Abstract:
Social Networking Sites have millions of users with global connections. More
and more, people are turning to the Internet to keep in touch with friends,
family and colleagues. Some popular social sites in the world are Facebook,
Twitter, MySpace, Pinterest, Google Plus+, Tumblr, Instagram, Flickr, MySpace
etc. These social websites provide very simple joining & working platform.
It provides platform for virtual communication that allows people to connect
with each other. During research, Research Scholar Mr. Navneet and Ms.Palak
found that Social Networking Sites are very beneficial. It provide interface
for chatting , emailing, instant messaging, video- and photo- sharing, audio
& video calling, which help people to communicate and socialize with each
other. But it’s
also affecting our social, educational and personal life. Due to SNS we are
globally connected but as actual we destroy our social values system, at one
side SNS is a very fast medium for information sharing related
to personal, political, social & educational but in other side our youth
addicted to SNS. Sometimes it’s also plays a role to spoil their life and waste
their time using SNS which have been broadly covered in this journal. The study found that almost half of users under the age of 25 and 27
percent of those over 25 - allow social media updates to interrupt meals, and
that 11 percent admit to checking updates during sex. Twenty-four percent of
users under 25 and 12 percent of users over 25 allow "electronic
message" to interrupt them while they're in the bathroom. So, its affect
our life which is must be noticed.Cyber expert and
criminals also takes advantage of these social networking sites to perform
various legal & illegal activities. We also try to elaborate SNS advantage,
disadvantage & facts. There are some safety tips which help user to use SNS
in much effective way.
Keywords: Social website impact, Social Networking
Sites, addiction of Facebook, social networking addiction disorder, Facts of
SNS, Advantage & disadvantage of SNS
I.
INTRODUCTION
We
all are globally connected with the help of internet and its related
technologies. More and more, people are turning to the Internet to keep in
touch with friends, family and colleagues. Social networking sites (SNS), make
staying involved quicker, easier and more fun than ever before. These sites
have millions of users, with more signing up every day. Some popular social
sites in the world are Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Pinterest, Google Plus+,
Tumblr, Instagram, Flickr, MySpace etc. These social websites provide very
simple joining procedure. After that you create a “profile” (you must have a
verifiable email address) and you may choose to join a “network”. Your profile
is where you provide information that you want to share. Once your profile has
been created you find people you know, and add them to your “friend” list. In
your profile, you can update your status, post items of interest, join groups,
download applications, play games, take quizzes and a myriad of other things to
spend time on. SNS allow people to stay connected by easily monitoring updates
or changes in others’ profiles.
II.
OBJECTIVE
Through
this topic (i.e. “Social Networking
Sites (SNS): A Quick study and its impact for Educational & Social
Platform”) we try to elaborate Social networking sites (SNS), how they
affect our social life, its present growth survey and activities with their
impact of Educational & Social Platform. We also try to focus their
advantages and disadvantage.
III. A VIRTUAL PLACE: SOCIAL NETWORKING AND IT’S EFFECT
Online
Social networking is a type of virtual communication that allows people to
connect with each other. This concept arises from basic need of human beings to
stay together in groups forming a community. Mr. Navneet a Research Scholar at
Jodhpur National University compared some world’s top Social Networking
Websites algorithm and its working style. Such as in Facebook people project
their identity by demonstrating their relationships to each other. You define
yourself in terms of who your friends are. Wikipedia defines social network
service as online platform that focus on building and reflecting social
networks or social relations among people who share interests and activities.
Social networking sites, email, instant messaging, video- and photo- sharing
sites and comment posting are all tools that help people to communicate and
socialize with each other. The first social networking site SixDegrees.com was
launched in 1997. It allowed users to create profiles, list their friends and
surf the friends list (Boyd, & Ellison, 2007). People join social
networking sites because it gives them an opportunity to express their views, a
feel of independency and self esteem. It is just a click way to create a
virtual profile and connect with millions of users across the world, becomes more
interesting because you can stay
connected with old friends and family members. The list of ten most popular
social networking sites based on their Alexa global traffic rank and traffic
rank from Compete and Quant cast is shown in below table as per survey on April
2014[1]
Rank
|
Sites
|
Estimated Unique Monthly
visitors
|
1
|
Facebook
|
900,000,000
|
2
|
Twitter
|
310,000,000
|
3
|
LinkedIn
|
250,000,000
|
4
|
Pinterest
|
150,000,000
|
5
|
Google Plus+
|
120,000,000
|
6
|
Tumblr
|
110,000,000
|
7
|
Instagram
|
85,000,000
|
8
|
VK
|
80,000,000
|
9
|
Flickr
|
65,000,000
|
10
|
MySpace
|
40,000,000
|
Table 1: world’s top 10 SNS as on April 2014
As
per comscore 84 percent of India’s total internet visitors are users of SNS.
