Social Networking Sites

So I will be comparing the four following social networking sites: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Tumblr.

The similarities and differences between these sites are actually pretty interesting. Each has its own purpose and style. Each involves different types of social interaction.

In my opinion, Facebook is definitely the most socially comprehensive out of the four sites. It reveals the most personal information about its users. Each user profile displays their photos, name, location, age, birthday, relationship status, friends, "likes", and so much more. Facebook seems to encourage people to upload all of this personal information by advertising themselves as a friend-based network. When I say friend-based, I mean that Facebook has the "add friend" feature, therefore, any two users that are not Facebook friends have limited viewing access to each other's profiles. For two users that are friends though, all of this information is usually pretty accessible. Facebook also seems to have the most extensive messaging features. Nowadays, not only can you directly message people back and forth but you can video chat and send phone calls.

Twitter can also be used to display a ton of personal information, but through a different style. Twitter  communication is based on user "tweets". People are able to post statuses up to 140 characters long. It's really up to each user how personal they would like to get with these statuses, but this freedom allows people to get creative with what they are saying and how they are saying it. Twitter also has a privacy feature like Facebook. Twitter users can set their accounts to private which only allows their approved followers to view their tweets. Also like Facebook, there is a direct messaging feature, but much less extensive. In my opinion, most of the communication done on Twitter is done publicly. Facebook can be quite private with its extensive messaging. The type of interaction is quite different too. The idea of twitter is that users post a status. It can be a thought, word, mood, literally anything, but it is not necessarily to start a two-way conversation. People can retweet each other, which is like reblogging a post.

Similarly to Twitter, Instagram can be as personal as the user wants it to be. The most obvious difference though, is that this social network is entirely photo-based. People can still comment back and forth as they would on a Facebook picture, but there is no option to post anything else. They do have a direct messaging feature incorporated into the app, though. Just like the two other sites, people on Instagram can "like" one another posts, and there is a similar privacy feature. Unlike Facebook, and similarly to Twitter, Instagram is based on "followers" and "following" rather than "adding".


Tumblr seems like a hybrid of Twitter and Instagram. Tumblr originally, and for the most part, was created and is a blogging platform. But, it has become just as much of a social networking site as the other three. Unlike Instagram, many users on Tumblr post and repost photos that are not theirs. It is based almost entirely on reblogging. A seemingly unique aspect of Tumblr is the anonymous questioning feature. Users can write to each other's blogs anonymously. This site is also based on followers and following. Out of the four sites, this site seems like the most emotionally expressive one. People on Tumblr seem to express themselves much more than on the other sites. This could possibly be because many of users' posts are not of themselves, therefore can somewhat "live" or express vicariously through pictures that they find ideal or interesting.

Social Net'g

Both corporate and non corporate sources can use social media and networking to their advantage. We see this being done all the time. The majority of companies these days have Facebook pages, Instagram and Twitter handles. We have also seen numerous non corporate people and groups doing this. For corporate companies, social media can be a good platform for them to connect with their customers and society in general. For example, companies can tweet business or product news to inform their followers. They can also take stances on  controversial social issues. Many companies have been gaining both new customers and customer loyalty by commenting on controversial topics. For example, Starbucks has taken a stance on gay rights issues. By making their stances public through social media and news statements, they have gained a progressive reputation. This is beneficial for them and their company business strategy. Social networking can also directly effect business strategy by now offering monetizing plans. Facebook now offers advertising. Companies can reach even more people now by using this feature. According to Reuters and the Chicago Tribune article, "Facebook search: Facebook adding search feature", Facebook has over one billion users. This makes their social network platform an extremely ripe place for companies and other sources to advertise themselves and reach tons of potential customers. "The initial focus is on getting users more engaged, so this is making Facebook more useful and sticky".

Non corporate sources can also benefit from social networking. Social media accounts don't always have to be used to reach a crowd of customers or post new products. Besides for personal use, people and groups have used social media for many other purposes. For example, in 2010 traffic police in New Delhi, India, found a way to fight street and traffic crime with the use of Facebook. "The traffic police started a Facebook page two months ago, and almost immediately became digital informants, posting photos of their fellow drivers violating traffic laws. " By using these pictures, the police were able to issue tickets and fight the extremely high traffic accident rate in New Delhi. My most immediate thought is that this is a great use of Facebook. The police in New Delhi are able to lower traffic accident rates while issuing more tickets to violators. But, after some further thought, I realized that this could also be an intrusion of privacy and community. If people are exposing their fellow community drivers, more and more people may start to feel uncomfortable and under constant pressure. It can also raise some issues of whether or not non-police citizens should be able to judge whether something is a criminal act when police aren't around.

So, as mentioned, both corporate and non corporate sources can benefit from social networking, but as also mentioned, there are some dark sides. With social media being present online, posts by all users are permanent. They can always be "deleted" but they are always accessible- they leave an "imprint". This can be positive or detrimental. If a company or person posts something that they later no longer believe or feel is appropriate, the damage is already done. Their followers, along with non-followers (for public profiles) have already seen the post and already formed their opinions. We see this happening all the time. For example, singer Kanye West and Wiz Khalifa had a Twitter "brawl" in which Kanye eventually deleted a majority of his tweets. But, with millions of followers, his tweets were bound to be archived and uploaded as breaking news articles and posts on sites such as EliteDaily and Buzzfeed.

Blog v Wiki

In my opinion, I think that one of the biggest differences between blogs and wikis is that the latter is created through collaborative effort. Some blogs can have more than one contributor but in most cases they are created and maintained by a solo writer. Wikis are websites that grow continuously from various users adding content. As defined Rob Edmonds (Up from the Grassroots), wiki is defined as "a type of website that allows users to add, remove, or otherwise edit and change all content very quickly and easily". Additionally they are, "designed to improve information sharing and collaboration known collectively"(Locher, "More on How to Build Your Own Wikipedia").

Wikis are also composed of pages that can be edited, changed, and added by multiple users. Blogs are composed of posts and entries and are left in the chronological order in which they are published. In a way blogs can be collaborative by allowing viewers to comment on posts, but this interaction is very different than that of the shared writing process used in wikis.

Wiki pages tend to stay relevant because they offer knowledge-based information and are constantly edited and changed by users. Blog posts are not usually updated, therefore they are timely and lose popularity/views and relevance as time goes by. Blogs themselves can still be just as relevant as wikis. They just need to be added to constantly with new posts rather than a single post being edited and added to.


I think that in the future wikis can potentially be used for exchanging and updating medical information resources. For example, hospitals can each have wikis where they add new information regarding diseases, surgical procedures, etc. With this, they can share them with other hospitals and have doctors and nurses update and edit information, making each hospital's array of information stronger and collaborative. This could be especially helpful for surgical theories and thesis research because if a doctor is stuck on a certain element, another doctor can add their insight and potentially help the other doctor make a breakthrough with their thinking.

We all know that social media has changed the game- but for better or for worse?

Social networks are dominating the internet and mobile world. With their widespread popularity and power, social networking has inevitably become a controversial topic of discussion. Because of this, I decided that it would be interesting to analyze both sides of the pro and con social networking arguments. So, I have chosen to conduct an analysis on both the positive and negative effects of social networking. In order to do this, I will first come up with all of the good and bad effects I can think of myself. Then I will consult websites, statistics, psychology studies, etc to find data that corresponds to the effects. Since the effects of social networking are becoming more and more heated, I am sure there will be tons of data to support all arguments.