Emerging Communications through Social Media - Dissertation Example

 Emerging Communications through Social Media 1.0 Emerging Communications through Social Media Social media, one of the hottest emerging technologies, has made an everlasting impact on lives in America, as well as across the globe! Social media dates back to the 1700s. It has vastly changed the way we communicate amongst each other. Social media is a medium of converged tools to communicate and share information. It is used for business and personal use. In terms of ethical and moral implications, it has desensitized human interactions. Social media has made life easier by expanding professional networks, assisting in solving crimes, sharing information such as pictures, videos, humor of the day, bridging the communication gap between family and friends across international lines, broadening the footprint for marketing and advertising and increasing the opportunity for dating on social sites which some have led to marriage. 1.1 Summary Although, social media is one of our biggest generational advancements, there are certainly various reasons why some are not as receptive as others. Today, a large proportion of the population use social media for both personal and professional use. The most popular social sites today include Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Pinterest and Google Plus+. According to surveys done by Pew Research conducted in 2013, “73% of all internet users use social media” (Pew Research, 2013). 2.0 Social Media Defined 2.1 What is Social Media? Communication has in general been in existence for quite a long time now. However, the modes of communication has changed with the increasing population been a key factor to this. This has led to an increase in demand for a more effective means of communication thereby leading to the increasingly more use of internet for communication. As of July 2014, there were 3 billion Internet users with over 73 percent of this using the social media (Pew Research, 2013). Social media provides an open forum of communication for the public to engage in online interactions without geographical boundaries. Initially, it was designed as a personal tool to connect family and friends. This online community is able to share personal and professional information, exchange ideas, collaborate, interact, transfer files, photos, and videos 24/7, 365 days a year. Although social media has changed the way we communicate, there are still critics that believe that social media has desensitized human interaction and ultimately killing communities. 2.2 The Convergence of Social Media Business Social media has gained popularity in the business community. Subsequently, businesses are using it as a low-cost formal means of communicating with customers and geographically separated employees. According to Naylor, Lamberton and West (2012), close to 83 percent of all Fortune 500 companies were using at least one form of social media to connect and communicate with their consumers by 2011. Looking at other business such as public relation agencies, they have been known to use social media historically to gather and analyze customers’ feedback. Although this feedback is not necessarily meant to determine the end result of a company’s performance, it is used as a tool to measure customer/client relations. Businesses also use social media to learn their target groups and audiences which enables the business to plan for products and campaigns to best invest on (Bosari, 2012). Other benefits that businesses can achieve from use of social media include better ways of getting feedback, increased sales through leads that emanate from social sites, cheap source of brand marketing and improvement of relationships with its customers through social interactions at these platforms Naylor, Lamberton & West, 2012; Weiguo, 2014). Military sector Social media has been seen as an interesting platform by both the governments and intelligence agencies largely due to the widespread use of the platform in most parts of the world. Usually, military operations such as Psychological Operations (PsyOps), Open-source Intelligence (OSINT) and Cyber espionage which are mainly driven by governments largely make use of social media. A good example of these military operations is the use of social media militias who promote certain cyber-offensive acts against other governments. This can be in the form of diffusing a certain crafted malware through social platforms especially emails and other powerful media forms. Social media is conversely used as a platform for spreading propaganda which is one of the widely used strategies in the military sector (Infosec Institute, 2012). In the US military, for example, social media platforms are used as channels for psychological operations in what is referred to as Psychological Operations (PsyOps). These are organized media operations which are used to transmit information that is meant to influence the population emotionally by arousing their motives and objective reasoning. The military employs various cyber technologies to achieve Psychological Operations (PsyOps) such as blogs, video games, websites, chat bots and virtual reality among other social network platforms. They do this to influence certain individuals or part of society to support a certain cause while also creating an environment of fear in the same manner that their adversaries do. This is especially common in the use of propaganda operations where the military counteracts operations such as those driven by cyber terrorists (Infosec Institute, 2012) Open-Source Intelligence (OSINT is another example of the ways