A word about social networking

This article is about the type of service. For the social science theoretical concept of relationships between people, see Social network. For a list of services, see List of social networking services.

A social networking service or SNS (sometimes called a social networking site) is an online platform which people use to build social networks or social relationships with other people who share similar personal or career content, interests, activities, backgrounds or real-life connections.^[1][2]

Social networking services vary in format and the number of features. They can incorporate a range of new information and communication tools, operating on desktops and on laptops, on mobile devices such as tablet computers and smartphones. This may feature digital photo/video/sharing and diary entries online (blogging).^[2] Online community services are sometimes considered social-network services by developers and users, though in a broader sense, a social-network service usually provides an individual-centered service whereas online community services are groups centered. Generally defined as «websites that facilitate the building of a network of contacts in order to exchange various types of content online,» social networking sites provide a space for interaction to continue beyond in-person interactions. These computer mediated interactions link members of various networks and may help to create, sustain and develop new social and professional relationships.^[3]

Social networking sites allow users to share ideas, digital photos and videos, posts, and to inform others about online or real-world activities and events with people within their social network. While in-person social networking – such as gathering in a village market to talk about events – has existed since the earliest development of towns,^[4] the web enables people to connect with others who live in different locations across the globe (dependent on access to an Internet connection to do so). Depending on the social media platform, members may be able to contact any other member. In other cases, members can contact anyone they have a connection to, and subsequently anyone that contact has a connection to, and so on. The success of social networking services can be seen in their dominance in society today, with Twitter, social-networking platform which being refer to as ‘world town square’ that offers its member a real-time activity like contacting anyone including friends, sharing their photos, videos and texts in form of ‘tweets’. Facebook having a massive 2.13 billion active monthly users and an average of 1.4 billion daily active users in 2017.^[5] LinkedIn, a career-oriented social-networking service, generally requires that a member personally know another member in real life before they contact them online. Some services require members to have a preexisting connection to contact other members. With COVID-19, Zoom, a videoconferencing platform, has taken an integral place to connect people located around the world and facilitate many online environments such as school, university, work and government meetings.

The main types of social networking services contain category places (such as age or occupation or religion), means to connect with friends (usually with self-description pages), and a recommendation system linked to trust. One can categorize social-network services into four types:^[6]

• socialization social network services used primarily for socializing with existing friends or users (e.g., Facebook, Instagram, Twitter)
• online social networks are decentralized and distributed computer networks where users communicate with each other through Internet services.
• networking social network services used primarily for non-social interpersonal communication (e.g., LinkedIn, a career- and employment-oriented site)
• social navigation social network services used primarily for helping users to find specific information or resources (e.g., Goodreads for books, Reddit)

There have been attempts to standardize these services to avoid the need to duplicate entries of friends and interests (see the FOAF standard). A study reveals that India recorded world’s largest growth in terms of social media users in 2013.^[7] A 2013 survey found that 73% of U.S. adults use social-networking sites.^[8]

Definition[edit]

There is a variety of social networking services available online. However, most incorporate common features:^[1]

• social networking services are, Internet-based applications^[1][9]
• user-generated content (UGC) is the lifeblood of social networking services.^[1][9]
• users create service-specific profiles for the site or app that are designed and maintained by the SNS organization^[1][2]
• social networking services facilitate the development of online social networks by connecting a user’s profile with those of other individuals or groups.^[1][2][10]

A challenge of definition[edit]

The variety and evolving range of stand-alone and built-in social networking services in the online space introduces a challenge of definition.^[1] Furthermore, the idea that these services are defined by their ability to bring people together provides too broad a definition. Such a broad definition would suggest that the telegraph and telephone were social networking services – the Internet technologies scholars are intending to describe.^[11] The terminology is also unclear, with some referring to social networking services as social media.^[2]

Attempting definition[edit]

An attempt in 2015^[1] at providing a clear definition reviewed the prominent literature in the area and identified four commonalities unique to current social networking services:

1. social networking services are interactive Web 2.0 Internet-based applications,^[1][9]
2. user-generated content (UGC), such as user-submitted digital photos, text posts, «tagging», online comments, and diary-style «web logs» (blogs), is the lifeblood of the SNS organism,^[1][9]
3. users create service-specific profiles for the site or app that are designed and maintained by the SNS organization,^[1][2] and
4. social networking services facilitate the development of social networks online by connecting a user’s profile with those of other individuals or groups.^[1][2]

Offline and online social networking services[edit]

Differences between offline and online social networking services^[12]

Characteristic	Offline social network	Online social network
Degree centrality	While the number of cognitively manageable ties is limited to about 150,[13] most people report having 14–56 ties at average[14][15]	Huge number of ties technologically possible, but average number is limited, e.g., Facebook: 395[16][17][18][19][20]
Symmetry	Usually symmetric (reciprocal behavior[21])	Symmetric (e.g., Instagram, LinkedIn, XING)[22] and asymmetric (e.g., Twitter)[23]
Affect	Positive (92–97%) and negative (3–8%) tie relationships[24] can be managed using high sophisticated coordination mechanisms such as argumentation and negotiation[12][25][26][27]	Except through blocking (e.g., Twitter) or hiding (e.g., Facebook) limited support to deal with negative tie relationships
Strength	2–8 strong ties and 12–48 weak/latent ties on average[14][28]	9–37 strong ties and 68–131 weak/latent ties on average[29][30][17]
Dynamic of change	Low due to manual interaction[31][32]	High because of technological support[32][24]

History[edit]

The potential for computer networking to facilitate newly improved forms of computer-mediated social interaction was suggested early on.^[33] Efforts to support social networks via computer-mediated communication were made in many early online services, including Usenet,^[34] ARPANET, LISTSERV, and bulletin board services (BBS). Many prototypical features of social networking sites were also present in online services such as The Source, Delphi, America Online, Prodigy, CompuServe, ChatNet, and The WELL.^[35]

Early social networking on the World Wide Web began in the form of generalized online communities such as Theglobe.com (1995),^[36] Geocities (1994) and Tripod.com (1995). Many of these early communities focused on bringing people together to interact with each other through chat rooms and encouraged users to share personal information and ideas via personal web pages by providing easy-to-use publishing tools and free or inexpensive web space. Some communities – such as Classmates.com – took a different approach by simply having people link to each other via email addresses. PlanetAll started in 1996.

In the late 1990s, user profiles became a central feature of social networking sites, allowing users to compile lists of «friends» and search for other users with similar interests. New social networking methods were developed by the end of the 1990s, and many sites began to develop more advanced features for users to find and manage friends.^[37] Open Diary, a community for online diarists, invented both friends-only content and the reader comment, two features of social networks important to user interaction.^[9]

This newer generation of social networking sites began to flourish with the emergence of SixDegrees in 1997,^[2] Open Diary in 1998,^[38] Mixi in 1999,^[39] Makeoutclub in 2000,^[40][41] Cyworld in 2001,^[42][2] Hub Culture in 2002, and Friendster and Nexopia in 2003.^[43] Cyworld also became one of the first companies to profit from the sale of virtual goods.^[44][45] MySpace and LinkedIn were launched in 2003, and Bebo was launched in 2005. Orkut became the first popular social networking service in Brazil (although most of its very first users were from the United States) and quickly grew in popularity in India (Madhavan, 2007).^[2] There was a rapid increase in social networking sites’ popularity; in 2005, MySpace had more pageviews than Google.^[46] Many of these services were displaced by Facebook, which launched in 2004 and became the largest social networking site in the world in 2009.^[47][48]

[edit]

The term social media was first used in 2004 and is often used to describe social networking services.^[49][50]

[edit]

Web-based social networking services make it possible to connect people who share interests and activities across political, economic, and geographic borders.^[51] Through e-mail and instant messaging, online communities are created where a gift economy and reciprocal altruism are encouraged through cooperation. Information is suited to a gift economy, as information is a nonrival good and can be gifted at practically no cost.^[52][53] Scholars have noted that the term «social» cannot account for technological features of the social network platforms alone.^[54] Hence, the level of network sociability should determine by the actual performances of its users. According to the communication theory of uses and gratifications, an increasing number of individuals are looking to the Internet and social media to fulfill cognitive, affective, personal integrative, social integrative, and tension free needs. With Internet technology as a supplement to fulfill needs, it is in turn affecting every day life, including relationships, school, church, entertainment, and family.^[55] Companies are using social media as a way to learn about potential employees’ personalities and behavior. In numerous situations, a candidate who might otherwise have been hired has been rejected due to offensive or otherwise unseemly photos or comments posted to social networks or appearing on a newsfeed.

Facebook and other social networking tools are increasingly the aims of scholarly research. Scholars in many fields have begun to investigate the impact of social networking sites, investigating how such sites may play into issues of identity, politics, privacy,^[56]
social capital, youth culture, and education.^[57] Research has also suggested that individuals add offline friends on Facebook to maintain contact and often this blurs the lines between work and home lives.^[58] Users from around the world also utilise social networking sites as an alternative news source.^[59] While social networking sites have arguably changed how we access the news,^[60] users tend to have mixed opinions about the reliability of content accessed through these sites.^[61]

According to a study in 2015, 63% of the users of Facebook or Twitter in the USA consider these networks to be their main source of news, with entertainment news being the most seen. In the times of breaking news, Twitter users are more likely to stay invested in the story. In some cases when the news story is more political, users may be more likely to voice their opinion on a linked Facebook story with a comment or like, while Twitter users will just follow the site’s feed and retweet the article.^[62] In online social networks, the veracity and reliability of news may be diminished due to the absence of traditional media gatekeepers.^[63]

A 2015 study shows that 85% of people aged 18 to 34 use social networking sites for their purchase decision making. While over 65% of people aged 55 and over-rely on word of mouth.^[64] Several websites are beginning to tap into the power of the social networking model for philanthropy. Such models provide a means for connecting otherwise fragmented industries and small organizations without the resources to reach a broader audience with interested users.^[65] Social networks are providing a different way for individuals to communicate digitally. These communities of hypertexts allow for the sharing of information and ideas, an old concept placed in a digital environment. In 2011, HCL Technologies conducted research that showed that 50% of British employers had banned the use of social networking sites/services during office hours.^[66][67]

