The Role of Identity Constructions and Social Media in Shaping the Image - Essay Example

? Shaping the Image: Identity Constructions and Social Media Question 2 Shaping the Image: Identity Constructions and Social Media Introduction The invention of digital technology was due to the need for making the world a global place. With its invention, digital media brought about social media, which has been misused to some extent. However, if applied well, social media can act as the best and most effective way of sharing information. This not only makes the human race advanced, but also opens avenues for the improvement of self, since information always provides one with power. As such, most learning institutions are now comfortable in incorporating digital devices in school and classroom. The seductive power of digital technology is what is making it more popular (Jones, 1997). Social media platforms are gaining terrific popularity to the extent that most of them are now becoming formal. Despite their vastness, only a percentage of them are acceptable by most countries’ department of communication. Among the acceptable ones are Facebook, Twitter, My Space, LinkedIn and boards. The most common one is Facebook and it is accessible internationally except a few countries such as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. This country has censored the site due to the religious and moral beliefs. The sites are used for different purposes such as to advertise a business or to find a job. The purpose of this particular paper is to analyse how online social worlds facilitate collective participation and the impacts they have on communities. There will be information regarding their importance and challenges on social constructions, ethical issues activated by networked practices and the relation between users produced content and ideologies within the internet (Kennedy, 2003). In order to understand this better, I am going to use students and business people because they rely a lot on internet for their work. Online Social Worlds as Forms of Multimedia Online social worlds have been designed to enhance socialisation. Social networking promotes a team spirit. There is a need at work places to promote a team spirit where everyone in the organisation is made to believe that they “are in this thing together”. This applies to all managers and employees where they interact through social websites. Great things are achieved when people work together. They also enhance communication. Online social world like Skype have a free way of communication. Communication is through chats, web camera and phone calls. Businesses take advantage of this to solve their problems. Communication problems need to be resolved in order to enhance loyalty. Lack of communication is interpreted by employees as not caring. Frequent communication with employees builds trust and diminishes fear. A recent survey, conducted by Chenn (2012), reveals that students prefer using social media for their researches as they act as some sort of group discussions. Social media platforms are formidable used to discuss critical issues among registered members. This can be done internationally and without any fear as there is no censoring. Apparently, social media can also enable shy students to express their ideas and thus, a more effective diffusion of information. Aaker and Smith (2009) surveyed undergraduate students in order to find out how and when they use it. Over the six thousand students who participated in the research showed immense receptiveness to using social media to connect socially with other students. This was especially between the students with similar academic interests where they shared different ideas. However, the interaction was not limited to academics since other aspects were also shared. Social media is also used as a form of education material. This issue is broadly discussed by Devoss (2010) who explain that E-Learning is one way of doing this. Here, students can download lecturers’ notes and even pose questions for their lecturers. Social media platforms serve as the place where students post any events and even welcome their colleagues for social functions such as parties and sometimes meetings for clubs. Apparently, the same avenue is used to form inter sex relationships. Catching up on issues is also done through social media, especially, if one of the students is not on the campus. How and why has Community become Central to Online Virtual Worlds? Social media has shown an increase in popularity over the past decade. In fact, November (2009) explains that this popularity has been so vast that children as young as ten years old now get most of their information through social media. The information sector has been plagued greatly with such popularity. To explain this fact further, it is important to explore the changes that have taken place during the past five years. In the past five years, magazines, newspapers and hearsay were the main ways of passing information. In schools, memos and announcements were done as a formal way of passing information. Social media platforms were not so popular at the time and important information was not passed through this means. Only unnecessary information could be passed through this means. This is also attributed to the high prices of most digital gadgets. This improved drastically when digital network was improved and became affordable (Heider, 2009). Digital devices also became cheaper, especially, with the infusion of Chinese products into the digital market. Many students could now afford digital devices and could have an access to social media. The climax of this was seen from the year 2010 where digital media became more accessible to developing countries. In order to advertise affordably their businesses internationally, most entrepreneurs used social media and thus its growth. This replaced newspapers and magazines, which also became accessible in most social sites. The cost of accessing social media is likely to affect a student’s choice to consume social media. For example, it is cheaper to access social media using a phone than a computer. Convenience of getting necessary information plays a big role in this, like the portability of a phone as compared to even a tablet or laptop (Cheung, 2000). The function of the gadget affects students’ decision. Some functions can only be carried out by certain gadgets, for example, downloading a document written in word can only be done by a computer. Online social worlds are used for social learning. Apart from socialising, there is a lot of information learnt through social websites. Social learning is learning from others plus taking advantage of social media tools to learn. Social learning enables people to interact, be informed, make better decisions and view things in a wider