Social networking – good or bad?
A social networking site is a web-based platform that is geared towards building and strengthening social networks or relationships between people. These sites allow individuals to create an online representation of themselves, known as profiles, and to engage in various forms of online communication such as exchanging messages, making public posts and uploading pictures to name only a few. Like many things, social networking sites bring both good and bad implications to society. This essay presents the good, which are its ability to promote close connections and widen one’s social circle, but also the bad, which is the risk of being the victim of ill intentions.
Social networking websites allow users to stay connected with friends and family near and far. The relationship between family members who are separated by distance can be maintained through the use of social networking portals such as Facebook and Myspace. Children who live away from their family do not have to wait till a trip home to share information. Friends, too, can enhance their bond of friendship by using the sites. They are able to update each other on their feelings and thoughts via the sites’ services such as instant messaging, posting, commenting and tagging among many others. In brief, relationships between family and friends are directly enhanced by social networking sites.
Another benefit that social networking websites offer is the chance to widen one’s circle of friends. Sites like Facebook and Twitter are platforms that operate like a network. Each user is linked to other users, who in turn are linked to others. The circle of people connected via these sites is therefore very wide. As such, an individual who intends to make a new friend can do so easily by simply inviting another individual to be