Research has provided us with mixed results as to whether or not a person’s involvement in social networking can affect their feelings of loneliness. Studies have indicated that how a person chooses to use social networking can change their feelings of loneliness in either a negative or positive way. Some companies with mobile workers have encouraged their workers to use social networking to feel connected. Educators are using social networking to stay connected with their students whereas individuals use it to stay connected with their close relationships.^[68] Each social networking user is able to create a community that centers around a personal identity they choose to create online.^[69] In his book Digital Identities: Creating and Communicating the Online Self,^[70] Rob Cover argues that social networking’s foundation in Web 2.0, high-speed networking shifts online representation to one which is both visual and relational to other people, complexifying the identity process for younger people and creating new forms of anxiety.^[70] In 2016, news reports stated that excessive usage of SNS sites may be associated with an increase in the rates of depression, to almost triple the rate for non-SNS users. Experts worldwide^[which?] have said that 2030 people who use SNS more have higher levels of depression than those who use SNS less.^[71] At least one study went as far as to conclude that the negative effects of Facebook usage are equal to or greater than the positive effects of face-to-face interactions.^[72]

According to a recent article from Computers in Human Behavior, Facebook has also been shown to lead to issues of social comparison. Users are able to select which photos and status updates to post, allowing them to portray their lives in acclamatory manners.^[73] These updates can lead to other users feeling like their lives are inferior by comparison.^[74] Users may feel especially inclined to compare themselves to other users with whom they share similar characteristics or lifestyles, leading to a fairer comparison.^[73] Motives for these comparisons can be associated with the goals of improving oneself by looking at profiles of people who one feels are superior, especially when their lifestyle is similar and possible.^[73] One can also self-compare to make oneself feel superior to others by looking at the profiles of users who one believes to be worse off.^[73] However, a study by the Harvard Business Review shows that these goals often lead to negative consequences, as use of Facebook has been linked with lower levels of well-being; mental health has been shown to decrease due to the use of Facebook.^[74] Computers in Human Behavior emphasizes that these feelings of poor mental health have been suggested to cause people to take time off from their Facebook accounts; this action is called «Facebook Fatigue» and has been common in recent years.^[73]

Usage of social networking has contributed to a new form of abusive communication, and academic research has highlighted a number of social-technological explanations for this behaviour. These including the anonymity afforded by interpersonal communications,^[75] factors that include boredom or attention seeking,^[76] or the result of more polarised online debate.^[77] The impact in this abuse has found impacts through the prevalence of online cyberbullying, and online trolling. There has also been a marked increase in political violence and abuse through social media platforms. For instance, one study by Ward and McLoughlin found that 2.57% of all messages sent to UK MPs on Twitter were found to contain abusive messages.^[77]

Features[edit]

Typical features[edit]

According to boyd and Ellison’s 2007 article, «Why Youth (Heart) Social Network Sites: The Role of Networked Publics in Teenage Social Life», social networking sites share a variety of technical features that allow individuals to: construct a public/semi-public profile, articulate a list of other users that they share a connection with, and view their list of connections within the system. The most basic of these are visible profiles with a list of «friends» who are also users of the site.^[57] In an article entitled «Social Network Sites: Definition, History, and Scholarship,» boyd and Ellison adopt Sunden’s (2003) description of profiles as unique pages where one can «type oneself into being».^[2] A profile is generated from answers to questions, such as age, location, interests, etc. Some sites allow users to upload pictures, add multimedia content or modify the look and feel of the profile. Others, e.g., Facebook, allow users to enhance their profile by adding modules or «Applications».^[2] Many sites allow users to post blog entries, search for others with similar interests and compile and share lists of contacts. User profiles often have a section dedicated to comments from friends and other users. To protect user privacy, social networks typically have controls that allow users to choose who can view their profile, contact them, add them to their list of contacts, and so on.

Additional features[edit]

There is a trend towards more interoperability between social networks led by technologies such as OpenID and OpenSocial. In most mobile communities, mobile phone users can now create their own profiles, make friends, participate in chat rooms, create chat rooms, hold private conversations, share photos and videos, and share blogs by using their mobile phone. Some companies provide wireless services that allow their customers to build their own mobile community and brand it; one of the most popular wireless services for social networking in North America and Nepal is Facebook Mobile.
Recently, Twitter has also introduced fact check labels to combat misinformation which was primarily spread due to the coronavirus but also has had an impact on debunking false claims by Donald Trump in the 2020 election.

Social media platforms may allow users to change their user name (or «handle», distinct from the «display name»), which could change the URL to their profile. Users are advised to do so with caution, since it could break back links from others’ posts and comments depending on implementation, and external back links.^[78]

Emerging trends[edit]

The things you share are things that make you look good, things which you are happy to tie into your identity.

While the popularity of social networking consistently rises,^[80] new uses for the technology are frequently being observed. Today’s technologically savvy population requires convenient solutions to their daily needs.^[81] At the forefront of emerging trends in social networking sites is the concept of «real-time web» and «location-based». Real-time allows users to contribute contents, which is then broadcast as it is being uploaded—the concept is analogous to live radio and television broadcasts. Twitter set the trend for «real-time» services, wherein users can broadcast to the world what they are doing, or what is on their minds within a 140-character limit. Facebook followed suit with their «Live Feed» where users’ activities are streamed as soon as it happens. While Twitter focuses on words, Clixtr, another real-time service, focuses on group photo sharing wherein users can update their photo streams with photos while at an event. Facebook, however, remains the largest photo sharing site with over 250 billion photos as of September 2013.^[82] In April 2012, the image-based social media network Pinterest had become the third largest social network in the United States.^[83]

Companies have begun to merge business technologies and solutions, such as cloud computing, with social networking concepts. Instead of connecting individuals based on social interest, companies are developing interactive communities that connect individuals based on shared business needs or experiences. Many provide specialized networking tools and applications that can be accessed via their websites, such as LinkedIn. Others companies, such as Monster.com, have been steadily developing a more «socialized» feel to their career center sites to harness some of the power of social networking sites. These more business related sites have their own nomenclature for the most part but the most common naming conventions are «Vocational Networking Sites» or «Vocational Media Networks», with the former more closely tied to individual networking relationships based on social networking principles.

Foursquare gained popularity as it allowed for users to check into places that they are frequenting at that moment. Gowalla is another such service that functions in much the same way that Foursquare does, leveraging the GPS in phones to create a location-based user experience. Clixtr, though in the real-time space, is also a location-based social networking site, since events created by users are automatically geotagged, and users can view events occurring nearby through the Clixtr iPhone app. Recently, Yelp announced its entrance into the location-based social networking space through check-ins with their mobile app; whether or not this becomes detrimental to Foursquare or Gowalla is yet to be seen, as it is still considered a new space in the Internet technology industry.^[84]

One popular use for this new technology is social networking between businesses. Companies have found that social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter are great ways to build their brand image. According to Jody Nimetz, author of Marketing Jive,^[85] there are five major uses for businesses and social media: to create brand awareness, as an online reputation management tool, for recruiting, to learn about new technologies and competitors, and as a lead generation tool to intercept potential prospects.^[85] These companies are able to drive traffic to their own online sites while encouraging their consumers and clients to have discussions on how to improve or change products or services. As of September 2013, 71% of online adults use Facebook, 17% use Instagram, 21% use Pinterest, and 22% use LinkedIn.^[86]

Niche networks[edit]

In 2012, it was reported that in the past few years, the niche social network has steadily grown in popularity, thanks to better levels of user interaction and engagement. In 2012, a survey by Reuters and research firm Ipsos^[87]
found that one in three users were getting bored with Facebook and in 2014 the GlobalWebIndex found that this figured had risen to almost 50%. The niche social network offers a specialized space that’s designed to appeal to a very specific market with a clearly defined set of needs. Where once the streams of social minutia on networks such as Facebook and Twitter were the ultimate in online voyeurism, now users are looking for connections, community and shared experiences. Social networks that tap directly into specific activities, hobbies, tastes, and lifestyles are seeing a consistent rise in popularity.

Science[edit]

One other use that is being discussed is the use of social networks in the science communities. Julia Porter Liebeskind et al. have published a study on how new biotechnology firms are using social networking sites to share exchanges in scientific knowledge.^[88] They state in their study that by sharing information and knowledge with one another, they are able to «increase both their learning and their flexibility in ways that would not have been possible within a self-contained hierarchical organization». Social networking is allowing scientific groups to expand their knowledge base and share ideas, and without these new means of communicating their theories might become «isolated and irrelevant». Researchers use social networks frequently to maintain and develop professional relationships.^[89] They are interested in consolidating social ties and professional contact, keeping in touch with friends and colleagues and seeing what their own contacts are doing. This can be related to their need to keep updated on the activities and events of their friends and colleagues in order to establish collaborations on common fields of interest and knowledge sharing.^[90]

Social networks are also used to communicate scientists research results^[91] and as a public communication tool and to connect people who share the same professional interests, their benefits can vary according to the discipline.^[92] The most interesting aspects of social networks for professional purposes are their potentialities in terms of dissemination of information and the ability to reach and multiple professional contacts exponentially. Social networks like Academia.edu, LinkedIn, Facebook, and ResearchGate give the possibility to join professional groups and pages, to share papers and results, publicize events, to discuss issues and create debates.^[90] Academia.edu is extensively used by researchers, where they follow a combination of social networking and scholarly norms.^[93] ResearchGate is also widely used by researchers, especially to disseminate and discuss their publications,^[94] where it seems to attract an audience that it wider than just other scientists.^[95] The usage of Research Gate and Academia in different academic communities has increasingly been studied in recent years.^[96]

Education[edit]

The advent of social networking platforms may also be impacting the ways in which learners engage with technology in general. For a number of years, Prensky’s (2001) dichotomy between Digital Natives and Digital Immigrants has been considered a relatively accurate representation of the ease with which people of a certain age range—in particular those born before and after 1980—use technology. Prensky’s theory has been largely disproved, however, and not least on account of the burgeoning popularity of social networking sites and other metaphors such as White and Le Cornu’s «Visitors» and «Residents» (2011) are greater currency. The use of online social networks by school libraries is also increasingly prevalent and they are being used to communicate with potential library users, as well as extending the services provided by individual school libraries. Social networks and their educational uses are of interest to many researchers. According to Livingstone and Brake (2010), «Social networking sites, like much else on the Internet, represent a moving target for researchers and policymakers.»^[97] Pew Research Center project, called Pew Internet, did a USA-wide survey in 2009 and in 2010 February published that 47% of American adults use a social networking website.^[98] Same survey found that 73% of online teenagers use SNS, which is an increase from 65% in 2008, 55% in 2006.^[98] Recent studies have shown that social network services provide opportunities within professional education, curriculum education, and learning. However, there are constraints in this area. Researches, especially in Africa, have disclosed that the use of social networks among students has been known to affect their academic life negatively. This is buttressed by the fact that their use constitutes distractions, as well as that the students tend to invest a good deal of time in the use of such technologies.