India is the third largest market worldwide for social networking after the
China and USA. [2]
According
to Facebook statement as on December 31, 2012, it has 1.06 billion monthly active
users (MAUs) worldwide including 71 million in India. [3]
Facebook
captures the top slot among SNS in India with 71 million visitors.
Interestingly, Social networking site Facebook has said it is having
approximately 50 million duplicate accounts besides 22 million of misclassified
and undesirable accounts as on Dec 31, 2012 [4]
The
growth rate of internet population in India is very fast. As per comscore
survey Indian internet population is 205 million as on 2013. But as per growth rate it’s projected to be
the second largest by 2015 with 330-370 million users [5] which is also shown
in below figure.
Figure 1: India on Internet
IV.
SOCIAL NETWORKING SITES (SNS) : FACTS
We
are Human being; we affect our society & environment with every action.
With the help of SNS we do lots of activities but it also affects our social,
educational and personal life. Below are some facts & concern about social
networking site:
1.
Personal Privacy Concern
2.
Educational & Social
Concern
3.
Biological Impact of SNS
4.
Marketing & Political concern
5.
Its affects Work Productivity
6.
Facebook & other SNS Addiction Disorder
7.
SNS - A Playground for Cyber
Criminals
8.
SNS affects Relationship
1. Personal Privacy
Concern: As Personal Privacy Concern there is a narrow
gap between private and public life in the age of social networking. Once you
put your personal data, image or video on web site, you are helpless to control
its distribution. Though you can set its privacy level in the profile but you
are sharing them with an unknown web administrator. Tomorrow your personal
information may lend in the hand of parents, teacher, employer, spouse,
criminal or a marketing company.
A study conducted by Pew Internet & American Life Project in
September 2013 found that 71% of online adults use Facebook, 18% of online
adults use Twitter, 17% use Instagram, 21% use Pinterest and 22% use LinkedIn. [6]
As compare all Social Networking Sites 66 percent of teens restrict their
online profile by making it private. They found 82 percent teens post their
first name, followed by photos of themselves (79%); name of city (61%) and
email address (29%). According to Pew study girls generally don’t post
information that could help in finding their physical location. On the other hand,
boys are just opposite and post more information about their real location. But
its statics changed day by day now, all adult try to put right current location
on SNS portal. Today many employers look online profile before giving the job
offer, because they don’t want to see only one side of employee’s personality.
Using the information available on Facebook profile one can easily determine
likely physical location of a person. Social networking sites are becoming a
threat to the privacy of an individual.
2. Educational
& Social Concern: Social networking sites poses various concerns related to Educational
& Social Surroundings, As Educational Concern it is very useful to all age
group people, They can easily make networks, connected with friends &
teachers to enhancing knowledge. Users can easily collect lots of knowledge
& experience using SNS. But in some cases teens also addicted to SNS and
involved in illegal activities. As per DNAINDIA many Rape & Harassment
committed with the help of Social Networking Sites. [7] It is also called
cyber-age friendship.
The Courier-Mail can reveal
police logged 3400 offences involving Facebook in the past year, including 21
murders and almost 250 rapes and sexual offences. [8]
3. Biological Impact of SNS: Social networking users face several health risks because they reduce
face-to-face contact and become addicted in a virtual world of relationships.
Instant gratification of needs become their goal. According to online survey
users spent an average of 7 hours a month on Facebook. This makes Facebook
Internet’s maximum time waster website. In U.S. 53% of people check their
Facebook profile before getting out of bed in the morning and 35% check their
accounts several times in a day.
The Retrevo Gadgetology Report examined data from 1,000 Facebook and
Twitter users to see when, where, and how much time they spend on their social
media accounts.
