The Power of Social Media - Report Example

The Power of Social Media Introduction The global prominence and use of different media platforms that include social media has transformed the overall cultural make-up of the world. Following the information explosion that gave birth to the Internet, manifold innovations crop up, pointing towards making people’s live more convenient and making the access to information a lot easier. It is apparent that there is a huge difference on the transfer of information nowadays as compared to the pre-industrialization era. Today, the proliferation of various social media has flooded the internet and drawn more and more audience with each succeeding day. Apart from the changes in the state of the world’s technology, this development is also an indication of the changes in the people’s responsibilities. In the recent years, social media has burst out into becoming a classification of online discourse in which people or “audiences” are enabled to create, to share and network information or content to everyone in the world at a remarkably high-speed rate. There are various examples of social media: Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace to name a few. Owing to its accessibility and speed, social media is quickly shifting the public dialogue in the community and establishing trends and agenda in subject matters that range from economics and politics to fashion and entertainment. Seen this way, the influence of social media in shaping public opinion and relaying information continuously rises. Nevertheless, this development comes with it an array of corresponding conditions as the growing influence of social media gives the world audience new rights, responsibilities, and risks. Social Media and Risks Ease of access to media does not mean everyone is allowed to do everything as they wish. Just like any other platforms of information dissemination or any legal mode of enterprise, self-imposed limitations should be implemented. These are founded on the risks associated with social media (Thompson et al. 2011). Social Media allows the “creation and exchange of user-generated content” (Kaplan and Haenlin 2010); thus, the information that is created and relayed may extend from general or public to personal information. This presents a disturbing find in that social media is linked to the internet that is a public domain and the information shared, whether it is personal or public information may be shared without interception or obstruction. In the corporate world, many of the senior financial executives believe that there are latent risks associated with social media (Thompson et al. 2011). Nevertheless, there are also those who believe that the risks involved will be compensated or, at least, counterbalanced by the benefits of engaging in social media. In a survey sponsored by the Grant Thornton LLP, it has found several most important social media risks: (1) disclosure of propriety information; (2) negative comments about the company; (3) exposure of personally identifiable information; (4) fraud; and (5) out-of-date information. While majority of these risks are heavily connected to corporate and business context, some of them can also be translated into the context of general use of the social media. For instance, Facebook and Twitter allows sharing of user-generated contents such as tweets or posts, sometimes photos and links: while everyone is entitled to upload or generate contents within the bounds of the social media company’s rules, these contents can be used against the user especially when the content is relatively or very confidential or personal in nature. Many cases of this nature in the past have been found to cause alarm to the entire social media community because safety is not absolutely assured to the user. After all, and as aforementioned, social media is connected to a public; thus, making it a public domain itself regardless of its internal rules and policies, there can be no containment that is imposable to those who deliberately use your personal contents against you. Another concerning risks associated with social media is fraud. Fraud is not only present in social media; as a matter of fact, it has long been in existence in the Internet. Oftentimes, they are guised in the form of websites offering attractive deals, offers, etc. Many uninformed audience have fallen victims of fraud on the internet because a large proportion of frauds look so real that they are so hard to distinguish from legitimate ones. If fraud is able to conquer the audience through generic websites – wherein the number of visitors is way smaller and the online visibility is usually poorer – you can only imagine how high its chance of deceiving a large number of audience in social networking sites; Facebook alone has more than a billion active users. Fraudulent activities target domains that are active and well-participated by many audiences. Other risks include information theft and bullying. Hacking is one form of the risk of information theft. This information can be your e-mail, which is linked to your social media account, your password and username. There were instances in the past that involved accounts hacked by external attackers, posting obscene photos and highly provocative messages. Cyber bullying has also borne itself recently: this risk involves online-based social stratification and discrimination of certain user profiles based on gender, race, color, etc. Rights Associated with Social Media Perhaps, one of the most important rights demanded by users to social media companies is the right to privacy. There is a jeopardy involved in user-generated content despite the fact that the social media company is hosting the content. This information can be exposed to the danger of security of information, and can possibly be seeped out or disclosed, whether unintentional or deliberate, to external parties who have shown attraction over the user-generated contents. Privacy rights promoters are providing cautions to users of the use of information that can be gleaned by means of the social media. Another right associated with social media is protection and safety. Users have the right to guard themselves against on the internet and guarantee that your personal information is safe. Social Media provides users with tools such as privacy settings that allow the user to modify the settings of his personal account based in his preference. Social networking sites enable users to report offensive or threatening content or behaviors. If users, by his own discretion, find highly offensive and provocative contents, he should report this case to the concerned agencies. Responsibilities Associated with Social Media Engaging in social media activities entail an observation of key responsibilities. Some of the responsibilities associated with social media are the following: (1) respect and protect other users: avoid using profane or obscene languages when responding to user-generated contents like tweets or posts; report any violation committed by another user especially if these violations may cause harm to thousands of other users; (2) being time responsible: spending significant hours in social media may jeopardize other activities such as school or work; it is the responsibility of the user to manage his time wisely and put a limit to the amount of time spent online, especially in engaging in social media; (3) Protect your online reputation: be very selective of the contents that you share to the social media community; your posts or tweets reflect who you are; your online reputation is defined by how well you behave in the online environment. Do not post nude photos of yourself or make discriminating comments about a certain group of people; etc. Annotated Bibliography Cyber Smart, 2013. Learn more about your online rights and responsibilities. [online] Commonwealth of Australia. Available at Cyber Smart provides an outline of the rights and responsibilities associated with social media. The author contends that as a social media user, there are rules and policies that have to be followed including respecting the rights of others, avoidance of using profane words and posting of highly provocative messages and pictures. Asur, S. and Huberman, B., n.d. Predicting the future with social media [pdf] Hewlett Packard. Available at Asur and Huberman details the enveloping models of social media including the various considerations that need to be taken into account such as the user’s rights and responsibilities and the risks associated with engaging in social media. It also accounts the growing role of the social media in public discussions touching on topics that range from economics and politics to arts and entertainment. Thompson, T. Jr., Hertzberg, J. and Sullivan, M., 2011. Social media and its associated risks [pdf] Grant Thornton LLP. Available at http://www.grantthornton.com/staticfiles/GTCom/Advisory/GRC/Social%20media%20and%20risk/social%20media_whitepaper%20-%20FINAL.PDF. Thompson et al. (2011) provides excellent information on the risks associated with social media in the context of corporate setting. It includes survey results involving top executives and gleaned responses and various views on what they consider as risks in social media. Specified in this resource are the influences of social media in the corporate world and the concerns that has to be addressed such as fraud, information safety and privacy. Read More