The Social Dilemma Review

I believe no person in the United States today is not influenced by a social media platform. Since the beginning of the twenty-first century, social media's presence has grown exponentially and engulfed millions of people's lives. What was started to simply connect people far apart from each other, to share lives and positivity with others, has become a tool of control and division. While there are still some good aspects of social media, it is not wise to avoid the negatives as well. The Netflix documentary, The Social Dilemma, gives insight into how social media companies operate and their primary goals. 

In the documentary, there are interviews with former social media employees, social media experts, and people with some background in social media. Some of these people explain that they have experienced the drastic change of social media over the years, their influence, and reasons why they left the companies they were a part of. They continue to discuss the overall impact of social media on the minds of people, specifically of younger generations that grew up alongside social media platforms. A few of these experts have tried to put a pause on or call out some of the aspects that are harmful to the public. Even when they had all the power and factors, it was only dismissed and forgotten. This forced these experts to leave and begin to advocate for controls on social media. Other experts and employees stated it is hard to avoid the influence of social media, but controlling it must be a primary objective. They've even controlled it in their own households. One of the most talked-about subjects is the spread of misinformation. This only hurts society and pushes people away from each other. Social media has led to strong democracies to crumble over false accusations and information. 

My opinion of the documentary is overall positive. I liked the side story with the family battling over the control of phones in everyday life. This portion allows the audience to relate to the real world, where people have become so addicted to their devices and have become easily influenced by outside forces. This resulted in them being hurt socially and physically, dragging others into messes that didn't need to happen. I believe this documentary is a great way for the world to know of the dangerous effects of social media and begin to think of the time they spend on it, what they read, and how it might affect their real life. I liked this documentary and I would highly recommend it to others. 

Chapter 1 Review

 In my take on Chapter 1 of the textbook The Essentials of Social Media Marketing by Michelle Charello, I believe that it provided a great introduction to the world of social media and its connection to the world of marketing. The good, the bad, and the confusing bits of it. This chapter provided important points to what social media offers, for advantages that can greatly improve customer engagement and services with communications and it can increase sales and revenue. It also covers the disadvantages, which are important to understand as well. For instance, it warns that can impact customers who prefer a face-to-face approach when dealing with sellers and requires more resources to manage. Furthermore, this chapter provided many resources and definitions for terms that I didn't even know existed. Finally, I did like the chapter's take on artificial intelligence and augmented reality. I know that AI has become a big deal when it comes to markets wanting to sell their products to the right people, but I was blank on the effects of AR when it came to marketing. This chapter provided insightful information on what AI and AR can do to benefit and harm a market's profits and reputation.