Few years ago, the scenario of knowing a friend of a friend, how the person looks, his education background and his interests is an uncommon one. Today however, the frequency of this scenario is rapidly rising: this is one of the effects of social networking phenomenon.
By definition, a social networking website is online social network for communities of people who share interests and activities. Some of the notable social network websites that you readers are likely to be part of are Facebook, MySpace, YouTube and Friendster.
The creation of a social network that holds private individual information enables the increased scenario where strangers can intimately know another depending on the level of information provided. Though the level of access to strangers can be varied from no information to full disclosure, the concept of ‘keeping in touch and making friends online’ is a pretext to the diminishing levels of privacy. This is particularly true as reported by The Independent, where judicial courts are now expanding their jurisdiction to search social networks to find out information regarding cases, where it is common for people to reveal intimate personal information on their blogs and profiles.
However, despite the knowledge of reduced privacy, many are addicted to it, with Facebook’s statistics showing it is the 6th most visited website in the US. Furthermore, the availability of an audience makes it a good business decision to expand business functions for both business-to-customer (B2C) and customer-to-customer (C2C). An example of the former is the marketing of brand products on YouTube channels and an example of the latter would be Facebook’s Marketplace, where you are able to advertise items for sale for other members of the social network website.
On a personal note and a user of social network websites, I am aware of the amount of privacy that is taken away from me by signing up with these websites. However, by careful selection of what information and pictures I put up and the people I interact with on these websites, I believe it this loss is justifiable for the function it provides: for keeping in touch with friends, especially those who are overseas. As for the business aspects of these websites, I do believe it is an efficient way to market products and ideas to the youth. This is particularly apparent with politicians, especially the US Presidential candidates, having a profile of Facebook and spreading the awareness of the importance of voting.
The phenomenon of social networking websites is unlikely to fade away so soon. It ultimately comes down to the user to decide what level of privacy is worth the value of socializing. So what’s your take on it?
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3 comments:
Ayman, a very interesting post. However, I beg to differ.
Social networking is already a benchmark for Web2.0, it'll grow bigger and badder.
Statistics have taught marketers to target a specific people, age, ethnic, geo-location, music pref etc. Which is good, because they can secure a deal faster and lower the ROI.
Another thing, lets not forget the generic human nature, everybody wants to be famous. By having more friends, wall posts, testimonials, comments etc, help them to gain attention.
In short, marketer needs it, user wants it. Thats social networking ;)
Keep writing ok bro.
- NoktahHitam.com
As you said, it ultimately comes down to the user to decide what level of privacy is worth the value of socializing, so this issue will definitely derive different responses, as people prefer to privatise their profiles in different extents, however there should always be a borderline where one knows not to expose too much to the vast everexpanding internet media.
Very good, insightful article. Not to mention relevant to the trends followed by today's generation Y. Will definitely be publishing this article in the next edition of MonGa, Monash University's campus-circulated magazine.
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