The Compelling Media Life

Social media accounts are centered around the user who naturally has a stronger sense of self-identity with the platform when everything about the app is about them.

The gratification goes to their account or any other purpose that the user has curated to be publicized. Being appreciated is a human experience that every individual desires.

According to NBC News, appreciation makes people want to collaborate and challenges people to do more.

The more people post, the more interaction and compliments people receive in return. This maintains the relevance and constant use of apps. So users will continue creating content and publicizing their lives in return for likes.

Likes accumulated on social media can eventually become money, if the user gains enough followers. Influencers on platforms such as Youtube can often make $57,996 annually, according to ZipRecruiter.

“Children and even adults who only know the media can forget about the real world when getting so caught up with the superficial lives that social media depicts in most cases,” junior Emily Santiago said. Having this relevancy in society has made the lifestyle alluring to younger generations. The impact of influencers continues to feed the minds of social media users, as they are essentially their own spokesperson that encourages others to engage more in the app, so they can potentially have

49% of consumers depend on influencer recommendations on social media from the editor h that same lifestyle. According to a survey directed by Bloomberg, 86% of young people in America want to become social media influencers. Additionally, according to a study conducted by The Sun, about one-third of children and teens hope to be popular YouTubers in the future. It is evident that the influencer’s lifestyle and choices trickle down to society as a whole, puppeteering today’s culture and trends. Social media and its influence are a normalcy in society that affect the majority of people. Society has leaned towards placing importance on capturing and creating moments that are meant to fit a two-dimensional plane, effectively reducing each user to that level.

Juan Fajardo Insight Editor

Whether the purpose of social media is to unite the world, brainwash youth or expand the portfolios of Sillicone Valley venture capitalists is up to each tweeting person to decide. My only certainty is that these smooth edged, click-eliciting platforms and the experiences they foster are our reality. There is no longer a “dawn of the digital age” it is simply the world we live in. Moreover, no matter how funny it is that the more hyper-individual the internet’s binary code suggests its constituents to be, the more we become the same, it is far more laughable to think this is something new. Found in response to a world whose direction was decided decades prior to our conception, there is a responsibility to shift narratives towards figuring out if social media has democratized us or made us prisoners of our own design; whether to stick around or let the levee break. As a credit to biology, perhaps we were all born users.