What exactly is social media?

When I visit some social functions or professional seminars, conferences, etc. I often encounter one question. What do I do? After my very brief intro, one more question arise – What area am I doing my Doctorate into? I say, its Social Media. But before speaking this, I am sure about the reaction that I am going to get after hearing those 2 words. Its like “What ???” Many people misunderstand Social Media with Social Marketing. I, at least, have to explain thrice what the term social media refers to. Most of them defines Social Media as Facebook. Many extends the definition to Orkut, YouTube and Twitter. Some even defines it as “Internet Chatting”.


When i hear these answers, i get mad, crazy, weird and become completely out of words. It becomes hard to explain 'Social Media' to those who have already defined the term in their own convenient perceptions. And this feeling makes me write today's article, so that i can explain well, what is Social Media? Let me put as simple as possible.

You will understand the term when you break it. Social + Media. It is the media for social interaction, which uses the technology called "Web 2.0". Social Media is an umbrella term that defines the various activities that integrate technology, social interaction, and the construction of words, pictures, videos and audio (defined by Wikipedia).

The above figure is a "Bird's Eye View" of Social Media, well defined by Brian Solis Social Media is not limited to Facebook or YouTube or LinkedIn. It is much more than social networking sites. It is about Social Conversations happening all over the internet through various social technologies like Forums, Discussions, Micro-Blogging, Photo Sharing, Events, Documents, Music, Blogs, Videos, Networking, Live streams, Wikipedia, Social Bookmarking, etc.

Social Media connects people with all these technologies and help them converse with ease like never before. It facilitates conversations and online interaction between groups of people’ (Solis, 2007). ‘The biggest problem I have with the term “social media” is that it isn’t media in the traditional sense. Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and all the others I don’t have the word count to mention aren’t media; they are platforms for interaction and networking’ (Hopkins, 2008). The facility that differentiates these social media sites from standard email software is that they allow people to upload and ‘insert content (not just share information) into a shared community’ (Powell, 2009). All these definitions say just one simple thing - " Social + Media ".

Hope, my this small introduction to social media proves to be an important definition to all those who really seek an answer to "What exactly is Social Media?" Remember, 1 simple sentence - " Social Media is about useful Connections, meaningful Conversations and lasting Collaborations "

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