Although social media has become ubiquitous for many necessities of human life in the past decade, its advent has brought together a multitude of challenges to society that we have not yet been able to solve. In my opinion, using social websites currently have more disadvantages than advantages, and this essay will show my arguments for this opinion.
The main disadvantage of social networks is that they have led to many social-economic problems that can jeopardize its use. The biggest unsolved issue concerns the amount of personal data collected by corporations that own digital applications. These companies collect, store, manipulate and learn from personal data without regulations, and they derive applications that operate against the interests of the end-users. The main example of this practice are recommendation algorithms that engage users to spend unhealthy amounts of time scrolling though addictive content in their social networks. The same algorithms limits what kind of content users can consume, making it easier to manipulate them to purchase items they would not otherwise show interest. Additionally, another massive problem with social media is the quality of content. Users of social applications consume tremendous amounts of fake information, scams and unmoderated content that cause negative societal effects. To exemplify, during the 2016 United States presidential elections, voters were strategically targeted with disinformation campaigns in the cyber space, spreading massive amounts of fake information about candidates, which influenced the result of the voting.
People who see advantages of social media use state that it has made human lives more convenient. First and foremost, people from multiple parts of the world can communicate with each other in centralized platforms to share their ideas and opinions. This is illustrated by the fact that the average number of international friendships has increased since the arrival of social media. Moreover, specialized social networks are important from human activities, such as work, entertainment and even relationships. To exemplify, LinkedIn have been growing as a website for job hunting and professional networking, although it has also been subject of investigation for excessive data harvesting.
In conclusion, although social networks revolutionized human communication in a global level, it has brought many impactful challenges that are damaging the fabric of society. In my opinion, these problems outweigh the initial benefits, and the social media industry needs urgently to be regulated to become a healthy communication mean again.