Internet Usefulness of social media?

[RGClark]

Observers of technological advance such as Ray Kurzweil regard the great expansion in the use of social media such as Facebook and Twitter as indications of our technological advancement.
I don't see it. I can certainly see things like Google increasing our general knowledge. But Facebook? Twitter? You use Facebook to tell your friends the changes in your relationship status. And Twitter is used by celebrities to tell their fans what they had for breakfast.
Anyone able to tell me the technological or intellectual usefulness of social media?


Bob Clark

 

[Quick_Nick]

Isn't this site social media? I like it.

 

[Codz]

Observers of technological advance such as Ray Kurzweil regard the great expansion in the use of social media such as Facebook and Twitter as indications of our technological advancement.
I don't see it. I can certainly see things like Google increasing our general knowledge. But Facebook? Twitter? You use Facebook to tell your friends the changes in your relationship status. And Twitter is used by celebrities to tell their fans what they had for breakfast.
Anyone able to tell me the technological or intellectual usefulness of social media?


Bob Clark

Bringing humans closer together as a species? The world has never been as interconnected as it is today, thanks in part to these sites.

 

[garyw]

Twitter is far more useful than facebook, Twitter provides all sorts of useful information.

For example:

@lowflyingrocks
2013 ER, ~20m-45m in diameter, just passed the Earth at 6km/s, missing by ~5,910,000km

NASA Watch ‏@NASAWatch
NASA Briefing Highlights Expedition 36-37 Space Station Crew http://srs.gs/h6V

NASAVoyager2 ‏@NASAVoyager2

Starting my quarterly Command&Ctrl Subsys timing test, measuring diff btw CCS timing chain & FDS frame start CCSTIM(B) (2003:066:191113:2T)

I don't see anyone sharing breakfast details there...

 

[4throck]

Social media is just a fashionable word. It's hype.

The same thing was said about radio, telephones and TV. And before about newspapers and mail.

That's just the normal evolution of technology. So yes, tech advancement sure.
But knowledge? No, that's a different thing.


What twitter does now... mailing lists + websites did 10 years ago. Nothing new there.

 

[Urwumpe]

I would not reduce social media to Facebook... Facebook forgot that its capital are its customers, not the otherway around.

 

[RGClark]

Isn't this site social media? I like it.

No, it's not what they are calling social media.

Bob Clark

---------- Post added at 04:34 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:32 PM ----------

Bringing humans closer together as a species? The world has never been as interconnected as it is today, thanks in part to these sites.

I like sites like this where detailed discussions on important topics can be discussed. That's not what happens on Facebook or Twitter.

Bob Clark

---------- Post added at 04:36 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:34 PM ----------

Twitter is far more useful than facebook, Twitter provides all sorts of useful information.

For example:

@lowflyingrocks
2013 ER, ~20m-45m in diameter, just passed the Earth at 6km/s, missing by ~5,910,000km

NASA Watch ‏@NASAWatch
NASA Briefing Highlights Expedition 36-37 Space Station Crew http://srs.gs/h6V

NASAVoyager2 ‏@NASAVoyager2

Starting my quarterly Command&Ctrl Subsys timing test, measuring diff btw CCS timing chain & FDS frame start CCSTIM(B) (2003:066:191113:2T)

I don't see anyone sharing breakfast details there...

The number of people getting those Twitter feeds is dwarfed by those of Justin Bieber and Kim Kardashian by a hundreds to 1.


Bob Clark

 

[Zatnikitelman]

My opinion of Twitter is that of Gary's, it's good for realtime, quick updates and it doesn't require you to log in to read most things. However, I dislike everyone jumping on the Facebook bandwagon. Unlike Twitter, you must log in to read alot of things, and particularly to comment. The Railworks Train Simulator company has gone to using Facebook almost exclusively for updates, but I can't give my feedback because I don't want a Facebook account. It's one thing to create a narrowly-focused account for a site, like their blog, but it's quite another to require enrollment in an entire system where I then have to be worried about other issues beyond what I type directly.

 

[insanity]

Perhaps you are approaching the subject with a preconceived notion of the medium's utility. I'm a relativist and believe that just because I don't 'get' the value of something means it is inherently valueless.

I personally find little of substantive value in the content of a facebook post or the average tweet (I'm not even subscribed to twitter). I don't think that a tweet or a status update will usually be the kind of content that changes the world. However, I find a lot of value in a platform that stores the overwhelming number of friendships and connections I have made in my life. I see facebook as a reflection of globalization: creating a smaller more connected world.

I've lived and traveled to many places and met many extraordinary people in my short 26 years on this planet. Without 'social media' I would lose a lot of these connections. For me, that is enough utility to deem social media useful.

 

[paddy2]

Surely these are just mediums for creating advertising revenue !!!

Facebook, handy for my Son to share photos of my Grandkids but there are many other ways.

Twitter, my pointless life reduced to 128 characters.

They do have their uses, yes, but the world will keep turning if they are off the air for 5 minutes.

"I can not live without my facebook"......then go get a life

 

[garyw]

The number of people getting those Twitter feeds is dwarfed by those of Justin Bieber and Kim Kardashian by a hundreds to 1.

So? I choose who I follow, I do not follow justin bieber, if others do so then good for them.

It's not many places where one can converse with an astronaut or discuss the finer points of cometary orbits with a bone fide ESA scientist. I've also spoken to those running outreach for new horizons.

 

[Quick_Nick]

No, it's not what they are calling social media.

