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Is social media a fad? Or is it the biggest shift since the Industrial Revolution?
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sIFYPQjYhv8&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fmashable%2Ecom%2F2009%2F08%2F14%2Fsocial%2Dmedia%2Dstats%2Dvisualized%2F&feature=player_embedded[/youtube]
[...] touted as not only the Next Big Thing, but as absolutely indispensable. There’s a YouTube video, previously linked on this site, that is typical of the muddled thinking around social media. Amid a welter of [...]
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Social media is definitely a big deal, but this video might be a wee bit overblown. After all, it was clearly made by social media junkies! So take it from whence it comes.
As Naomi said–social media matter, but there will be other tools tomorrow that look even bigger. We need to be paying attention. We also need to learn to filter hype. Of the statistics posted in that video that I could verify, none were remotely true–all represented extreme exaggeration.
Does that mean that social media are hype? No. For those of us trying to reach people, or to build community today, these are critical tools. But older media also still matter, and there will be other things to come along.
The only constant is that there will always be some humans who cannot discuss new phenomena without using apocalyptic terms
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I think discussing social media gives way to hyperbole (why does it have to be either a “fad” or a “revolution”?), but it’s hard to ignore how so many people are communicating. It matters very much how younger people not only get their information but how they expect to get their information.
This video is an interesting case study in itself. It’s actually a plug for a book by Eric Qualman, which none of us heard about in a bookstore (probably – I know I didn’t). Instead, we saw a video that someone shared on a blog that now all of us are discussing. Can’t deny how information travels nowadays.