Introduction to Social Media

SOCIAL MEDIA: Is a broad term used to define website and web applications where you have
social interactions around a media form (text, images, audio, video, or any combination of
them).
The term also refers to the use of web-based and mobile technologies to turn communication
into interactive dialogue (web 2.0).

The best way to define social media is to break it down. Media is an instrument of
communication, like a newspaper, TV or a radio, but you have very limited ability to give your
thoughts on the matter. Social media, on the other hand, is a two-way street that gives you the
ability to communicate.

WEB 2.0 is the term given to describe a second generation of the World Wide Web that is
focused on the ability for people to collaborate and share information online.

The 1st generation of www (otherwise known as web or web 1.0) started in 1991. It was not
INTERACTIVE (i.e. You can only view the web pages and you cannot communicate with the
website), but today, we can communicate (interact-blogging, chatting, etc) with people on the
internet through social media websites. The advent of social media websites gave birth to web
2.0.

Web 1.0 pages do not allow visitors to contribute. Computer illiteracy and slow Internet
connections also contributed to these restrictions.

Social Media and Social Networking

It is easy to confuse social media with social networking because we often refer to members of
the news as "the media." Adding to the confusion is the fact that a social networking site is also
a social media site because it falls into that broader category.

But Social Networking is not the same thing as Social Media anymore than a banana is the same
thing as fruit. A banana is a type of fruit, but fruit can also be grapes, strawberries, or lemons.
Note: Any website that invites you to interact with the site and with other visitors falls into the
definition of social media.

SOME EXAMPLES OF SOCIAL MEDIA WEBSITES

 SOCIAL NETWORKING: A sub-category to Social Media encompassing ‘networking’ activities

such as interaction by adding friends, commenting on profiles, joining groups and having
discussions. E.g Facebook, Hi5, Twitter, Myspace, Skype, Google+, Fistrocket and Yukos e.t.c

 SOCIAL PHOTO AND VIDEO SHARING: Interact by sharing photos or videos and commenting on
user submissions. E.g YouTube and Flickr e.t.c

SOCIAL BOOKMARKING: A sub-category to Social Media that allows you to share, organise and
manage your bookmarks, or favourite websites, with other users that use the same social
bookmarking tool, such as Digg, Delicious, Stumbleupon, Blinklist and Simpy e.t.c

 SOCIAL NEWS - Interact by voting for articles and commenting on them. E.g Digg Propeller,
Reddit

WIKIS - Interact by adding articles and editing existing articles e.g Wikipedia and Wikia e.t.c

Social Networking in detail

Social networking is the grouping of individuals into specific groups, like small rural
communities or a neighborhood subdivision, e.g, Market women association, Timber Sellers in a
city can come together to form a social network, thus they can have Aso-ebi or uniformed
Wrapper and meet periodically at agreed location.

When it comes to online social networking, websites are commonly used as the meeting point.
These websites are known as social sites. Social networking websites function like an online
community of internet users.
 
Although social networking is possible in person, especially in the workplace, markets,
universities and schools etc, it is most popular online. This is because unlike most markets, high
schools, colleges, or workplaces, the internet is filled with millions of individuals who
are looking to meet other people, to gather and share first-hand information, interests and
experiences.

Depending on the website in question, many of these online community members share
common interests in hobbies, religion, politics and varieties of topics. Once you are granted
access to a social networking website you can begin to socialize. This socialization may include
reading the profile pages of other members and possibly even contacting them. 
 
The friends that you can make are just one of the many benefits to social networking online.
Another one of those benefits includes diversity because the internet gives individuals from all
around the world access to social networking sites. This means that although you are in Nigeria,
you could develop an online friendship with someone in America, Japan, UK or India. Not only
will you make new friends, but you just might learn a thing or two about new cultures or new
languages and learning is always a good thing.

Online Social Networks are communities that allow individuals to interact with one another. It
provides a variety of ways for you to interact with existing friends and family, make new
“friends,”.
“Friends” on a social network such as Facebook, are people who can see your personal profile
and information.
"Social Networking" is about starting and maintaining friendship communications through
websites. It is the modern digital form of socializing, done through web pages.
Users will choose one or more online services that specialize in groupwide-communications,
and then gather their friends there to exchange daily greetings and regular messages. Although
not the same as face-to-face communications, social networking is immensely popular because
it is easy, playful, and quite motivating. Social networking sites can be general, or focused on
hobby interests like movies and music.

