Cole_Final
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1. Facebook began as a college directory but grew rapidly to become one of the largest social networks globally due to its ease of use. It allows users to create profiles, connect with friends, and share updates and photos. 2. Some concerns about Facebook include user privacy and "stalking" given the visibility of profile walls and news feeds to friends and advertisers. However, additional privacy settings have been added to address these issues. 3. Studies show that Facebook has minimal impact on reducing real-world social interaction for college students, who spend only about 30 minutes on the site daily. However, it remains a significant part of social and communication norms.
Cole_Final
- 1. 1 Chris Cole COM 364 22 May 2011 Facebook, which began as a type of college directory and relatively small social network, has now become one of the most viral and global social networks in history. Social networks such as Myspace, Bebo, and others had been around for several years, but when Facebook arrived on the scene its ease of use, mobility, and popularity made it into the fastest and biggest social network in the world. The first question that might come to mind is, What’s the catch? The easy answer is there isn’t one. Keep in mind that Facebook is free and will always be. (Larsen, 2011) Signing up is simple; a person only needs an e-mail address to do so. Facebook will ask for a few standard things such as your name, a password, and your gender and birthdate. The rest of the process involves “looking” for friends on the network, entering other personal information if desired (such as high school, university, workplace, and so forth), and setting up other optional profile information, including a profile picture. (Larsen, 2011) More advanced features can then be activated such as mobile alerts and texts, e- mail alerts, and privacy settings. Here, as always, it is important to go through the privacy settings very carefully and to read the “fine print” in the privacy agreement to know what your rights are as a user. “Profile Pages” are a mainstay of Facebook. On them are a user’s gender, birthday, political affiliation, religious preferences, favorite books, movies, and music. Also contained are local contact addresses, phone numbers, and e-mail addresses. (Kolek
- 2. 2 & Daniel, 2008) When people view these, they will also see a user’s posted photographs (called “photo albums”) as well as the groups the person belongs to on the site and his or her “friends.” Users can send “friend requests” to other users; if accepted, both profiles are hyperlinked, reflecting their “friend” status. It is these “friend” requests and a user’s subsequent networks built on these relationships that are the main goal of Facebook. (Kolek & Daniel, 2008) There are several features Facebook presently lacks. Although the Facebook development team may perhaps think them minor, some users might consider them major enhancements that Facebook should add in the future. The first is a blogging feature. Currently the closest thing Facebook users have is a function known as “Notes.” Here a user can write comments and musings similar to a blog (and can even “tag” friends in their comments); however, things do not display as a true “rolling” blog similar to those found on the web. Users have to click on individual posts and then go back to the main page to view the listing again. There has been some argument that the Facebook “wall,” which is an accumulation of a user’s online activity and statuses (brief descriptions of what is on a person’s mind, thoughts, profile changes, and so forth) and their friend’s updates could be considered a blog. (Larsen, 2011) Another feature that is notably absent is video instant messaging. Users can “live” chat with other users provided they are friends with each other, but it is limited to text only. No live audio or video chats are available on the site; however, you can post your own videos, music and audio comments to your profile. Social media initially became a trend as younger, more Internet-savvy people entered onto the scene. It became a social norm as people began to rethink the way they
- 3. 3 shared information, news, and ideas with one another—with family, friends and other people with whom they wished to communicate. (Lukes, 2010) The history of Facebook seems like a technology geek’s dream. In 2004 a 19- year-old Harvard sophomore named Mark Zuckerberg created a social networking site in his dorm room. Known as thefacebook.com, it was billed as "an online directory that connects people through social networks at colleges." (Grossman, 2010) Starting as a social network for students at Harvard, it later expanded to include other Ivy League schools and other major universities such as Stanford. Then still other universities appeared on the scene, and ultimately Facebook grew to what we are familiar with today. (Lukes, 2010) Zuckerberg’s name is perhaps more than quite apt, given his creation: “Zucker” in German means “sugar,” while “Berg” means mountain; the name thus means “sugar mountain.” He certainly created a mountain that many find to be quite a sweet, enticing treat. Today Zuckerberg’s creation is home to over 550 million members. In other words, one out of every twelve people on the planet has an account with Facebook. (Grossman, 2010) Facebook users speak over seventy-five different languages and are online for a collective total of 700 billion minutes per month. Facebook is also the second most visited site on the Internet, with Google being the first. (Lukes, 2010) According to Time, which named Zuckerberg 2010’s Person of the Year, Facebook grows at an astounding rate of 700,000 new members every day. The social network site’s membership is twice the size of the United States’ population. (Grossman, 2010) Moreover, according to Forbes, Zuckerberg himself is now worth $6.9 billion, putting
