With a week off from academic blogging I decided to formally introduce myself, and talk about our friend social media!
My name is Alliah Johnson, I am from Elbow Lake MN. I’m sure anyone reading this right now knows where that is (hi grandma), but if you don’t it is smack dab in the middle of nowhere! The closest “map town” to home, Alexandria, is commonly know as the “pit stop between Fargo and St. Cloud.” Currently I go to MSU in Moorhead MN, and I am studying communications with minor in advertising! My dream job is a social media coordinator or manager. Everyone wants to get paid to do what they love, and I’m thinking I found it! I also love cats and can’t wait until I get my own, until then I love on my cat niece Rosie.
Social media was a huge deal while I was growing up. I had classmates that lived nearly 45 minutes away! The easiest way to keep up to date with everyone was with social media.
I remember the day my mother caved and allowed me to join Facebook. I was probably 11 at the time and I didn’t have an email yet, so that was my first step, create an email. At 11 you don’t think into the future to when you will turn 16 and start applying for your first job and see that you have to write down your email. You don’t think about when your standing in line at Hollister and have to tell the cute boy that your email is “wigglesj17”.
I know I’m not alone being stuck with cringe worthy usernames or email. At the young age of 11 I was given ~mostly~ free rein into the wild world of the internet.
In eighth grade when I got my first smart phone, I don’t think I was even out of the Verizon store before I had downloaded and started a Snapchat account. Luckily by then I didn’t go by wigglesj17 anymore and I came up with a more appropriate username, and started creating a personal brand I’m not 100% ashamed of!
The next week was filled with account creation, and exchanging usernames. Social Media became real during that week for me, it wasn’t waiting to log in to Facebook once I got home from school. It was checking Facebook on the bus ride home, and looking at Instagram on the walk from the bus stop to my house. The watching YouTube makeup tutorials while eating dinner. Any type of social media platform you can think of I, more than likely, made an account during that week.
As new platforms came out I hoped on the bandwagon and made accounts for those as well. To this day, six years after my major social media boom, I still am finding new social media platforms to join!
What is social media? A quick google search of “social media platforms” and some thought about what each does changed my outlook of what social media is.
In my social media campaigns class we came up with this definition for social media : An umbrella term for defining various different online activities and platforms that integrate technology, social interaction, and the construction of words and imagery. This information-rich environment is used to network, customize, connect, and create a personal or professional brand.
If Whatsapp and Messenger are considered social media, should we also consider just basic texting a form of social media? Is Animal Crossing or Minecraft played online with friends social media?
Everyone uses some form of social media everyday. Personally I start and end my day checking my socials. My cell phone alone logs around 4 hours a day of usage and I still use my laptop and occasionally a tablet on top of that. It’s undeniable that social media is everywhere and changing constantly. So, to leave you off tonight I have a question for you; what do you consider a social media?
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