iMedia: Did You Know 2011-Welcome to the Social Media Revolution
Did You Know 2011 - Welcome To The Social Media Revolution

We don't have a choice on whether we do social media, the question is how well we do it."

              -Erik Qualman

Being a Facebook, Twitter, and hardcore Google and web browser myself, I  consider myself to be a pretty "wired- in” kid. Before I continue, I must let you know that this isn't something I consider a good thing. However, there are people who are older, younger, fatter, skinnier, smarter, less intelligent, Caucasian, and different ethnicities than myself who far exceed my degree of being "wired-in." And they don't even realize what's happening to their minds as a resul (and nor do I mine)t.

As everybody who is dependent on technology and social media, to such an extreme degree that they often don't even realize it's integration into the framework of their minds, is alerted by our peers of the dangers it presents and challenges that even more technologically dependent future generations will face, we barely even understand these statistics, nevertheless consider alternatives and solutions to the technology and social media pandemic which tightens its grip with every tweet, google search, post to Instagram, and Facebook status update. 

However, by comparing apples to apples instead of apples and oranges in this video, I was able to better understand the true volume and effect that technology and social media has on our lives after watching this video. For example, the video presented a chart early on which compared the number of posts on Facebook to the number of Google searches, as opposed to relating number of zfacebook posts to a very big number. This absolutely connected to me because when think about the number of Google searches I make relative to the number of times I post in Facebook or "Like" someone else's status, I can truly understand how these statistics portray themselves in my life and those of people around me, even though I may not even recognize their presence every time I launch my Facebook application. Because I can understand the effect that technology and social media has on my life through comparisons like those in the video instead of  lectures from experts and teachers that go in one ear and out the other, I am sure that it means more to other people too than arbitrary statistics.

By no means will anyone going to relax the tight grip that technology and social media have on our global society in the near future; technological dominance, especially through social media's prevalence is just the "spirit of the age," as one wise author and biographer once said, referring to behavior of people in a certain period of time. On the other hand, if we are able to comprehend to a greater extent, as a society, the control and role that this particular form of media plays in our lives, we might be able to reverse some of the negative effects that it has taken on our social skills, communication abilities, and intellectual strength that we once had. I think the "exponential effects" that the video refers to not only apply to technology and social media dominance in our culture, but also some of its reversal. 

It'll be good for us; it'll be, at last, something that isn't google-able.