through which social media is used to facilitate intelligence operations as seen in the US Department of Defense. This method is used to collect and analyze various sources of strategic public information. The sources of such data are collected from social network sites, blogs, wikis and other aggregators of public information where intelligence agencies constantly monitor. The monitoring process usually involves collecting information from billions of conversations through analyzing text which is based on predefined criteria. The military and other intelligence agencies also make use of data mining procedures on social media where military analysts identify trends as displayed in various countries with respect to the events and news such as social movements and demonstrations. The social media platforms thus provide raw data for examinations into such trends thereby being of great interest and help to military and intelligence agencies all over the world. Finally, the military also use social media for the purpose of cyber espionage through use of techniques such as identity spoofing, replacement of identity and malware-based attacks. In all these techniques, the military strives to gather information through spying and other concealed avenues. The military uses data mining on the linked networks and contacts where certain individuals and other targets are analyzed and spied upon for certain information gathering. It is undoubtedly clear that social media is such an important part of the military sector especially when it comes to gathering and analysis of intelligence information. It is, however, imperative to understand that military adversaries are reliant on the same platforms as well and thus the military always have to take caution to avoid falling prey to their tactics (Infosec Institute, 2012). Education sector According to a recent survey, close to 61 percent of teachers, librarians, and school heads are active in at least one of the popular social media site. The main purpose, of engaging in social media by this category of people, is to gain professional development. Usually, they do this through various ways such as participating in blogs discussions, attending webinars and podcasts, and watching videos on popular sites such as YouTube (Ferriter, 2011). On the other hand, education facilities have adopted various ways of utilizing social media in achieving certain goals and objectives concerning promotion of learning processes, marketing institutions, general public outreach and enhancing institutions’ pride. In classrooms and learning environments, for example, most education centers and facilities are increasingly making use of popular social spaces such as Facebook and Twitter to make important announcements and even host academic discussions. It is also common to find tutors and instructors sharing learning materials with their students through platforms such as blogs and other networking sites. Institutions of education have also adopted ways through which to market themselves to potential students and the outside world in general through the use of social media platforms. Such institutions, most of which are the higher level colleges and universities, offer virtual tours to the institution displaying images and videos on the institutions’ amenities and facilities for the purpose of self-marketing. This is common in most institutions’ web platforms such as their websites and the interactive avenues such as Facebook and Twitter. Most institutions today also engage with their audiences in social media sites, with key examples being Facebook and Twitter, in a bid to promote their services and convince their audiences to choose them over their rivals (Ferriter, 2011). Institutions of education also engage the publics and other stakeholders such as the parents in a way to reach them out and provide them with up-to-date information on the developments taking place. Through social sites, institutions are also able to promote their activities which provide a platform for conversations and provision of feedback from the audiences. The social sites also provide platforms for connection of various groups such as the alumni students and other groups of interest to the institutions. Natural disasters It is common knowledge that use of social media hikes during certain events such a disaster which primarily is as a result of people seeking immediate and in-depth information of the event. This virtually instantaneous rise in social media activity has been found to occur in nearly all industries and countries alike. Social media has been used for various purposes during various natural disasters that have taken place in most parts of the world. According to various researchers, social media is used to communicate with family and friends in time of this occurrences, to seek emotional support, to determine the magnitude of a disaster and to provide information about the disaster (Fraustino, Brooke & Yan, 2012). People have been found to prefer using social media to let their family members and friends understand their state and position during an occurrence of a natural disaster. Such communication usually takes various scenarios such as solicit for help, communication confirming that they are safe, and an offer to help among others. For example, a survey conducted following the 2005 Hurricane Katrina, indicated that over a half of the respondents made use of the internet to communicate with other people concerning the disaster. It has also been found that people widely use social media platforms to relay their emotional support to those affected by natural disasters (Hampton et al., 2015). This is