According to the report, the individuals were distributed across gender,
age, income and location in the United States.
The study found that almost half of users under the age of 25 and 27
percent of those over 25 - allow social media updates to interrupt meals, and
that 11 percent admit to checking updates during sex (6 percent of users over
25 do the same). Twenty-four percent of users under 25 and 12 percent of users
over 25 allow "electronic message" to interrupt them while they're in
the bathroom. [9] So, its affect our life which is must be noticed.
4. Marketing & Political concern:
Social Media marketing is rapidly earning a role in the integrated marketing
mix of small and enterprise businesses; it’s transforming every division from
the inside out. It may be customer service, marketing, public relations,
advertising, interactive, eventually inspires an entire organization to
socialize. Following are the comparative chart which show B2C & B2B
Marketing ratio. [10]
Figure 2: B2C & B2B Marketing ratio
Social Media has rapidly grown in importance as a forum for political
activism. Social media platforms, such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube provide
new ways to stimulate citizen engagement in political life, where elections and
electoral campaigns have a central role. Personal communication via social
media brings politicians and parties closer to their potential voters. It
allows politicians to communicate faster and reach citizens in a more targeted
manner and vice versa. Reactions, feedback, conversations and debates are
generated online as well as support and participation for offline events.
Messages posted to personal networks are multiplied when shared, which allow
new audiences to be reached. Although the presence of social media is spreading
and media use patterns are changing. We can easily see the social media effect
in 2014 elections in India. [11]
5. Its
affects Work Productivity: People spent hours chatting with their friends and browsing profiles on
social networking sites. It becomes a compulsive habit to visit own profile
several times in a day for checking friends updates, changing status, and
commenting on others photos and videos. Finally it diverts employee’s attention
from the office work and students from study.
6. Facebook
& other SNS Addiction Disorder:
After drugs and alcohol
addiction, if the world is facing any new type of addiction disorder, then that
is Social Networking Sites addiction. This is a kind of Internet addiction, but
social networking site influences such that people goes mad behind it. It’s
like people being immersed in virtual life and forgetting about the physical
world around them. The following numbers will help you get an idea of what Social Networking
Sites such as Facebook addiction looks like:
·
Approximately 50% of individuals between the ages of 18 and 34 check
Facebook immediately after waking up.
·
More than half of these individuals check their Facebook pages on their smart
phones before getting out of bed.
·
48% of young Americans stated that they get their “news” through Facebook.
·
Young people not only see Facebook as a place to interact with friends,
but as a place to get legitimate information about current events.
·
11% of individuals age 25 and under (compared with 6% in older age
cohorts) can be interrupted by a Facebook or Twitter message during sex.
·
22% of the same group can be interrupted by a message during a meeting
(compared with 11% of older adults).
·
24% can be interrupted while going to the bathroom (compared with 12%).
·
And 49% can be interrupted during a meal (compared with 27%).
·
48% of Facebook users update their status or check for notifications
after going to bed.
·
18% of individuals age 25 and under cannot go “more than a couple of
hours” without checking their Facebook page.[12]
Due to this SNS addiction a
mother from north Florida, killed her own child because the boy was crying that
make her anger while she was playing Farmville on Facebook. The shocking story
was reported by the Florida Times-Union in 2010. Salum Kombo, 18 yrs from London, was stabbed
by his friend over an argument that started over Facebook. Salum wrote
something stupid on his friend’s wall and that provoked the boy to kill his
best friend on the street (France, 2009). When we searched Facebook addiction disorder in
Google, it gives 40, 90,000 results as on May 2014. The more interesting thing
is that there a number of communities in Facebook itself that talks about FAD. You are an Addict If:
·
You start losing sleep over
Facebook and that hampers your daily activity.
·
Spend more than an hour on
Facebook.
·
You become obsessed with
your old loves and start visiting their profile. And gradually it starts to
affect your current relationship status.
·
You tend to ignore work and
use Facebook in office hours.
·
When you think of going a
day without Facebook, it causes stress and anxiety to you. [13]
According to Mr. Navneet (Research Scholar) it is a situation in which
Facebook usage overtake daily activities like your normal function, eating,
working, waking up, sleeping and many more. So,
Social networking sites should be limited for making friends and fun in
the leisure. But don't substitute it with your real life social contacts.
