Social Media News

Rated — ★★★★★

Diversified, within a globally interconnected twenty-first century society; the revolutionized concept of social media has intrigued the interests of those from sixteen to beyond sixty. Operating on similar principals of bringing information to a large amount of people at a single time; social media differs from that of traditional industrial mass media, such as newspapers, magazines, television broadcasting, and film; giving users a chance to become their own media users obtain full privileges to create content, modify and sharing that content, and even censor and delete at their will — within the Terms of Service guidelines, of course. A large percentage of revamped social sites operate free of monetary cost. Social media differs also from mass media in that it remains relatively accessible to all with a network connection. Disseminated though social interactions, social media can be that of a single user monologue or a massive user dialog – this dialog increasing the perspectives of socialization by allowing interpersonal communication. As social media reached new peaks in 2009, hundreds of social mediums exist; each offering something different for each separate user. With thousands of public reviews pertaining to social media, the revolutionized Internet provides assistance for all in choosing the right platform; good tips to keep in mind is to first research a network staying largely on target with popular mediums due to the populace of users, second test drive each interested social networking site for up to six weeks before deciding to stay or leave, and third use feeding if a large number of sites fit desires –- remembering that there is no limitation to the amount of social membership only limitation of time; as one needs to spread oneself across all accounts.

With close to thirty-million users, close to a thousand third party applications, platform browsers, and over twenty-three unique visitors per day; Twitter remains the new-age favorite social network — best described at a monolog with limited features for that of a dialog. Populated by individual users that are seeking to grow their networking and befriend those with like-minded interests; businesses wishing to compete within a new generation of online marketing, are also signing into Twitter, for its interpersonal relations with customers — Twitter offers something for everyone, with a target audience of 25 and older. A networking interface for all to consider signing up with, it must be remembered that studies have shown that Twitter remains a one-way monologue micro-blogging platform — meaning that interpersonal communication exchanges may be few and far between, often leading to a drop in follower rates. Yet, Twitter remains exceptional for one way updates in life events, data, and news. However, for users who are looking to communicate, without limits, with a diverse group of people with like-minded interests; I do not hesitate to recommend the service of Frendfeed –- even for loyalists to Twitter, Friendfeed provides added benefits in that it inputs information from 56 networks and unlimited RSS Feeds and goes above and beyond to output that information to Twitter.

Described as a fun and interactive way to discover and discuss information among a network, Friendfeed is simplistic to use — maintaining ease-of-access to users amidst all of its prolific functions. Users are free to share text, video, audio, and photography instantly within a personalized network or group environment. Once one submits a post, of a limited 350 characters with an option to copy to Twitter; that post uniquely appears on the timeline stream of subscribers — alerting them of the new data and providing them with an instant chance to “comment” — without a character limit. Per posted update/thread, others included and not included in the user’s network are given options to “like” and “share” the posted information; sharing will enable a forward that is similar in appearance to an electronic mail forward, while like will put the username of the user(s) who choice this option on the post – forward posts also include options to share on Twitter and to add additional text while liking a post creates a spot for it within that users liked post database. To further assist, I have taken the liberty to bring forth attention to Friendfeed’s remarkable features, absent on Twitter and other popular social networking sites. Simplistically, each account holder can access Friendfeed via the web, without the need to download; however  Friendfeed applications can be downloaded optionally to insure all updates are viewed and kept up with – the most popular application, a notification system for FriendFeed, runs in the background of your operating system and alerts based on customized settings. Friendfeed has proven to be award winning in its function, for a heightened and enjoyable experience for all with:

• Groups: Unlike Twitter, Friendfeed allows users to create groups subjective to their choice of customized topics; these groups can be public or private with the majority public, edited in accordance, and moderated by the creator at anytime — these groups are a recommended source of interpersonal socialization.

• Comment Subscriptions: Unlike Twitter, or other popular social mediums, a Friendfeed user can subscribe themselves to the comments of another user; who exists in their subscription database. To subscribe to comments is to expand the degree of interpersonal socialization by trading communication; this allows for each user to participate in threads/topics they may have missed or not have accessed due to no prior subscription.

• Subscriptions to Like Databases: Again, unlike Twitter or other popular medium, a user can engage in the same principals as detailed above. Once a user “likes” a thread/post it appears in their unique database; retrieved when clicking the hyperlink on their homepage. Users subscribed can also subscribe to this content, so to ensure they add to their information and education – reaching peaks in the interpersonal experience, as can also like or share the material. This functions as reassurance that you maintain friendships with those with like-minded interests, and respect them by viewing what they are denoting as worth reading.
• Grouping: Each user, group, and subscription can be easily retrieved by creating groups for content organization; this is recommended for all to utilize and simple to create and use. Groups can be created based on type or based customized by subject; for example groups can be added for comment subscriptions, liked data, technology, business, health, social media, friends, family, new users, groups, and so forth — without limits, each user can be donated to one group or at choice more than one. From there, a user can click on the custom created group in the left board navigation pane and retrieve all updates from this group.

Lastly, as an added note the features of commenting to a user’s post, sharing content via forwarding that content, and subscriptions to the above enhance the Friendfeed experience by increasing communication and friendship subscriptions –- on both levels. If respectful to another on Friendfeed, security is given that a pure friendship will be made a large percentage of times; once a user has a new subscriber, the second step is to establish a friendship foundation — easily done by continuing to read the users thread/posts, share them with the network, link to them, comment in accordance, etc. Respectful use of Friendfeed will in return lead to that respect coming back to benefit the user who gives his/her respect first-handedly.

(Copyright © Social-Media-News 2009)