Social Networking: Good, Bad, or Indifferent?

Posted Apr 30th 2009 4:02PM by Francis Duncan
Filed under: Social Networking, Articles of Interest

Social Networking has been in the news for a while, and I am sure it will be in the news a while longer. One observation is how diverse opinions can be about all things related to social networks and social networking.

This article from CNN warns about the "dangers" of Twitter, saying that it could numb your sense of morality.

LiveScience reports that Facebook users are getting worse grades than those who don't participate.

Immoral students who are failing sound pretty bad.

On the other hand, there are many suggestions the Social Networks are being used for good.

For all those students who are getting their letters of acceptance or denial out there, there are several colleges that are looking to Facebook to recruit students.CNN suggests actively participating online, especially social networking sites, can help you land a job.

There is even a study done at the University of Melbourne in Australia suggests that using the Internet for personal use (including social networking) can increase your productivity at work by up to 9%.

Getting into college, finding a job and being more productive sounds like a pretty good use of time.

We need to treat the Internet and social networks as we do with everything else; there are pros and cons to young people using them. There are a lot of teens getting in trouble over online mistakes, but there are a lot of young people getting in trouble having nothing to do with a computer. I think our job as parents and educators is to teach them right from wrong, regardless of the tool they are using.

Comments (1)

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Lisa Quinn 4-30-2009 @ 4:47PM

Social networks are multifunctional for a wide ranged group of people, all for different reasons. Social networking, however, is unsafe for both children as well as adults. This is a great article, one that was able to identify the full spectrum of social networking at its finest, as well as its darkest.
What I've been thinking about recently is the user retention percentage of Twitter. This once very popular trend is already beginning to die off. So who is going to step up next, and try to overcome these obstacles?
I found a social network called www.HopOnThis.com, that not only values their members opinions and needs, but also rewards them for their social activity on the site. I suggest checking out what might possibly be the next big thing to hit the social media sphere.