Social network sites have bloomed & bloosemed over the last 5years! In this day & age about 95% of teenagers will go home and spend part of thier evening on sites such as 'Facebook, MSN & 'Twitter'. Social sites like these have also been banned in some working business enviroments...
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| Facebook logo |
Facebook was founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerburg in Havard college. Todays statistics suggests that Facebook has 750 million users, it tops 'Google' for weekly traffic, an Egyptian baby named after it and one of the oldest user worldwide, a lady named Ivy Bean of Bradford joined Facebook in 2008 at the age of 102! If Facebook were its own indvidual country it world be the 3rds biggest!
Obviously Facebook has its advantages:
- Users of this social network site can pretty much do what they please, they are able too 'tag' photos of thier friends/family, upload videos/photos, list thier personal interests/hobbies, create profiles/pages/events/groups, you are able to 'like' pages, you have 'real - time' chat feature, and now you also have the new 'real - time' video chat feature, can set your privacy setting s to exactly how you want it too and, if needed you also have the 'block' people feature
- It can reunite lost friends/family
- Has been involved with campaigns with the likes of 'Top Gear, True Blood & American Idol'
- Banned from many countries & workplaces
- Unfortunately 1 in 5 divorces are blamed on Facebook
- A lot of people get 'addicted' & spend way to much time on this site than they should do
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| Twitter logo |
Twitter is also a big thing going at the moment, it originated in 2005 by Jack Dorsey. Twitter soon hit the ground running with over 200 million users worldwide! Generating 200million 'tweets' daily. They also apparently have to deal with 1.6 billion queries a day! This is a very active social network site! what makes it different is that its more about 'to - the - point' information. A user is allowed to send/recieve 140 spaces worth of text, this is formally known as a 'tweet'. So its more on the lines of a 'micro - blogging' system!
Here are statistics of the overall percentage of what is 'tweeted' about on Twitter:
- Pointless Babble (40%)
- Conversational (38%)
- Pass - along - value (9%)
- Self Promotion (6%)
- Spam (4%)
- News (4%)
Advantages would be:
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- Quick/fast way to find out information
- You can use the '#' key before a word to signify a certain discussion
- Can 'follow' whoever you want
- Real time
Dis-Advantages:
- High percentage is pointless babble...
- Some people state that 'they feel to connected' in the Twitter World
- Only allowed to send /recieve 140 characters
MSN is again another boss in the social network site, like the others it is free to set up & uses real time technology. What makes it different? Well, it runs off 'Hotmail' so if you have a Hotmail account you'll most probably have MSN messenger. It is used mostly within the 'younger years' as they find other sites like 'Facebook' to complicated to use.
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| MSN messenger logo |
Advantages would be:
- You can send files over messenger
- Real time technology
- Can have 'Group' chats with your friends
- easy interface
Dis-Advantages:
- It's not as new as other social network sites
- Nowhere near as many people use it as they use Facebook/Twitter/Bebo
- Have to download some kind of software to use it
- Quite dull features...
In my own personal expeirence, I have a very broad understanding of social sites, how? Well firstly I have used MSN messenger &, I do own a Facebook account. I find sites like these very distracting, especially Facebook, this is an extremely active site! A lot of people spend hours on end on this thing! However, it does have it's benefits from time - to - time... there have been times when i've forgot what to do on an assigned task & all I had to do was ask a friend what to do, & before you know it your now stress free of what to do! I also like how you can view pictures from maybe the messy Friday night thats just passed...
Personally though, I would have to disagree with the critics of social network sites. In fact sites like these may be 'time consuming' or 'a waste of time'. But great things have evolved from sites like Facebook! familys and friends have been re-united, tell me thats not a good thing!? And for teenagers like myself its just brilliant to know whats happening when & where 24/7!
E-mail
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| E-mail logo |
E-mail also know as 'electronic mail' was one of the first forms of successful communication within the e-world. And, was introducedinto this world in 1978! Since then, it has evolved to be one of the many 'must haves'. Many people & companies rely on e-mail! Without it, would be very difficult to communicate with people over the world. Infact a case study in 2010 'Study on Work Place' suggested that 83% of US companies though it was critical to have e-mail to keep their company going.
Pros of e-mail:
- Can send over pretty much what you want
- Free
- You can control your scheme/time independently
Cons of e-mail:
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- Information can be misinterpreted
- Not always consistent
- Lots of junk mail
- Can accidently send stuff to others quite easily
- Loss of context can occur
I have used e-mail in many occasions. A good example would be for school use, I have a personal e-mail address & an address for a school account. There are many times where teachers have posted critical links to view for myself to see how to improve my work. Also, another good example could be if you were ill & needed to do the work, youcould e-mail that teacher to send you that work over! A last example would be 'subscribing' to some you like... for instance I love music, so I am subscribed to 'SBTV' & whenever a new tune drops into the scene I'll be one of the first to know about it!
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| SBTV logo |
An overall outlook on e-mail, I would say at its time it was critical that if you were a busines, that you had e-mail. If you didn't then, well, bascially you were isloated. Thus, making your reputation & sales harder to increase! I also think that it is still a benefit to have but not as much. Why do I think this? Well, these days we have social network sites to communicate as well as top end mobiles such as the 'iPhone' & business can now use these sites to get noticed & can even use Public Relations... However, having an e-mail account will last for along time & will stay vital for a long time. But in my opinion, I am one of the many to believe that it is slowly dying.
This technology was made possible by the upcoming technology, fairly new to the technology scene but nevertheless, a very useful bit of kit! A lot of people/companies have saved thousands of pounds on travelling by using this software!
Advantages of Online Conferencing:
- Live HD streaming
- More convenient - as you can access it when & whenever you want
- Higher level of participation - typically, more people will actively participate in a n online conference, rather than a face - to - face one
- More wide spread
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| Typical Online Conferencing |
Dis-Advantages:
- Nothing beats face - to - face communication
- Electrics could cut out...
- Everyone has to have roughly if not the same software for it to run smoothly
- Can be costly too!
Message Boards
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| London rioters with MET police 2011 |
Also known as 'Forums', message boards have become very big in the wide web... Mainly used for discussions. Having message boards means that you can find out how good the new Fifa game is & the other alternatives for that game! That was just one example, another example could be discussing the recent London riot events... I know that obviously a lot of people were very angry with this. And you could discuss your own personal opinions with people who shared your opinion & others who felt differently.
- Can absorb endless information
- Easy to join in with
- Get great reviews of products
- See everyones views
- Can get quite heated
- Arguements can arise faster than you think
- 'Haters'
- Can sometimes be quite hard to find your desired topic question
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| Fifa 12 vs PES 2012 |
I have indeed used message boards to find out information about the new football games such as 'Fifa' to find out if its worth buying, & done the same with music/films too. Message boards have been very active in these last on going months, mainly due to the London riots. But by having these forums means that you can have a say in what you think, & what you think should happen or simply what you would do or who you follow!
