There is always a big debate about the affects the social world online has on our lives. Social media can have a huge impact on a person lives whether is be virtually or in the real world, many people have different social presence depending on the social media site that it is. Your Facebook profile may be completely different than your Twitter or Instagram account and even your Linkedin profile.
There are over 1 billion people who have a Facebook profile whether that be for personal or private reasons many people are connected and consume this one site. Facebook is positive in some ways because it allows you connect to family members or friends who maybe in a different country to you, it is one of the only ways you can stay connected. You are able to communicate with them in some way especially if you don't often get to in the real life. However some people can create a different persona on Facebook and some people tend have fake accounts for many different reasons, in that sense it is dangerous as you only believe what you see and don't know the really person behind the computer. You are supposed to be able to trust the person. But there are many ways you can make your profile private and only available to friends and loved ones. Just because people may use Facebook on a daily basis does not mean they no longer interact or communicate with people in the real world. A lot of people have many different devices in which they can log onto their account, so it is available pretty much anytime anyway. This doesn't mean that people live in a social world, it just allows them to stay connected wherever they are.
I know that my use of social networking sites has definitely changed over the years as I am sure many other peoples have, for instance I now only really use Facebook to post photos and I have many family members on there who can keep updated with me (especially being here in America). Which is different from Instagram for me because you are not 'suppose' to post on their frequently and I don't have the same people across all my social networking sites. Twitter is the site I would say I visit the most it is good because you can connect with not only friends, but sports, news, celebrities almost anything you want to find out or get the local news on your favourite things who generally have Twitter feeds. Companies also use Twitter to connect with people who use their products, it has definitely become a more global social network. Although there are many people who revolve their life around being on these sites and making sure they have a certain number of likes or followers I think there is a generational difference in who has a more impact on the social world than the real world. Many young people probably feel that it is one of the only ways they can stay connected to their friends.
The big part of this whole debate I believe that your social media presence may have some affect on you in the real world so people may say 'Oh yeah I saw that on your Facebook' people are able to get to know things about a person based on there profiles, so when you may meet a person for the first time you may already know a lot more about them, which in some ways is kind of creepy. However I think a clear indicator about your consumption would be whether you would be able to live with out any of these sites?
Social Networking sites are free so an individual can use them. They incorporate many different things that allow you to stay connected to who ever you want which is what I think is the overall appeal.
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