Last week I was scrolling down my profile page on a social networking site, I found one of my old friends as a suggested friend. I had completely lost touch with her and it was great to get connected after so long. Since the advent of social media, if you want to connect with people,you know which medium to explore. Social media has made it easy for us to reach out to people, we never thought we would. This medium has done so much in terms of connecting friends.
Social media is also a great platform for marketing. There are a number of brand pages that have enormously increased customer engagement for their brands. In the toy space, Barbie and Lego are the leading examples.
But how often do we think about the pitfalls of social media. Here are a few downsides:
Social media serves as a medium to connect with people, but then large portions of your personal life becomes public (notwithstanding the privacy settings). Your information gets disclosed easily which you might not reveal otherwise. Your pictures taken by others can be accessed. There are several features to hide your information, but then there are ways to crack it too. There might be people whom you are not friends with, still they know all about you. This is social media indulgence. Recently, I had posted a picture of my niece playing with Leapfrog’s Letter Factory Phonics on a social media site and I received comments from unwanted people, whom I don’t even know.
Another addition to this list is you get addicted to it. Before you know it, every small little detail happening in your life starts getting chronicled. You start keeping a track of what other people are doing, and all the other trivia in their life. All this becomes a part of your life that starts affecting you. Not a single day passes without logging into these social media sites. I have some friends logging in three times day. Do you have any such friends?
The most negative aspect of social media that needs to be addressed is, increasing malpractices. Practices like burglary, social engineering & phishing, cyberstalking, malware are some to name. Several actions are undertaken by the cybercrime cell; still it is not eradicated completely.
Social media is a channel that connects people. You can stay in touch with your old pals or can even meet new ones. To have this everyone presents their best foot forward, which might not be the case in reality. Pictures uploaded are the best ones. Everything seems to be perfect, this belief that others’ life is going perfectly well sometimes makes people upset. You start comparing your life with others and it seems to be completely on a different track. This leads to ailments like depression and tension.
In the above discussion we analyzed how social media can pose threats for you. It has become an inevitable part of our lives both professionally and personally. It is very necessary to keep a check on what impact this medium is leaving on us. Now, when you go to these social media sites, be aware of what is going around you.