Social Networking Sites

Comparing social networking sites, Facebook, undoubtedly, is the most popular one among the others. Facebook can be use in any languages according to our preferences and can find our long lost friends through this site. I believe when Facebook first launched out in 2004, they are mainly used by college students and one can only register an account with a  valid college email address. But now, it's grown rapidly and can use by variety groups of people with a regular email address. My first impression of Facebook was that there was lots of stuffs I can do with Facebook. We can upload pictures, videos and what most people lost was the status update. People are constantly looking at their friends or even stranger's status to know what they are up to or to be updated with the current events. Comparing to other sites, what's impressive about Facebook is their rapid global and international expansion. They are adding more and more features to get more people attention and to stay on Facebook hours after hours. My first time using Facebook years ago, I feel like Facebook is just a regular tool to connect with friends, but now, my impression of Facebook is that there are many things going on, maybe too much at times. For example, the constant changes of Facebook layout can be confusing and over complicated. But overall, I believe using Facebook as communication platform is a good choice.

As for Myspace, launched in August 2003, they are losing their users with rises of Facebook popularity. My first expression of Myspace is that it is very familiar to a social networking site, Xanga. Like Xanga, most people write their journal on Facebook. We can even customize our own page with backgrounds and different layout. What I like about it is that we can have our unique own pages and can even have our own background musics. But it's been a while since I log into Myspace. It seems as Myspace did not catch up with the technology world these days. Its mobile Myspace was realized year 2011 which was pretty late for today's world as everyone seems to have a smartphone that can access to internet every second. Myspace was popular during my high school years, but now, my friends and I seem to quit using Myspace to socialize.

For Twitter that was launched in year 2006, their catchy service is their text messaging service, tweets. We are all getting use to text messaging rather than making a phone call. I even text my sister when she's on the first floor and I'm on the second floor. What makes twitter useful is that I can get SMS for free if we don't have unlimited texting. We can even follow celebrities and my first impression of this social networking site is that its features are rather simple and can easily adapt its different functions. I like getting updates from twitter instantly. It's main feature are pretty much like a chatroom and like Facebook, twitter is like part of daily life that we check in at least once a day. Today's teens are getting use to the technology culture, so these SMS services can easily fit into teens and college student's lives.

Another interesting social networking site that I have been using is SINA. I believe this social networking site is more popular among asian as it had not expand to international users yet. SINA is like Facebook in Asia. The rises of SINA begin with the fact that all Chinese celebrity are using these tools to communicate with their fans. And the Celebrity in SINA is real celebrity, not fans page so one can directly leave msg to their favorite pop star and if one is lucky, they are get a message back from those celebrity. My first impression about SINA is that we can get to know another side of these celebrities. But the technology these days are changing so fast, we can not be sure if one social networking site can be still remain popular depending on how the trends go.