Topic: Legal, Policies, and Ethics

My father has been lecturing me about appropriate social media use since I’ve been old enough to know how to use a computer. “Everyone can see everything you do.” “Nothing you do on the Internet ever really goes away.” As I have gotten older I have come to realize that all these discussions that I deemed as silly fatherly advice are becoming more prevalent in the way that I post on social media.

Truly, everyone can see everything. Regardless of passwords or blocks, people can find their way in to find out anything and everything about you; even after you press delete. It seems like more and more social media platforms are loosening or removing entirely their user’s right of privacy. And the crazy part is they are being very honest about this, well they have to be or else it’d be illegal. But regardless of these changes being announced, users still continue to log in, Snapchat and message.
Have you ever opened an app to an announcement of a policy change pop up? Do you do what I do and quickly scroll the bottom and click “I accept” so that you can quickly get back to your Instagram feed? Social Media platforms are being very open in their policy updates and changes to avoid legal issues, but yet we as users don’t seem to notice until it becomes personal and in our face.

During some research I found where Facebook shows all their policies on privacy. I liked their setup; it provided an outlet for curious individuals like myself to seek questions to my concerns and somewhere to place complaints: Facebook's Policies

I found a very interesting article that discussed "5 Trends that will change the way you use Social Media in 2015"
The last trend applied a lot to my post and I wanted to share it here:

"The illusion of social media privacy gives way to the real thing

2014 saw a number of anonymous and ephemeral social networks – Snapchat, Secret, Whisper, Yik Yak and Telegram, to name a few – surge in popularity. Not everyone wants every conversation over social media broadcast to the world, after all. At the same time, savvy users are increasingly aware – and concerned – about ways personal data is being collected and later sold to advertisers, manipulated in tests or accessed by government agencies.

The problem is that few of these “private” networks fulfill their mandates. Snapchat has been hacked, repeatedly, with hundreds of thousands of sensitive – supposedly disappearing – user photos posted on the Internet. And in October, it was revealed that the anonymous network Whisper was actually saving users’ posts and locations and compiling this information in a searchable database. As Venture Beat points out, real anonymity and privacy on the Internet is extremely difficult to achieve. While it’s easy to make promises, it’s nearly impossible to deliver.

Ryan Holmes is CEO of Hootsuite."

The truth of the matter is, we need to be careful with what we put on the Internet because we never know when it will resurface. The way we use social media can have very long-term affects on future relationships, job opportunities and reputation. As unfavorable as these new policies may be, many of us will continue to oblige to them, so what can we do to protect ourselves on social media? I searched for proper social media etiquette and how to best present ourselves on the computer screen. This article had great tips on how to properly use social media: Online Etiquette

Golden Rule: don’t post anything your Grandma wouldn’t “like”

Topic: Collaborative and Distance Communication Platforms

I don’t personally have very much experience using Collaborative or Distance Communication Platforms. I have skyped or face-timed someone a time or two, but I am definitely not an avid user of any of these platforms. While I personally don’t use these platforms that often, I see their importance and benefits.

Brent Whent, in his article "How Skype Changed the World", he discusses how the ability to see and hear someone half way across the world has forever changed the way we can communicate. “136 years after Alexander Graham Bell patented the telephone, he could finally see what Watson was wearing!” I know a lot of individuals who use it often because of circumstances they are in. Such circumstances may be because their family lives far away, they are in a long distance relationship, involved in distant tutoring, and video conferencing for work. It is a great tool that when needed can be awesome to use!

I have recently started using a cool feature of a very well known app, Snapchat. How many of you know you can do video chat on this app? If two users are both on at the same time, you can open a video chat. It is convenient feature when you both don’t have Iphones or you don’t want to download another software or platform to use.

This article brought up an interesting view of the uses of social media, and the virtual life that can be created on Distance and Collaborative Communication. It has created the possibility that we can escape the reality of our lives and go into some virtual life we can create. When I think of Distant Communication, my mind goes to talking to people that I already know, not getting to meet new people. But studies show, that is exactly why people use such platforms.

The author stated: “[Collaborative and Distance Communication] is something that will eventually become more popular as technology progresses and we start to converge with it. As for the communication aspect, it can greatly increase your reach to increase your social network, find a niche, and to express yourself with others that share in the same interests as yourself.”

 Check out this article to see the BENEFITS

While serving a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, I was able to skype my family on holidays. On these particular occasions, I was beyond grateful for the invention of Collaborative and Distance Communication. I believe that dependent on circumstances of users, these platforms are either very important and almost essential or it can seem irrelevant for those who have no use. While I do not currently use it often, I know it has a place and purpose within my Social Media use, that I predict will increase.

