We are all guilty of this phenomenon that has become a huge part of our lives. Whether it be for email, facebook, or twitter, we all have some sort of social media in our lives. Facebook was founded in 2004 as a social networking service. Two years later, Twitter arrived.
I began using Facebook in 2006 and haven’t looked back. Facebook became another email account for me. I checked it everyday (still do), replied to messages, and if I needed to get a hold of someone, all I had to do was write on their wall. I belong to an international non-profit youth organization, which has allowed me to meet friends from all over the world, including across the United States and Australia. Without Facebook, I strongly doubt that I would still be in contact with most of the people I have met. Emailing and Facebook has allowed me to share pictures of trips and events I have attended with others in this organization. However, in recent weeks I have started to wonder how much we all depend on social media and if we can say that it’s a good thing or bad?
In an article published by Inc. Technology, Social media has become a great, inexpensive tool for companies to use in order to promote products. At the same time, social media has made it easy for us to take work from others and make it seem like it is our own. In recent weeks, Facebook, Blackberry, and Twitter representatives have said that social media was a positive tool during the English riots.
I became aware of the deaths of NHL player Wade Belak and British soul singer Amy Winehouse through Facebook. When news of Amy Winehouse’s death reached the Hollywood world, celebrities used their twitter accounts to express their grief and shock over this passing.
With all this in mind, do you think social media is good or bad for our society? Do you believe that social media will be around for many years to come or will it eventually become something of the past?
I think social media is as good or bad as you want it to be. For example, I use Facebook to communicate with my family and friends in Europe. They use social media for its basic function, but their dependency on it for social interaction is limited.
ReplyDeleteOn another hand, I know of someone who is fully satisfied maintaining their friendships through FB. She even turned down someone's request to meet in person because she felt she was updated and knew everything important about her "friend" from her newsfeed.
Personally, I use it as a function rather than a resource. I think it will be around for a good number of years on that alone--it's a huge contacts list of people. You wouldn't find a vast personal network like you can obtain through social media anywhere else.