Week 5: Social Media

After reading Paul Sheehan's article, 'Internet giants can earn with ease, it's the churn they must fear', it got me thinking about how quickly society swings between social media platforms. I remember it only being 5 years ago that I thought myspace and MSN were the coolest things ever, but now I do not know one person who still actively uses either. And now facebook, my current social media addiction, which I use to communicate with most of my friends, is being predicted to fall within the next 5 to 8 years... Personally, I could never imagine this happening! I rely on facebook for countless things, and I know most of my friends do too. But professional analysts are quick to support their argument with hard-hitting proof: on May 17 this year, facebook became a public company, and at that point in time their market value was US$104 billion. It had only been 3 weeks after this date that facebook market value halved to US$55 billion, and analysts are finding this comparable to the destruction of Yahoo Inc. - still a profitable company today, but only 9% of the value compared to its peak in the year 2000.

The internet giants are now faced with a constant battle: to keep up with the ever-evolving trends of technology, communication and social media. 'Adapt or die'. Google is fighting to get it's claws into people through Google+, another social media site, as it's share price has stagnated for four years.

And that is the key - adapting, or treading the water. It's like high school really; if you don't conform, you get left behind. So now as we are entering the 'mobile' generation, where applications such as Instagram will take the spotlight for social media, expect to see the web giants attempting to infiltrate their way into your smartphone. They will find a way - they have to, or they will become history.