The Rise of Digitla Media
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| Photo from Ecoworld.co |
What comes to mind when you hear "Digital Media?" My first thought is social media, emails, and YouTube videos. Digital media is electronically distributed media. Most often, our minds go to social media but do not forget video games, videos, websites, and online advertising. (Preston, 2022)
The first website went live on August 6, 1991. The birth of the web began a new medium we now call digital media. Many people will credit the rise of digital media to the beginning of Twitter or Facebook but let us not forget that the first message sent electronically was done in 1844 by Samuel F.B. Morse, who later coined the term morse code. Morse code allowed communication with family, friends, and unknown locals. Operators used things like S F D which means "stop for dinner," almost like we use OMG for 'oh my God" today. I am sure Morse had no idea he created the path for Twitter to launch in 2006. (Rosenwald, 2017)
Twitter was not the first social site. One of the first social media sites, SixDegrees.com, allowed users to create profile pages and send messages to users across the world. Over the years, we have seen sites come and go. I am sure you remember some if not all of these:
- SixDegrees.com
- Are you Hot or Not?
- Friendster
- Myspace
- Facemash (Facebook's predecessor)
Some social media sites, like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Tumblr, and LinkedIn, have stuck around for the long haul.
Digital media continues to grow as traditional media transform into websites and smart-device applications. Advertisers continue learning trends and how to stay on top of marketing. The tricky part of digital media is that there are new trends almost every hour as opposed to print media trends, which were daily. If you are thinking about a topic to write about today, you should do so today because tomorrow, no one may care.
Predictions state that 72.6% of internet users will solely access the internet via smartphones by 2025. There is a slight difference in how we view things on our laptops vs. how we see them on our smartphones. Businesses are learning how to convert most of their advertisements to smartphone users. We learned before that advertisers say smartphone users spend less than one second watching or reading ads online. Traditional printed ads seem to have more extended longevity when readers see their ads. Now the tactic is how do we get them to interact with our ads, so they remember them? Predictions say smartphone usage will be as high as three hours 22 minutes daily. (Handley, 2019)
Advertising has changed quite a bit over the years. As someone who follows trends on social media daily, I have noticed how ads have changed. Once before, when scrolling social media, you would see ads state "sponsored" boldly across the top or bottom of a post. I now see ads in videos that look as if they came from one of my friends. I have often found myself reading a post or watching a video I thought was a regular post about someone's day, to only get to the end to see it was a product ad.
Does this upset me? As a marketing professional, no. I understand businesses need to reach an audience to stay relevant and make sales. I enjoy watching advertisements transform and adapt to different sites. The same product may advertise on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter but will display diverse content among the three.
As a regular consumer, yes. I am starting to see an infiltration of ads so much that it feels like I cannot enjoy regular content. For instance, Instagram was once a place to see pictures and videos of your friends. Instagram has now added new features such as stories and video reels. The video reels are now primarily ads (in my opinion, I do not scroll my feed as often as I used to). The video reels are less likely friends I have manually added, but now users who Instagram thinks interest me. Most often, the videos pushed to my timeline are influencers and product ads through sponsored ads. However, this is my experience with ads on my social media timelines; it could be true for many others.
In 2020, 53% of social media users said they sometimes or often get their news from social media. 36% say they get their news from Facebook, 23% from YouTube, 15% from Twitter, and 11% from Instagram. Women make up 63% of people who say they get their news from Facebook and 55% of men from YouTube. (Shearer, 2021)
I recently had a conversation with a friend of mine about how we use social media differently. He watches many YouTube videos and follows multiple channels to get his news. He listens to other people talking about a topic and formulates his opinion based on what they say. On the other hand, I scroll social media and follow up with official news websites to develop an opinion. I spend a lot more time on my phone than he does. Not just because of my profession, but studies show that women between the ages of 30 - 49 spend more time on social media sites than any other gender or age group. (Shearer, 2021)
The question is, can social media ruin journalism, or will they form a partnership? Social media brings large audiences to stories posted by the news media. Traditional journalism is still needed. We will always need someone dedicated to hunting stories and writing about them unbiased. The biggest battle between social media and new media sites is misinformation. New media post stories and re-posters tend to twist the plot by adding their opinions and other users taking that as fact. There have been several instances where misinformation has been spread so quickly that it almost seemed impossible to recover the truth. I have noticed on Twitter and Facebook that if you are to share a story without clicking the link, the site will ask, "Are you sure you want to share without reading?" This allows Twitter and Facebook to prove they are not responsible for spreading misinformation if links are labeled as potentially false information. (Thomsen, 2021)
-Jaleesa
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References
Handley, L. (2019, January 24). Nearly three-quarters of the world will use just their smartphones to access the internet by 2025. Retrieved from CNBC: https://www.cnbc.com/2019/01/24/smartphones-72percent-of-people-will-use-only-mobile-for-internet-by-2025.html
Preston, L. (2022). What is Digital Media? Retrieved from Digital Logic: https://www.digitallogic.co/blog/what-is-digital-media/
Rosenwald, M. S. (2017, May 24). Before Twitter and Facebook, there was Morse code: Remembering social media's true inventor. Retrieved from Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2017/05/24/before-there-was-twitter-there-was-morse-code-remembering-social-medias-true-inventor/
Shearer, E. (2021, January 12). More than eight-in-ten Americans get news from digital devices. Retrieved from Pew Research: https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2021/01/12/more-than-eight-in-ten-americans-get-news-from-digital-devices/
Thomsen, I. (2021, March 1). Can Social Media and Journalism Form a Global Partnership? Retrieved from News at Northeastern: https://news.northeastern.edu/2021/03/01/can-social-media-and-journalism-form-a-global-partnership/
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