Social media. When hearing these words, the first things that come to mind are usually different platforms. Some think of Instagram, others about Facebook. Some might even remember Pinterest. Google defines social media as "any digital tool that allows users to quickly create and share content with the public”. There are thousands, if not tens or even hundreds of thousands, of social media apps and platforms that compete for popularity, relevance and, overall, the title of the best.
People use social media for a number of things. Most share different types of content such as short videos, posts, streams etc. For some social media has become a source of income, as well as a way of entertainment. However, the debate on which platform is the most enjoyable and profitable persists. To try to solve this dilemma, let’s take a look at the most famous social media platforms and the opinions of the GZAAT Students.
First on the list is Facebook. Everyone has heard about it. In fact, it would be much harder to find someone who does not have a Facebook account, than someone who does. The platform was designed for people to easily share their favorite memories, posts and small videos. There are some extra features in the app, such as being able to tag a person in the post or set location where the picture/video was taken.
Furthermore, it is not only a way of sharing content but also communicating with people. For this purpose, Facebook has created a sister-app called Messenger, through which people can text each other and have group conversations. For me, messenger is the best platform for communicating with my friends and classmates. Another student from GZAAT who prefers to stay anonymous, chose messenger and facebook as their preferred platform. He says: “easy to use, informative, can be used for contact, can send messages, photos and videos, can call others, share screens, can publish photos and videos”.
Next let’s take a look at Instagram. This platform is very similar, but at the same time very different from Facebook. Just like on Facebook, people can share all sorts of posts and videos. However, Instagram combines all features of the app into sections. There is a search section where you can search for celebrities, popular posts, people to follow or your friends. There is a section for messaging too, which is one of the primary reasons why people prefer Instagram to Facebook. It has messaging, posts and stories all in one app unlike Facebook and Messenger. Among respondents of the conducted survey, t
here were a lot of people who considered Instagram as the best social platform. Here is just one explanation of preference, among many others: “compared to other social media apps instagram is easier to use and fits my taste. I see news where I follow people who inspire me and at the same time stay in touch with my friends. The feed is personalized so it's easier to reach out to more people with the same interests as you. Almost all of my friends have it and it's pretty useful. I learn much more from there than from any other social media apps. plus there's not only serious educational articles, but fun stuff too. To sum it up it is easy to use, pretty informative and fun at the same time.”
Another different type of social media platform is YouTube. This platform is second most popular in the world and is owned by Google. On YouTube people can post videos, posts, stories and stream live. Furthermore, YouTube has special ways of monetization for content creators. Some people have actually begun to work on creating YouTube videos as a full-time job. A person needs to have at least 1000 subscribers and 4000 hours of watchtime to be eligible for monetization and to become a member of the YPP (YouTube
Partner Program). YouTube is based on a strong algorithm that changes every day. It creates automatic suggestions that a person might like based on what a person has watched in the past. The survey, of course, contained an option ‘YouTube’. Here is a response by Georgi Bakuradze “I prefer YouTube because there I can search for information if I need something, and also there are types of videos that I enjoy watching.”
These were just some of the most popular social media platforms that almost everyone uses. To find which one is the favorite of the GZAAT community I conducted a survey in which 120 students from all grades participated. The main question was which social media platform do people prefer and why. The results showed that the majority (44.2%) prefer Instagram, followed by Youtube (17.5 %) and TikTok (15%).
Here are some quotes from the students surveyed who chose other social media platforms that were not listed above: “I prefer Tik Tok because I watch videos that I can relate to and some of them are funny. I also see videos that are related to things that I like, such as TV shows, movies, etc.” Another person, who chose Pinterest, says: “You can see your friend's interests, other unknown people's interests. You can be in your thoughts without anyone distracting them, because you cannot text others.” Next we have a person who likes twitter the most: “Because I support my favorite artists here and I am having fun with my internet friends.”Mia Katsman, an 8th grader who prefers TikTok says: “It's entertaining. But, unfortunately tik tok community is toxic.” And finally, we have a Snapchat fan saying: “I like Snapchat, since I send streaks and I talk to everyone on it and it is very handy and easy to use.”
Edited by Lika Gegenava
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