Beyond daily communication, social media has also been used as a platform of spreading news events. Owing to this development, many people now have instant access to current issues. Despite the convenience and efficiency, I personally believe there are more disadvantages in such excessive use of social media.
It is true that the current technology and social media make news available to the public sooner than any conventional media like newspapers. This not only enables a faster coverage of news, but reduces the use of printed materials to some extent. What also needs to be acknowledged is the significance of social media in promoting interpersonal communication and information exchange. In extreme cases, like during Corona virus prevention and control, social media has proved its liability as an alternative for offline activities, such as family gatherings and school orientations.
However, many people are so tied up with social network that they tend to overlook the long-term side effects. The major problem with using social media in news reporting is that there tends to be a lack of fact verification before the sharing process happens. People are easily overwhelmed by the political arguments, posted selfies, shared links, and brand videos that enter the average news feed every day. When reading current events on social media, many people are found just scrolling past headlines and not wanting to read them, either because of information overload or the suspicion of fake news.
The notion that social media improves communication also tends to be simplistic and idealized. Very often, the quality of an online conversation is unfavorable because one cannot sense the emotion from the other person. Reliance on social media could hurt a person’s ability to have a face-to-face conversation, since it is unusual to convey a thoughtful message through spoken word or instant texting. Thus, the dependence on social network has in fact reduced communication quality.
To conclude, my view is that the benefits of using social media as a mean of daily contact and news events are tiny, compared with the negative repercussions in the long run. The excessive use has caused an unhealthy environment in society.