Social Media

Definition: Social media is a form of interactive online communication that includes a variety of outlets, such as:

• Blogs - Blogs are considered a form of social media because they allow people to share and comment on posts. When blog writers and commenters trade thoughts and opinions or respond to each other, they are in effect, "socializing".
• Social networks - Facebook and LinkedIn are two prime examples of social networks. Social networks are places where people interact with each other, discuss topics that interest them, build their networks through invitations to other people or businesses they'd like to connect with, etc.
• Social news - Social news sites include Digg. Essentially, members submit stories they enjoyed or think are important. The usual social news model allows other members to vote up or vote down a specific story.
• Social bookmarking - Social bookmarking sites allow members to share their bookmarks - sites and pages on the web they use frequently - with other members.
• Twitter and YouTube - Both Twitter and YouTubeare part of social media because they allow people to interact with each other. In the case of YouTube, videos may be shared or commented on. Twitter is considered a "microblogging" tool because it is similar to blogging but posts are limited to 140 characters or less. Twitter posts (Tweets) may consists of a quote, a link or recommendation to a good article or page on the web, or an opinion about someone else's posts.

Examples:

Social media is growing in popularity as sites like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube have exploded in popularity.