especially common on Twitter where hashtags are created to show support towards a certain cause as a result of disaster occurrence. For example, a powerful storm that hit a festival in Belgium (2011) led to an enormous twitter activity with over 80,000 tweets sent from the platform in support of those affected by the storm. Other common uses of social media during disasters include communications sent to the public and other related persons on the magnitude of such disasters. For example, the public administration and authority bodies may prefer to send some statistical details to the public, usually as a warning and precautionary measures applicable to the disaster. In other cases, first-hand accounts of what is happening during this occurrences are shared to provide information necessary to the public and those affected by the natural disaster (Fraustino, Brooke & Yan, 2012). Gaming industry The gaming industry is a very popular industries in the US today, thanks to the numerous games available for gamers today. Some of the popular games include the PlayStation, Xbox and Nintendo among others. Due to the increased growth of this industry, competition between these game providers has definitely increased leading to the adoption of various survival strategies. A common strategy by the game providers today is the use of social media to market, advertise and communicate with their market. PlayStation, for example, was launched in 1994 and is one of the leading gaming providers in the market today. The company has highly invested in its social media presence, leading to a big following on two of the most popular platforms; Facebook (about 40 million fans) and Twitter (about 6 million followers). The company uses these platforms to advertise its games and is highly interactive with its audience. PlayStation also uses these social media platforms to inform its fans and audience about probable game releases and competitions through which these fans get to be rewarded. On the other hand, Xbox, a direct competitor to PlayStation, enjoys a large social media following as well with over 4.5 million followers on Twitter (Twitter, 2015) and another 24 million fans on Facebook (Facebook, 2015). The company is also very active on its social media platforms, constantly engaging its audience through communicating games releases, general interactions and seeking input from the users towards improvement of their games. They also use these platforms to inform its audience of the impending events and competitions while also rewarding them. This is quite a clear indication of the use and impact of social media on this industry today. Particular interest is seen in the gaming providers use of these platforms to market and ultimately sell their products to their fans through provision of links that direct these users to the online stores. Social media has evidently had such a huge impact towards the growth and improvement of the gaming industry. 2.3 Technology of social media Currently, social media users have a wide variety of avenues through which they can access their platforms such as blogs, forums, wikis, social bookmarking, communities, podcasts and portals among others. This has led to the sophistication of this socialization segment with each of these platforms virtually adopting varying technology and interfaces to suit their respective clienteles. Technology in social media has taken various forms with most of this largely concerned with ensuring that users enjoy swift and enjoyable operations of these platforms. This has led to most of the social media services providers such as Facebook and Twitter adopting superior technological advancements that ensure their sites interfaces and maneuverability is sleek and efficient. They have also invested heavily in areas of data protection and backup which ensures user confidence and security. The use of algorithms in classifying data on these social media platforms ensure that order and management of information posted on this sites are achieved. It is clearly evident that the technological advancement has consequently facilitated an increase in the use of social media platforms. Education and technological literacy have seen creation of more efficient technologies with simpler methods of building websites and online spaces being evidence to this (Goulding, 2011). More people are able to create websites and other online platforms using very simplified platforms such as Word Press and Blogger among others. These are easily accessible and convenient platforms that have facilitated growth of the social media space today. 3.0 Early Developments in Social Media 3.1 Evolution of Social Media Social media is believed to have first come into existence with the successful relay of the first email in 1971. This took place when an email was sent from two computers connected through the Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) which is the origin of internet as well. The next innovation came in 1978 with the introduction of BBS (Bulletin Board Systems) which were internet forums that were used to share, post and comment on various topics using web applications. These forums provided the first group exchanges and interactions. Around 1994, the internet had gained popularity with several advancements and developments being seen. By this time, the internet changed its name to what is popularly known as World Wide Web (www) and to some, it was known as the “Information Superhighway.” Following these advancements, various Internet Service Providers (ISPs) sprouted such as CompuServe, Netcon and AOL among others. There were also a growing number of technology companies