Albayrak and Yildirim (2015) examined the educational use of social networking sites. They investigated students’ involvement in Facebook as a Course Management System (CMS) and the findings of their study support that Facebook as a CMS has the potential to increase student involvement in discussions and out-of-class communication among instructors and students.^[99]

Professional use[edit]

Professional use of social networking services refers to the employment of a network site to connect with other professionals within a given field of interest. These type of social networking services are referred to as «Career-oriented social networking markets (CSNM)».^[100]
LinkedIn is one example and is a social networking website geared towards companies and industry professionals looking to make new business contacts or keep in touch with previous co-workers, affiliates, and clients. LinkedIn provides not only a professional social use but also encourages people to inject their personality into their profile – making it more personal than a resume.^[101]
Similar websites to linkedin (also geared towards companies and industry professionals looking for work opportunities) to connect include AngelList, XING, Goodwall, The Dots,^[102] Jobcase, Opportunity, Bark.com, …^[103] Various freelance marketplace websites (which focus on freelance work) also exist. There are also a number of other employment websites focused on international volunteering, notably VolunteerMatch, Idealist.org and All for Good.^[104] National WWOOF networks finally allow for searching for homestays on organic farms.^[105]

Now other social network sites are also being used in this manner. Twitter has become [a] mainstay for professional development as well as promotion^[106] and online SNSs support both the maintenance of existing social ties and the formation of new connections. Much of the early research on online communities assume that individuals using these systems would be connecting with others outside their preexisting social group or location, liberating them to form communities around shared interests, as opposed to shared geography.^[107] Other researchers have suggested that the professional use of network sites produce «social capital». For individuals, social capital allows a person to draw on resources from other members of the networks to which he or she belongs.^[108] These resources can take the form of useful information, personal relationships, or the capacity to organize groups. As well, networks within these services also can be established or built by joining special interest groups that others have made, or creating one and asking others to join.^[109]

Curriculum use[edit]

According to Doering, Beach, and O’Brien, a future English curriculum needs to recognize a significant shift in how adolescents are communicating with each other.^[110] Curriculum uses of social networking services can also include sharing curriculum-related resources. Educators tap into user-generated content to find and discuss curriculum-related content for students. Responding to the popularity of social networking services among many students, teachers are increasingly using social networks to supplement teaching and learning in traditional classroom environments. This way they can provide new opportunities for enriching existing curriculum through creative, authentic and flexible, non-linear learning experiences.^[111] Some social networks, such as English, baby! and LiveMocha, are explicitly education-focused and couple instructional content with an educational peer environment.^[112] The new Web 2.0 technologies built into most social networking services promote conferencing, interaction, creation, research on a global scale, enabling educators to share, remix, and repurpose curriculum resources. In short, social networking services can become research networks as well as learning networks.^[113]

Learning use[edit]

Educators and advocates of new digital literacies are confident that social networking encourages the development of transferable, technical, and social skills of value in formal and informal learning.^[97] In a formal learning environment, goals or objectives are determined by an outside department or agency. Tweeting, instant messaging, or blogging enhances student involvement. Students who would not normally participate in class are more apt to partake through social network services. Networking allows participants the opportunity for just-in-time learning and higher levels of engagement.^[114] The use of SNSs allow educators to enhance the prescribed curriculum. When learning experiences are infused into a website student utilize every day for fun, students realize that learning can and should be a part of everyday life.^[115] It does not have to be separate and unattached.^{[116][unreliable source?]}

Informal learning consists of the learner setting the goals and objectives. It has been claimed that media no longer just influence human culture; they are human culture.^[117] With such a high number of users between the ages of 13–18, a number of skills are developed. Participants hone technical skills in choosing to navigate through social networking services. This includes elementary items such as sending an instant message or updating a status. The development of new media skills are paramount in helping youth navigate the digital world with confidence.

Social networking services foster learning through what Jenkins (2006) describes as a «participatory culture».^[118] A participatory culture consists of a space that allows engagement, sharing, mentoring, and an opportunity for social interaction. Participants of social network services avail of this opportunity. Informal learning, in the forms of participatory and social learning online, is an excellent tool for teachers to sneak in material and ideas that students will identify with and therefore, in a secondary manner, students will learn skills that would normally be taught in a formal setting in the more interesting and engaging environment of social learning.^{[119][unreliable source?]} Sites like Twitter provide students with the opportunity to converse and collaborate with others in real time.

Social networking services provide a virtual «space» for learners. James Gee (2004) suggests that affinity spaces instantiate participation, collaboration, distribution, dispersion of expertise, and relatedness.^[120] Registered users share and search for knowledge which contributes to informal learning.

Constraints[edit]

In the past, social networking services were viewed as a distraction and offered no educational benefit. Blocking these social networks was a form of protection for students against wasting time, bullying, and invasions of privacy. In an educational setting, Facebook, for example, is seen by many instructors and educators as a frivolous, time-wasting distraction from schoolwork, and it is not uncommon to be banned in junior high or high school computer labs.^[116] Cyberbullying has become an issue of concern with social networking services. According to the UK Children Go Online survey of 9- to 19-year-olds, it was found that a third have received bullying comments online.^[121] To avoid this problem, many school districts/boards have blocked access to social networking services such as Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter within the school environment. Social networking services often include a lot of personal information posted publicly, and many believe that sharing personal information is a window into privacy theft. Schools have taken action to protect students from this. It is believed that this outpouring of identifiable information and the easy communication vehicle that social networking services open the door to sexual predators, cyberbullying, and cyberstalking.^[122] In contrast, however, 70% of social media using teens and 85% of adults believe that people are mostly kind to one another on social network sites.^[98]

Recent research suggests that there has been a shift in blocking the use of social networking services. In many cases, the opposite is occurring as the potential of online networking services is being realized. It has been suggested that if schools block them [social networking services], they are preventing students from learning the skills they need.^[123] Banning social networking […] is not only inappropriate but also borderline irresponsible when it comes to providing the best educational experiences for students.^[124] Schools and school districts have the option of educating safe media usage as well as incorporating digital media into the classroom experience, thus preparing students for the literacy they will encounter in the future.

Positive correlates[edit]

A cyberpsychology research study conducted by Australian researchers demonstrated that a number of positive psychological outcomes are related to Facebook use.^[125][126] These researchers established that people can derive a sense of social connectedness and belongingness in the online environment. Importantly, this online social connectedness was associated with lower levels of depression and anxiety, and greater levels of subjective well-being. These findings suggest that the nature of online social networking determines the outcomes of online social network use.

Grassroots organizing[edit]

Social networks are being used by activists as a means of low-cost grassroots organizing. Extensive use of an array of social networking sites enabled organizers of 2009 National Equality March to mobilize an estimated 200,000 participants to march on Washington with a cost savings of up to 85% per participant over previous methods.^[127]
The August 2011 England riots were similarly considered to have escalated and been fuelled by this type of grassroots organization.

Employment[edit]

A rise in social network use is being driven by college students using the services to network with professionals for internship and job opportunities. Many studies have been done on the effectiveness of networking online in a college setting, and one notable one is by Phipps Arabie and Yoram Wind published in Advances in Social Network Analysis.^[128] Many schools have implemented online alumni directories which serve as makeshift social networks that current and former students can turn to for career advice. However, these alumni directories tend to suffer from an oversupply of advice-seekers and an undersupply of advice providers. One new social networking service, Ask-a-peer, aims to solve this problem by enabling advice seekers to offer modest compensation to advisers for their time. LinkedIn is also another great resource. It helps alumni, students and unemployed individuals look for work. They are also able to connect with others professionally and network with companies.

In addition, employers have been found to use social network sites to screen job candidates.^[129]

Hosting service[edit]

A social network hosting service is a web hosting service that specifically hosts the user creation of web-based social networking services, alongside related applications.

Trade network[edit]

A social trade network is a service that allows participants interested in specific trade sectors to share related contents and personal opinions.

Business model[edit]

Few social networks charge money for membership. In part, this may be because social networking is a relatively new service, and the value of using them has not been firmly established in customers’ minds. Companies such as Myspace and Facebook sell online advertising on their site. Their business model is based upon large membership count, and charging for membership would be counterproductive.^[130] Some believe that the deeper information that the sites have on each user will allow much better targeted advertising than any other site can currently provide.^[131] In recent times, Apple has been critical of the Google and Facebook model, in which users are defined as product and a commodity, and their data being sold for marketing revenue.^[132] Social networks operate under an autonomous business model, in which a social network’s members serve dual roles as both the suppliers and the consumers of content. This is in contrast to a traditional business model, where the suppliers and consumers are distinct agents. Revenue is typically gained in the autonomous business model via advertisements, but subscription-based revenue is possible when membership and content levels are sufficiently high.^[133]

[edit]

People use social networking sites for meeting new friends, finding old friends, or locating people who have the same problems or interests they have, called niche networking. More and more relationships and friendships are being formed online and then carried to an offline setting. Psychologist and University of Hamburg professor Erich H. Witte says that relationships which start online are much more likely to succeed. In this regard, there are studies which predict tie strength among the friends^[134] on social networking websites. One online dating site claims that 2% of all marriages begin at its site, the equivalent of 236 marriages a day. Other sites claim one in five relationships begin online.

