Social Networking is a communication technology that has recently hit home with our generation. Not only does it provide an easy way to talk to people that you know, but it provides an easy way to talk to people that you don't know. Sites like Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace have become more than just a short profile with random facts. They have morphed into a person's identity. What people put on their Facebook not only says their favorite movies and books, but says who their family is, what exactly they did that weekend, place of employment, and personal contact information like addresses and phone numbers. Many people use social networking not just to keep in contact with friends and family, but to see what they have been doing with their lives. Checking for status updates, looking at pictures, and keeping a close eye on their relationship statuses are just a few ways you can learn personal information about someone without even speaking to them.
A lot of people don't realize the information they are putting on their Facebook or MySpace is available to the entire world wide web. Although safety settings can be set a lot of people ignore them thinking "only my friends will see my page." This has proven time and time again to be untrue. Many colleges and even future employers will log onto Facebook and check and see if you put anything inappropriate or illegal on your profile. Not only that but the generation before us (laggards if you will) are now starting to get the hang of tweeting and news feed. Grandma probably wouldn't appreciate seeing a picture of you half naked as you're beer-bonging 8 BudLights.
Since Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace are becoming such an important role in culture and technology today it's easy to see why some people have had their profiles represent their identity. Lee Keenan Farquhar states that, "Facebookers craft their identity performances through a variety of components for a variety of audiences, and those performances are manifested in the selection and emphasis placed on specific types of images and text. Performance is a negotiation between performer desires and audience expectations and reactions." Clearly social networking and Facebook in particular has become more than just saying hello to old classmates. It has become a place where people go and update their lives. Like the saying goes, "it isn't official, until it's Facebook official," clearly is the way this technology is headed if it isn't already there.
Work Cited:
Farquhar, K.L. (2009). Identity negotiation on facebook.com. Dissertation Abstracts International Section A: Humanities and Social Sciences. Vol 70(8-A), 2010, 2785.
I somewhat agree with your blog. SNS allows us to not only meet friends and family who live far away from you constantly, but know someone who you have never met before by just clicking the names. This could be a strong point, but sometimes this could be very bad especially people like celebrities. Because if they even make a minor mistake, they are going to be a target for personal attack from tons of thousands of people. This kind of attack can make person to think of bad think like death. It is rare, but it happened in my country.
ReplyDelete-Yoo.144-
I agree, our lives do constantly revolve around some sort of social media. Personally, I think I wasted a good five or ten minutes on Facebook after reading your blog entry before deciding to focus and write out my comment on it. Another example on our heavy reliance on social media is a friend’s birthdays. If you asked me at this moment how many of my friends’ birthdays I remember off the top of my head, the number would probably be less than ten, if even that. We all constantly rely on social networking to inform us of such information.
ReplyDeleteI have a smartphone and I check social networking constantly, as well as having it instantly pushed to my phone in real-time. This just goes to further emphasize your point that where people go to update and keep in touch with everyone’s lives.
- lee.3697
I agree with your blog, cause everyone is doing the same thing in facebook. Uploading some of their interesting pictures to let more people know more about your current life. Update some status and let more people to know how you feel and what are you doing. However, privacy is becoming the biggest problems for all of us. Our profiles, status and pictures have exposed much information to the public. If the bad guys take advantage of it, people will be in big trouble. I think it is still quite safe to do this kind of things for now. But in the future, as technology advanced rapidly, people should concern more about it. Anything you do in social networking would give others more information about yourselves.
ReplyDeletesun.336
I found it interesting on how you pointed out how people do not just use Facebook to connect with others. People also use Facebook to form their identity and look through what others have put up as their identity. The problem is that sometimes the identity you have on Facebook can cause dire consequences for your future. So with that there is a dilemma, do you allow everyone to see the "real" you or do you censor your page to avoid any problems? Most people would say they would rather be safe than sorry and would choose to censor. I feel like that will be the downfall of Facebook, the fact it got too popular to the point where it affects outside forces. People are constantly deactivating their accounts and some even permanently deleting them because maybe their boss has one, or their 8 year old nephew might see inappropriate pictures. While Facebook tried to expand, I feel it did too much to the point where Facebook accounts will lose their unique "personality touch," a major reason Facebook is even popular.
ReplyDeleterubio.17 (david)
I agree with your blog. At times I myself have used the phrase, "well its not facebook official" and even my boyfriends sister didn't call everyone in the family prior to her engagement. She posted it, and waited for others to call her. I am a fan of how facebook is laid out, its usability and span of use it great. It has surpassed Myspace by far through their innovations. But what intrigues me more is how Facebook effects our society, through actual social events, health and privacy. Privacy has been under the fire in the past few years and not without good reason. I think if Facebook can continue to innovate, fix their problems, and maybe implement a social currency program like American Express, to help people get active and join more organizations.
ReplyDeleteScott.1028
great essay. I agree that social networking sites have created a new way to interact with people. It is so easy to meet someone, just learn their name, look it up on facebook and learn a lot about them. But I wonder what the consequences of this are. I think social networking sites are great in how we can share so much information, and interact with people. But is this going to take away from face to face communication? I am not sure, but with social networking sites being somewhat new it is going to be interesting to see the effects it has on us down the road.
ReplyDeletekocheff.1
Right before I read this I got off the phone with my mom about how many facebook pictures I should take down. Social networking has not only added new forms of communicating with one another, but new ways to be paranoid about who's looking at your private information, as well. I also agree with you about checking statuses, tweets, and updates almost constantly. Writing a paper is almost easier without WiFI to get easily distacted by Facebook, Twitter, and other social networking sites. Another good point you made was the use of the "facebook official" comment, what my friends and I always shorten to "FBO." No one is married, dating, pregnant, or broken up until it's FBO. People weren't even sure if Obama was dead or not until it was FBO! Your post is a great example of how social networking has really affected today's realm of communications.
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