With the development of internet and worldwide web
(www) in the early 1990s by Tim Burners Lee, the human race witnessed a drastic
revolution in the information technology and data sharing. We, indeed are the
luckiest people to have ever lived on the earth as we have seen all these
progresses in our own lives. Our ancestors neither dreamt nor witnessed the
perks of social media. And our progenies will know about its evolution only by
studying history. But, we are the lucky ones to have lived the era.
Social media or social networking sites include
electronic communication websites like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Google
Plus, and many more. Developed in early 2000s by Mark Juckerberg as his project
of interest in his college years, Facebook gained so much popularity in a
decade that no any other social media probably will. This incredible popularity
in such a short duration is only because that was the need. Just in the right
time, when the world was getting busier, was getting faster; getting more
efficient and the volume of information was expanding exponentially, Facebook
was launched. So, naturally, it received an overwhelming response. Social media
definitely is a boon in this world of globalization.
As the human race is evolving in science and
technology, the world is getting smaller. Physical meeting was the only way of
communication before the invention of telephone. That got improved into text
messages and email. And now, we are in the world where real time media sharing is
possible in social media. We can instantly share audio files, images and videos
to friends and family all over the world. We can video chat with our only
daughter who has gone to a week long winter camp with her friends and be
assured that she’s fine; we can rekindle the love and friendship with our
friend who has been abroad for many years just by sending some of his comic
childhood pictures; parents of a rural village of Nepal can see the graduation
ceremony of their son graduating from the University of California; a desperate
newly-wed bride can video chat with her husband working as a foreign worker in
Saudi Arabia longing for the days of his return; lonely grandparents in their
late 70s can smile for a moment seeing their grandchildren grow older in
Australia; all these are possible only because of social media.
Opponents of social media have been raising their
voices against it contesting that it has drained time and money of today’s
teenagers and young adults. Excessive use of social media has been implicated
as the cause of poor academic performance, insomnia related disorders, quarrels
among the couples and ultimately even lowering of the Gross Domestic Product
(GDP) of the nation. Social media shouldn’t be regarded as curse based on these
ridiculous notions.
Students are not only wasting their time on social
media, they are using it for making study groups and group discussion projects
too. Many a times we have been surprised by the cleverness of kids these days.
How are these kids getting so smarter? That’s mostly because of internet and
social media. A brief respite from work and engaging in media actually reduces
our stress and anxiety level and improves our communication skills too. Those
shy and reticent boys who were too frightened to approach a girl can
communicate with ease. Thousands of dollars that used to be squandered before
for organizing a small business meeting by multinational companies need not be
wasted anymore. Because, executives all over the world can now video chat,
group-chat, and share their ideas. Newspapers and media houses can limit their
human resource to a minimum and work faster and more efficiently by the best
use of social media. Large audience and targeted consumers can be reached by
the producers and service providers in social media and they needn’t spend too
much on advertising anymore. This will actually enhance the sales and increase
the Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
In conclusion, as everything can be interpreted as
either good or bad, we cannot take social media as a curse simply because some
evil-minded people can misuse and exploit it. We need to consider its
usefulness and its impact on our lives. We shouldn’t look at how many quarrels
among couples it has led to, we need to see how many people are living happily
who got connected due to social media; how many marriages are saved too. Yes,
Social media has really changed our lives and that change is a good one. It
definitely is a boon.
- Samiksha Sharma
BDS 2015 , BPKIHS
SYNAPSE 2016
Essay Competition Third