Users do not necessarily share with others the content which is of most interest to them, but rather that which projects a good impression of themselves.^[79] While everyone agrees that social networking has had a significant impact on social interaction, there remains a substantial disagreement as to whether the nature of this impact is completely positive. A number of scholars have done research on the negative effects of Internet communication as well. These researchers have contended that this form of communication is an impoverished version of conventional face-to-face social interactions, and therefore produce negative outcomes such as loneliness and depression for users who rely on social networking entirely. By engaging solely in online communication, interactions between communities, families, and other social groups are weakened.^[135]

Issues[edit]

Social networking services have led to many issues regarding privacy, bullying, social anxiety and potential for misuse.

Investigations[edit]

Social networking services are increasingly being used in legal and criminal investigations. The information posted on sites such as MySpace and Facebook has been used by police (forensic profiling), probation, and university officials to prosecute users of said sites. In some situations, content posted on MySpace has been used in court.^[136]

Facebook is increasingly being used by school administrations and law enforcement agencies as a source of evidence against student users. This site being the number one online destination for college students, allows users to create profile pages with personal details. These pages can be viewed by other registered users from the same school, which often include resident assistants and campus police who have signed up for the service.^[137] One UK police force has sifted pictures from Facebook and arrested some people who had been photographed in a public place holding a weapon such as a knife (having a weapon in a public place is illegal).^[138]

Application domains[edit]

Government applications[edit]

Social networking is more recently being used by various government agencies. Social networking tools serve as a quick and easy way for the government to get the suggestion of the public and to keep the public updated on their activity, however, this comes with a significant risk of abuse, for example, to cultivate a culture of fear such as that outlined in Nineteen Eighty-Four or THX-1138.

The Centers for Disease Control demonstrated the importance of vaccinations on the popular children’s site Whyville and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has a virtual island on Second Life where people can explore caves or explore the effects of global warming.^[139] Likewise, NASA has taken advantage of a few social networking tools, including Twitter and Flickr. The NSA is taking advantage of them all.^[140] NASA is using such tools to aid the Review of U.S. Human Space Flight Plans Committee, whose goal it is to ensure that the nation is on a vigorous and sustainable path to achieving its boldest aspirations in space.^[141]

Business applications[edit]

The use of social networking services in an enterprise context presents the potential of having a major impact on the world of business and work.^[142] Social networks connect people at low cost; this can be beneficial for entrepreneurs and small businesses looking to expand their contact bases. These networks often act as a customer relationship management tool for companies selling products and services. Companies can also use social networks for advertising in the form of banners and text ads. Since businesses operate globally, social networks can make it easier to keep in touch with contacts around the world. Applications for social networking sites have extended toward businesses and brands are creating their own, high functioning sites, a sector known as brand networking. It is the idea that a brand can build its consumer relationship by connecting their consumers to the brand image on a platform that provides them relative content, elements of participation, and a ranking or score system. Brand networking is a new way to capitalize on social trends as a marketing tool. The power of social networks is beginning to permeate into internal culture of businesses where they are finding uses for collaboration, file sharing and knowledge transfer. The term «enterprise social software» is becoming increasingly popular for these types of applications.

Dating applications[edit]

Many social networks provide an online environment for people to communicate and exchange personal information for dating purposes. Intentions can vary from looking for a one time date, short-term relationships, and long-term relationships.^[143] Most of these social networks, just like online dating services, require users to give out certain pieces of information. This usually includes a user’s age, gender, location, interests, and perhaps a picture. Releasing very personal information is usually discouraged for safety reasons.^[144] This allows other users to search or be searched by some sort of criteria, but at the same time, people can maintain a degree of anonymity similar to most online dating services. Online dating sites are similar to social networks in the sense that users create profiles to meet and communicate with others, but their activities on such sites are for the sole purpose of finding a person of interest to date. Social networks do not necessarily have to be for dating; many users simply use it for keeping in touch with friends, and colleagues.^[145]

However, an important difference between social networks and online dating services is the fact that online dating sites usually require a fee, where social networks are free.^[146]
This difference is one of the reasons the online dating industry is seeing a massive decrease in revenue due to many users opting to use social networking services instead. Many popular online dating services such as Match.com, Yahoo Personals, and eHarmony.com are seeing a decrease in users, where social networks like MySpace and Facebook are experiencing an increase in users. The number of Internet users in the United States that visit online dating sites has fallen from a peak of 21% in 2003 to 10% in 2006.^[147] Whether it is the cost of the services, the variety of users with different intentions, or any other reason, it is undeniable that social networking sites are quickly becoming the new way to find dates online.

Educational applications[edit]

The National School Boards Association reports that almost 60% of students who use social networking talk about education topics online, and more than 50% talk specifically about schoolwork. Yet the vast majority of school districts have stringent rules against nearly all forms of social networking during the school day—even though students and parents report few problem behaviors online. Social networks focused on supporting relationships between teachers and their students are now used for learning, educators professional development, and content sharing. HASTAC is a collaborative social network space for new modes of learning and research in higher education, K-12, and lifelong learning; Ning supports teachers; TermWiki, TeachStreet and other sites are being built to foster relationships that include educational blogs, portfolios, formal and ad hoc communities, as well as communication such as chats, discussion threads, and synchronous forums. These sites also have content sharing and rating features. Social networks are also emerging as online yearbooks, both public and private. One such service is MyYearbook, which allows anyone from the general public to register and connect. A new trend emerging is private label yearbooks accessible only by students, parents, and teachers of a particular school, similar to Facebook’s beginning within Harvard.^{[citation needed]}

Finance applications[edit]

The use of virtual currency systems inside social networks create new opportunities for global finance. Hub Culture operates a virtual currency Ven used for global transactions among members, product sales^[148] and financial trades in commodities and carbon credits.^[149][150] In May 2010, carbon pricing contracts were introduced to the weighted basket of currencies and commodities that determine the floating exchange value of Ven. The introduction of carbon to the calculation price of the currency made Ven the first and only currency that is linked to the environment.^[151]

Medical and health applications[edit]

Social networks are beginning to be adopted by healthcare professionals as a means to manage institutional knowledge, disseminate peer to peer knowledge and to highlight individual physicians and institutions. The advantage of using a dedicated medical social networking site is that all the members are screened against the state licensing board list of practitioners.^[152] A new trend is emerging with social networks created to help its members with various physical and mental ailments.^[153] For people suffering from life-altering diseases or chronic health conditions, companies such as HealthUnlocked and PatientsLikeMe offers their members the chance to connect with others dealing with similar issues and share experiences. For alcoholics and addicts, SoberCircle gives people in recovery the ability to communicate with one another and strengthen their recovery through the encouragement of others who can relate to their situation. DailyStrength is also a website that offers support groups for a wide array of topics and conditions, including the support topics offered by PatientsLikeMe and SoberCircle. Some social networks aim to encourage healthy lifestyles in their users. SparkPeople and HealthUnlocked offer community and social networking tools for peer support during weight loss. Fitocracy and QUENTIQ are focused on exercise, enabling users to share their own workouts and comment on those of other users. Other aspects of social network usage include the analysis of data coming from existing social networks (such as Twitter) to discover large crowd concentration events (based on tweets location statistical analysis) and disseminate the information to e.g. mobility-challenged individuals for e.g. avoiding the specific areas and optimizing their journey in an urban environment.^[154]

Social and political applications[edit]

Social networking sites have recently showed a value in social and political movements.^[155] In the Egyptian revolution, Facebook and Twitter both played an allegedly pivotal role in keeping people connected to the revolt. Egyptian activists have credited social networking sites with providing a platform for planning protest and sharing news from Tahrir Square in real time. By presenting a platform for thousands of people to instantaneously share videos of mainly events featuring brutality, social networking can be a vital tool in revolutions.^[156] On the flip side, social networks enable government authorities to easily identify, and repress, protestors and dissidents.^[157] Another thing that social media helps with in political applications is getting the younger generations involved in politics and ongoing political issues.^[158]

Perhaps the most significant political application of social media is Barack Obama’s election campaign in 2008. It was the first of its kind, as it successfully incorporated social media into its campaign winning strategy, evolving the way of political campaigns forevermore in the ever-changing technological world we find ourselves in today. His campaign won by engaging everyday people and empowering volunteers, donors, and advocates, through social networks, text messaging, email messaging and online videos.^[159] Obama’s social media campaign was vast, with his campaign boasting 5 million ‘friends’ on over 15 social networking sites, with over 3 million friends just on Facebook.^[160] Another significant success of the campaign was online videos, with nearly 2,000 YouTube videos being put online, receiving over 80 million views.^[160]

In 2007, when Obama first announced his candidacy, there was no such thing as an iPhone or Twitter. However, a year later, Obama was sending out voting reminders to thousands of people through Twitter, showing just how fast social media moves. Obama’s campaign was current and needed to be successful in incorporating social media, as social media acts best and is most effective in real time.^[161]

Building up to the 2012 presidential election, it was interesting to see how strong the influence of social media would be following the 2008 campaigns, where Obama’s winning campaign had been social media-heavy, whereas McCain’s campaign did not really grasp social media. John F. Kennedy was the first president who really understood television, and similarly, Obama is the first president to fully understand the power of social media.^[162] Obama has recognized social media is about creating relationships and connections and therefore used social media to the advantage of presidential election campaigns, in which Obama has dominated his opponents in terms of social media space.

Other political campaigns have followed on from Obama’s successful social media campaigns, recognizing the power of social media and incorporating it as a key factor embedded within their political campaigns, for example, Donald Trump’s presidential electoral campaign, 2016. Dan Pfeiffer, Obama’s former digital and social media guru, commented that Donald Trump is «way better at the internet than anyone else in the GOP which is partly why he is winning».^[163]

Research has shown that 66% of social media users actively engage in political activity online, and like many other behaviors, online activities translate into offline ones.^[162] With research from the ‘MacArthur Research Network on Youth and Participatory Politics’ stating that young people who are politically active online are double as likely to vote than those who are not politically active online.^[162] Therefore, political applications of social networking sites are crucial, particularly to engage with the youth, who perhaps are the least educated in politics and the most in social networking sites. Social media is, therefore, a very effective way in which politicians can connect with a younger audience through their political campaigns.^[164]

On June 28, 2020, The New York Times released an article sharing the finding of two researchers who studied the impact of TikTok, a video-sharing and social networking application, on political expression. The application, besides being a creative space to express oneself, has been used maliciously to spread disinformation ahead of US President Donald Trump’s Tulsa rally in Oklahoma and amplified footage of police brutality at Black Lives Matter protests.^[165]

Crowdsourcing applications[edit]

Crowdsourcing social media platform, such as Design Contest, Arcbazar, Tongal, combined group of professional freelancers, such as designers, and help them communicate with business owners interested in their suggestion. This process is often used to subdivide tedious work or to fund-raise startup companies and charities, and can also occur offline.^[166]

Open source software[edit]

There are a number of projects that aim to develop free and open source software to use for social networking services. These technologies are often referred to as social engine or social networking engine software.

