop texts, posts, tweets, and other digital breadcrumbs without knowing when or if our friends and followers will even see them. But for millions of teenagers, that old messaging experience is returning.