Characteristics of Social Media
Social media has the following unique
characteristics (İşlek, 2012: 19):
Participation: Social media
encourages everyone who is willing to contribute and give feedback, which make
the line between the media and the public become indistinct. That is, the clear-cut
distinction between the follower and content creator has become
indistinct.
Publicity: Most of social media
services is open to participation and feedback giving. Voting, commenting, and
information sharing are encouraged. There is seldom limitation to access and
use contents. The content that are protected via passwords are seldom preferred
by the users.
Dialogue: The conventional media
concerns itself with publication (the content is disseminated from a particular
source), social media offers opportunities for bidirectional interaction and
communication.
Community: Social media
allows for quick formation of groups and an effective interaction among them.
These communities share common interests, information and knowledge.
Connectivity: Social media sites are developing ways for being
connected to one another and allow for multi-access to other sites, sources and
persons.
According to Adams (2011), the characteristics of social
media are divided to five parts. These are approachable, accessible, timely,
usable and eternal (yet changing).
2.2. History of Social Media
Today emerging communication sectors have
considerably become supportive of particularly internet and modern
communication technologies. Internet use which began in the 1970s has been
developing tremendously since the 1990s through the increasing number of users
of Websites and web portals. In the 2000s social media applications have given
it another dimension where people from different social groups gather (Doğan,
2013: 4).
History of social media reveals that it all started in 1978
with an intention of two friends, called Ward Christensen and Randy Suess, fan
of technology and communication, to stay connected with each other through a
software called BBS. This is acknowledged as the birth of social media. When
technological facilities particularly in 1978 are considered, the initial
attempts of these friends are praiseworthy.
This primitive social media means developed then led to the
establishment of the first social media 11 years after BBS and developed
rapidly till today. MIRC was introduced to establish communication among people
in 1995. People were given opportunities to meet others whom they have not met
before using nicknames. The users did not have to give private information
about themselves, so no one was receiving true information from one another.
Following this, ICQ program allowed us to gather with people we already knew
with user numbers, which were the identities of each user. Social media was
completely cyber then because people did not need and want to publicize
themselves (Çile, 2012).
History has seen a wide
range of technologies that have facilitated conversation, and in just the last
40 years there have been a startling number of innovations in this sector.
People have recently begun using digital media for networking, socializing and
gathering information. There are websites for every individual and specialized
interest. There are websites for sharing photos, sharing videos, telling
friends about activities, meeting new people and connecting with old friends.
Celebrities regularly update their statuses and interact with fans on Twitter,
Facebook and other social networks. Social media has come a long way since the
days of the telegraph and even the more recent days of Internet-relay chats
(IRC), and it continues to evolve. In the last few years, social media has
become a convention of the online landscape. Major social networks and social
media websites make changes and improvements on a fairly regular basis, so it’s
sure to keep evolving in coming years (Adams, 2011).
2.3. Social Networking Platforms
History of social networks is those that are as old
as that of human (Akyüz, 2009: 31). The concept of social networking was first
used in the studies of group dynamics in sociological research in the 1930s
(Vural and Bat, 2010: 3355). Social
networking theory concerns itself with the relation among the network members
(Keenan and Shiri, 2009: 439).
According to Zarella (2010: 53), social network is a
website where people connect with friends, both those they know offline and
those who are online-only buddies. Social networking sites are a hot topic for
marketers, as they present a number of opportunities for interacting with
customers, including via plug-in applications, groups, and fan pages. Each
social network presents its own possibilities and challenges. Users of
individual sites have different expectations of commercial behaviour.
In broader terms, social networks are online communities in
which people having the same interest share different activities (cited in Redbridge, 2008 by İşlek, 2012:
50).
The introduction of social network sites allows
consumers to share and exchange ideas far more easily with others particularly
about companies and products (Mangold and Faulds, 2009: 357).
According to Boyd and Ellison (2008: 211), social networks are
web-based sites which allow users to:
-
develop an open or semi-open profile in a
confined system,
-
be identified explicitly in the list of other
users who they share with,
-
see others’ contact list, be seen by others,
refine own contact lists
Mazman (2009: 4), on the other hand, list the general
characteristic of social media as follows:
-
Most social networks facilitate interaction and
communication between users by providing them with opportunities of e-mailing,
instant messaging, chatting, video and photograph sharing, and blogging,
-
Social networks keep record of its users’ data
base and users find their friends easily, form groups and share with others who
have similar interests.
-
Most of the social networks are free of
charge.
-
Most of the social networks add new features on
the basis of the feedback by users and develop them. Some open versions of
networks allow users to develop applications and integrate them to the
site.
-
Most of the social networks focus of
individual-based online communities rather than on those based on interest,
theme or content.
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