Social networking is based on certain structures that allow people to both express their
individuality and meet people with similar interests. This structure includes having profiles,
friends, blog posts, widgets, and usually something unique to that particular social networking
website - such as the ability to 'poke' people on Facebook or high-five someone on Hi5.
BASIC STRUCTURES OF SOCIAL MEDIA

 Profile - This is where you tell the world about yourself. Profiles contain basic
information, like where you live and how old you are, and personality questions, like
who's your favorite actor and what's your favorite book.

 Friends - Friends are trusted members of the site that are allowed to post comments on
your profile or send you private messages. You can also keep tabs on how your friends
are using social networking, such as when they post a new picture or update their
profile. Friends are the heart and soul of social networking.

 Groups - Most social networks use groups to help you find people with similar interests
or engage in discussions on certain topics. They are both a way to connect with like-
minded people and a way to identify your interests. Sometimes, groups are called by
other names, such as the 'networks' on Facebook.

 Discussions - A primary focus of groups is to create interaction between users in the

form of discussions. Most social networking websites support discussion boards for the
groups

 Blogs - Another feature of some social networks is the ability to create your own blog
entries.

 Widgets - Widgets allow users to turn personal content into dynamic web apps that can
be shared on websites where the code can be installed. For example, a "Weather Report
Widget" could report today's weather by accessing data from the Weather Channel

 Instant Messengers (IM) – Allows you chat real-time, Voice IP calls, and can share video
images with friends. E,g Yahoo messenger, Windows Live messenger, Skype, google talk,
facebook chat, whatsapp etc
What is a Web Widget?

A web widget is a mini-web application you can put in your web page, blog or social profile that
can quickly and easily provide your visitors with, user specific information, extra functionality,
and even a bit of fun and games.

A widget is available in a ready-to-use formats and are visually attractive and customizable by
the user. It takes the form of pictures, graphs, statistics,

Widgets allow users to turn personal content into dynamic web apps that can be shared on
websites where the code can be installed. For example, a "Weather Report Widget" could
report today's weather by accessing data from the Weather Channel, it could even be
sponsored by the Weather Channel.

Social Networks

There are hundreds of Social Networks available online. The best way to find one suited to a
particular interest is to do a web search. Doing a web search will allow you to find the networks
that are well suited to your interests.

Here are Some Popular Social Networks

1. Facebook 2. YouTube 3. WhatsApp 4. Instagram 5. TikTok 6. QQ (Chinese

instant messaging software) 7. Douyin 8. Telegram 9. Sina Weibo (Chinese
microblogging website) 10. Snapchat 11. Kuaishou 12. Pinterest 13. Reddit

14. Twitter 15. Quora

 

Facebook is a hugely popular social networking site that allows you to make connections,
share interests, and join groups.

The Facebook social networking site is used to connect with a variety of people — your friends,
family and those you work with, go to school with, or people you used to be friends or
classmates with.

When you join Facebook and create a profile, you will enter in key information which can help
other people find you on Facebook. This includes; Basic information like name, birthday,
hometown, political and religious views. In your profile you can also include contact
information, your relationship details (married, single, and so on), and personal details such as
your favorite teams, shows, movies, and books. Facebook also provides options for users to
include education and work details

What is Twitter?

Twitter is a real-time communication platform, meaning that messages that are posted are
seen (and often responded to) instantly, and the flow of messages is constantly updated.

Twitter lets you write and read messages of up to 140 characters, or the very length of this
sentence, including all punctuation and spaces. [SMS (i.e., cell phone texting) limits each
message to 160 characters. Twitter takes that limit and reserves 20 characters for your
username, leaving you 140 characters to play with.]. The messages, called ‘tweets’ are public
and you decide what sort of messages you want to receive—Twitter is a recipient-driven
information network.

You can configure your mobile phone to be sending/receiving tweets as SMS. You can be
following your favorite newspaper, TV or FM Radio station and be receiving headline news, or
follow your pastor on twitter and be receiving inspirational messages or follow your musical
idols and be receiving their tweets.

What is LinkedIn?

LinkedIn is a professional, business-oriented social networking site. Here, users can create a
profile that is akin to a resume. Your LinkedIn profile summarizes your current and previous
professional experience, your company and its industry and affiliates, your educational
background, and any Web sites you own or are affiliated with. By providing this type of
professional information, you can then connect with colleagues, clients and partners.

