The user’s information uploaded on Facebook helps the company to maintain data on its users to help out marketers, advertisers, employers and many other concerned parties to gain personal insight of the individuals. Despite this, users continue to depend on Facebook for their social gratification which shows the extent of addiction users have developed for Facebook.
Facebook has become the most popular social networking site. It has over 350 million users and these users spend 10 billion aggregate minutes on the website each day to keep up with what is happening in the social world (Hafner). Facebook has changed the way people interact to such an extent that many are considering if traditional socializing avenues such as going with friends to enjoy a cup of coffee would be completely eradicated.
Facebook, with its lucrative socializing platform, has increased one more addictions in the list. Facebook is addictive. Once a user signs in, he keeps going through the endless news feed which allows users to check into other people’s lives. With the advent of smartphones, this addiction continues to increase as users can now login to Facebook 24/7 on their cell phones. This greatly impacts other activities such as studying, office work, household work etc. With users becoming increasing addictive with Facebook, the website gains more power over the users which often has negative consequences of the lives of the users. These include cyber bulling and privacy exploitation of the users.
Cyber Bullying refers to the practice of using technology for the purpose of bullying. According to the Cyber Bullying Research Center, nearly half of the young adults surveyed have been victims of cyber bullying at one time in their lives while 10 to 20 percent experience cyber bullying regularly (“Cyber Bullying Statistics’).
One of the many effects of Facebook includes cyber bullying.