[edit]

The following is a list of the largest social networking services, in order by number of active users, as of April 2021, as published by Statista:^[167]

Service	Active users (in millions)
Facebook	2,853
YouTube	2,291
WhatsApp*	2,000
Instagram	1,386
Facebook Messenger	1,300
WeChat	1,250
TikTok	1,000
QQ	606
Douyin**	600
Sina Weibo	566
Telegram	550
Kuaishou*	481
Twitter	478
Pinterest	478
Reddit*	430
Quora*	300
Snapchat	293

*Platforms have not published updated user figures in the past 12 months, figures may be out of date and less reliable
**Figure uses daily active users, so monthly active user number is likely higher

See also[edit]

References[edit]

Further reading[edit]

External links[edit]

• The rise of social media, by Esteban Ortiz-Ospina (Our World in Data, Sep. 18, 2019) – Includes graph showing exponential growth

What is social networking?

Social networks are websites and apps that allow users and organizations to connect, communicate, share information and form relationships. People can connect with others in the same area, families, friends, and those with the same interests. Social networks are one of the most important uses of the internet today.

Popular social networking sites — such as Facebook, Yelp, Twitter, Instagram and TikTok — enable individuals to maintain social connections, stay informed and access, as well as share a wealth of information. These sites also enable marketers to reach their target audiences.

Social networking sites have come a long way since the first social networking site, SixDegrees.com, was launched in 1997. Today, the world is rapidly adopting newer social networking platforms. According to DataReportal, a Kepios analysis from January 2022 indicated that there are more than 4.74 billion social network users worldwide.

How does social networking work?

The term social networking entails having connections in both the real and the digital worlds. Today, this term is mainly used to reference online social communications. The internet has made it possible for people to find and connect with others who they may never have met otherwise.

Online social networking is dependent on technology and internet connectivity. Users can access social networking sites using their PCs, tablets or smartphones. Most social networking sites run on a back end of searchable databases that use advanced programming languages, such as Python, to organize, store and retrieve data in an easy-to-understand format. For example, Tumblr uses such products and services in its daily operations as Google Analytics, Google Workspace and WordPress.

What are social networks?

With the broad spectrum of websites, apps and services that exist online, there is no single exact definition of a social network. Generally, though, social networks have a few common attributes that set them apart.

• A social network will focus on user-generated content. Users primarily view and interact with content made by other users. They are encouraged to post text, status updates or pictures for viewing by others.
• Social networks allow the user or organization to create a profile. The profile contains information about the person and a centralized page with the content posted by them. Their profile may be associated with their real name.
• A social network has a way to form a lasting connection with other users. These connections are commonly called friending or following the other user. They allow the users to find other users and form webs of relationships. Often an algorithm will recommend other users and organizations they may want to form a connection with.

Although often used interchangeably, social network is different than social media. A social network focuses on the connections and relationships between individuals. Social media is more focused on an individual sharing with a large audience. In this case, media is used in the same sense as in mass media. Most social networks can also be used as social media sites.

What is the purpose of social networking?

Social networking fulfills the following four main objectives:

• Sharing. Friends or family members who are geographically dispersed can connect remotely and share information, updates, photos and videos. Social networking also enables individuals to meet other people with similar interests or to expand their current social networks.
• Learning. Social networks serve as great learning platforms. Consumers can instantly receive breaking news, get updates regarding friends and family, or learn about what’s happening in their community.
• Interacting. Social networking enhances user interactions by breaking the barriers of time and distance. With cloud-based video communication technologies such as WhatsApp or Instagram Live, people can talk face to face with anyone in the world.
• Marketing. Companies may tap into social networking services to enhance brand awareness with the platform’s users, improve customer retention and conversion rates, and promote brand and voice identity.

What are the different types of social networking?

While there are various categories of social networking sites, the six most common types are the following:

• Social connections. This is a type of social network where people stay in touch with friends, family members, acquaintances or brands through online profiles and updates, or find new friends through similar interests. Some examples are Facebook, Myspace and Instagram.
• Professional connections. Geared toward professionals, these social networks are designed for business relationships. These sites can be used to make new professional contacts, enhance existing business connections and explore job opportunities, for example. They may include a general forum where professionals can connect with co-workers or offer an exclusive platform based on specific occupations or interest levels. Some examples are LinkedIn, Microsoft Yammer and Microsoft Viva.
• Sharing of multimedia. Various social networks provide video- and photography-sharing services, including YouTube and Flickr.
• News or informational. This type of social networking allow users to post news stories, informational or how-to content and can be general purpose or dedicated to a single topic. These social networks include communities of people who are looking for answers to everyday problems and they have much in common with web forums. Fostering a sense of helping others, members provide answers to questions, conduct discussion forums or teach others how to perform various tasks and projects. Popular examples include Reddit, Stack Overflow or Digg.
• Communication. Here, social networks focus on allowing the user to communicate directly with each other in one-on-one or group chats. They have less focus on posts or updates and are like instant messaging apps. Some examples are WhatsApp, WeChat and Snapchat.
• Educational. Educational social networks offer remote learning, enabling students and teachers to collaborate on school projects, conduct research, and interact through blogs and forums. Google Classroom, LinkedIn Learning and ePals are popular examples.

What are the advantages and disadvantages of social networking?

Social networking can be a double-edged sword. On one end, it provides unsurpassed social benefits, yet it can also make people more vulnerable to the spread of misinformation, as well as privacy and security threats.

Social networking offers the following benefits to consumers and businesses:

• Brand awareness. Social networking enables companies to reach out to new and existing clients. This helps to make brands more relatable and promotes brand awareness.
• Instant reachability. By erasing the physical and spatial boundaries between people, social networking websites can provide instant reachability.
• Builds a following. Organizations and businesses can use social networking to build a following and expand their reach globally.
• Business success. Positive reviews and comments generated by customers on social networking platforms can help improve business sales and profitability.
• Increased website traffic. Businesses can use social networking profiles to boost and direct inbound traffic to their websites. They can achieve this, for example, by adding inspiring visuals, using plugins and shareable social media buttons, or encouraging inbound linking.

Social networking also has the following downsides:

• Rumors and misinformation. Incorrect information can slip through the cracks of social networking platforms, causing havoc and uncertainty among consumers. Often, people take anything posted on social networking sites at face value instead of verifying the sources.
• Negative reviews and comments. A single negative review can adversely affect an established business, especially if the comments are posted on a platform with a large following. A tarnished business reputation can often cause irreparable damage.
• Data security and privacy concerns. Social networking sites can inadvertently put consumer data at risk. For instance, if a social networking site experiences a data breach, the users of that platform automatically fall under the radar as well. According to Business Insider, a data breach in April 2021 leaked the personal data of more than 500 million Facebook users.
• Time-consuming process. Promoting a business on social media requires constant upkeep and maintenance. Creating, updating, preparing and scheduling regular posts can take a considerable amount of time. This can be especially cumbersome for small businesses that may not have the extra staff and resources to dedicate to social media marketing.

Social networks in business

There are many ways a business or organization can use social networks. Globally, the average person spends over two hours a day using social networks. This represents a great opportunity and market.

Most social networks are run as for-profit companies. They make most of their revenue from selling ads or promoted content. Facebook’s parent company Meta has an almost $300 billion market cap.

Social networks can be used for customer research, engagement and marketing. They offer a way to directly connect businesses and customers. Brands can build a community around themselves. Social networks collect information about users’ likes and dislikes, allowing for extremely targeted advertising. Social media listening allows an organization to learn what people are saying about their company.

Some businesses are implementing internal social networks. In very large organizations this can increase employee engagement and satisfaction. Also, as teams become more geographically diverse or have members working from home, private social networks can promote collaboration and information sharing.

Some business are beginning to use social networks in their recruitment strategies.

Examples of social networking

Every established organization advertises on social networking these days. Here are four examples of social networking websites:

• Yelp. Picking a restaurant, dentist, doctor or hair salon is not always easy, so social networking sites like Yelp offer crowdsourced customer reviews of these types of businesses or providers.
• Pinterest. Bookmarking sites like Pinterest enable users to share photos and organize links to a variety of online resources and websites. Similar to a digital scrapbook, Pinterest enables users to save specific pins to pinboards, making it easier to search for specific topics and share them with followers.
• Rover. A popular pet-sitter services portal, Rover enables pet owners to connect with pet sitters, dog walkers and pet-boarding services.
• Airbnb. Airbnb helps travelers search for a place to stay based on their preferences, including multishared spaces, shared spaces with private rooms and entire properties. Places on Airbnb are mostly rented out by homeowners.

What are the top 10 social networking sites?