Otherwise, you will be facing social isolation, high level of anxiety and other
behavioural disorders.
7. SNS - A Playground for
Cyber Criminals: The beginning of social networking sites
started to make contacts with people and build a network of healthy
relationship in the society. But now it seems offering cybercriminals a great
advantage to target victims. Generally cybercriminals collect information from
SNS such as name, dob, family background, current status, your choice, work
culture and use this information to commit crime. Think
what we do generally, suppose a family was out of home for treatment of his
son. Instead of making phone calls to everyone, he was updating on Face book
message about son's health. Everyone read his Face book message and the
criminal commit crime at home during this time. Cybercriminals use
social media not only to commit crime online, but also for carrying out real
world crime owing to “over-sharing” across these social platforms. A survey of
2,000 home-owners stated that 35% users post their vacation plans on social
networking sites. Availability of such authentic information helps the criminals
achieve their motives easily. Adding to these reasons, the money associated
with the malware market is also a motivation for criminals to attack using
social media. Although social media talks more about individual users, the
cyber criminals not only attack the user as an individual, but they also use it
as a channel to victimize businesses. A study by Cyberoam reveals that
disclosures over social media highly affect business. As per survey 40% company
posted their confidential information on SNS, 70% posted clients details, and
70% posted complete company profile and top management personal profile. [14]
Just like any other medium, social media can also become a source of data
leakage, intrusions, entry for malicious content, loss of productivity and so
on. A good balance between security and social networking can help.
8. SNS affects Relationship:
Social networking site that once was thought to be helping people
across the world to unite and making new relationship can also damage the
relationship and make life miserable. Imagine one morning you find, your spouse
updated his marital status to single on Facebook. And people posting comments
about your sad break up. How cheap has become our relationships in the age of
social networking. A survey by the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers
(AAML) reveals Facebook is the main reason behind one out of five divorces in
the US. It also says 80 percent of divorce lawyers use social networking site
to gather evidence. Flirty messages, photographs and other personal information
that you share on Facebook can be used as proof of infidelity.
Facebook is fuelling divorce rate because it easily reunites old lovers
and acts as a secret platform for dating. A research conducted on 308 Facebook
users found majority of participants (74.6%) are likely to add previous
romantic or sexual partner as friends on Facebook. It also shows time spent on
Facebook increasing jealousy related feelings. Some people’s flirting comment
on your profile can make your partner feeling aggressive and jealousy. And this
starts the beginning of a break up. Today social networking site making it much easier, your spouse not
feeling good to have sex with you but seeking sexual solicitation from Facebook
friend. Interestingly, there are sites dedicated to Facebook cheating.
FacebookChea-
ting.com provides tips how to catch a cheating spouse in the social
networking sites. Some typical clues to know if your spouse is involved in
cyber Infidelity also known as “Online Affair”
·
Spends excessive time
online.
·
Computer use continues even
after its bed time.
·
Computer screen is changed
by your partner when you come close.
·
You don’t know any password
or anything about his email address.
·
Internet history is always
cleared.
V.
SOCIAL NETWORKING SITES (SNS) : ADVANTAGE
·
The main advantage of social
networking site is that it helps in establishing connection with people,
friends and relatives. It helps in
sharing one’s view, share pictures and lots of other stuffs.
·
It helps students in
interacting with one another and share ideas.
This helps in improving student’s creativity.
·
The social networking
websites can be accessed from any part of the globe. This helps the students to
establish communication with their teachers and friends through which they can
improve their knowledge.
·
Social networking sites are
not only used by the students for sharing pictures, videos or it is not only
meant for fun and entertainment. Through
social networking sites like Facebook, LinkedIn one can become a member and can
also post relevant information about campus drive.
·
Through these sites the
students can establish contact with entrepreneurs, corporate people and can
gain valuable information from them.
·
Social networking sites have
taken a new dimension called marketing.
Certain websites offer advertisements to its subscribers. [ 15 ]
·
These sites give users a
platform across the globe to express their feelings and views.
·
It helps users to get
interact with other users, no matter from where s/he operates these sites in
world.
·
These sites help users to
organize and participate in any events.
·
Social networking sites help
us to find our long-lost and childhood friends and relatives.
·
These sites help many love
birds to find and meet their soul mates.
