We have long left the era of going to post a letter at the post office and having to wait endlessly for the letter to be delivered and for the response to come back via the same route. Today, one can stay in the comfort of his or her room in Nigeria and chat with someone in the USA without any delayed feedback.
About a decade ago, Nigerians paid much to surf the Internet at cybercafes, to check vital information on websites as well as to read and respond to mails in their mail boxes. Then, social media was almost unheard of in this part of the world. The most common thing then was to go to cybercafe cafe to check a personal mail box or to Google a project or an assignment.
The story is no longer the same today. Social media networks and the growth of internet service providers have birthed a whole new virtual world for all to get excited about. Youths do not need to throng cybercafes as much as they used to, as almost everyone now has the enabling device to go online from the comfort of their homes.
Research shows that nine out of ten youths (aged 18 – 35) in cities own a mobile device that enables them access the Internet. The time spent on the Internet by this target audience is mostly on social media networks such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.
The benefits of such virtual chat apps and the ease of social media has, however, been two fold. For some, it has caused their pitfall as they have spent too much precious time on it, resulting in negative impacts on their academics, businesses, relationships and so on. In some extreme cases, people get defrauded, bullied, and cajoled into devious relationships that could lead to death.
Last year, Cynthia Osokogu left her school, Nasarawa State University, Keffi, to meet male friends she met on Facebook and was murdered by these same friends in a private hotel in Lagos. Similarly, in the UK recently, a 14 year-old girl committed suicide after repeated bullying by her friends at school and on social media.
On the flip side, there are several advantages of social media. Many have used it to build relationships, grow their business, establish their fan base and much more. To some people, social media affords them an opportunity to chat and escape from boredom, while some see it as an avenue to explore the world of opportunities available on the internet.
Lots of jobs search sites abound online, with many people testifying to have gotten their dream jobs via such sites. In the area of information dissemination, many have argued that social media is the
future of news sharing and that it is only about time when people will no longer wait for the traditional media sources to get news.
As a matter of fact, before most traditional media sources report news stories, it would have already been trending on social media. Most traditional media channels have as well joined social media networks to meet the yearning and expectations of their teeming followers.
Many have been duped by people on social media, many have gotten their dream job through it. Many have gotten breakthrough from the social media, while many have as well met their Waterloo through it.
In the virtual world, it’s different strokes for different folks.
Credits: Telegraph.
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