Location Based Platforms

Facebook always tempts me to “Check In” with my current location. Does the world really want to know that I am sitting on my couch right now, or that I’m at Walmart for the fourth time this week? I don’t understand what is so alluring about the possibility of posting your location on Social Media. Is it for bragging benefits to you can showcase your fun and exciting life of travel? Is it used to connect with those that are in your close surroundings? Or do you do it to virtually journal your daily doings and happenings? I can say that I have used location based social media for all of the above reasons. Why do you do it? In this blog post I want to dive into why individuals, businesses, etc use location based platforms and how does it benefit them. 

The first blog that I read addressed the benefit of location tagging when other forms of tagging fails. This relates to our discussion in class when we talked about the hashtag used by Utah State University that was also used by another college. We can use tags to find similar posts, but somewhere in the middle non-related posts can get intermingled; in this instance it is beneficial to tag a specific location or event so that all related posts can be found and connected.

 BENEFITS

The article stated:

"What if the hashtag didn’t catch on? What if people were using your target keywords but weren’t actually at the event? What if they were posting valuable, actionable content, but didn’t use any relevant keywords at all?

Now, imagine searching for that location on a map, drawing a virtual perimeter around your area of interest, and visualizing the content coming only from within those boundaries regardless of what words were used.

For two weeks during the Olympics, we used Geofeedia’s platform to create virtual perimeters around 34 Olympic locations. Then, we gathered all geo-tagged content from five different sources (Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Flickr, Picasa) and searched the data for posts that contained keywords like Olympics, London 2012, #london2012 and a number of others. Here’s what we found:

• 170,000 total geo-tagged posts from the 34 locations
• 69% did not contain one of our target keywords
• Many Instagram and Flickr photos didn’t contain a caption at all

Without a location-based social media monitoring tool, more than 115,000 social media posts originating directly from Olympic venues would have been difficult to find or lost entirely.

 While researching I came across a site solely used to post location tagging social media. I was amazed at how many of them are already out there and in use. There was many that offered similar benefits, but the majority offered a place for you to simply connect with those around you by posting your current location. There are many out there, which means people must be using them!

 Check out this post to see how many social media there are, that offers sharing location:

 Social Media to try

 

The last article I would like to discuss is one I found on http://techcrunch.com/2013/07/23/location-vs-communication/

It addresses the fact that location-based social media is not an essential use of Social Media. It is not what all the hype of networking is about. Users of Social Media do not create an account with a platform for their ability of tag their location, there are far greater benefits that will rank prior to location tagging. The article states that Social Media users have a “need to communicate at regular intervals — which is the driving force behind the rise and rise of mobile messaging apps. Far fewer people feel a similar imperative to regularly broadcast their location. Or tether their communications to a particular location. That’s got ‘niche use-case’ written all over it.”

From my research, it is evident that there are multiple reasons to use location tagging Social Media platforms. For some individuals there are very apparent benefits to it's use. Others view it as tool that is not essential to their social networking. Regardless of where your opinion lies, location tagging is a something that more and more sites are adapting to. 

So the world shall continue to see that yes, I am once again at Twizzleberry getting frozen yogurt.

Most Used Platforms

FACEBOOK

Who else remembers when Facebook was just for our parents and other old people? I sure do! I vowed I would never have an account, because it was “the lamest thing ever.” Now here I am many years down the road, an avid Facebook user. It was tough for me to decide which Platform I use the most. It was close one in between Facebook, Instagram and Snap Chat, between the three I definitely spend way too much time.

Facebook has been such a great tool in my life. I have used it to stay connect to those that are dear to me that are far away. I served a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, where I made many life-long friends. It is truly a blessing in my life to be able to easily stay in contact with these individuals and to see how they are doing. Also while I am up at school, Facebook is very beneficial to stay in touch with my family and friends not in the area.

Facebook has so many avenues of expression for what is going on in our life. Individuals can post successes for all to see, we can share our trials so others can offer support, or we can simply post a picture of our delicious burger we had for lunch. Facebook is very versatile when it comes to it’s uses.

It is interesting to me how much we “share” on facebook. It seems it is the quickest way to get something to go viral as it spreads on our news feeds. Each time I get on my Facebook it seems like I see many blog posts that my friends share. Some of the blog posts are great, however some are inappropriate and I would prefer to not see on my feed. There are also funny memes floating around my news feed, which seem to always put a smile on my face.

With every Social Media, we must make sure we are using it in a beneficial way and not in a way that is negative. I must admit that I spend too much time on this site. In an effort to check it less I turned off the notifications on my phone so that I am not updated each time something happens. Facebook can be addicting, there is always something new and entertaining to look at. There can be a negative element to Facebook when we use it compare ourselves to others and their “perfect life” as it is portrayed on their Facebook. It is my goal to use my Facebook to uplift others and myself.