·
It is a great source of
communication between two users, irrespective of the distance between them.
·
These sites help users to
refresh their mind and mood, as it is a great source of entertainment and
gaming.
·
It helps to give rise some
newcomers in the world of music, acting, drama, and other arts.
·
SNS boosts many
organizations and business, through their promotions on these sites.
·
It helps in building
credibility amongst the customers.
·
It helps to make people and
community aware of any issue.
·
It helps to bring social
change in society.
·
It helps to be in touch with
our interested, loved ones, relevant group or people or community.
·
These sites are not only a
source of creating social activities but also a great way to participate and
enhance our skill through participating in many contests and activities.
·
Many people even can win
many prizes through these sites.
·
These sites also help in
terms of educations awareness and motivations though many educational groups
and communities.
·
Through these sites, users
can easily get in touch with many celebrities and their updates.
[16]
VI.
SOCIAL NETWORKING SITES (SNS) :
DISADVANTAGE
Every coin has two sides. Whenever
there comes the point of advantages, disadvantages also comes into picture
obviously. So some of the disadvantages
are:
·
One of the major
disadvantages of using social networking websites are the students get addicted
to it. They used to spend hours in those
social networking sites which can obviously degrade the student’s academic
performance.
·
Some students may tend to
use to these social networking sites till mid night or even more which can
obviously lead to health related problems.
·
Some students may spend time
in Facebook through which they lack to spend time with their family
members. This can also be a disadvantage
also.
·
Some students may provide
detailed information like phone numbers, address which is very dangerous
because they can easily tracked down by strangers. [17]
·
One of the major demerits of
these sites are increment in criminal activities, as there is no hard restrictions
on creating account on these sites.
·
Another important issue is
security of our personal data and information, as it’s free to everyone; most
of the users create face accounts and misuse the personal information of other
users/celebrities.
·
Sometime some non genuine
and face account users attacks to some religious communities and political
groups.
·
It encourages porno
activities, and attacks many children and youths.
·
These sites unnecessarily
waste our valuable time, when user spend time on these sites and get addicted.
·
Addictions of these sites
can even affect our mental conditions, sometime is became a big reason of
depression and tension.
·
It also affects our health
directly.
·
User's reliability is not
sure; it's very hard to trust on any stranger on these sites.
·
Many of time it has been
seen that it became the reason of one's death, as it becomes the medium to get
in touch with the victim.
·
It affects children and
youngster's studies. As they spend their valuable time on these sites and loss
their studies and concentration. You can read about these bad effects of
internet on children, and step of preventions.
·
It encourages many scams. [18]
VII.
SAFETY TIPS IN SOCIAL NETWORKING
SITES (SNS)
·
Change the profile privacy
now. By default it is public so change it friends only.
· Always close your session after login/logout with SNS
or try to delete history from web browser.
·
Personalize your firewall setting during the setup process which show how
much data you want to allow into your system from internet or some SNS
Application.
·
Keep your information
accessible only to people in your friend list.
·
Don’t accept friendship
request from strangers.
·
Generally we judge particular
person online, by his /her profile picture and personal information. This is
the first mistake that cyber criminals wanted us to do.
·
Don’t post very personal
information on the profile. It includes your email id, date of birth, contact
number, home address and information about your family members.
·
Be cautious while posting
your photo. Ensure your photo background doesn’t show about your actual
whereabouts.
·
Don’t post your current
location when on a tour. Posting this information on social networking site is
just like inviting criminals.
·
Don’t post negative things
about your life. This is just like maligning your own image. Your friends are
monitoring your activity and one such mistake can cause havoc in future.
·
Make distance from your ex’s
profile. This might seem you little cruel, but once you decide to quit a
relationship there is no meaning again visiting your ex-partner’s profile. If
you want to have a good life in future, then unfriend your ex from friend list.
·
Don’t substitute real
friends with virtual friends. Facebook and other SNS is a great tool to connect
new people across world. But they can never be your real friends. You need real
friends to enhance your social image and reduce stress and anxiety.
· Change your password regularly on all SNS accounts.
·
Installed
software updates, patches & Antivirus of operating system regularly. It protect
from attack. Because some SNS allow some background access of information
through its related apps.
