Social Media and Social Life Winter 2024

As we progress through the course, I've had more opportunities to contemplate the impact of social media on my daily life. While I've always had a vague awareness of this influence, there hasn't been much time to delve into it and formulate my own thoughts. Thus, this course has provided me with the chance to do so. Slack and Wise highlight a crucial aspect of technology known as assemblage, explaining how these assemblages are in a constant state of transformation rather than remaining static. This continuous transformation is ensured by the various articulations that are prone to change. I found this concept intriguing and drew parallels with a previous course, Technology and Society. Often, when discussing social media and its pervasive influence on our lives, people tend to emphasize its negative aspects. However, this course has prompted me to reflect on the fact that while new advancements in social media and connectivity continue to emerge, our technological progress...

 Something that I have always thought about when it comes to social media is what are the next steps and what is going to be the new improvement that changes social media?  I have felt for a while that every social media app is the same and although they have different features they still all follow the same format.  Recently my group and I did our presentation on tiktok which has been the fastest growing social media but in my opinion it is not a new concept that just made the app extremely easy to use and understand.  I am wanting for an app to really revolutionize social media and completely change the field.  One way that I think a social media company could change the way social media is done would be by doing activities in real life that you have to record and post to social media.  I think that this would make social media so much more interactive and engaging.  I am wondering if anyone in the comments has an idea that could do this and change t...

 Funny pictures and videos that blow up on the internet are known as "memetic media" coined by Ryan Milner, Whitney Phillips and Limor Shifman.  An example of such is the saga of Ben Affleck and his Dunkin' Donuts experience occuring December of 2020. After a photo of Affleck picking up his Dunkin' Donuts order made its way to social media platforms, it became a viral sensation with people adding their own funny captions. The Affleck meme is an example of how basic images can go viral with the addition of a funny caption. Memes thrive on multimodality, reappropriation, resonance, collectivism and spread. By remixing existing content that people can connect to on personal levels and allowing them to circulate through social networks, certain images become viral and allow for everyone to recognize certain photos instantly because of this. This meme exemplifies how everyday moments can be shared cultural experiences due to the internet.