Twitter and other social media websites will eventually be the end of civilized, face-to-face conversations in the future. Early symptoms of social interaction’s demise are already visible, since you really don’t have to talk to people in order to learn what’s going on in their lives; reading a Tweet, or status update is much easier than having to legitimately talk to the person it involves.
There was a time not too long ago when those in my generation had to physically walk/ride a bike/rollerblade to a friends house, just to see if our friend(s) might be home and, if they were, would possibly be interested in hanging out. Gone are the days of exerting effort to make a friendship last, since you can Tweet what you’re doing/what you just did and your friends can instantly be informed as to what’s happening in your life. Social media sites have, however, had a significant impact on e-commerce, specifically for websites such as eBay (and, consequently, PayPal), Amazon, and most recently NewEgg. Since the advertisements are based off of your “cookies”, most of the ads will pertain to websites relating to the big named sites like Amazon and eBay. This increases exposure to “small market” e-commerce websites, and allows the economy to grow (in our case, recover) every so slightly, proving that social media sites won’t be blamed for everything that’s wrong with the world.
Back to the topic at hand, though. There’s such thing as having too much of a good thing, and the cliche adage is most apt when describing how one should go about treating social media sites. An hour or two a day seems reasonable, and will still keep you “in the loop” when it comes to your friends. Unfortunately, it will be a hard habit to break for kids who are now addicted to this/these mediums…