·
Avoid using Social
networking sites in work hours. When you try to use social networking sites
during work hour, it not only affects your work performance but also increases
chances of getting fired.
·
Do not visit
un-trusted apps or link which provided by unknown or un-trusted user or sources
on Social Networking Sites.
- Do not respond to any
unsolicited (spam) incoming e-mails or links on SNS.
- Do not open any
attachments or link contained in suspicious emails or attachment over SNS
or other websites.
- Do not enter personal
information in a pop-up screen. Providing such information may compromise your
identity and increase the odds of identity theft. Because sometimes when
you visit any social sites or application, they want permission to access
your all account information. So be cautious before clicking this
information.
- Have separate
passwords for important work related and SNS related accounts.
- Be educated with
modern technology and applications. [19]
VIII. CONCLUSIONS
At the end, we want to conclude that Social networking
sites are playing very significant role; it has a direct impact on all age group
people. Though it has many conclusions but still these are like an effective
tool in communicating millions of people and spreading our expressions
worldwide. We all need a change in the pattern of use, in order to prevent
miss-happenings on these sites. If we will be active and aware these sites will
serve us their batter and will bring some more revolution in the world of cyber
technology. Following Step can be taken to avoid and prevent disadvantages from
Social Networking Sites:-
·
Impositions of
some restriction on these sites by the government and cyber department of that
country
·
Proper counseling
should be given to addicted users and students, regarding its bed effects and
proper utilizations of these sites.
·
Social awareness
programs can related to many scams running on these sites can also help users.
·
Parents-children
interaction and counseling is also a good idea to prevent children from
excessive use of these sites.
·
User's activeness
is also necessary, if a user sees anything illegal, unnatural, and a kind of
criminal activity they can "Report Abuse" that content. Report abuse
is a feature in almost many sites to report a suspicious and non social content
and activity, then the site admin would like onto that matter.
·
Avoid
unnecessarily uploading of your personal data, including information's,
pictures, and other things.
·
Setting time
schedule for using these sites can also help in unnecessarily waste of time.
·
Must be follow
safety tips which is mention in section VII.
IX. REFERENCES
[1] http://www.ebizmba.com/articles/social-networking-websites
[2] http://www.slideshare.net/mitraarnab1/india-on-internet-2014
[3] http://gadgets.ndtv.com/social-networking/news/facebook-has-71-million-active-users-in-india-50-million-duplicate-accounts-worldwide-328213
[4] http://gadgets.ndtv.com/social-networking/news/facebook-has-71-million-active-users-in-india-50-million-duplicate-accounts-worldwide-328213
[5] http://www.slideshare.net/mitraarnab1/india-on-internet-2014
[6] http://www.pewinternet.org/fact-sheets/social-networking-fact-sheet/
[7] http://www.dnaindia.com/mumbai/report-facebook-pal-from-mumbai-held-for-rape-of-teenaged-goan-girl-1949882
[8] http://www.couriermail.com.au/
news/queensland/facebook-increasingly-being-used-by-criminals-to-lure-victims/story-fnihsrf2-1226747159852
[9] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/
2010/04/06/youth-interrupt-sex-to-an_n_525839.html
[10] http://www.briansolis.com/2010/02/the-role-of-facebook-and-twitter-in-social-media-marketing/
[11] http://epthinktank.eu/2014/02/12/the-role-played-by-social-media-in-political-participation-and-electoral-campaigns/
[12] http://www.lifementalhealth.com/facebook-addiction-statistics-a-new-era/
[13] https://www.facebook.com/notes/i-suffer-from-fad-facebook-addiction-disorder/symptoms-of-facebook-addiction-/124798097549198
[14] http://www.cyberoam.com/blog/why-social-networking-sites-are-a-favourite-with-cyber-criminals-today/
[15] Advantage-http://students3k.com/advantages-and-disadvantages-of-social-networking-sites-for-students.html
[16] Advantage-
http://www.digitaltechinspiration.com
/2012/09/social-networking-sites-facts.html
[17] Disadvantage
– http://students3k.com/
[18] Disadvantage-
http://www.digitaltechinspiration.com
[19] Safety
Tips – By Mr. Navneet- Vol. 2 Issue II, February 2014 ISSN: 2321-9653 With
Topic “Is your website protected: a quick study to know “unknown doors to your
websites?”
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