perspective. Social learning includes blogging and media. There is a serious need in the work force to embrace technology and this can be learned through social media. Learning through social media increases productivity. This is because a lot of information like the latest technology is learned through social media. In the olden days, social media was just used for branding and marketing. Social media today is a powerful tool for learning. Social media is a technology for sharing information. Companies have benefited from social learning by solving complex problems and planning succession. In order to verify that social learning would help professional, ASTD commissioned a research to be done using survey questions. Social learning means a lot to human resource managers. They get updates on new information for improving their work force. This helps them make better decisions and eventually it leads to increase of their output (Turkle, 1996). The social media used by many businesses is Facebook. This site has many users who have registered accounts. It is a popular social networking site and is easy to use. Information is shared on blogs that are created in Facebook. How have Multimedia Practices Challenged Social Constructions of Authorship and Identity How Businesses Collect Private Information Multimedia practices include blogging and interaction through social websites. Identity and authorship is always interfered by multimedia practices. This is mostly done to those who share their private information in social websites. Some firms visit sites where people are socialising and other websites including blogs where a number of people have joined. The analysis of these blogs and social groups initiates these companies to acquire information which can be used in their own interest. This is either used in business related posts or other non-business related posts. On the other hand, some businesses engage internet directory while others make use of web browsers to gather the stated information. Apparently, the most prevalent tools that are used are cookies and registration of websites (Seglin, 2007). Using Cookies Cookies enable a private user to access a private site or social sites which are used by other people. As such, cookies share private information that is gathered from the private individuals over internet. Most of the networkers know about the information sharing and can easily access such information. Apparently, some social sites have enabled cookies to collect massive information (Sen, 2009). This includes yahoo which is used to customize the sites, while Amazon uses this to strengthen their services which are offered online. Similarly, Doubleclick uses these cookies to gather data usage in demography and internet use Site Registration Most of the companies that are involved in online business have a quest to achieve more visitors. Most of these visitors are needed in registering access to the content that is available on their sites. As such, most of the new users have to leave their email address and other critical information. This is then used by the companies as they sell out such information to other companies (Sen, 2009). Personal Account of Information Privacy Violation Consequentially, I tend to visit hundreds of websites in normal day routines. Most of these websites need registration and some other personal details. As such, at times, I end up giving most of my personal details as it is mandatory when accessing such sites. There are no other options other than offering information as this is considered vital. For instance, I have to give names, residence, address, phone numbers and my age. Due to this, I have been receiving numerous spam emails which are advertising products while some emails are an attempt to get information about credit cards. These spams are a way of soliciting information and money from users (Tomlinson, 2012). Apparently, I have not deliberately been registering in such sites but they get personal information from other sites. Though some of these spams and emails are out rightly ignored, some emails are convincing and this could lead to fraud. This is an experience that focuses on the atrocities of social sites violating the privacy of individuals who use their services. They share private information that could lead to lose of valuables and cash if a person is not keen about the offers that are relayed through the emails. Apparently, business ethics state that companies should do honest work when dealing with its customers for morality purposes and continuity in service delivery. However, when companies indulge in such activities, they may not be looking at the long term effects on the business. Such activities could be detrimental to a business as it affects its customers who might discontinue their commitment to the company. Infringement of intellectual property in social sites With the emergence of digital technology, there is ease in the transfer of material information which is then used by the beneficiaries. In this scenario, digitalisation involves transformation of information into a binary form, which is then easily transmitted via the internet. After transferring such data, the information is easily accessible via the internet, and it is even transferred to other social sites. Thereafter, the information is ripped and stored in a digital form (Turkle, 1996). The transfer of information in text, videos and sounds are mostly done by computer software which is a common activity on the internet. In the recent past, many people are refereeing to the internet as the world’s fastest copying machine. This is due the fact that people are able to exchange information from one site to another in the shortest time possible, which also includes visual and audio files. In addition to this, some sites have been marred by copied books, journals and magazines which are available to all the users that access such sites. One of the setbacks of preventing such a menace over the internet is the lack of international laws that regulate these activities. Social sites and other online activities are not regulated by international laws, which paves way for free transfer of information via the internet. This has led to loss of billions of revenue especially by copyright owners and the governments. People use these materials free of charge whereas they should have parted with some payment to get full access. In fact, it is declared that the internet and development of e-commerce are the attributes that are setbacks to the copyright industry. Apparently, it is very easy to produce numerous copies of artistic work and give it to a number of people that will not pay for the same. The piece of work is then spread via the internet instantly. This subdues the copyright holder as the people already have access to the materials (Turkle, 1996). One