Only the human brain and its hunger for interpersonal communication, fueled by developments in information technology, have allowed social media to evolve. According to Merriam-Webster, social media refers to websites used for social networking and microblogging as well as other online communication channels.
The content and ideas on these social networks are contributed by users through these channels and mediums, who also build a virtual world of communication. Social media's history is one of massively expanding and sustaining human connections.
Urbanites find it difficult to picture a day without social media since it has gotten so ingrained in their everyday routines. There's no disputing the rise and effect of social media on contemporary lifestyle, although some of us may occasionally go on a "social media detox" or try to avoid it altogether.
Social media platforms are no longer restricted to particular demographics; they are now used by everyone, young and old, people and enterprises. For the majority of us, it serves as a source of information, a way to interact with others, a venue for personal expression, or even a call to action; yet, for some, it serves as their primary source of income.
Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and most recently TikTok are regularly mentioned while discussing social media networks.
The emergence of social media
Social media quickly transitioned from fostering a social connection to serving as a trading platform, moving from direct electronic information exchange to virtual reality. It has emerged as the top option for marketers, proprietors of small businesses, artists, and other experts.
Before the Internet
The invention of the telegraph on May 24, 1844, is credited with giving rise to social media. From Baltimore to Washington, D.C., Samuel Morse transmitted a message. Only when ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Agency Network) first appeared in 1969, did social media start to take off. The scientists from four prestigious universities were able to connect and exchange their software, hardware, and other resources while just sitting at their desks thanks to this newly developed digital network. However, social media expanded when NSF introduced NSFNET, a dynamic, quick, and more digital network, in 1979. The first genuine social media site was introduced ten years later.
The web of social websites all over the place
CompuServe, Prodigy, and America Online paved a new path in response to the development of faster and more dependable internet. These services gave users access to digital communication in its purest form. They let them use online messaging services like email, chat rooms, and bulletin boards to send correspondence.
Continue reading to learn how it all started; the 11 stages of evolution social media grew through:
1 SixDegrees (1997)
SixDegrees, which Andrew Weinreich founded in 1997, is frequently cited as the first successful forerunner of contemporary social networking services. It was given the six degrees of separation moniker and, like Facebook, utilizing the "social-circles network paradigm". This allowed users to check their connections to other site users while sending messages and posting items to the bulletin board to persons in their first, second, and third degrees. Before it closed in 2000, there were around 3.5 million registered users.
2 Friendster (2002)
Friendster was likely the most well-known social networking platform before Facebook came along. Friendster was first headquartered in California but eventually moved to Kuala Lumpur.
The website, which was developed in 2002 by Peter Chin, Jonathan Abrams, and Dave Lee, enables users to exchange movies, photographs, messages, and comments with other users via profiles (friends), networks, and messaging. Additionally, it was used for gaming, dating, and learning about new events. Sadly, due to "the altering scenario" in the "difficult market" and a lack of community interaction, it was suspended in 2015.
3 MySpace (2003)
From 2005 to 2008, MySpace replaced Friendster as the top social networking site on the planet. It was established by a group of workers from the Internet marketing company eUniverse, which organized competitions to see who could sign up the most users. This was a major factor in the company's quick expansion. In contrast to Friendster, Myspace allowed users to edit their public profiles, add music and video, and communicate with other users right away. The website is still operational today, even though it has changed from a social networking site to a carefully curated music and entertainment website after its gradual drop in popularity in 2008.
4 LinkedIn (2003)
LinkedIn, which is known as the social media site for professionals, gives users a place to post their credentials and professional experiences to interact with companies and other individuals who share similar interests. With over 740 million users, LinkedIn has become a popular place for users to look for employment and for companies to find talent. The platform also provides publishing tools, polls, tales, skill training, and extra features for premium accounts that are paid for.
