Wikipedia defines social media as the means of interaction among people in which they create, share, and/or exchange information and ideas in virtual communities and networks. I got introduced to social media almost ten years back and it's been quite a journey. That was after ignoring the likes of tagged and Hi 5 networks largely owing to some comical blind dates that my then friends arranged in town - shock on them!! That's a story for another day. The social media bug didn't spare me though, shortly after, I opened a Facebook account and forgot about it altogether. If my memory serves me well, my current Facebook account is probably the third I opened. You guessed right, the other two had very fancy names informed by the "swag" of the day. I shudder at the thought of digging out some of my earlier posts that reek of first degree juvenility. I have been deleting them until the other day when I decided to let them be; who knows, probably one day my social media metamorphosis will cost millions - yes, when I will be rubbing shoulders and dining with the likes of Barack Obama... oh sweet Jesus, I pray that it's gonna be soon. Amen!!
As much as social media has since turned half it's users anti-social to some degree, myself included, I've got social media to thank for many things: I have traced virtually 99% of my former classmates whom we parted one cold morning of November 1996 immediately after clearing our KCPE exams. FYI, I did not attend a village primary school, but do i say... *waits for the point to sink in* Ahem, I attended Chogoria Boys Boarding Primary school which had pupils from virtually every district in Kenya. Now, assuming Facebook did not exist, half the class would probably have bumped into each other in heaven or hell. School reunions are most dreaded occasions because everyone wants to outdo each other to an extent of showing up with borrowed cars and I dare say borrowed suits. Well, Facebook is one big school reunion where as much as folk might pretend to be successful in life, one day you gonna forget and check-in in your true GPS location (in the ghetto) or get tagged in a photo at city market as you buy miguu na vichwa za kuku (chicken legs and heads) that are discarded from the chicken that the rest of nairobians are served in fast food joints.. LOL!!
Usororaji (prying) and gossip is rife on social media platforms. Be warned though, as you continue to pry, others are making careers in social media marketing, minting money from entrepreneurial Facebook pages, getting paid to tweet, gaining invaluable knowledge from common interest groups, network marketing, people have got dream jobs courtesy of LinkedIn, some of us constantly have their ears on the ground thanks to twitter etc.. err mm I don't exactly have tangible benefits of some social media platforms; and they are many. My intention is not to school anyone on social media usage though. A recent article in the eBizMBA listed the following as the top 15 most popular social networking sites according to eBizMBA rank of Novermber 2013. As biased as it may seem, it still might do you some good to join or know a couple of them. They say that ours is a digital government, don't they? In this regard, all enterprising digital citizens might want to read Jayson DeMers' post in the Forbes website that talks about The Top 7 Social Media Marketing Trends That Will Dominate 2014. Disclaimer: If I grow richer than you in 2014 please don't blame it on the village witch doctor or Mganga kutoka Sumba Wanga; It might just be good use of the Social Media.
Just like the two sides of a coin, social media has it's cons. Tuanze na Facebook: While people might feign the triviality of social media, I believe that to some extent, it's an expression of our personality. Careful use of social media is therefore advised. Some Facebook features like relationship status are better left unused, especially if you are the type who has literally updated 70% of all of them at one time or another in your life.. eeeisssh bana!! TMI!! Some people will post statuses like: "nkt", "sawa tu", "Mungu anakuona", "Go to hell" etc and sit back and wait for our reaction. Seriously?? even if you are my only friend on Facebook or twitter, I'll ignore such even if you update at a constant rate of thrice per second.. seek help, call a shrink, pray, or go jump off a cliff for chrissakes.. eeeiiisshh bana!! Some homosapiens will constantly keep us posted on their next move to the extent that all we see is their updates on our timelines. Get a life!! If I were a thief all I need is to invest or steal an ipad, load it with sufficient bundles and open Facebook or Twitter timelines of such folks and take my sweet time stealing their stuff and even fix myself a cup of tea in their house as they bombard me with updates like: "I have stepped out my house", "sasa niko stage", "kuingia tao, mvua nayo", "awww just met my long time buddy", "having coffee at java" ..eeeiiisshh bana!! Security hakuna hata!! The following category have a special place in my foot: Folk who go out and buy the most expensive drink (hata kama wame-save for months), or cover the entire table with booze, take photos and promptly post on social media. Yaani kusifu ulevi. why don't you go work in a brewery or jump into a distillery??... eeeiiissh bana!! Trolling is so rampant on social media with twitter leading the pack. Kenyans on Twitter #kot have perfected this art without discriminating on the physical (anatomical) attributes of their victims. A good friend of mine is ever quick to remind me whenever I utter an unkind remark about someone's physical appearance: "Sema tu hivo na haujazaa". I could rant the whole day of the disadvantages of social media, but in my honest opinion, the merits outweigh the demerits..
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