of the fundamental industries that enhance global economy is the copyright industry. For instance, in the US, the industry contributes an estimate of over 91.2 billion dollars. This is a substantial amount of money that can be used to enhance the economy. In mathematical terms, this is a contribution of 5% of the country’s GDP. However, with the prevalence and spread of the internet, the US is likely to record a diminishing outcome from the copyright industry. Has the Idea of the Networked Community Challenged the Ideologies Found in the Internet? It is indisputable that the internet has revolutionised so many processes in the world including the way that people live. People can play online games, download music and movie videos and listen to radio online. However, despite all the benefits of the internet phenomena and making life simpler to live, it has led to the emergence of arguably a new psychological disorder now known as Internet Addiction Disorder (IAD). The addiction is characterised by loss of self-control, withdrawal symptoms, academic disruptions, job losses, marital disagreements, etc. Internet addiction is mostly common with adolescent because they like spending most of their time social networking and playing online games (McLeod, 2011). Apart from spending a lot of time online and exhibiting withdraw symptoms, they show no remorse when interfered with. An addicted adolescent is always irritable and may hurl insults to their parents or friends if interfered with. Such people do not like being disturbed or given chores by their parents. Other characteristics of internet addiction are lying, fighting, arguments and other health problems. The addicts tend to lie to their parents or guardians about the time they spend online. A parent may become concerned if his/her adolescent is not performing well in school, is skipping classes so that he/she can be online, or is spending a lot of time on the internet. Addicts always follow their desires of wanting to be online all the time. This reduces social interactions with real people including parents, friends and teachers. The addicts prefer isolation where they are not disturbed when surfing. The porn addicts always hide so that their parents and friends do not observe what they are doing (McLeod, 2011). Apart from being occupied by excessive playing of games and watching pornography on the internet, the adolescents can also be addicted with excessive shopping online, internet gambling and e-mailing or text messaging. Those addicts who do excessive internet gambling and shopping end up wasting most of their money online. Most teenagers are students and they become a burden to their parents when they demand a lot of money for pathological gambling or shopping. Ethical Issues Activated by Networking Practices Ethics involves what is good or bad. It is always concerned with the behaviours of people. There are networking behaviours that are moral and there are those that are immoral. When networking, there are several ethical factors that one should consider. Does a networker have ethical obligations to fulfil? Is it ethical to use people’s information without asking them first? There are various fundamental approaches that have been incepted to enhance networkers in enforcing the privacy rights of individuals (Tomlinson, 2012). To begin with, owners of social sites that are online have ensured that social networkers have knowledge of the various approaches of getting information before using such practices of collecting information. As such, the people that are involved have a decisive action of showing such information or hoarding onto such information. The online locations have incorporated options for social networkers to decide whether or not to give private information. To second this, the people that use these social sites and offer information to the stated site have the discrepancy of changing or erasing such information. There are some online companies that guarantee their users that they are going to protect their private information. Fundamentally, governments have enacted and enforced regulations that are geared towards reducing the scenarios where private information is accessed by online sites. In addition to this, the government legislations ensure there is reduction of unethical approaches in accessing such data. Conclusion It is noteworthy that social media is misused by students. A survey by (November, 2009) reveals that some students use social media to acquire pornographic material. Some of these are accessible to any underage person with access to a computer. Such behaviours contribute to moral deviance. The same media platforms are used to spread rumours and slander about professors who are not popular with students. Students use the same method to plan for social ills and even strikes. Some students prefer getting their information from social media, which is not always true and is not in their best interest. Organisations also have problems with networking sites. There is lack of security and privacy in social websites. Sensitive information is always seen by everyone. Despite the disadvantages of social networking discussed above, there are numerous advantages. Social networking enhances social learning. Many people are often resistant in embracing learning through social media. They see it as wastage of time. It is therefore important for an organisation to come up with techniques of overcoming organisational challenges using social learning. Stake holders in an organisation need to be educated on the importance of learning through social media (Tomlinson, 2012). Education will enlighten the employees that social learning leads to making better decisions and improving their working condition. This solves most of the problems mentioned above. They are supposed to be influenced to learn through social media. Bogging and learning through social media should be made fun in order to encourage stake holders in an organisation learn and share information in blogs and other social media tools. References Aaker, J., & Smith, A. (2009). The dragonfly effect: Quick, effective and powerful ways to use social media to drive change. New York: Jossey-bass Publishers. Chenn, A. (2012). Students find E-Textbooks ‘clumsy’ and don’t use their interactive features. The chronicle of higher education, 1225(3), 2876-3098. Cheung, C. (2000). Web studies: Rewiring media studies for the digital age. London: Arnold. Devoss, N. D. (2010). Because digital writing matters: Improving student writing in online and multimedia environments. New York: Jossey-bass Publishers. Heider, D. (2009). Living Virtually: Researching New Worlds. New York: Peter Lang. Jones, S. (1997). Virtual culture: Identity and communication in cybersociety. London:Sage Kennedy, H. (2003). 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