Although there are numerous social networking websites, the following sites are the most popular:

1. Facebook. Facebook users create profiles, share information, send messages and post status updates on their walls. Ranked the most active social networking platform by DataReportal, Facebook has more than 2.9 billion active users. In 2021, the company was renamed Meta to reflect its business beyond just social media.
2. YouTube. This popular video-sharing website enables users to share, upload and post videos and vlogs. According to Global Media Insight, YouTube has more than 2 billion monthly active users.
3. WhatsApp. This free instant messaging app lets users send text messages, make video and voice calls, and share documents. According to WhatsApp, it has more than 2 billion users worldwide.
4. Instagram. This free social media platform enables users to share long- and short-form videos and photos. It is primarily designed for iOS and Android smartphone users, but a desktop version is also available. However, sharing and uploading of content is only available through the Instagram app. Also owned by Meta, Instagram has over 2 billion monthly active users as of December 2021, according to CNBC.
5. TikTok. This app is used for sharing and making personalized short videos. TikTok caters to a younger audience and is well known for being a lively and fun-to-use social networking platform. According to the Business of Apps newsletter, TikTok has more than 1.2 billion users as of the end of 2021.
6. Tumblr. This microblogging site enables users to publish multimedia and other content types inside short blog posts. Users can also follow other users and make their blogs private. According to FinancesOnline, as of February 2021, Tumblr has more than 518 million user accounts.
7. Twitter. Launched in 2006, this social media platform enables users to share their thoughts and opinions with a broad audience by posting messages known as tweets that contain up to 280 characters. According to DataReportal, as of January 2022, Twitter has more than 436 million users.
8. Pinterest. The Pinterest bookmarking site enables users to save and organize links to favorite online resources and destinations through tagging. According to Pinterest Inc., the platform has 431 million global monthly active users as of December 2021 — a 6% decrease over the previous year.
9. Reddit. Founded in 2005, Reddit provides a diverse collection of forums and subforums — also known as subreddits — on a variety of topics, including sports, breaking news and technology. Here, users can comment on each other’s posts, as well as share news and content. According to Reddit, it has more than 50 million daily active users. This translates into 430 million monthly users as of 2019, according to The Small Business Blog.
10. Snapchat. This multimedia app can be used on smartphones running Android or iOS. Founded in 2011, Snapchat enables users to send pictures or videos called snaps to friends. These snaps vanish after they have been viewed. According to Snap Inc., Snapchat has 319 million daily active users as of the end of 2021.

Controversies in social networks

Social networks are used daily by much of the world’s population. There are therefore many controversies that surround their use and management.

Social media addiction is becoming common. People can begin to feel a sense of anxiety if they don’t check their social media accounts, or they may compulsively refresh them. Social networking posts are also highly curated, people only post the good things that happen to them. This can cause a warped view of reality where the viewer thinks that others have better lives than they do. This leads to a fear of missing out (FOMO) on social events.

Cyberbullying is when someone makes social media posts with the intention to harm someone else. This can take the form of publicly posting the private information of someone or sending abusive messages. Tragically, cyberbullying has led to the suicide of some individuals. It is now a major concern in public schools. Doxing is when someone publicly posts the personally identifiable information, such as an address or phone number, of someone else.

As mentioned in disadvantages, privacy is a major concern for many social network users. Anything that is posted can be used by the site to sell advertisements. This can include location information, embarrassing details or private data. This information could also be requested by law enforcement officials. Additionally, some social networks have confusing privacy settings, causing people to accidentally make information public. Since they store a lot of personal information, social networks are also susceptible to data breaches.

Censorship is a hot-button issue for many social networks. Social networks are private companies, so the content posted by individuals isn’t necessarily protected by governmental free speech laws, but instead is at the discretion of the site’s terms of service (ToS) or administrators. This can put the site into the position of arbitrating what is or is not allowed on the site. This can be particularly divisive when it comes to political issues, hate speech and calls to violence that may be posted by public figures. Some say that the sites have a moral responsibility to take a hard stand against all negative speech, while others say that all speech should be allowed by the platforms and any content removal is censorship.

Misinformation can be easily spread on social networks. Users are encouraged to share the latest news or discuss new topics. This can cause rumors or hearsay to be shared as truth. Others share their opinions as fact. It has also been reported that users, organizations and even governments may intentionally share false information, sometimes while pretending to be someone else. This has caused some social networks to begin adding fact checking alerts to some posts that may contain misinformation.

Learn ways to spot disinformation on social media and essential social media guidelines for employees.

This was last updated in December 2022

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Presentation on theme: «A Word About Social Networking»— Presentation transcript:

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A Word About Social Networking
Lauren Taylor – Dardanelle High School

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Statistics 93% of teens and young adults in the U.S. use internet regularly More than 70% use social networking sites 62% of teens use the internet to get news about current events and politics 48% of teens use the internet to make purchases 31% of teens use it to get health, dieting, or physical fitness information

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Advantages & Disadvantages of Social Media
Opportunities & Risks

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Advantages of Social Media
Social Skills Independence and Self-expression Digital competence Educational development Research

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Social Skills Keep up with friends and make new ones
Increase self esteem Help someone feel less isolated

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Independence and Self-expression
Creating your own online presence helps you express yourself Join groups and pages that interest you Find out about other people’s interests Support causes that interest you

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Digital competence Technology is evolving faster than ever
Using technology ensures an easier transition to future changes

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Educational development
Discuss schoolwork online Share discussions about assignments As a professional create social groups related to topics being researched

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research Gather information about topics that are hard to discuss with others Large amount of educational resources online (Ex: google scholar)

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Risks of Social Networking
Release of Personal information Bullying The Permanence of online problems Disclosure

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Release of personal information
Giving personal information online could result in victimization People looking to do harm can use personal information about you How to help prevent: make your social accounts private

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bullying Harassment can occur online only (cyberbullying)
Causes significant emotional harm resulting in: Depression, anger, school avoidance, violence, and suicide

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The permanence of online problems
Once information is shared, it is out there forever Retrieving information you have shared is impossible These pictures, comments, or posts can come back to haunt you as you get older and start a professional career

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disclosure People are much bolder online than they are in person
Information tends to be shared online that would not be disclosed in person Disability information, private health information, marital status or children’s name(s)

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Safe and Responsible Decisions Online
Think about how you learned to cross a street First, hold hands with an adult Then, Gain some independence and let adults watch from afar Finally, make safe and responsible decisions on your own Use knowledge, skills, and values to exercise good judgement

Social networking has become an everyday, mainstream way to use the internet. Social networking refers to the use of social media websites and apps, such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, to connect with family, friends, and people who share your interests.

Social networking is commonplace throughout the world, especially with young people, but not everyone understands exactly what it means. Here’s a simple breakdown of social networking’s uses, components, and common terms.

Social Networks Explained

If you’re participating in social networking, it means you’re using social media sites, also known as social networks, to connect to others. Some of the most popular social media sites are Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, LinkedIn, and Pinterest.

While various social media sites attract certain types of users, Facebook is a good example of a general social network. When you join Facebook, you may know some other people who use the site and add them as friends. As you use the platform more, you may add friends who share your interests or discover people you know and add them, as well. Other people may find you on Facebook and seek to connect with you.

The more you interact with a social media site like Facebook, the more your network of friends and interests will grow. It’s similar to networking in real life, for example at a business conference. The more you interact with other people and discover common friends and interests, the wider your circle becomes.

Common Social Networking Terms and Elements

Social networking sites and apps each have unique features and points of view, but most have common elements. Whether you’re starting out with Facebook Twitter, or a new site, you’ll encounter these terms.

Your Public Profile

Your profile contains basic information about you, including a photo, short bio, the town where you live, and sometimes more personal information, such as your birthday, where you went to college, and what your interests are. You can usually make your profile as personal or vague as you’re comfortable with.

Social networks dedicated to a specific theme, such as music or movies, might need you to supply more information about the topic. For example, dating websites are social networks that focus on making love matches, so you need to be clear about who you are and what you’re looking for so you can find a compatible person.

Friends and Followers

Friends and followers are the heart and soul of social networking, adding the social component. Friends and followers are the people you allow to access your profile. They are able to see any photos and posts you make and interact with you via comments and «likes» (more on this later). You can also see and interact with their posts.

Some people enjoy getting as many friends and followers as possible, while others prefer a smaller, more intimate group of friends and followers to interact with. Some people even set their profile to «public,» meaning anyone who wants to can follow them or become friends with them. This is often used as a marketing tool.

Home Feed

Most social networking sites have some kind of home page you see when you log on. This usually displays a feed showing updates from friends. Scrolling through your home feed gets you caught up quickly on the activities, thoughts, and news friends want to share.

Likes, Comments, and Shares

Getting and giving feedback is a huge component of social networking. To indicate that a friend or follower has read and appreciated a post, most sites have some kind of «like» button, perhaps a heart or a thumbs up. Facebook has an array of icons you can use to express your reactions to a post, such as sadness, surprise, or love. You’re expressing yourself without having to say anything specific.

Most social media sites support comments on posts. Since social networking thrives on interaction, comments are an important element. Whether you comment that someone’s baby is cute or make a pointed political observation, comments create conversations and boost the synergy of social networking.

Groups

Some social networking sites have a «group» element that helps users find people with similar interests or engage in discussions on certain topics. A group can be anything from «Johnson High Class of ’98» and «People Who Like Books» to «Doors Fans.» 

Social networking groups are both a way to connect with like-minded people as well as a way to identify your interests. 

Hashtags

A hashtag is a word or keyword phrase that’s preceded by the # symbol, which is called a hash or the pound sign. Users put a hashtag by a name or phrase to help others who may be interested in it to find it when they search for a keyword or particular hashtag. For example, if you post a picture of your baby’s cute face and add #babysmiles, people can find it, along with other posts with the same hashtag, if they search for that phrase. Hashtags help to draw attention to your posts and encourage interaction.

Tagging

Tagging is another common element of social networking sites, particularly Facebook and Instagram. If you post a photo of several people, you can identify another person in the photo by tagging them, usually by clicking on the picture and adding their name. Tagging is a way of creating more interaction for your posts.

Should You Start Social Networking?

Social networking can be enjoyable and entertaining. It’s a great way to stay in touch with friends and family and can be an effective promotional tool for businesses, artists, or anyone in need of some exposure.

Social networking lets us reach out to other people with similar interests, such as books, television, video games, or movies. It can be a great tool for companionship and interaction.

Which Social Network Do I Join?

Social networking is for both young and old people, with social media sites that cater to everything from general interests to specific hobbies. There are niche social networks that focus on a specific theme or style of posting.

The top social network sites appeal to a wide variety of users. Try a site that appeals to you and see if it’s a good fit. You can always leave and try something else.

Thanks for letting us know!

What Is Social Networking?

The term social networking refers to the use of internet-based social media sites to stay connected with friends, family, colleagues, or customers. Social networking can have a social purpose, a business purpose, or both, through sites like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest.

Social networking is also a significant opportunity for marketers seeking to engage customers. Facebook remains the largest and most popular social network, with 2.91 billion people using the platform on a monthly basis, as of Dec. 31, 2021. Instagram, Twitter, and Pinterest are among the next most popular, according to Statista.