- 4. 4 him ahead of fellow Harvard dropout Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. Time states that while Zuckerberg has such a high net worth, his life still remains simple: “Zuckerberg lives near his office in a house that he rents. He works constantly; his only current hobby is studying Chinese. He drives a black Acura TSX, which for a billionaire is the automotive equivalent of a hair shirt.” (Grossman, 2010) The latest innovation for Facebook has been its business model. With side bar advertising, businesses can now reach out to each individual user based on certain “tags” that are on the profile. For example, people that have “Amateur radio” as a hobby will see amateur radio ads, and so on, all based on a person’s individual tastes. Many businesses are beginning to take advantage of this as they realize most Facebook users spend at least several hours each day on the site. (Lukes, 2010) Moreover, users may look at their profile more than once a day. Also since the site is based more or less on user networks, there is a lot more of word of mouth happening on the site. Through Google or another search engine, one can discover not only the positive aspects of Facebook (such as the ever-increasing number of users, but also the negative. User security is clearly one of the latter. One of the major concerns for users is “stalking,” given the visibility of the “wall” or news feed on users’ profiles. A “wall” or news feed post can be as simple as a link to a news item on CNN or as complicated as a rant about the latest boot off of American Idol. (Westlake, 2008) Everyone on a user’s friend list can see everyone’s posts to the news feed. The issue here is that users are feeling as if they are in a giant fish bowl and are being watched not only by their friends but also by advertisers and “others.” One person compared the feeling to Sting’s 1983 song “Every
- 5. 5 Breath You Take,” where the ending of the chorus is “I’ll be watching you.” (Westlake, 2008) Concern has ranged from people so genuinely worried about privacy that they have created groups on Facebook to combat the problem to others who were more annoyed than anything else. As Westlake (2008) points out, this latter group was just annoyed at the flood of minutiae they faced when they logged in: “‘The new Facebook was supposed to let us know a little about what is going on in our world’ but it just shows us who has been bored recently,” posted a user. After getting a huge amount of feedback, Zuckerberg himself posted on Facebook, “We heard you. Take a deep breath. Calm down.” Since the Westlake article was written, additional privacy settings have been added to help eliminate useless posts and to beef up security to prevent “stalker syndrome.” All this begs a question: Is Facebook trying to take over the world? For some people, even for Zuckerberg, it might look like it. Hempel & Kowitt, for example, argue that Facebook is changing the way Americans communicate with each other. (Hempel & Kowitt, 2009) And Zuckerberg revealed his bigger ambition to them: to make Facebook the standard communication (and advertising) platform in the world where, in Zuckerberg’s own words, “you can just type in anyone's name, find the person you're looking for, and communicate with them.” (Hempel & Kowitt, 2009)
- 6. 6 Hempel & Kowitt state, that some people have more than one account: one for a user’s work environment and another for home or pleasure. The main reason for this is the “wall” function. As they say: An "anything goes" page we share with pals might not be appropriate for office mates--or for the moms and grandmas who increasingly are joining the site. (Hempel & Kowitt, 2009) But Facebook may not be the “holy grail” it touts itself to be, especially for users’ self-esteem. Gonzales and Hancock state it can go either way. For the most part Facebook is a great tool to boost self-esteem. Users feel they are connected socially to friends and family and have easy access to pictures and information. (Gonzales & Hancock, 2011) However, the “wall” and “status updates” can potentially lower users’ self-esteem, since “this information could make people aware of their own limitations and shortcomings.” (Gonzales & Hancock, 2011) The lower the self-esteem a user has, the more susceptible they are to suicide. And Facebook can and is an easy place to post suicide notes. The list of suicides may be considered small by some, but it should in good conscience be considered large, since no one should be driven to commit suicide over social networking. (Gonzales & Hancock, 2011) While many can argue that Facebook is phasing out socialization--human interaction and social mixing as we know it--one study has shown it might not be changing it a bit. A study of college students showed an average of only thirty-one minutes of usage each day. Moreover, the study showed that the site was used just once
- 7. 7 per day and that the usage only went up by five minutes for a college senior as compared to a freshman. (Kujath, 2011) In conclusion, we have seen how a 19-year-old Harvard student took on the cultural and social world. Facebook, now a 550 million-member site, is a part of not only this country’s but the world’s social fabric. Perhaps old pick-up lines such as “Buy you a drink?” or “Can I have your phone number?” will change to “Friend me on Facebook?” Not just yet, but maybe down the road.
- 8. 8 Works Cited Gonzales, A. L., & Hancock, J. T. (2011). Mirror, Mirror on my Facebook Wall: Effects of Exposure to Facebook on Self-Esteem. Cyberpsychology, behavior, and social networking, 14 (1-2), 79-83. Grossman, L. (2010). 2010 Person of the Year Mark Zuckerberg. Time International, 176 (26), pp. 32-57. Hempel, J., & Kowitt, B. (2009). How Facebook is taking over our lives. Fortune, 159 (4), pp. 48-56. Kolek, E. A., & Daniel, S. (2008). Online Disclosure: An Empirical Examination of Undergraduate Facebook Profiles. Journal of Student Affairs Research and Practice, 45 (1), 1-25. Kujath, C. L. (2011). Facebook and MySpace: Complement or Substitute for Face-to- Face Interaction? Cyberpsychology, behavior, and social networking, 14 (1-2), 79-83. Larsen, K. (2011, April). Computer Corner: All things Facebook. PN, pp. 32-34. Lukes, C. A. (2010). Social Media. Professional Practice, 58 (10), pp. 415-417. Westlake, E. (2008). Friend Me If You Facebook. The Drama Review, 52 (4), 21-40.