Archive for social networking
An Interpretation of Social Media
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By now you’ve certainly heard the buzz surrounding the terms “social media” and “Web 2.0“, but what do they really mean?
There doesn’t seem to be a definitive one-line answer for either of these terms. If you were to ask 20 people you would likely get 20 varying responses, as everyone has their personal perception of their meaning. The definitions of these terms have no hard boundary.
This is my interpretation of these terms, which could be discussed for hours on in, but I will attempt to keep this as plain and simple as possible. I do however; hope to stimulate some conversation in the comments section below.
Web 2.0
Web 2.0 is not the latest software upgrade for the internet but rather a transition to a system where content and sites have integrated the use of various formats and tools. It’s a community of people who are content producers as well as consumers of content, products and services. It’s all about how people now use the internet.
The landscape has now changed forever as the web is now perceived as having reached it’s second generation of development and design. The old model was about content production from one to many; today’s model observes content production from many to many. Static web pages have been replaced by dynamic sites with sharable content and social networking capabilities.
The term “Web 2.0″ was actually introduced in 2004 to characterize the new generation of web apps which began the movement toward a more dynamic environment, as we have today. Tim O’Reilly has stated that he first encountered the term in the name of a 2004 web conference.
Social media
This term is not, in my opinion, mutually exclusive from Web 2.0. There is much similarity and crossover in terms of what they each represent. Social media is really the methods, tools and platforms used to drive the web 2.0 experience.
I find both terms fascinating as if nothing else, they always stimulate a conversation. Many have seen these as just the latest computer jargon, but if these topics are explored, you’ll find that they are far from that.
For instance, publishing technologies have made it easy for people to satisfy the need for online social interaction and the result is nothing short of amazing when you consider the enormous amount of content being shared all over the world in today’s digital environment.
Look at the various forms of content sharing available to us today. Here are just a few examples:
Communication
- Blogs
- Micro-blogs: Twitter, Tumblr, Plurk
- Social networking: Facebook, Myspace, Ning
- Social and news aggregation: Friendfeed, Ping.fm
- Conferences and other events
Collaborative Efforts
- Social bookmarking: Stumbleupon, Delicious
- Social news: Reddit, Digg
- Wikis: Wikipedia, Wikispaces
- Opinion and reviews: Eopinion, Cnet,
Multimedia
- Audio: itunes, Pandora, Soundboard
- Video: YouTube, Vimeo
- Photo: Flickr, Zooomr
- Livecasting: LiveCast
Conclusion
As you can see, this is not your Daddy’s internet. Social media is part of the Web 2.0 experience and will continue to be for years to come. The internet has changed in way perhaps not envisioned a couple of decades ago. It has become a living, thriving digital world full of knowledge and interaction.
So what is your interpretation of these terms and how have they affected your online experience?
Readers of this article may also find interest in:
Social Networking Sites – They’re in Your Business
Managing Your Social Networking Activity
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Are Social Networking Sites Reducing Email’s Usage?
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Just the other day I was talking with my good friend Andre’ Smith and we were discussing how many of our friends have now jumped on the social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter. People that once had no interests in online activities just a few short years ago have been bitten by the social networking bug. Man, how times have changed.
Next thing you know they’ll be telling us how the discovered the internet 
After the conversation, I began to wonder about the impact of social networking sites on the use of email. People who once spent all of their time using email now spend lots of time using Facebook and other community sites.
So are they using email less or staying online more?
When asked, most are unable to quantify this or simply have no idea.
Email was once the main social networking tool online. This is how most of our information was circulated. Many emails would quickly go viral, depending on the content and served as the conversations of the day.
Today, social networking has surpassed email in popularity and for good reason. The responses are often instant and let’s face it, there is a lot more to keep your interest using social networking sites. Email shall remain a powerful tool but for many, it has become more just another tool.
With all of the interaction on the social networking sites, one may think that a reduction in the number of emails required to communicate would have occurred. This would represent a shift in the message delivery system, but has this really occurred?
I honestly cannot tell if I am using less email today than years ago. The data needed to answer this or to conduct a survey is difficult to recover at this point, some of which has been deleted anyway. So I’m left to go on my internal feelings, which seem to indicate that I am actually using just as much or more email today than in the past.
For one thing, I have more accounts now than yesteryear and each gets it’s fair share of new mail daily. A look at any inbox indicates that things have not really slowed at all. But that’s my personal view, what about the larger view?
In researching the answer I came upon an Online Publisher’s Association Press Release that indicates that consumers are spending more time online with content sites than with social networking and communication sites.
This supports the decline in email usage, since people are able to communicate on the social networks more efficiently, as the report points out.
Facebook, MySpace and LinkedIn, according to the Press Release, have had a significant impact on the communications category, which saw a 41% decline.
So what impact has social networking had on your email usage?
Do you feel you are using less, more or about the same?
If you’d like to read the full OPA Press Release, you can find it here.
