Facebook Is Lexington, Twitter Is Concord
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Social Networking has changed everything. Anyone who is still not convinced of this truth either has been hiding under a very large rock for the last 5 years…or they’re disagreeing with you just to be contrary. People communicate today in ways like never before. If the internet was the most important shift in communication since the printing press then social networking is the digital age’s equivalent of the first newspaper. It is difficult to understand exactly what the communication landscape is going to look like once all of the dust settles, but I think it’s safe to say that it will be vastly different than the static one-way communications of the twentieth century.
The things that tend to change the world are usually misunderstood or even taken for granted at the time. Social media is no different. The brilliance of Facebook and Twitter isn’t their complex nature, quite the opposite. The simplicity is what takes people by surprise. People don’t comprehend Twitter when they first sign up. “What’s the point” is the question I get most from friends registering for the microblogging service. These are intelligent people who simply don’t understand. I can’t blame them. I didn’t get it at first either. To be honest, I’d be lying if I told you I completely understand it now.
It’s okay not to fully recognize what social media means for the future. The common Virginia militiaman could not fathom how his actions and those of his countrymen would change the world in 1776. He was probably just mad at the redcoats for burning his crops and looking for a little payback. Only a handful of visionaries in Philadelphia had a glimmer of recognition.
Okay, okay…maybe Facebook and Twitter aren’t as important as the founding of a democracy that has survived for 200 years as a beacon of hope to the world (cue patriotic music), but it is undeniable that they have triggered a fundamental change in the way people interact with each other. History has a funny habit of changing things in ways we don’t expect.
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Tags: Cloud, Facebook, Social Media, Twitter
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Good post. It really got me to thinking. I came up with, owning a twitter account is like owning a gun. [Clever and witty resemblance here.]
You can have my Twitter account…when you pull it from my cold dead hands!
Is it fair to say that the social networking revolution wasn’t really a revolution until the mobile revolution? I mean MySpace was a surge but it was mainly for young people. Now that anyone can participate quickly and easily from a mobile device, it seems the whole world has decided to jump in.
I think we were already seeing Facebook start to explode before mobile became a reliable platform for social media. The secret sauce is the ease in which Twitter and Facebook allow you to connect to other people. I feel like social media stands on it’s own without mobile.
However, mobile is a huge part of the social networking equation and at this point it’s hard to imagine one without the other. Being able to update and upload on the go increases the aforementioned ease of connection. I think it’s also safe to say that social networks like Facebook and Twitter enhance mobile computing. The two go together like peas and carrots.