Introduction to Contemporary American Social Media

“Our generation doesn't ring the doorbell. They text or call to say they're outside,” this line is from one of the well-known social networks, Tweeter, which shows how the way of communication has change in this modern life. According to 2013 statistics by Business Insider, in United States alone, smartphone owners aged 18 to 24 send 2,022 texts per month on average — 67 texts on a daily basis — and receive another 1,831 texts (Cocotas). Nowadays, technology such as text messaging has practically replaced traditional face to face communication among the society primarily in young generations because texting allows messages to be sent fast and effortless. In order to quickly type what they are trying to say in text messaging, people are

It is no surprise that Facebook is the most popular social network. Baby Boomers and seniors use social networks to follow groups and organizations, watch and post videos, and to support causes and join groups they like.

Since the technological phenomenon towards the end of the 20th century, text messaging has been widely used by cellphone users, specifically teenagers, in order to get their conversations across easier and quicker in a very convenient way. In the modern technology world, people have become so accustomed to the idea of

Social media has taken the world by storm. Facebook currently has more than 1 billion active users, which is three times the number of people who live in the US. With so many people using Facebook it comes to no surprise that it has been made to have a negative influence from concerns over privacy, to people spending hours on the site and ultimately becoming addicted to it. But Facebook can also be a useful tool when used correctly, it helps people stay in touch, make new friends and it cures boredom.

Social networking is a way to communicate with family and friends. Technology has improved over the years and with its improvement and advances we have advanced with technology. Social networking can provide good points and bad points, it’s all in the

Financial gain is not always the immediate objective of social media. However, monetization attaches a revenue stream to social media content. This monetization can be financial or psychic. Psychic income is defined as value that is not expressed in monetary form (Solomon, 2015). Like other businesses, social media providers need to earn money. To do so, they need to create a monetization strategy as a part of the company’s business model. A successful monetization strategy attracts consumers to the marketer’s content. By measuring who is viewing the content, the social media provider can determine how much a marketer should pay to place their promoted content (Tuten & Solomon, 2013).

“I sit up straight and do the first thing a person is supposed to do in an emergency, which is send a text message.” Robin Sloan, author, says it best; we are a society relying on texting for everything. Determining whether texting is a hindrance or an advantage is up to you. Although texting did not take off in the United States until 2005, the technology was developed in the late 1980’s in the United Kingdom, with the first text message being sent in December of 1992 (Stewart, A., 2015). Texting has evolved over the last decade to alert us of missing children, our children’s grades, coupons and sales at local stores, and updates from family and friends. Texting is a double-edged sword; it can help us in our everyday lives, yet decrease our social skills, quality of relationships, and attention to our surroundings. The remainder of this discussion will highlight the pros and cons of texting.

In today’s time social media is major part of everyone’s daily life. For instance, “people spend over 700 billion minutes per month on Facebook” (Lawrence, 2012). This demonstrates that social media has a major influence on an individual’s life. Not only is social media having an influence over individuals, it is also influencing the way society communicates. For example, communication was once through phone calls or by mail, but now communication is being executed through various form of social media such as, Twitter, Snapchat, Facebook, Tumbler, etc. In addition to social media being used for communication, smartphones are also contributing to this as well. Furthermore, smartphones can be used to access the web when there is no internet.

The rapidly growing rate of phone technology at this modernized generation is kind of disturbing. In the modern technology world, people have become so accustomed to the idea of sending and receiving information almost instantly. It seems that anywhere you go someone is glued to their cell phone screen, fingers just typing away. Look around in any public vehicles, in restaurants, on sidewalks, school premises, even at a crowded place you can notice most people are holding their phones and text messaging. Majority of these people are teenagers. We can’t seem to stay away from it for a few hours. Text messaging is perhaps one of the things that people do most daily. With the introduction of text messaging feature, conversation over text messages become popular among a large number of people.

Social media can be regarded as a tool that allows human beings to stay connected no matter the physical distance between them. It has enabled family members to keep in touch with each other and remain relevant in their activities. With platforms such as Facebook, friends and families can update each other on what they are up to (Charles et al. 1146). They can share the experiences they are going through. As more and more people are hooked on social platforms, it’s much easier to deliver a message to a family member or friend through online platforms as compared to physically meeting people.

Social Media has taken over how we communicate, interact, and even investigate certain people of criminal interest. Throughout the years, several social media websites has dominated the online web, each providing a unique service tailored to the individual preference, starting off with the most known social media Facebook. Facebook is a social network that most people use like a public dairy, it allows individuals to express themselves and voice their opinions with the world. Moments of anger, frustration, sadness can now be share via the interest at the press of a button, moments that were once private and limited to whom you can express your feelings with has now become global. Facebook is also use to stay in contact with friends and family who live too far to visit or too expensive to call. For example, I have relatives in Haiti, and back then before Facebook was invented the only way to communicate with family overseas was to either buy a calling card, which the time was limited on how long you can speak to a relative and can become costly if you need to make serval phone calls. The second method was to physically go there to meet them, and we all know the costs of plane tickets out of the country aren’t cheap. Facebook also provide users with the ability to promote and run their business such as online marketing, and ad advertising.

We live in an evolving world of communication where if we want to talk someone we are given the medium – regardless of time and distance. The age of mail is a dying one and the breed that continues to write hand written letters is scarce. Nowadays we can roll over, grab our phones, type a message, and send it all without having to move from where we are. Today, 92% of U.S. adults have a cell phone and 68% have a smartphone (Anderson, 2015). With these large numbers it only makes sense that interpersonal communication has strayed away from face-to-face communication and veered towards mobile communication. The purpose of this paper is to clearly explain why mobile, text based communication is not only a great tool in the hands of its users despite claims that it is the threatening face-to-face interactions.

Since Facebook’s inception, it has become a world-renowned social networking service connecting millions of people around the world. As of June 2014, there were over 1.3 billion active users globally. The concept of Facebook is incredibly simple, yet has managed to attract a large consumer base in such a short period of time. After registering to the site, users create an online profile specific to the individual’s preferences. Once the profile page is personalized, users add other people on the site as “friends”, send messages to people in the friend group, post pictures and status updates, share multimedia with friends, and join groups that share a common interest. Facebook has become a social media site giant and continues to trend upwards as more and more users join everyday.

With the increased connection and speed of internet connection, users of social media have increased exponentially in the recent past. Social networking sites are virtual groups which permit individuals to join and interface with one another on a specific subject or to simply ' 'hang out" together online (Murray & Waller, 2007). A set of persons where there is individual -to -individual connectivity make up social networks. Facebook is one kind of online application that has developed quickly in prevalence and notoriety as of late among the social networking platforms. There is a proven record that in the year 2006 when social networking had found its roots among the youth, the number of clients grew from 46.8 million to 68.8 million amid the earlier year. These locales uncover essential data about how teenagers and youthful grown-ups are associating with each other in the data age (Nielsen/NetRatings, 2006).

Facebook was created in 2004 and within three years, it was reported to have more than 21 million registered members generating 1.6 billion page views each day (Needham & Company, 2007). The site has become an integral part of its users social life. How many of us check Facebook more than once a day? According to a study done in 2006, the average participant spends an average of 20 minutes a day on the site, and two-thirds of users log in at least once a day (Cassidy, 2006). Facebook, allows its users to showcase themselves in an online profile, accept or request friends, (other users) who can post comments on each other’s profile pages, and have access to each other’s displayed information. Facebook members can also join virtual groups based on common interests, see what classes they have in common, and learn each other 's’ hobbies, interests, musical tastes, and romantic relationship status through the profiles (Ellison et al. 2007).