Twitter Trends

Until last Easter, twitter was something I wanted nothing to do with. As a frequent 'facebooker,' I felt that I didn't need an account for other networks, and on top of this I wasted a lot of time, nosing around on Facebook, that I could have spend doing things that were much for beneficial, so I generally had the idea that it would just be another distraction. I did get peer pressured into getting Twitter though, and to my friends that made me get it - THANK YOU - as I am now a regular tweeter!!

I hadn't heard of the term 'micro blogging' until my lecture on Monday, but I guess I now need to go back to my first blog and update it, as it turns out I am a frequent blogger and frequently check blogs, as Twitter is a type of micro-blogging which it allows you to write up to 140 characters in a single 'tweet' about anything you like. Tweets can therefore range from what you had for dinner, or what one gets up to in the day, which is what my tweets are generally about, to global news events. The latter is actually what has made me more socially aware recently and kept me up to date with news events, as well as what my friends and celebrities are up to.

It is the accessibility and speed at which individuals are able to find things out that has made social networking sites so popular, and since Twitter was launched in 2006, it has gained MILLIONS of registered users. Cohl (2012) states this is because networking and interacting increases happiness and fulfillment. Interacting creates discussions, some of which can become heated and some of which influence others. This is the same of twitter. Because twitter uses hash tags it enables users to see what is most talked about and therefore what is 'trending,' and this is what the majority of discussions are regarding on twitter.

One of the first major news events that I became aware of through twitter, and that became discussed both offline and online, was the Kony 2012 movement which was trending on twitter because of the 30 minute viral sensation. Hash tags like 'STOPKONY' and 'KONY2012' were trending and through research are still being hash tagged for more awareness.

                                              

      Having recently done a presentation on this social movement for another of my sociology modules, I feel I have quite an understanding about how it being shared on social networking sites has influenced social net workers but was also classed as a scam. Due to Kony 2012 trending on twitter, a lot of people suddenly became aware of this social movement that was not well known previous to this. I think the reason for it being a trend was through the 30 minute YouTube video that was shared, and became a viral sensation through facebook and twitter, because over 100 million people viewed it in the first 6 days of it being released. This viral sensation allowed people to become aware of things that although weren't occurring in our country, were still important issues that should be spoken about. I think this is an extreme case of something trending and being talked about possibly because of it was more of a campaign and maybe a plea to get people on board, but nevertheless, it definitely was a worldwide trend on twitter that got people talking.
      Some people did think that this trend was a scam to get people to spend money etc and this is a downfall of trends, and possible social networking generally, because it could be the common view of trends. For my group presentation though, we have decided to look at how important twitter is in relation to current affairs and this is something that we will consider, as well as looking at how important twitter/micro blogging is in relation to current affairs and seeing how trends were useful for ultimately finding out about them. This is something I will relate a lot of my blogs too - so WATCH THIS SPACE!