Social Media Content

The term social media refers to a wide variety of Internet and mobile networking applications that foster the exchange of information, interests, and opinions within personal networks or to broader audiences. Social media applications generally share the following attributes: personalization, interaction, collaboration, aggregation, presentation, and "content replication". Social media provides families, friends, business associates, and the public with a convenient and expansive means to share information, interests, and opinions with other members of their personal networks or to broader audiences. Facebook and other major social media providers are currently implementing various strategies to address these issues, although it is too early to ascertain the effectiveness of each strategy. The chapter begins with an overview of social media followed by a closer examination of six popular types of social media platforms: social networks, media sharing networks, blogs, microblogs, wikis, and social bookmarking sites. The chapter concludes with a several specific evaluation challenges presented by social media.