Social media has been part of my life for quite some time. When I first joined Facebook in 2006, it was purely for marketing reasons. Marketing gurus were telling us to be everywhere, and when I say everywhere, it also meant Second Life, which was originally why I joined.
Back then, MySpace was dominating. People would ask for your MySpace account, not Facebook. I ran into a guy in a shopping centre once who looked vaguely familiar.
“Do I know you?” I asked.
He looked at me for a few seconds then replied with a smile, “Yeah. MySpace…” We both laughed and ended up dating for a while.
There were plenty of other platforms trying to compete with the MySpace, Twitter and Facebook. One such platform was Plurk.com which was loosely compared to Twitter essentially because it’s also a micro-blogging platform. Plurk never made it to the top of social media platforms but is still around.
We used to check-in with Brightskite in 2008 which was Foursquare’s biggest rival until they winded down.
The use of video started to become a thing with a website called 10-Second TV which winded down a year later, letting its users download their videos.
If it wasn’t for social media platforms, I wouldn’t have travelled to the USA when I did.
Just in case you don’t see the Vlog, here is the direct link on YouTube.
Over the years, the friends I’ve first met online have proven to be more loyal friends than people I first meet face to face. With smartphones and the constant evolution of social media, it gets easier to keep in touch and meet even more people worldwide.
Social media is brilliant if used wisely. What is your experience with social media?