Social Media

Social media is all the rage right now. There is no way you have no idea what social media is, unless you've been living under a rock with your Friendster account. Social media comes in different forms, as you can see from the image below. You have your microblogs, networking sites, content communities and the list goes on. I am pretty sure that we will be seeing more new ones every single month.

Of course, we can't say that all existing social media sites are meaningful or useful. If I had to pick a favorite social media, it would probably be Youtube. I've been visiting the site since '07 and I am still not sick of it.

As I recall, Youtube used to be a site where people can upload videos. No one would ever thought that it can turn into this massive and influential community. I love how this video-sharing website became our one-stop center for anything – tutorials for learning a new language or how to cook a certain recipe, beauty, music, gaming etc.

Majority of people can only pay attention to visuals more than text these days. This is probably why Youtube is still appealing to the masses and also why the Youtube community keeps growing. We don’t have to spend money to subscribe to cable television when all we need is Wifi, type in something of our interest (sneezing panda/dramatic chipmunk!/random music video) and tadaaaaah! Instant entertainment.

You could say that it is like the ‘television’ of our generation. Television itself isn't dying yet but given that most of us are always hanging around our laptops and computers, we tend to turn to Youtube as an easy access for entertainment. Due to this fact, television stations such as Korea’s KBS World has started to upload full episodes of their variety shows and drama serials on their official channel. With everyone being able to gain access to the Internet, Youtube videos have the ability to reach to a wider audience without any geographical boundaries. Anyone can watch the same thing and share comments/thoughts with those who share the same interests as them. It can become a space where you can relate to others or laugh at the same stupid video content. If we feel nostalgic and decided to watch old school music videos, they are there too!

This video perfectly sums up how insanely huge (and fun) the current Youtube community is:

If you have your own comments/opinions on the Youtube rewind vid, why not join these teens in this Teens React vid:

Sure, there will be pros and cons to social media but I personally feel that social media has assisted us tremendously to how we receive entertainment and it clearly shows the shift in our source of televised entertainment as current technology continues to evolve further. That's my take on social media. I hope you had (some) fun reading this entry and do enjoy the weekend!