Who is 'they' and why does their opinion matter?
If you're defining social media as specifically those sites that you can view negatively (or those with highly split opinions), obviously you're going to doubt the use of them.
To me, social media is very broad and composes a lot of media for communication. Pick whichever ones you like, popular or not. Obviously more popular sites provide easy networking and advertising in general, while less popular sites are probably better for specific topics. Though you can easily create groups on most popular social media sites and manage the content and access however you please, which I've found very useful for group discussion of school coursework and collaborative projects. It is especially useful when the majority of the members of your group already have and use an account. There are many choices for that sort of collaboration or discussion, social media is just a very easy one to set up and work with.

---------- Post added at 04:44 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:40 PM ----------

The number of people getting those Twitter feeds is dwarfed by those of Justin Bieber and Kim Kardashian by a hundreds to 1.

Celebrities are not a new invention.

 

[Pipcard]

I think he is talking about "social networking" sites (i.e. Facebook and Twitter), which are a part of "social media" (which includes internet fora).

When I opened this thread, I confused the two terms, but then I decided to look up the definitions.

 

[Quick_Nick]

http://www.onion.com/O8lGS5

 

[ADSWNJ]

Twitter, my pointless life reduced to 128 characters.

Good news: there's another whole 12 characters available to you, unless you always put a 12 byte checksum on your tweets ��

 

[paddy2]

there's another whole 12 characters available to you

Maybe if some of these folk had 12 characters in their life they would not be twitters in any case!!!

 

[sorindafabico]

I don't see it. I can certainly see things like Google increasing our general knowledge. But Facebook? Twitter? You use Facebook to tell your friends the changes in your relationship status. And Twitter is used by celebrities to tell their fans what they had for breakfast.

You quote some examples of bad use of Twitter/Facebook to criticize them, but people can (and actually does) use social media to expand their knowledge - using as platform for debates, sharing common interests (like this forum), finding useful links, etc.

It doesn't matter the tool, but HOW YOU USE IT. Most people say Instagram is a useless tool to publicize your last dinner, but I know a lot of people (mostly professional photographers) using it to build a new photography style derived from Lomo and other things which inspired the creation of instagram itself. Most people use it to post useless junk because they don't know HOW to use it - they don't have "literacy in photography".

You can use social media very well if you know how to explore its potential and connect to "right people".

 

[RGClark]

Surely these are just mediums for creating advertising revenue !!!
Facebook, handy for my Son to share photos of my Grandkids but there are many other ways.
Twitter, my pointless life reduced to 128 characters.
They do have their uses, yes, but the world will keep turning if they are off the air for 5 minutes.
"I can not live without my facebook"......then go get a life

Funny you said that. What led to this question was a Google Talks lecture by Ray Kurzweil. He mentioned some particular internet access was down in connection with accessing social media and he said he thought he would die during the time it was down.

Kurzweil is a very smart guy so there must be something to it but I don't see it.

Bob Clark

 

[4throck]

The only thing that is new with FB, Twitter, Foursquare, whatever "new" social site, is the connection to advertisement, brands and revenue.
And the fact that you have to log in or be a "friend" to access information.

I'm not comfortable with the notion of depending of others to spoon feed me information, apps, whatever. You get boxed in your own micro-cosmos too quickly...
This has to do with the "get a life" comment from the previous post. Real life is about creating/doing something. It can be cooking, washing you car, etc. Sharing that with others can enhance living, but will never substitute DOING the things.

I'd say that living other people's life through images is not new. You have soap operas for example. But preferring that over the real world is a sign of trouble (addition, escapism, depression, etc). So "get a life" and by all means visit a doctor ;-)


All in all I do prefer old school Google Search and a visit to websites to see the latest updates. And traffic stats show that most people do exactly that. Of course, if varies by country and €€€. It's like books. There are movies, but books are still sold.

 

[RGClark]

Perhaps you are approaching the subject with a preconceived notion of the medium's utility. I'm a relativist and believe that just because I don't 'get' the value of something means it is inherently valueless.
I personally find little of substantive value in the content of a facebook post or the average tweet (I'm not even subscribed to twitter). I don't think that a tweet or a status update will usually be the kind of content that changes the world. However, I find a lot of value in a platform that stores the overwhelming number of friendships and connections I have made in my life. I see facebook as a reflection of globalization: creating a smaller more connected world.
I've lived and traveled to many places and met many extraordinary people in my short 26 years on this planet. Without 'social media' I would lose a lot of these connections. For me, that is enough utility to deem social media useful.

I like this. The number of countries joining the "nuclear club" is increasing and so is the number of countries capable of orbital, and ICBM, launch.
Perhaps social media could be used by the people themselves not their governments to connect us together.
That would be an interesting question to see how that could be done.

Bob Clark

---------- Post added at 06:40 AM ---------- Previous post was at 06:30 AM ----------

So? I choose who I follow, I do not follow justin bieber, if others do so then good for them.
It's not many places where one can converse with an astronaut or discuss the finer points of cometary orbits with a bone fide ESA scientist. I've also spoken to those running outreach for new horizons.

That's a valid use. But when the number of people using these useful sites is one thousandth that of those using the Justin Bieber one, it's very dubious to use the gross users numbers as a sign of technological progress.
On the other hand, when you see a billion people using Google they all are increasing their useful knowledge to some degree. Granted many do searches on Justin Bieber but the overwhelming majority also do searches on useful information, if not every one of them.

Bob Clark