The Impact of Social Networking Sites
The advent of technology signified endless possibilities for people regarding communication and interaction across the globe. An array of social networking sites provides a platform that individuals use to capture each moment of their lives and document their feelings. However, while social networking sites help people communicate, it affects how people live their life. Individuals are so obsessed with the idea of online living that they forget reality and the experience it offers. Peggy Orenstein in “I Tweet Therefore I Am” indicated that people should tweet for themselves and not because of other people. Christine Rosen in “In the Beginning Was the Word” stated that today, abbreviations are the norm, images are increasingly used for communication, and people have become impatient for information. John Dickerson in “Note to Selfie” asserted that today, people have become obsessed about sharing their lives with others and sharing indicates that one is connected to the happening in the environment while not sharing means one is actively engaging with the environment. I believe social media has decreased education and literacy culture but has become an essential tool for self-expression since it captures moments in a better way than words would do.
The Changing Reading Culture
Technology has revolutionized how people access and digest information, which is different from the past. Years ago, people looked for books and sought to read chapters after chapters profoundly engaging with the writer and the content in books. Rosen states that individuals today prefer shorter passages with intricate details, with the aim of saving time. She reports that impatience for information has led people to prefer 60-second news cycles to 62 condense pages per month (Rosen 232). The image-consuming culture results in partial attention that negatively affects the reading culture due to constant distractions presented by video games, television and screen media (Rosen 233). I think this is true because many people are opting to watch films based on books rather than reading the actual book.
The Attention Span Debate
On the other hand, there are disputes against the argument that technology leads to a shorter attention span. The human brain has an immense capacity to adapt and change to different circumstances in life (Lang n.p.). The rate at which new changes stream in the social challenges the brain’s ability to adapt to the changes. According to Lang (n.p.), technology has not contributed to the decrease in the attention span of human beings. The attention span is a phenomenon that has been there before time. The “cognitive limitations” of the human brains are part of the “structural design” of the mind (Lang n.p.). I believe that when a person is presented with too much information, he or she will have difficulties in remembering, sustaining attention, and switching between tasks. The challenges in the attention span of individuals are because of the rapid influx of information. Lang (n.p.) argues that in the past people did not suffer from poor attention, because technological innovations occurred over a long stretch of time. Rosen argues that “onscreen-intensive culture poses three challenges to traditional reading: distraction, consumerism, and attention-seeking behavior.”
The Power of Instantaneous Information
Alternatively, Orenstein (253) asserts that “social networking sites allow people to share almost instantly, moments in time.” The regular posting on social media is a way of communicating with the public about personal issues. I believe that technology allows people to know the other profoundly and also aids in comprehending who each person is and their perceptions about self and the word.
The Importance of Real-Time Capturing
While Rosen states, “it is a rare website that presents its material without the clutter of advertisement, and a rare screen reader who isn’t lured by the siren song of an incoming email’s ping! To set aside her work to see who has written” Orenstein (253) illustrates that “I learned to be ‘on’ all the time.” Therefore, I believe that technology offers people instantaneous information that expires at a shorter period. People have to be online always to experience news as it comes as no one wants to consume stale information. Rosen might think that technology is a distraction, but I think the flow of information allows people to absorb information as it comes and develops the multitasking ability of individuals.
Living Beyond the Normal Life
I believe that capturing information has to occur in the real-time while the moment is still fresh in allowing live discussion of events and life hence social media has become an important tool for expression. Orenstein (253) states that technology helps people capture the essence of life in its exact moment. He said that “I quickly mastered the Twitterati’s unnatural self-consciousness processing my experience instantaneously, packing life as I lived.”
Increasing Self-Consciousness
Dickerson (255) affirms Orenstein premise stating, “Technology offers more than just the cloud backup. It has improved this process of engaging with life through pausing to capture it.” Dickerson and Orenstein believe that technology allows people to live beyond the normal life. Additionally, Dickerson posits that technology opens the eyes of people enabling them to view the world in a new way. Thus I believe that an individual can pause and look at a moment as an outsider and admire the beauty and that can happen through social media.
The Drawbacks on Education
Orenstein (253) seconds Dickerson asserting that “if the entire world was once a stage, it has now become a reality TV show: we mere players are not just aware of the camera we mug for it.” In these statements, Dickerson and Orenstein illustrate that technology increases the level of self-consciousness in individuals. People no longer look at life as a tedious journey, but an adventure that offers unique moments worth capturing. People now are more aware of their behavior and things they say since they want to achieve the best of every moment. Therefore, I believe this is the reason people tend to try and capture every best and sad moment and later share on the social media platform.
Enhancing Self-Expression
In another perspective, social media has decreased the quality of education. Rosen (234) states that technology has reduced the reading culture in the world today, as people tend to focus more on the images and the fast-living of capturing moments. Rosen (234) states that “abbreviations have become the norm and people have become impatient for information. They use images a lot than words.” Contrarily, I believe that technology has enhanced the reading culture in the world. People are now moving from the traditional method of analyzing texts to analyzing images. It is not hard to find pictures and photographs in the media that tell a story and people appreciate it. Other people capture views and write new captions and poems about the particular model. Technology has intensified the creativity and thoughts of people making it easy to interpret pictures and find a connection with the owners of the images. Social media sites provide the channel for self-expression, through images, tweets, and captions in photographs. Orenstein states that she appreciates good writing on the internet as some Tweeple are skillful in online writing (Orenstein 254). Technology is a vital platform that gives voice to everyone to express their ideas, opinions, and thoughts without bias which helps people to freely self-express in real time.
The Pros and Cons of Technology
Technology is necessary for our life, as a tool for self-expression that traditional media does not allow. As people tend to show every moment of their life, writing each moment of a person’s growth will require a lot of books and days to write. Technology offers the best medium that allows a summary in a picture and 140 characters like Twitter. However, technology has both the pros and cons. As much as social media allows for self-expression and real-time communication, it has had adverse effects on education. Students spend too much time on social media connecting with friends and little time on their education. Moreover, students use more abbreviations and images when communicating which affects the quality of education.
Works Cited
Dickerson, John. “Note to Selfie.” In Exploring Language (pp. 255-259). Pearson, 2015.
Lang, Jim. “The Distracted Classroom: Is It Getting Worse?” ChronicleVitae for Higher Ed Jobs, Career Tools and Advice, 2017, chroniclevitae.com/news/1803-the-distracted-classroom-is-it-getting-worse. Accessed 17 Oct. 2018.
Orenstein, Peggy. “I Tweet, Therefore I Am.” In Exploring Language (pp. 252-254). Pearson, 2015.
Rosen, Christine. “In the Beginning was the Word.” In Exploring Language (pp. 231-235). Pearson, 2015.
