Facebook is a social networking website launched in February 2004 that is operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc., with more than 500 million active users in July 2010, which is about one person for every fourteen in the world. ...
Definition source: en.wiktionary.org/wiki/facebook
It may surprise you that Facebook has only been around since 2004 because in a relatively short period of time it has become a world icon. It is as visible as the term as email and flat screen televisions in the media and tech speak. If you are not on Facebook you tend to be the exception not the rule. It has become a social media template for almost every form of communication we know. It has tapped into our phones, homes, schools, churches and most of the loca, national and international business community. It is international, used the world over to gather, share and distribute information. It uses almost every form of media from video, audio, pictures, feeds and the list goes on and on. Think back i f you are old enough to when answering machines and cell phones were just starting to appear in the market and how long it took them to catch on with the general public. However, this doesn't seem to be the same with Facebook it has caught on like a wild fire and shows no signs of slowing down. Yet as with any emerging technology it has its positive and negative attributes and the society as a whole is only beginning to deal with the overall implications of such a wide reaching form of social awareness and distribution of information. One could say it has taken on a life of its own like Hal the computer.
Why should we care even if we don't use it, and appreciate the benefits it provides for real-time communication and exchange of every form of information? Well as with before mentioned technologies like the answering machine and the cell phone I believe we can all attest to the fact that eventually we all brought into the existence and use of these products. I remember the first time I didn't hate the answering machine when all I got was ringing phone with no one at the other end and I couldn't even leave a message to say I had called "Don't they know we are in the 21 century"? As with the cell phone in the mid-nineties when a person decided to cut across my lane from the left side to make a right hand turn and left me know where to go but t-bone their Ford Mustang that they thought was so much faster than my at the time 2 plus ton SUV. After we confirmed everything was ok, except the vehicles he offered me his cell phone so I could call home and let them know I would be late. Needlessly to say I didn't use his, because I would have probably smashed it into the ground but from that day forward I have had a cell phone of my own just for such an occasion.
Facebook and social media in general is here to stay in some form or fashion and the sooner we appreciate that we will start taking action to further understand it and why it is essential that apply good judgment in the monitoring and use of it by the ones we love and care about. We live in a society where everything that glimmers is not gold and Facebook is no exception while it has some great applications for general, business and personal communication as other technologies it will be tested. We know of quite a few examples over the past few years where kids of been suspended from school and sports, people have loss their jobs and moral standards have been compromised in the inappropriate and sometime appropriate use of this media. While we continue to learn everyday about the good and bads of social media my primary recommendation is that those areas where it has already made inroads to your life that you at least spend a little time getting to know something about it. If your kids are using it I believe you have to take at least enough interest to monitor if they are using it and utilizing good judgment ....because small mistakes of yester-year of getting caught passing a note in class with something you shouldn't have, has been multiplied by about a 1000 with the ease of use of Facebook and social media in general and the consequences of bad decisions may not only be local, or national but maybe even have international implication for years to come.
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