which led to over one million websites developed by 1995 (Leiner et al., 2009). In 1997, Google, a search engine, was launched beside other prominent technology companies which would be very influential in the social media space. Around this time also, blogs grew exponentially largely due to the emergence of improved technological tools that allowed simplified creation of these platforms. This facilitated increased sharing of content and other socializing functionalities (Leiner et al., 2009). Definite social networking sites came with the introduction of Friendster in 2002, thereby becoming the first social network to garner over one million users. This was closely followed by the introduction of Myspace in 2002 before Facebook came on the scene in 2003. Twitter emerged in 2006 in a new and different fashion that provided its users a micro-blogging experience. YouTube, a video-sharing platform, was later created in 2005. Other notable platforms developed include Tumbler and Instagram. Other advancements that have characterized the evolution of social media include the introduction of smartphones such as IPhone (2007) and the Social Media Management Systems (SMMS) in 2008 which provided an avenue for effective management of social communities by companies and brands. 3.2 Early examples of Social Media As noted from the evolution phases of social media, there are various forms that these platforms have taken over the course of the years. The earliest forms of social media, therefore, include; Usernets (Newsgroups), Bulletin Board Systems (BBSs), Online Services (such as CompuServe and Prodigy), Internet Relay Chat (IRC) and Internet Messaging among others. These social sites usually took the forms of forums while others were dating sites (such as Classmates.com), and online games sites (such as World of Warcraft) among other social interactions media platforms (Leiner et al., 2009). 3.3 Modern Social media More than ever, the social media space is very crowded, competitive and increasingly sophisticated than before. There are thousands of social media platforms today with the largest and most popular being Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest, Instagram, MySpace, Snapchat, LiveJournal, Flicker and WordPress among others. The discussion will briefly look at the two most popular platforms today i.e. Facebook and Twitter. Facebook According to Pew Research (2013), Facebook is used by over 57 percent of all adults in America and another 73 percent of young people aged between 12-17 years. It is arguably the most popular social website today with a worldwide fan base of over 800 million users (Information Resources Management Association, 2014, p. 747) Twitter This is another of the world most popular social media platforms which is based in San Francisco. According to statistics provided by Twitter, the platform has over 288 million users on a monthly basis with over 77 percent of these users located outside the US. The platform is deemed to be one of the most interactive with over 500 million tweets being sent on the platform every day. Twitter supports over 35 languages for its users (Twitter, 2015). References Bosari, Jessica (2012). The developing role of social media in the modern business world. Retrieved January 14, 2015, from Forbes Web Site: http://www.forbes.com/sites/moneywisewomen/2012/08/08/the-developing-role-of social-media-in-the-modern-business-world/ viewed 28 January 2015. Facebook. Xbox. (19 February 2015). Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/xbox Ferriter, W. M. (2011). Digitally Speaking / Using Social Media to Reach Your Community. The Effective Educator. 68(4) 87-88. Retrieved from http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational leadership/dec10/vol68/num04/Using-Social-Media-to-Reach-Your-Community.aspx Fraustino, J. D., Brooke, L. & Yan, J. (2012). “Social Media Use during Disasters: A Review of the Knowledge Base and Gaps,” Final Report to Human Factors/Behavioral Sciences Division, Science and Technology Directorate, U.S. Department of Homeland Security. College Park, MD: START, 2012. Retrieved from http://www.start.umd.edu/sites/default/files/files/publications/START_SocialMediaUse uringD sasters_LitReview.pdf viewed 28 January 2015 Goulding, J. (2011). Historical thinking and social media. Agora, 46(3)11-19. Hampton, K., Rainie, L., Lu, W., Shin, I., & Purcell, K. (2015, January 15). Social media and the cost of caring. Retrieved from http://www.pewinternet.org/2015/01/15/social-media-and-stress/ viewed 28 January 2015 Infosec Institute. (2012). Social Media Use in the Military Sector. Retrieved from http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/social-media-use-in-the-military-sector/ viewed 28 January 2015 Information Resources Management Association. (2014). Digital arts and entertainment: Concepts, methodologies, tools, and applications. Hershey, PA: Information Science Reference. Leiner, B. M., Cerf, V. G., Clark, D. D., Kahn, R. E., Kleinrock, L., Lynch, D. C., & Wolff, S. (2009). A brief history of the Internet. ACM SIGCOMM Computer Communication Review, 39(5) 22-31. Naylor, R. W., Lamberton, C. P., & West, P. M. (2012). Beyond the “like” button: The impact of mere virtual presence on brand evaluations and purchase intentions in social media settings. Journal of Marketing, 76(6) 105-120. Twitter. About (factsheet page). (19 February 2015). Retrieved from https://about.twitter.com/company Twitter. PlayStation @PlayStation. (19 February 2015). Retrieved from https://twitter.com/Xbox Weiguo, F., & Gordon, M. D. (2014). The power of social media analytics. Communications of the ACM, 57(6) 74-81. Read More