“Social Networking Services: Tribute to Fashion or Vital Necessity?”

Tchirkina Victoria

“Social Networking Services have stopped being the tribute to fashion, but have recently become people’s vital necessity”

Social Networking Architecture

Profile. This is where you tell the world about yourself.

Profiles contain basic information, like where you

live and how old you are, and personality questions, like

who's your favorite actor and what's your favorite book.

Friends. Friends are trusted members of the site that are allowed to post comments on your profile or send you private messages. You can also keep tabs on how

your friends are using social networking, such as when they post a new picture or update their profile. Friends are the heart and soul of social networking.

Discussions. A primary focus of

groups is to create interaction between users in the form of

discussions.

Blogs. Another feature of some

social networks is the ability to create

your own blog entries.

Groups. Most social networks use groups to help you find people

with similar interests or engage in discussions on certain topics.

Widgets. A popular way of letting your personality shine through is by gracing your social networking

profile with web widgets.

A nice form of entertainment

Great for meeting people with similar

interests

A very effective technique for professional

communication

Why do people use Social Networks?

Advantages and Disadvantages of Social Networking

Keeping in touch with a great number of people (family, friends)

Being up to date with worldwide information

Looking for lost friends

Entertaining

Socializing

Experiencing cultural exchanges

+

Isolation

Lack of face-to-face socializing and physical interacting

Inadaptability

Misusing the information by hackers

-

Threats for people

Cyberbullying

Stalking

Vulnerabilities in Applications/

Widgets

Spear Phishing

and SpamCollection and Aggregation of personal data

Evil twin Attacks

Threats for companies and organizations

•reputation management

•corporate espionage

•information leakage

Ways to Safe Use of Online Social Networks

• set appropriate privacy defaults

• be careful with third-party applications/ widgets

• limit personal information, "The more info you share, the more vulnerable you are"

• only accept your friends' requests, connections from people you know directly

• only post information your mother is comfortable seeing

Vkontakte.ru is Russia’s Largest Social Networking Site

Odnoklassniki

Facebook

Vkontakte OdnoklassnikiI have been using this site

for935 days 567 days

I have 457 friends 73 friendsI have 805 photos 163 photosI have 39 videos no videos

I have changed more than 50 statuses 20 statusesI joined 68 groups 1 group

I have sent 10087 messages 118 messagesI have got 9127 messages 108 messagesI can see 65-90 people online

every day4-12 people online every

day

My Social Virtual Portrait

The Results of My Experiment “Three Days without Social Networks”

25%

19%13%

38%

6%

What are your general impressions?

It was easy

It was a bit difficult

It was extremely difficult

I learnt how to organize time ef-ficiently

I have become calmer

10%10%

40%10%

30%

¨What have you gained?

I didn’t see any spam, advertisement or vulgar jokes

I had enough time to visit relatives and friends

I had more time for my hobbies

I had more free time to dedicate to younger family members

I had a possibility to study and prepare for the state exams and lessons

40%

20%

40%

¨What have you lost?

I couldn't communicate with people who live far away

I was unable to listen to music

It was impossible to send quick messages and pho-tos

21%

47%

8%

5%

8% 11%

What is a Social Network?

Tribute to fashion

Vital necessity

Addiction

Bussiness

Waste of time

Modern mean of commu-nication

Social Networks

COMMUNICATION

EDUCATION

SECURITY

INDIVIDUALITY

CREATIVITY

WORK

LOVE

FAMILY

FRIENDSHIP