I interviewed my best friend, Will, who goes to New York University and studies hotel management. He has used several social media platforms such as myspace,snapchat,twitter,facebook, back when he was young and linkedin now that he is about to enter the labor force.Now he only uses facebook and linkedin because some of the platforms mentioned before has disappeared or are not in use nowadays.
Typically he uses his real name for these platforms so that people can communicate through them. But in the past he has used fake names for different accounts in facebook in order to gain benefits from various game entertainment websites. He did not use them in order to conduct fraud but he simply used them to gain advantages in various games.It shows how it is easy to duplicate one’s self in virtual reality. This digital liberation allow people to become multidimensional beings, something more than physical selves (page 127).
Facebook, snapchat and Myspace are social media platforms that relate to his personal life so it shows more of his daily life. He uses them mainly to communicate with different people and show the gist of how he is living and his whereabouts. As stated in the reading, “the distinctive aspect of contemporary social media, is their capacity to integrate online social networks with those formed in the physical context of daily life(page174)”.In contrast, Linkedin is a social media platform which represents more of his business side. Anything job related would be shown on Linkedin such as abilities or special skillsets that can land jobs.
He thinks digital personas has and will create new problems because the representation from the personas can be perceived differently depending on the individual who goes through his social media. Back in highschool, he experienced and observed many cases in which social media personas were interpreted differently which caused as little as arguments to real fights. People hold grudges based on some of the actions that he has done. He thinks that sometimes people go overboard and exaggerate and criticize certain behavior and especially with the impact and influence social media platforms have, there will be more problems that will rise. He thinks nothing good comes out of social media and sharing.
Computer allows us to share everyday of our life that we talk, share ideas, and create communities. People often use Instagram to post their good experiences such as going to nice bars, restaurants, or having spa days. Those who follow these people could misunderstand and think that fancy life is just an ordinary life for them. However, they overlook the fact that the people who seem to have fancy life might havedifferent aspects of life. They could be just like people who loves to eat out spending all of money on restaurants but living in a small apartment. One frame of picture on the virtual life does not define their entire daily life. People should be aware of this and should not feel relative depreation because of the “frame”.
- Have you ever met anyone who lives so differently on social media compared to thier real life?
- Is there any social media that you want to get back that is no longer exists or popular?
I think its really interesting how so many people promote themselves on social media but only put out the most extravagant aspects of their lives– most of which is relatively fake. By doing this, it actually has a negative effect on our emotions because we are constantly comparing ourselves to each other rather than trying to achieve happiness of our own.
So true. In my country, there is even term called ” social media fever” because people get so strssed out of comparing and being afraid of judging by people in social media.