How Social Networking Works

Social networking involves the development and maintenance of personal and business relationships using technology. This is done through the use of social networking sites, such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

These sites allow people and corporations to connect with one another so they can develop relationships and share information, ideas, and messages.

For Family and Friends

Family members and friends can reconnect and remain connected through personal social networking sites like Facebook. They can share photos and status updates on everyday or important events in their lives. People can also connect with unknown individuals who share the same interests, goals, or experiences. Individuals can find each other through groups, lists, and the use of hashtags.

For Marketers

Social networking is commonly used by marketers to increase brand recognition and encourage brand loyalty. Social media marketing helps promote a brand’s voice and content. It can help make a company more accessible to new customers and more prominent for existing ones,

For example, a frequent Twitter user may learn about a company for the first time through a news feed and decide to buy a product or service. The more exposed people are to a company’s brand, the greater the company’s chances of finding and retaining new customers.

Marketers use social networking to improve conversion rates. Building a following provides access to and interaction with new, recent, and longtime customers. Sharing blog posts, images, videos, or comments on social media allows followers to react and engage, visit a company’s website, and become customers.

Major Social Networking Platforms

Facebook

Facebook is a social network that offers users the opportunity to connect with people, businesses, and organizations. They can post updates and respond to the posts of others. They can share photographs and links to online content. Users can chat live, and upload and share video.

Users can also communicate directly with each other via Facebook Messenger. They can join groups with like interests, and be notified of friends’ activities and pages they elect to follow.

Facebook was designed to be open and social. However, while the platform encourages publicly available content, it also has privacy controls that can restrict access to, for instance, friends.

Facebook was created in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg while he went to Harvard University. Today, it is owned by Meta Platforms (of which Zuckerberg is CEO). Facebook is the world’s largest social network, with about 3 billion active users.

Instagram

Instagram is a social network that focuses on sharing visual media like photos and videos. It’s similar to Facebook in that users create a profile and have a news feed. It allows users to upload media that can be edited with filters and organized by hashtags and geographical tagging. Posts can be shared publicly or with followers.

Users can browse other users’ content, view trending content, and follow other users. They can add others’ content to their personal feed. Over time, Instagram has added new features, such as Instagram Stories, Instagram Reels, and access to shopping. Like Facebook, Instagram encourages users to keep their content publicly accessible but it also lets them set access to approved followers only.

Instagram has its own direct messaging feature. In addition, Facebook Messenger has been incorporated by Instagram so users can direct message Facebook contacts while in Instagram.

Instagram was founded in 2010 by Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger. In 2012, it was acquired by Meta Platforms (the former Facebook). Today, Instagram has around 1.5 billion active users.

Twitter

Twitter is a social network that allows people to communicate with short messages called tweets. Tweets are limited by the social platform to 280 characters. Users post tweets that may be useful, interesting, or even inflammatory for readers.

Others use Twitter to find people and companies posting appealing, important, or newsworthy content. Once users discover others who pique their interest, they can follow them and receive their ongoing stream of tweets in their feeds.

Tweeting is sometimes referred to microblogging. It’s distinguished by users’ ability to scan and distribute content quickly, conveniently, and easily. This may account for its popularity with those who want (or need) to get lots of messages out to the world and those who want to follow such socialistas (or vital sources of crucial information).

Twitter is used by professional and citizen journalists, politicians, celebrities, marketers, and more. It was founded in 2006 by Jack Dorsey, Noah Glass, Biz Stone, and Evan Williams. It is owned by Twitter, Inc. and its CEO is Parag Agrawal. In 2021, Twitter had about 430 million users. That number is expected to rise to almost 500 million by 2025.

Pinterest

Pinterest is a social networking site that promotes image saving and sharing using a virtual pinboard. It’s an innovative platform that facilitates the cataloguing and organizing of meaningful information for individuals.

With Pinterest, account holders find images by browsing the web or Pinterest itself. They then pin (or save) those images to an online pinboard. Multiple pinboards can be set up and organized, based on a topic.

Once they’ve created and built their boards to catalogue ideas and interests, users can access them whenever they want. Clicking on the image reveals related information.

As with other social networks, Pinterest users have a feed that exhibits images according to their interests. They can interact by «liking» images, following each other, and posting comments. There’s also a feature that provides for private messaging.

Pinterest was created by Ben Silbermann, Paul Sciarra, and Evan Sharp in 2009. It’s owned by Pinterest, Inc. and its CEO is Bill Ready. As of 2022, Pinterest has approximately 433 million active users.

Special Considerations

There isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach to social networking marketing strategies. That’s because every business is unique and has a different target demographic, history, and competitive marketplace.

Social networking companies want businesses to pay for their advertising. That’s why platforms often restrict a business’ reach and the number of responses it may receive through unpaid posts. For example, if a company has 500 followers, followers may not all receive the same post.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Social Networking

Social networking has the ability to affect individuals and corporations positively and negatively. That’s why it’s important to weigh the advantages and disadvantages of using these social media sites before getting too heavily involved.

Advantages

• Social networking allows individuals to make and stay in contact with family and friends that distance and lost connections would otherwise prohibit.
• People can also connect with unknown individuals who share the same interests and develop new relationships.
• Social networking also allows companies to connect with new and existing clients.
• They can use social media to create, promote, and increase brand awareness.
• Companies can capitalize on customer reviews and comments that promote products, services, and their brands. The more that customers post about a company, the more valuable the brand authority can become. This can lead to greater sales and a higher ranking by search engines.
• Social networking can help establish a brand as legitimate, credible, and trustworthy.
• Companies may use social networking to demonstrate the quality of their customer service and enrich their relationships with consumers. For example, if a customer complains about a product or service on Twitter, the company may address the issue immediately, apologize, and take action to make it right.

Disadvantages

• Social networking can facilitate the spread of misinformation about individuals and companies.
• Due to its online nature, falsehoods can spread like wildfire. This became increasingly prevalent after 2012. One study found that misinformation is 70% more likely than factual information to be shared on Twitter.
• The detrimental impact of misinformation can create a virtual headache for a company’s public relations (PR) department.
• The anonymous aspect of newfound personal relationships requires caution.
• Building and maintaining a company profile takes hours each week. Costs add up quickly.
• Businesses need many followers before a social media marketing campaign starts generating a positive return on investment (ROI). For example, submitting a post to 15 followers does not have the same effect as submitting the post to 15,000 followers.

Examples of Social Networking

Almost every product or service you use is backed by a company with a social media presence. It’s virtually impossible to think of any major corporation that doesn’t operate, market, and advertise on social networks.

Tapping into social media is not only a good business practice, it’s necessary if you’re going to succeed in the corporate world. Here are two examples of companies that are doing it right.

Taco Bell

Popular fast-food chain Taco Bell has more than 1.4 million followers on Instagram and nearly 2 million followers on Twitter. The company knows how to engage people on social media, posting content about its menu offerings, employees, and restaurants. Taco Bell also posts light-hearted tweets and Instagram posts that garner thousands of replies, retweets, and likes.

Taco Bell lobbied for a taco emoji by creating a petition on Change.org in 2014. The company spread the word on social media. The petition garnered 33,000 signatures from Taco Bell enthusiasts. Apple released the taco emoji in October 2015 when it released iOS 9.1.

Kylie Jenner

You don’t have to be a corporation to use social media expertly. This is, after all, the age of the influencer. Kylie Jenner has more than 314 million followers on Instagram, 36.4 million followers on Snapchat, and 39.6 million followers on Twitter.

The young influencer and reality television star uses her social media platforms to boost her image and brand name. She is also an entrepreneur who uses social networking to promote her business, Kylie Cosmetics.

The beauty brand earned her a spot on Forbes’ list of self-made women, young billionaires, and the Celebrity 100 of 2020. Want proof of her reach? The company’s lip kits sold out within 10 minutes of the star tweeting the link to her followers in February 2016.

The Bottom Line

Social networking involves the use of online social media platforms to connect with new and existing friends, family, colleagues, and businesses. Individuals can use social networking to announce and discuss their interests and concerns with others who may support and otherwise interact with them.

Businesses can use social networking to build a brand, sell products, grow a customer base, and strengthen customer relationships and service.

Social networking may have certain disadvantages, but its benefits—including giving individuals and companies a method to spread messages instantly—make it a technology that will continue to be used and developed for years to come.

Social Networking is the use of internet-based social media programs to make connections with friends, family, classmates, customers and clients. Social networking can occur for social purposes, business purposes or both through sites such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Classmates.com and Yelp. Social networking is also a significant target area for marketers seeking to engage users.^[1]

Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn are websites that are frequently talked about in the news, online, and in conversation. When trying to define social networking, one might think of beautifully decorated webpages that describe someone and what they like to do for the purpose of making friends. But a social networking definition cannot be complete without talking about the other aspects of these websites. Social networking websites are a collection of webpages that are user generated using a form. The information put into the form is then published on a generated page. From that point on, the user can customize the page, adding pictures, video, MP3s, and other media that are all the choice of the user. But social networking sites aren’t just for regular people looking to make friends. Social networking sites are perfect for businesses too. There are features on these sites that allow a particular page to indicate whether it is for personal or business use, which shows other businesses which pages to look at. There are also search engines, so any keywords optimized on a business page will come up with a search of that particular keyword.^[2]

When the Web became popular in the mid-1990s, it enabled people to share information in ways that were never possible before. But as limitless as the possibilities seemed, there was a personal aspect that was lacking. While users could create home pages and post their own content on the Web, these individual sites lacked a sense of community. In the early 2000s, the Web became much more personal as social networking websites were introduced and embraced by the masses. Social networking websites allowed users to be part of a virtual community. These websites provide users with simple tools to create a custom profile with text and pictures. A typical profile includes basic information about the user, at least one photo, and possibly a blog or other comments published by the user. Advanced profiles may include videos, photo albums, online applications (in Facebook), or custom layouts (in MySpace). After creating a profile, users can add friends, send messages to other users, and leave comments directly on friends’ profiles. These features provide the building blocks for creating online communities. These websites also provide an important linking element between users that allows friends to communicate directly with each other. Because people often have friends from different places and different times in their lives, social networking sites provide an opportunity to keep in touch with old friends and to meet new people as well. Of course, this means that people you don’t know may also be able to view your profile page. Therefore, if you join a social networking website, it is a good idea to review the privacy settings for your account. And more importantly, remember to always use discretion in what you publish on your profile.^[3]

The Social Networking Landscape

source: Brian Solis

Social Networking for Personal and Professional Use^[4]
The definition of online social networking encompasses networking for business, pleasure, and all points in between. Networks themselves have different purposes, and their online counterparts work in various ways.

