The term "Social media" was used first after LinkedIn created their social network application around 2004. The term has risen steadily since July 2006. At that time, the Wikipedia article on "social media" defined it as a term "used to describe media which are formed mainly by the public as a group, in a social way, rather than media produced by journalists, editors and media conglomerates."
Ever since the term was used by people who build applications that support the concept, spoke at conferences to help embrace the idea of social networking and communicating with others through the newly available technology rather than through print and other mass media.
Social media are distinct from industrial media, such as newspapers, television, and film. While social media are relatively inexpensive and accessible tools that enable anyone (even private individuals) to publish or access information, industrial media generally require significant resources to publish information. Examples of industrial media issues include a printing press or a government-granted spectrum license.
"Industrial media" are commonly referred to as "traditional", "broadcast" or "mass" media.
One characteristic shared by both social media and industrial media is the capability to reach small or large audiences; for example, either a blog post or a television show may reach zero people or millions of people. The properties that help describe the differences between social media and industrial media depend on the study. Some of these properties are:
Primarily, social media depend on interactions between people as the discussion and integration of words to build shared-meaning, using technology as a conduit. Social media has been touted as presenting a fresh direction for marketing by allowing companies to talk with consumers, as opposed to talking at them.
Social media utilities create opportunities for the use of both inductive and deductive logic by their users. Claims or warrants are quickly transitioned into generalizations due to the manner in which shared statements are posted and viewed by all. The speed of communication, breadth, and depth, and ability to see how the words build a case solicits the use of rhetoric. Induction is frequently used as a means to validate or authenticate different users' statements and words. Rhetoric is an important part of today’s language in social media.
Companies have begun to use social media to communicate with consumers. Companies like Ford have leveraged social media web sites like Twitter to enhance their relationship with customers. They recently held the largest tweet-up to launch their new Ford Fiesta.
Social media are not finite: there is not a set number of pages or hours. The audience can participate in social media by adding comments, instant messaging or even editing the stories themselves. The new tools and applications online have not only created new ways to communicate and collaborate, but have also opened up new job positions and careers, due to the unique convergence of technology, marketing, and social media.
Social media can take many different forms, including Internet forums, weblogs, social blogs, wikis, podcasts, pictures, video, rating and bookmarking. Technologies include: blogs, picture-sharing, vlogs, wall-postings, email, instant messaging, music-sharing, crowdsourcing, and voice over IP, to name a few. Many of these social media services can be integrated via social network aggregation platforms like Mybloglog and Plaxo.
Examples of social media software applications include:
- Communication
- Blogs: Blogger, LiveJournal, Open Diary, TypePad, WordPress, Vox, ExpressionEngine, Xanga
- Micro-blogging / Presence applications: fmylife, Jaiku, Plurk, Twitter, Tumblr, Posterous, Yammer
- Social networking: Bebo, BigTent, Elgg, Facebook, Geni.com, GovLoop, Hi5, LinkedIn, MySpace, Ning, Orkut, Skyrock,
- Social network aggregation: NutshellMail, FriendFeed
- Events: Upcoming, Eventful, Meetup.com
- Collaboration
- Wikis: Wikipedia, PBwiki, wetpaint
- Social bookmarking (or social tagging): Delicious, StumbleUpon, Google Reader, CiteULike
- Social news: Digg, Mixx, Reddit, NowPublic
- Opinion sites: epinions, Yelp
- Multimedia
- Photo sharing: Flickr, Zooomr, Photobucket, SmugMug, Picasa
- Video sharing: YouTube, Viddler, Vimeo, sevenload
- Livecasting: Ustream.tv, Justin.tv, Stickam, Skype
- Audio and Music Sharing: imeem, The Hype Machine, Last.fm, ccMixter, ShareTheMusic
- Reviews and Opinions
- Product Reviews: epinions.com, MouthShut.com
- Business Reviews: Customer Lobby, yelp.com
- Community Q&A: Yahoo! Answers, WikiAnswers, Askville, Google Answers
- Entertainment
- Media & Entertainment Platforms: Cisco Eos
- Virtual worlds: Second Life, The Sims Online, Forterra
- Game sharing: Miniclip, Kongregate
- Other
- Information aggregators: Netvibes, Twine (website)
- Social media monitoring: BuzzMetrics, Radian6, Infegy, Sprial16
In recent years, numerous companies and brands have begun using the platforms and channels above to help market their products. Healthcare and pharma companies have been slower than many other industries to adopt these technologies due to regulatory concerns. Recently, this has changed with many healthcare and pharma companies using social media to communicate with physicians and patients.
