In today’s generation everything is based off the internet. Lots
of social media sites have become popular due to this. Facebook, twitter, and
Instagram are just a few examples. This provides people to express opinions or
feelings and even waste some time during the day. This is why the internet has
so many positive and negative influences and effects on people. Facebook is a
perfect social media site that proves all the different things going on around
the world. When someone uses this all day long or for just the need to “stay
connected” the effects will slowly show.
One major advantage of using Facebook is connecting with
friends and family and the communication is free! “Facebook is free and it's
one of the best medium for communication.”(Hasan) If you are communicating with
people in another country you do not have to worry about the costs of sending a
text message or when speaking on a phone line. Facebook provides you an easy
and fun way to communicate with multiple people at once and it has video
chatting available all from the comfort of a smart phone, tablet, TV, and a
computer! “You can chat with friends by using Facebook. The Facebook messenger
application is very handy for chatting online.”(Hassan) The social media site allows you to find old friends
that have moved away and makes it easy to just connect with people from all
over. From a business stand point, Facebook is a great way to get your name out there. So many people are on it that if one person sees your page, they can share it to all their friends, and so on. “Facebook allows businesses to build a community with the potential of turning a proportion of those community members into customers.”(Robshaw-Bryan) This can cut down advertising costs for small businesses that cannot fund it right away. It allows people from all over to connect and share the reviews as well. Businesses can use this to market such as setting up special internet offers allowing only Facebook users to see. “The key to successful use of Facebook for businesses lies in your ability to engage followers, listen to them and to balance the content you are publishing”(Robshaw-Bryan)
And we all know that with social media there are some
disadvantages to them. One major effect is addiction, a lot of people will become
addicted to it because it provides such a broad way to follow friends and express
their feelings to no extent.” Facebook is Addicting! For some people Facebook
could be more addicting than Cigarette! (Hassan) This will impact the user in
many negative ways. An excess amount of time every week on Facebook will affect
the person in the way they think and potentially act out. This addiction can lead people into creating
false identities that later on can lead to cyber bullying. “People often use
fake profile to insult or harass someone they don't like. Teen girls are more
vulnerable to these activities. There are news found that many girls are
mentally depressed or committed suicide after being harassed in Facebook.”(Hassan)
It allows people to be non-confrontational but still get the bullying
experience. I believe this experience is bad for younger adults such as kids
entering middle school and so on. It can promote a lot of illegal activities
and behavioral issues. People need to make sure who they add as friends and
make things private. ”From different sources it is found that, Facebook can be
life threatening sometimes. Many unknown people can track your activities and
where you are going. As a result you can face trouble. So people should be
careful in choosing friends and should try to keep their activities private.”(Hassan)
My thoughts are that as long as you don’t abuse Facebook for
a diary than all the positives will be more relevant than the negatives.
Friends have a huge impact on the way people usually act out or express themselves.
Facebook is great just until people make it more of a personal life problem
than keeping it a simple social media. Just keep it to a simple opinion
sharing, funny videos/photo postings, and simple communication between peers.
Hassan, Mahamudul. "The Advantages and Disadvantages of
Using Facebook." HubPages. N.p., n.d. Web. 02 Mar. 2014.
Robshaw-bryan, Shell. "Facebook: Understanding the Business Benefits." RSS. N.p., n.d. Web. 02 Mar. 2014.
