When I first got a Facebook, I thought it was the greatest thing that ever happened to me. I spent hours of time scrolling down newsfeeds and messaging my friends. It was the coolest new trend. But, ever since the beginning of my sophomore year, I’ve seen my time spent on Facebook decrease tenfold. It went from visits once or twice a day to a few log-ins every month. My fellow peers seem to agree that this digital social scene has dropped in importance on their lists as well. With these new developments, I’ve been forced to ask myself, Is Facebook just a fad?
“I don’t even go on,” explained sophomore Ethan Tannen speaking about Facebook, “I basically forgot my password. I don’t really care about that stuff anymore. Ask my friends and they’ll say the same. I mean we all used to be obsessed with it, but it’s like whatever now.”
More and more teens flock to Twitter everyday, a site originally seen exclusively for the use of celebrities. The photo-sharing app, Instagram, became popular among young adults as well for it’s quirky digital photo filters. It seems as though Facebook users have become less and less satisfied with the simple features of the multibillion-dollar networking site. One thing to notice about each of these sites is that most of them are just extensions of the sharing tools already found on Facebook. Twitter is just another version of the ‘Status Update’ and Instagram is just an alternative to the Facebook’s photo sharing app. The question keeping me up at night is will something new ever be able emerge at the colossal level of Facebook?
We’ve seen social media powerhouses like Myspace come and go. Smart phone social games like Words with Friends and Snapchat tend to be popular one month and gone the next. So will Facebook last? Will our grandchildren tweet? A year from now, will anyone be snapchatting? What do you think?