Extra Credit: Media Overload… When is it time to put it away?

Current society uses all different types of media and technology as various means of daily living. Examples of this include Facebook for leisure usage, google for a work email, and even Instagram for business promotion of a company. With various different aspects of one’s life linked to media it is necessary in today’s society to flourish and thrive. Through media people are able to interact with one another faster, spread ideas quicker, as well as learn a different ideas and ways of thinking. Society has made media very time consuming in that the average person spends around 13.6 hours taking in social media from various different sources. Since media has become so addictive, people have become more vulnerable, and easily manipulated making it easier for companies to promote different products in particular ways; thus gaining a profit. Since the average person spends so much time on social media, advertising through a means of social media proves to be much cheaper, quicker, and hits a variety of consumers. Current day media such as Facebook has tracked down our likes and dislikes to promote advertisements based off of pages we have liked on Facebook, links we have shared, as well as other websites we have looked at. This allows the consumer to be in direct contact with products that relate exactly to him or her.

Since media proves to be so addictive, people are easily manipulated in believing that everything they read online is true. Most posts and articles shared within media have been shown to be very bias and unsupported by scientific data, and in some cases promote false data. We, as social media users need to understand what we are taking in from social media, and how it affects our lives. With the knowledge of how to view and understand information on social media helps us to be able to know which information is accurate and which is bogus. One tool I use in doing so is reading multiple sources online to create a picture of the story from many different opinions and viewpoints. Even when buying a product online, read the reviews and listen to what multiple sources are saying online. As for scientific evidence, do your research OUTSIDE of informal means of media such as Facebook or Instagram.

Media has shed light on lots of good areas of life, but in many ways it has shown to increase rates of depression and anxiety. Since media consumes our daily lives, we have to be able to know when to put it down/away. When you start to find yourself at a point in life when you feel bored if you aren’t on your phone, it’s time to put it down. If you find yourself using media without learning or gaining knowledge or opinions on a topic, it’s time to put it down. When you start to find yourself “not all there” when you aren’t staring at your phone, it’s time to use social media less. When you start to have better interactions with people over media rather than face to face, it’s time to limit your social media. We have to be able to draw the line from when we benefit from social media, and when social media benefits from us.

 

2 thoughts on “Extra Credit: Media Overload… When is it time to put it away?

  1. I agree with you about how social media overload can be good/bad, as well as how much it actually does consume our lives. It is truly crazy to believe that we spend so much time on our phones or computers or televisions, until you actually see the hours you do spend. There are just so many different things considered social media now and to be connected to the world, I almost feel like if you aren’t on these social media’s then you will not be as connected as others. It really is insane to think about.

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