The term “social media” is best described as online, virtually operated platforms and applications that allow users make connections, share personal opinions and ideas to other users. The first form of social media was created in 1997, with the appearance of SixDegrees. Following this came the rise of social media in the 21st century until now, with a variety of widely used online apps such as Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Whatsapp, Twitter, and many more. In January 2025, it is estimated that there are around 5,2 billion people in the world using social media, which is 64% of the whole global population, according to Backlinko.
What we do on social media
Generally, social media is a virtual world where you can do anything, at any time to show who you are to the “netizens”. The basic functions of social media that users know include: sharing thoughts or personal moments, texting alongside with calling and building relationships. In some cases, people would use social media for the purpose of work and entertainment, too. The true advantage of social media is that all of these activities are pretty simple to follow, providing that you have electronic devices with you.
The pros
So, having read to this line, you probably think of the prospects of social media firsthand. We can name many of them, but only a few of them are truly practical and approachable to the majority of social media users. What are the most noticeable pros of social media?
- Making connections: For the fact that the Internet enhances, this helps users make cross-border connections with foreigners, expanding personal networks and building long – term relationships. For instance, Reddit or Quora are the virtual platforms where people build relationships by showing their opinions and are willing to befriend others.
- Gaining knowledge: The information placed on social media can be quite informative and comprehensible, which makes it easy for the users to understand it. The more we comprehend, the deeper we can see everything around us.
- Keeping up with the trend: The news and information we gain access everyday, every second, on every corner of the globe. This allows us to keep up with the world’s pace, and everything happening in it, from the small stuff to the big events. In fact, Bernard Marr has shown us that there are 300 million new photos and videos being uploaded everyday.
- Showing love and care: As we see the users uploading their pieces of precious moments and achievements, we can show them that we care and appreciate them by virtually reacting to their content. This can be done through many methods; however, the best examples of this are reacting and commenting on posts.
- New means of entertaining: Social media consists of photos, videos, online games, videos, etc. All of these categories give the users a never – ending sense of enjoyment.
The cons
Of course, the pros of social media are multiple, and so are the cons. In fact, social media is not always like what we always think: The beautiful virtual world with flowery words and qualitative information. In some cases, the cons can overshadow the pros, so let’s delve into the cons of social media.
- Losing touch with reality: According to Backlinko, the average screen time until this moment is around seven hours, which is the highest average of all time. The more time we spend on the Internet, the less we interact with everything that is actually around us. For example, in a family, when all you care about is your internet friends, you start to interact less with your family members. Or, at school, when you just invariably look at the screen and scroll, your schoolmates, your teachers are all “living statues”.
- Misinformation: As I have mentioned, the information we see on social media is not always correct. It can be easily modified or adjusted to distract the users, which is dangerous. A perfect example of this will be the amount of money we see on a post of an entrepreneur is approximately 500 million dollars, when it is only 50 million dollars in real life.
- Unknown identity: Every user we see on the Internet is considered to be real, but this is only the outer layer. We have no idea about who they are in real life because we haven’t met them in actual events. A large portion of users also pretend to look different from their real life appearances. A recent survey conducted by UK Finance showed that over 27% of online dating service users admitted to being catfished in the last 12 months.
- Fraud, scam: When we try to purchase something on social media, we always look at the authenticity of the sellers and their goods. Obviously, we see them and their product’s quality and price via photos and videos. However, these documents can be stolen from other sources, which becomes a trap for the users, making it an opportunity for the cyber thieves. AI and deep fakes are mainly the tools that scammers use for this.
- Discrimination and humiliation: A community of users on social media consists of people from different backgrounds, cultures and opinions. This difference inadvertently causes discrimination, cyberbullying and pushing down among users. Users may be insulted on social media for their physical appearance, or insulted for having a different opinion than another user.
Conclusion
Social media has become an essential element of each person’s life. It is a kind of spice that makes our life more colorful and tasteful. In contrast, it can become a great distraction that robs us off a good life. All in all, we should use social media carefully, beware of online threats, know exactly when to stop and always be authentic.
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