SOCIAL MEDIA CHANGE

How has social media changed communication?   It has changed vastly!  I am from the beginning of the baby boomer generation where phones had a cord hooked to them, typewriters were the way to process papers, and letters and messages were sent by snail mail.  Most families consisted of two parents, with a working father and a stay-at-home mother.   When I was a teenager, many women were starting to leave the home and going to work professionally.  I remember talking to friends on the phone, and my parents would have to pick up the line and tell me it was time to get off.  I learned to type on an electric typewriter at school, copy machines were a new item in the business world and computers were relatively unheard of and only used at businesses.  The newspaper was a main source of information, as well as the 6:00 and 10:00pm news on TV.  According to the article, “Social Media and Its Effect on Communication-- Multidimensional interactions have altered the basic rules of communication”  at the following link: 

http://www.solari.net/documents/position-papers/Solari-Social-Media-and-Communication.pdf 

“The one-way communication methods of the recent past—business-to-customer and business-to-business—have been replaced by a more robust multidimensional communication model.  That model is collectively called social media”.

This article outlines social media characteristics and rules, as well as the 5 C’s of social media: 

•          Conversation—Social media is at least a two-way communication, and often a multidimensional conversation, as it engages everyone involved
•          Contribution –Social media encourages contributions and reaction from anyone who is interested both in a positive and negative light, which makes it easy to contribute
•          Collaboration—Social media promotes an exchange of information between you and your audience, and among audience members by inviting participation
•          Connection—Social media thrives on connections, within its own web vehicles and through links to other sites, resources, people, and automatic feeds. 
•          Community—The fundamental characteristic of social media is the creation of community:  a fellowship and relationship with others who share common attitudes, interests and goals

Before social media, these rules were not in existence.  I have personally found myself slow to jump on the social media bandwagon.  I have a Facebook page, and a LinkedIn account.  I have dabbled very little in online dating, as I struggle with trusting what people post online.   Some of the advantages of social media are the instant connections with others.  As a former high school class reunion planner, it would have been helpful to have Facebook 20 years ago.  Finding people and connecting with classmates from the class of 1986 was so hard for our 10 year reunion. It is so much easier now to find people and it is very interesting.  I recently connected with someone I went to grade school with, and we are actually meeting for dinner this weekend!   Never in a million years would that have happened without social media.  Pollock Communications has an interesting website that discusses the following:

http://www.lpollockpr.com/blog/social-media-changed-way-communicate/

With social media, we shop, we can compare, we can share our “favorites”; food, clothes, pictures, etc.  We can find our future spouse on dating sites, we can learn about a future roommate or date before we ever meet them.  “Blind dates” no longer exist.  We can communicate with many people at once, with people all over the world instantaneously, or privately. Social Media has totally changed communication in the world.  For the most part—I think it is for the better!