On the LinkedIn site you create a network that consists of "connections". Connections on
LinkedIn are the people you know, and connections expand to include the people they know
and have connected with on LinkedIn.

Skype

Skype is a social networking software that allows you to send instant message and make voice
and video calls to fellow Skype users on the internet for free.

Skype provides a way for users to create groups, chat rooms, voice and video calls, plus allows
users to instantly share files with one another. The difference between Skype and other social
networks like, Facebook, Twitter is that it is not a “website”; rather it is software that is
downloaded in order to be used.
 Google +

Google has just revealed the first five features coming with its new social product, called
Google+.

Google+ brings together all of your friends in one place, and lets you simply and easily
designate

and organize all of your contacts into different groups. Additionally, Google+ will incorporate
some cool chat and mobile features that can come in handy when uploading photos and
organizing get together

First five features that will come with the social service below.

 Circles — This is basically your friends hub. Instead of grouping everyone together as
your "friend," you can create different circles for the different types of people in your
life. For example, you can have groups for friends, family, co-workers, acquaintances,
and your once-a-week softball team. It's super easy to make a new group and add
contacts to it — just drag and drop.

 Hangouts — The old-school chat room gets an update. Send a broadcast to your friends
that you're online and ready to chat face to face, and your pals can drop by your
"hangout" to video chat with you.

 Sparks — Designate your interests in Sparks, and Google+ will collect articles, videos,
and photos of the things you love from around the web to read when you're free (like
an RSS reader). You can even share these items with specific circles of friends instead of
all of your friends.

 Instant Upload — With Instant Upload, your mobile photos and videos are
automatically uploaded to the web.

 Huddle — A group messaging system, Huddle allows you to chat with a number of
friends on the go via your mobile phone.
SOME SOCIAL MEDIA TERMS

 Avatar –An icon or animation to represent a participant used in Internet chat and games

 Blog - A blog is an online journal that’s updated on a regular basis with entries that
appear in reverse chronological order

 Cloud computing - Refers to the growing phenomenon of users who can access their
data from anywhere rather than being tied to a particular machine.

 Digital inclusion - Digital inclusion, or e-inclusion, is an effort to help people who are not
online gain access with affordable hardware, software, tech support/information and
broadband Internet service, so they can begin to use this technology to improve their
lives.

 Flash mob - A flash mob is a group of individuals who gather and disperse with little
notice for a specific purpose through text messages, social media or viral emails. It’s
now generally considered a somewhat dated term (already!).

 Firewall - is a software that controls access from the outside

 Phishing- Phishing is the luring of an internet user to reveal personal details (like
passwords and credit card information) on a fake web page or email form pretending to
come from a legitimate company (like their bank). Phishing is a variation on "fishing,"
the idea being that bait is thrown out with the hopes that while most will ignore the
bait, some will be tempted into biting

 Podcast - A podcast is a digital file (usually audio but sometimes video) made available
for download to a portable device or personal computer for later playback
 Spoofing - Spoofing is masking true identity to deliberately deceive to gain advantage.
Caller-id blocking is a form of spoofing

 SMS - SMS stands for Short Message Service, a system that allows the exchange of short
text-based messages between mobile devices

 Troll - In Internet slang, a troll is someone who posts controversial, inflammatory,

irrelevant or off-topic messages in an online community, such as an online discussion
forum or chat room, with the primary intent of provoking other users into an emotional
response or to generally disrupt normal on-topic discussion.

 Tweet - A post on Twitter, a real-time social messaging system. RT stands for retweet:
Users add RT in a tweet if they are reposting something from another person’s tweet.

 Web conferencing - Web conferencing is used to conduct live meetings or presentations

over the Internet. In a web conference, each participant sits at his or her own computer
and is connected to other participants via the Internet.

 Webinar - Short for Web-based seminar, a webinar is a presentation, lecture, workshop

or seminar that is transmitted over the Web.

 Webcast - Webcast can be defined as the Internet counterpart of traditional radio and
television broadcasting, in which live audio/video is sent over the Internet using
streaming technology

 Widget - A widget, sometimes called a gadget, badge or applet

 Wiki - A wiki is a collaborative website that can be directly edited by anyone with access
to it.

 Wikipedia - Wikipedia is a Web-based, multi-language, free-content encyclopaedia

written collaboratively by volunteers.