1. Introduction

Over the years, there have been many different inventions that have connected the world. Innovation in transportation made the world much smaller than it ever was. Stronger and more powerful ships allowed for people to cross the ocean. Cars and trains allowed people to travel all the way across the continents with ease. Humankind invented planes that allowed for insanely quick travel across the world. Travelling to meet with people became tiresome and tedious, humankind wished to find ways to create much easier and faster communication with having to cross the planet. Telephones, telegraphs, and telegrams were invented to connect the world and allow for communication without even leaving a seat. However, that was not enough. The creation of the internet shook the world and allowed the entire world to be connected in one place. The internet has been the most important invention for communication. Soon after the creation of the internet came social media, which used the internet to connect the world and others, allowing people to talk and view each other from all over the world. Social media started and revolutionized communication. Family members and friends could keep track of everything that is going on. The news and other events can be posted and displayed for people to see. Social media is one of the key and pivotal inventions in the 21^st century so far, because of how it has connected the world and created such a profit.

2. History of social media

The Bulletin Board System was one of the predecessors to social media. The Bulletin Board System, or BBS for short, allowed people to talk and download codes of information from each other. This allowed people to communicate and trade games. BBSs were usually ran locally because they ran on telephone modems and this meant that telephone rates applied. This really limited the potential of the BBS because it could not extend out very far without charging people large amounts of money. Many people that spent their time only on the Bulletin Board System began to gather and meet up. The impact of communication on the BBS brought people to expand outside of their computers.

2.1. AOL

AOL was the first true form of social media. AOL allowed people to create profiles and list things about themselves to create groups that they could join. These groups were filled with people that had similar interests. In these groups, people could chat and participate in many other activities. There were chatrooms that people could join even if they did not match the criteria. People could talk about almost anything they wanted to. AOL started to grow large in the 1990s, gaining millions of users in a short span of time. (Staff) AOL made a huge impact on people and how the internet could be used to communicate and connect.

2.2. Myspace

AOL opened the door for social media to take hold of the increasing internet users and fans. Soon after AOL began to die down Myspace was created. Myspace let people create statuses, telling the world how they were feeling or what they were doing. People could post pictures of themselves and place music ion their profile pages. This allowed people to feel more than just a name and they were able to put faces behind there names of the people they were friending and talking to. Myspace was created in 2003. (Staff) Myspace created a fun environment for the youth to enjoy. The music and music videos on people’s profile pages made it fun and people could determine others’ personalities just by viewing their profile pages. Because Myspace made social media so fun, people started to use it more. Many more people started to use Myspace as it became more popular. However, as it died down a new social media titan appeared.

2.3. Facebook

Myspace began to decline and Facebook took its place. Facebook was created in 2004 and immediately became popular. Facebook has billions of users. Facebook was very easy to use and fun. The like button, videos, and advertisements made Facebook much different from other social media sites. Facebook was much more interactive. It allowed people to like things and share things. This interactivity let people spend much more time on Facebook. (Staff) People posted videos, pictures, and statuses and could receive feedback on them from other people. Companies and other accounts posted trailers to movies and other videos. Facebook’s impact and success paved the way for a very similar social media site.

2.4. Twitter

Soon after Facebook grew large, Twitter began to make its large debut. Twitter used a short amount of characters to allow people to convey their messages quickly. Twitter became extremely easy to use. All people needed to do was post a picture, message, or video. Twitter also had a feature called direct messaging that allowed for people to send individual messages to each other. It did not become hard for people to find Twitter to become very interesting and fun, especially for the youths. Large corporations made twitter accounts. They posted ads and whatever was going on in the world or their companies. People made parody accounts and posted funny tweets and videos. Apps like Vine and Instagram were made and connected directly to Twitter to make the apps more interesting. Twitter become very important to everyday life, especially because it could be ran on cellphones, tablets, and computers.

3. Technology used social media

Social media would not be has popular now if it could not be used on cellphones or computers. The accessibility to the apps made them much bigger than what they were originally going to be. All of social media apps were created and could be used on smartphones. Smartphones let every single person with a smartphone use the apps wherever they wanted. People can record videos and post them immediately, no matter where they are. No one is restricted to only using the apps on their computers. Twitter is actually much easier to use on the phone than on the computer. Facebook and Twitter also have constant updates and other changes to bring new stuff to the apps.

3.1. Computers

All social media started on computer and this made it much easier to use at home. But the users were stuck with only being able to access the sites and apps at home. People could not immediately post whatever they wanted wherever they wanted. Computers worked well for social media but they became outdated. Everyone can use social media anywhere and keep track of it on their phones.

4. The impact of social media

Social media has made a huge impact and change to society. The youth in the world are constantly on social media posting thousands of pictures and messages a day. People are making friends with people they have never met. Social media has desensitized people in everyday life but it has also made the world much smaller than it has ever been before. Many people take part in one type of social media or another. Whether they are using Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or LinkedIn. Social media has become a way for people to communicate and even find jobs.

5. Conclusion

Social media has made a large impact in the world connecting just about every part of the world that has internet. Without social media, the world would appear to be much larger than it does now. Youthful people can communicate and spend hour’s online making friends that they would never meet. Or they can leave their phones and computers and actually go meet the people they have been talking to online. Social media has come to aid the world in making friends with one another.

References

Hendricks, D. (2013, May 06). Complete History of Social Media: Then And Now. Retrieved April 19, 2017, from https://smallbiztrends.com/2013/05/the-complete-history-of-social-media-infographic.html

Staff, D. T. (2016, May 12). The history of social networking. Retrieved April 19, 2017, from http://www.digitaltrends.com/features/the-history-of-social-networking/

The Importance of Social Media