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There's Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest, Linkedin and Flickr and so on. The variety of social media available to internet users is really mind blowing. Social media is all around us and has changed the world in many ways.
Social media has changed the way we interact dramatically. It used to take forever to get a message to a relative or friend that didn't live in the same area as you (of course I speak mostly from what I've heard my parents say :P). I have family in Kentucky I can speak to on Twitter in no time. It's almost impossible to lose contact with someone now, as long as they have some type of social media.
Social media allows us to talk to more people at once. You can post statuses, send group messages, or join a forum. I mean you can talk to all your friends or even people across the world who share the same opinions as you. Your opinion has a better chance of spreading on social media. Also, social media is relatively uncensored. You have to have your comments approved to be printed in a newspaper or even on a website ran by someone else. There's no filter or anyone controlling what you post to the people who decide to look on your profile.
Okay so, if you read my post about Google, you should know I'm about to post something negative to go along...
Again, what if this is making us unlikely to socialize? We don't even have to leave our houses to speak to the people we meet. Messaging someone on Facebook is becoming more common than coming up to someone in person for the first interaction. Many people say things on the internet they would NEVER have the courage to say in public. You really learn a lot about your peers when you creep on their profiles as opposed to watching them sit quietly in class, trust me. And we (well, most of us...at least I don't) don't have thousands of friends. We only have a few. It's crazy how many people we're sharing all our personal information with. But to each their own.
Oh, and one more complaint before I move on...while yeah you can get your opinion out to a wider range of people..you typically only form into groups of people with people who share the same opinions as you. So we're not exposed to different opinions which might make us a little close minded. And if someone feels different than a group, they get excluded or even worse, bullied. Social media has made bullying just so much easier I feel.
Social media has become an important source for news. While the credibility of some sources can clearly be contested, news channels tweet or give updates on significant happenings all over the world. Their availability on social networks makes news more accessible. For instance, when I want to know anything going on at my college, I check the school's twitter page for the news:
Political awareness has definitely increased with social media. Some countries aren't even allowed to log into Facebook because it enables them to see everything going on in the world. News channels make information known to us all. This was apparent to me during the presidential elections in the US. CNN went above and beyond to keep their Facebook connected to everything going on.
The last subject I'll tread on is how social media has changed advertising. It seems like more companies are less TV based and more social media based. When you buy something, it will usually have "Check us out on Facebook/Twitter" somewhere on it. And because social media is all about you and your desires, the sites will tailor the adds to you. You're more likely to find ads for what you want and buy more of it.
It's debatable whether social media has changed us for the best or the worst, but it's needless to say it has changed this generation indefinitely. Who knows what will come next for social media?
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