Social Networking for Personal Use
Many people join a social network because their current friends and family are using the service and they want to stay in contact. Once you’ve been using a social networking site for a while, you’ll inevitable come in contact with other people you know, or knew long ago. These networks are great places to catch up with old friends, share current and old photos, and find other friends whom you may have lost contact with along the way.In this case, the definition of social networking includes nostalgia and reconnecting.

Social Networking for Professionals
Professionals have always networked in one way or another. Whether it’s a business meeting, a conference, or a larger industry event, meeting other people who are involved in the same profession is a necessity. Social networks, especially those like LinkedIn that cater to businesses and professionals, provide another platform to meet career peers and influential people in the industry. Putting yourself out there in a social network and spreading the word of your business is easy to do, and can result in catching the attention of many people in your profession.

Types of Social Networking Services^[5]
This section attempts to order the current range of Social Networking Services (SNS) available, and cover the two main formats – sites that are primarily organised around users’ profiles and those that are organised around collections of content. However, it’s important to remember that services differ and may be characterised by more than one category. Users are also quite happy to subvert the intended use of platforms to suit their own interests. Educators setting up private groups in order to make use of collaborative space and tools are a good example of this.

• Profile-based SNS: Profile-based services are primarily organised around members’ profile pages. Bebo, Facebook and MySpace, are all good examples of this. Users develop their space in various ways, and can often contribute to each other’s spaces – typically leaving text, embedded content or links to external content through message walls, comment or evaluation tools. Users often include third party content (in the form of ‘widgets’) in order to enhance their profiles, or as a way of including information from other web services and SNS.
• Content-based SNS: In these services, the user’s profile remains an important way of organising connections, but plays a secondary role to the posting of content. Photo-sharing site Flickr is an example of this type of service, one where groups and comments are based around pictures. There are many people of course who have ‘empty’ Flickr accounts – people who have signed up to the service in order to view their friends’ or families’ permission-protected pictures. Shelfari is one of the current crop of book-focused sites, with the members ‘bookshelf’ being a focal point of their profile and membership. Other examples of content-based communities include YouTube.com for video-sharing and last.fm, where the content is created by software that monitors and represents the music that users listen to. In the latter case, the content is primarily the user’s activity – the act of listening to audio files.
• White-label SNS: Most SNS offer some group-building functionality, which allows users to form their own mini-communities within sites. Platforms such as PeopleAggregator and Ning, which launched in 2004, offer members a different model, based on the creation and membership of users’ own social networking groups. These sites offer members the opportunity to create and join communities. This means that users can create their own “mini-MySpace’s”, small scale social networking sites which support specific interests, events or activities.
• Multi-User Virtual Environments: Sites such as Second Life, an online virtual world, allow users to interact with each other’s avatars – a virtual representation of the site member. Although the users have profile cards, their functional profiles are the characters they customise or build and control. There are also hybrids of these and social-networking sites, such as Habbo Hotel and Cyworld.
• Mobile SNS: Many social network sites, for example MySpace and Twitter, offer mobile phone versions of their services, allowing members to interact with their networks via their phones. Increasingly, too, there are mobile–led and mobile-only based communities. MYUBO, for example, allows users to share and view video over mobile networks.
• Micro-blogging/ Presence updates: Micro-blogging services such as Twitter and Jaiku allow you to publish short (140 characters, including spaces) messages publicly or within contact groups. They are designed to work as mobile services, but are popularly used and read online. Many services offer ‘status updates’ – short messages that can be updated to let people know what mood you are in or what you are doing. These can be checked within the site or exported to be read elsewhere. They engage users in constantly updated conversation and contact with their online networks.
• People Search: People search is another important web development. There are various kinds of social and people search, but sites like Wink generate results by searching across the public profiles of multiple social network sites. This allows search by name, interest, location and other information published in profiles, allowing the creation of Web-based «dossiers» on individuals. This type of people search cuts across the traditional boundaries of social network site membership, although the data that are retrieved should already be public.

Pros and Cons of Social Networking^[6]

Pros of Social Networking

• Ability to connect to other people all over the world. One of the most obvious pros of using social networks is the ability to instantly reach people from anywhere.
• Easy and instant communication. Now that we’re connected wherever we go, we don’t have to rely on our landlines, answering machines or snail mail to contact somebody. We can simply open up our laptops or pick up our smartphones and immediately start communicating with anyone.
• Real-time news and information discovery. Gone are the days of waiting around for the six o’clock news to come on TV or for the delivery boy to bring the newspaper in the morning. If you want to know what’s going on in the world, all you need to do is jump on social media. An added bonus is that you can customize your news and information discovery experiences by choosing to follow exactly what you want.
• Great opportunities for business owners. Business owners and other types of professional organizations can connect with current customers, sell their products and expand their reach using social media. There are actually lots of entrepreneurs and businesses out there that thrive almost entirely on social networks and wouldn’t even be able to operate without it.
• General fun and enjoyment. A lot of people turn to it when they catch a break at work or just want to relax at home. Since people are naturally social creatures, it’s often quite satisfying to see comments and likes show up on our own posts, and it’s convenient to be able to see exactly what our friends are up to without having to ask them directly.

Cons of Social Networking

• Information overwhelm. With so many people now on social media tweeting links and posting selfies and sharing YouTube videos, it sure can get pretty noisy. Becoming overwhelmed by too many Facebook friends to keep up with or too many Instagram photos to browse through isn’t all that uncommon. Over time, we tend to rack up a lot of friends and followers, and that can lead to lots of bloated news feeds with too much content we’re not all that interested in.
• Privacy issues. With so much sharing going on, issues over privacy will always be a big concern. Whether it’s a question of social sites owning your content after it’s posted, becoming a target after sharing your geographical location online, or even getting in trouble at work after tweeting something inappropriate — sharing too much with the public can open up all sorts of problems that sometimes can’t ever be undone.
• Social peer pressure and cyber bullying. For people struggling to fit in with their peers — especially teens and young adults — the pressure to do certain things or act a certain way can be even worse on social media than it is at school or any other offline setting. In some extreme cases, the overwhelming pressure to fit in with everyone posting on social media or becoming the target of a cyberbullying attack can lead to serious stress, anxiety and even depression.
• Online interaction substitution for offline interaction. Since people are now connected all the time and you can pull up a friend’s social profile with a click of your mouse or a tap of your smartphone, it’s a lot easier to use online interaction as a substitute for face-to-face interaction. Some people argue that social media actually promotes antisocial human behavior.
• Distraction and procrastination. How often do you see someone look at their phone? People get distracted by all the social apps and news and messages they receive, leading to all sorts of problems like distracted driving or the lack of gaining someone’s full attention during a conversation. Browsing social media can also feed procrastination habits and become something people turn to in order to avoid certain tasks or responsibilities.
• Sedentary lifestyle habits and sleep disruption. Lastly, since social networking is all done on some sort of computer or mobile device, it can sometimes promote too much sitting down in one spot for too long. Likewise, staring into the artificial light from a computer or phone screen at night can negatively affect your ability to get a proper night’s sleep.

Emerging Trends in Social Networking^[7]
While the popularity of social networking consistently rises, new uses for the technology are frequently being observed. Today’s technologically savvy population requires convenient solutions to their daily needs. At the forefront of emerging trends in social networking sites is the concept of «real-time web» and «location-based». Real-time allows users to contribute contents, which is then broadcast as it is being uploaded—the concept is analogous to live radio and television broadcasts. Twitter set the trend for «real-time» services, wherein users can broadcast to the world what they are doing, or what is on their minds within a 140-character limit. Facebook followed suit with their «Live Feed» where users’ activities are streamed as soon as it happens. While Twitter focuses on words, Clixtr, another real-time service, focuses on group photo sharing wherein users can update their photo streams with photos while at an event. Facebook, however, remains the largest photo sharing site—Facebook application and photo aggregator Pixable estimates that Facebook will have 100 billion photos by Summer 2012. In April 2012, the image-based social media network Pinterest had become the third largest social network in the United States.

Companies have begun to merge business technologies and solutions, such as cloud computing, with social networking concepts. Instead of connecting individuals based on social interest, companies are developing interactive communities that connect individuals based on shared business needs or experiences. Many provide specialized networking tools and applications that can be accessed via their websites, such as LinkedIn. Others companies, such as Monster.com, have been steadily developing a more «socialized» feel to their career center sites to harness some of the power of social networking sites. These more business related sites have their own nomenclature for the most part but the most common naming conventions are «Vocational Networking Sites» or «Vocational Media Networks», with the former more closely tied to individual networking relationships based on social networking principles.

Foursquare gained popularity as it allowed for users to check into places that they are frequenting at that moment. Gowalla is another such service that functions in much the same way that Foursquare does, leveraging the GPS in phones to create a location-based user experience. Clixtr, though in the real-time space, is also a location-based social networking site, since events created by users are automatically geotagged, and users can view events occurring nearby through the Clixtr iPhone app. Recently, Yelp announced its entrance into the location-based social networking space through check-ins with their mobile app; whether or not this becomes detrimental to Foursquare or Gowalla is yet to be seen, as it is still considered a new space in the Internet technology industry.

One popular use for this new technology is social networking between businesses. Companies have found that social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter are great ways to build their brand image. According to Jody Nimetz, author of Marketing Jive, there are five major uses for businesses and social media: to create brand awareness, as an online reputation management tool, for recruiting, to learn about new technologies and competitors, and as a lead generation tool to intercept potential prospects. These companies are able to drive traffic to their own online sites while encouraging their consumers and clients to have discussions on how to improve or change products or services. As of September 2013, 71% of online adults use Facebook, 17% use Instagram, 21% use Pinterest, and 22% use LinkedIn.

See Also

References

Further Reading

• The history of social networking Digital Trends
• The Psychology of Social Networking Psychology Today
• Introduction to Social Networking Tim Trampedach
• The Benefits of Social Networking Services UWS