Classification of social media

Social media technologies take on many different forms including magazines, Internet forums, weblogs, social blogs, microblogging, wikis, social networks, podcasts, photographs or pictures, video, rating and social bookmarking. By applying a set of theories in the field of media research (social presence, media richness) and social processes (self-presentation, self-disclosure) Kaplan and Haenlein created a classification scheme in their Business Horizons (2010) article, with six different types of social media: collaborative projects (for example, Wikipedia), blogs and microblogs (for example, Twitter), content communities (for example, YouTube), social networking sites (for example, Facebook), virtual game worlds (e.g., World of Warcraft), and virtual social worlds (e.g. Second Life). Technologies include: blogs, picture-sharing, vlogs, wall-postings, email, instant messaging, music-sharing, crowdsourcing and voice over IP, to name a few. Many of these services can be integrated via social network aggregation platforms. Social media network websites include sites like Facebook, Twitter, Bebo and MySpace.

[edit]Mobile social media

Social media applications used on mobile devices are called mobile social media. In comparison to traditional social media running on computers, mobile social media display a higher location- and time-sensitivity. One can differentiate between four types of mobile social media applications, depending on whether the message takes account of the specific location of the user (location-sensitivity) and whether it is received and processed by the user instantaneously or with a time delay (time-sensitivity).[2]

Space-timers (location and time sensitive): Exchange of messages with relevance for one specific location at one specific point-in time (e.g., Facebook Places; Foursquare)

Space-locators (only location sensitive): Exchange of messages, with relevance for one specific location, which are tagged to a certain place and read later by others (e.g., Yelp; Qype)

Quick-timers (only time sensitive): Transfer of traditional social media applications to mobile devices to increase immediacy (e.g., posting Twitter messages or Facebook status updates)

Slow-timers (neither location, nor time sensitive): Transfer of traditional social media applications to mobile devices (for example, watching a YouTube video or reading a Wikipedia entry)

This section has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page.

This section does not cite any references or sources. (November 2012)

This article's factual accuracy is disputed. (November 2012)

This article focuses too much on specific examples without clearly discussing its abstract general subject. (November 2012)

Mobile social media can also be used on the go when one is not near a personal computer or laptop. With the emergence of new devices such as tablets, iPods, phones, and other new products, there is no use for sitting at home using a PC[citation needed]; mobile social media has made other sources of internet browsing obsolete[citation needed], and allows users to write, respond, and browse in real-time. New mediums of social networking such as Instagram allow the world to interconnect and make space and time much smaller. For example, Instagram allows individuals to snap a photo wherever they are and share it with the rest of the world instantly, delivering a social media site full of foreign accomplishments and strange scenarios[clarification needed]. While photo sharing was introduced by Facebook and other existing social media sites, Instagram is a recent addition to the social media scene. Mobile social media is a relatively new platform since it is contingent on mobile devices' ability to access the Internet.