The Emerging of Social Media

Social media has had a staggering impact on the practice of public relations since the first weblogs, or blogs, appeared more than a dozen years ago. This has continued and increased as social media developed into a number of different forms including text, images, audio and video through the development of forums, message boards, photo sharing, podcasts RSS (really simple syndication), search engine marketing, video sharing, Wikis, social networks, professional networks and micro-blogging sites.

Recent research (Tancer, 2008) says social media have overtaken pornography as the number one use of the Internet. According to the International Association of Business Communicators (Young, 2009) more than half of all Internet users have joined a social network, social networks have become the number one platform for creating and sharing content and nearly 75 percent of all Internet users have read a blog.

Even though social media are changing how people and organizations communicate, it still is difficult to define exactly what social media are. In some circles what most people call social media are referred to by others as “consumer-generated media” or as “user-generated content.” The Pew Research Center (2008) for the first time in 2008 noted more people were getting their news online than from traditional mass media. However, most blend online and traditional sources and the Pew study also points out more young people than ever before are reading online versions of traditional news media.

Breakenridge (2009) believes powerful new social media tools offer unprecedented new opportunities in a day when most traditional methods of communication will not reach many audiences; much less convince them to do anything.

Nurul Amirah Bt Abdul Halim

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