5 Facebook (2004)
Facebook has risen to become the biggest social media powerhouse to date since its start in 2004. A Harvard-only club that gained popularity swiftly and currently has more than 2.5 billion monthly active users. Users of Facebook could only share text and multimedia at first on their news feed or through messages (now known as Facebook Messenger). The Like button then appeared, along with new features and business-related tools like Facebook Pages, Facebook Business Manager, and Facebook Marketplace. However, as more younger users leave the network in favor of more modern alternatives like Instagram and TikTok, the platform may face difficulties in the future.
6 YouTube (2005)
Since its launch in 2005, YouTube has remained the unchallenged leader in internet video. With its headquarters in San Bruno, California, YouTube is an American social media and internet video-sharing company. On February 14, 2005, Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim officially debuted it. After Google Search, it is the second most visited website and is owned by Google. More than 2.5 billion people use YouTube each month, and they watch more than one billion hours of video per day. More than 500 hours of content were uploaded every minute of video as of May 2019.
7 Reddit (2005)
Reddit is a website that features discussions of user-generated content in what is effectively a bulletin board format. This content includes photographs, videos, links, and text-based contributions. The word "Reddit" is a pun on the verb "read," as in "I read it on Reddit." Reddit estimates that 430 million monthly users, or "Redditors," used the platform in 2019. Over 138,000 active communities comprise the site's "subreddits," which are categories or communities within which the content is separated.
8 Twitter (2006)
Twitter, formerly known as Twttr, is a social media platform for microblogging that enables users to post and respond to messages known as "tweets." The website was originally designed by Dorsey as a text-based tool for friends to exchange updates, but it quickly evolved into "the SMS of the Internet," or a platform for headlines and bite-sized material. In 2007, a Twitter user by the name of Chris Messina created the now-ubiquitous hashtag, giving rise to the idea of tagging that is now utilized across many platforms (and curiously, daily conversations).
9 Instagram (2010)
With 1.28 billion active monthly users, Instagram is the third-most popular social network (apart from messaging apps like WhatsApp and Messenger) after Facebook and YouTube. In 2010, it was introduced as a mobile social networking site for sharing images, allowing users to post just square photos with optional filters. Within two months, it had one million subscribers, and Facebook bought it in 2012 for $1 billion.
10 Snapchat (2011)
Snapchat was founded in 2011 by Stanford University students Evan Spiegel, Bobby Murphy, and Reggie Brown. Snapchat introduced the idea of serial images or videos, referred to as "stories." Beginning in 2015, it also helped popularise filters, driving users insane with rainbow puke and animal ears. It changed its name to Snap Inc. in 2016, becoming the parent company of Snapchat and Spectacles smart eyewear for augmented reality. The platform has maintained consistent growth despite increasing competition by offering new services like Spotlight and short-form Shows. It has more than 500 million active monthly users as of 2021.
11 Clubhouse (2020)
The newest social media site to join the group is Clubhouse. Clubhouse is an invitation-only audio-based social networking program that launches only for iOS in 2020 amid widespread curfews. Users can converse in voice chat rooms where they can host or join discussions with individuals around the world, or talk privately with friends. After entrepreneurs and celebrities like Elon Musk, Drake, and Oprah Winfrey expressed their support for the app, it saw a surge in users, especially in the first quarter of 2021. Ironically, downloads and enthusiasm appear to be waning since it became available to Android users in May of this year. Nevertheless, it appears that the app's current users are still using it; there are around 10 million weekly active users.
The Future Ahead
Technology growth is the only thing that can foretell what will happen to social media in the future. It's more likely that these social media platforms will develop and replace existing features with newer, more cutting-edge ones.
How will these websites support their consumers' needs while making money?
How will these platforms' end users adjust to the new changes?
How will companies address their demands while attracting new customers?
The only restriction on the future is one's imagination. Social media has a short history, but it has already left its mark. Rapid shifts in demand, technological development, skyrocketing financial market needs, and cultural change will define and reshape the entire state of the social media environment.
The vault of time contains the answers to these queries.
People are social creatures. The only way that business and communication can exist is through interaction. These two realities will serve as the cornerstones for determining how social media will develop in the future and beyond.