16 - #itb8 Social Media - What does this actually mean?

teach-it (54)in #itb8 • 6 years ago (edited)

Everybody speaks about Social Media, so my students need to know what it is about. Even more important: They use them themselves – I guess 90% of my students use at least one social media platform.

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Let us compare the term “digital literacy” to classical literacy. Classically literacy meant the capability to read and write while Digital Literacy means to consume and create content on the internet.

Classical Literacy

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Most people who can read at least on a mediocre level can write as well. Though in the process of teaching, readings is easier than writing as you have for reading only cognitive aspects, while you need additionally fine motor skills for writing.

Digital Literacy

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For Digital Literacy the gap between those who can consume content of the internet (analogue to reading) and those who can create content for the internet (analogue to writing) is much wider. Most computers, tablets and smartphones have been coming with a pre-installed browser and connecting to the internet for many years and connecting to the internet is well supported by the telecomunication providers.

When it comes to writing on the internet knowledge about markup languages like HTML (something similar to a programming language) had been necessary in the 1990s. The only exception were forums where like-minded users could read and post content. That content was only visible to the users of the same forum and was sometimes difficult to find with search engines. That changed with the rise of Facebook, Youtube, Instagramm and Snapchat.. Many people shared the same platform to create content on – be it text, video or picture.

What made social media grow so fast?

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Connecting to like-minded was featured as people connected (called “friends, subscribers, followers or similar) to a user were informed automatically about a users activities and vise versa. This automation lowered the effort of communication and information which made the social media that powerful.

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The second plus compared to classical forums was the development of mobile internet. The social media platforms developed early applications for smart phones. An internet connection was available everywhere and whenever a user has a couple of minutes to wait anywhere, he can use social media.

So that is a very general observation of social media. This major trend created or enhanced a couple of other phenomena. I have already posted about the Filterbubble and the next posts for my #itb8 series will be closely related to social media.