In today’s day and age, it is very rare to see someone who doesn’t carry a smartphone, or at the very least access to one. Due to the fact that there is such an enormous influence around these phones, the culture of everything is starting to revolve around the smartphone and it’s features. By having a device like this, it allows for web browsing, phone calls, and most importantly connecting, at the palm of your hands and on the go. Since the smartphone is very heavily used because of its convenience, people are starting to direct their attention towards social media.

Social media is a term used to describe technology that allows for online social interaction between multiple people for conversations, collaborations, and creativity (Dabbagh & Kitsantas, 2012). When it comes to this type of online concept, it includes applications and websites like, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter. Although these three are classified under the same category, all three of these have their differences.

With Facebook, it’s an online social media that is used for the purpose of sharing your personal life with people you have chosen to be connected with. On this platform, you can write statuses, update your personal details, or even upload photos and videos. Essentially, Facebook is a platform used mainly for personal life usage. On the other hand, however, LinkedIn is an app that has the same concept, but for a business purpose. When someone uses LinkedIn, its for the purpose of a professional reason (i.e. Showcase who you are and the achievements you’ve accomplished, or the place you’re employed at). With this, you hold back on your private life, and focus on more of your title. The similarity between these two however is that they are both social media platforms used for sharing different details about you, professionally or casually.

Besides Facebook and Linkedin, the use of Twitter is completely different. Unlike, the other two social media platforms, Twitter relies on the usage of “status updates” and the hashtag. When you send out a tweet about something, it is broadcasting that status to the world, if they choose to see it. Normally, the people who are tweeting can use the (#) key, followed by words to depict keywords that people can search up and find related status updates for them to see. By searching up a certain hashtag, you can find all the tweets about that certain topic in a matter of seconds and in the masses. Also, there is a feature on Twitter where one can see “Whats trending?”, which is something that shows how popular a certain keyword is.

It is because of this reason that people of higher authority rely on social media to convey their message. Since people in this generation are always on their electronics and most are on social media, you see more people of interest switching over to online campaigning or to send out messages to the masses of people in a matter of seconds and in real time. Slowly, but aware, social media is a tool that is utilized more everyday by people and is being accepted as a valuable tool to convey information and appeal to this generation.

References:

Dabbagh, N., & Kitsantas, A. (2012). Personal Learning Environments, social media, and self-regulated learning: A natural formula for connecting formal and informal learning. The Internet and higher education, 15(1), 3-8.