Privacy Problems Part 1

Privacy is a sticky subject when it comes to social media. Ever since the ordinary internet user began to be able to connect themselves to a potential audience of thousands, the problem of privacy has become a leading debate around new media.

There is a blurry line between public and private on the World Wide Web – especially when it comes to social networks. Facebook, Twitter and YouTube make it easy for Joe from down the road to consider himself very famous thanks to his hundreds of followers.

Twitter in the marketplace

In an earlier blog post I talked about how business are not taking advantage of social media platforms for marketing their products and services. Twitter has recently announced that it is building a new campaign for advertising on Twitter.

There are pros and cons to the new Promoted Tweets monetisation scheme.

Social media make legends

Human beings have always found a way to rally and discuss issues in society. In the days of the town crier, people would gather around and listen to the news of their world and then stand around and discuss ideas.

Coffee shops became a masculine place for minds to meet and ideas to circulate; washing areas were where women got together to add to the debates. It’s not inconceivable that society’s first intellectuals gathered around some communal space and began debating. It is from these spaces that great things begin to happen in society.

Social Networking Anonymous

How attached are you to your phone?

Social networking is becoming an addiction. A company released a new Gadgetology report which drew some interesting conclusions from a relatively small study in the US. The most disturbing results were from users who don’t mind being interrupted by social messaging. 18% said that they check electronic messages during sex.

Over half of those surveyed check their social networks, like Facebook and Twitter as soon as they wake up in the morning. They also found that 26% of people do so before they get out of bed. In fact, nearly a third of iPhone users check their social networks while they are still in bed in the morning.

The survey found that while 86% of social media users don’t need to check their Facebook accounts everyday; about 29% can’t go for more than a few hours without logging on to Facebook.

SA Businesses ignore Facebook

2.6 million South Africans use Facebook, and study released by MWeb early in 2010 shows that social networking has become conventional in South Africa. Despite South Africa’s growing love affair with sites like Facebook, businesses are not yet taking advantage of the new platforms.  

Friendship 2.0 looked at sites like Facebook and MySpace as well as applications like MSN Messenger and found a reasonably large number of South Africans are quite well versed in using these sites. So, local business are then missing out on a captive audience. Although 84% use the internet for work related activities, only 16% use social platforms to promote their businesses. This is remarkably low considering how well business and social networks go together in countries like the states.