That seems a bit broad to me, though if we were to use such a definition it would seem to encompass those things Veho and I have troubles with.
Also "Social media
... social networking"
Defining a term with what is almost the same term?
Dipping slightly into cynicism I would have gone with
Services designed to allow people to satisfy an exhibitionist streak, most commonly by means of a shared and somewhat open journal that aims to facilitate discussion of the entries, and while that is possible and even occasionally seen on the likes of forums like here and reddit it is generally not the intended use or even all that encouraged (see also all the various meanings behind "move it to the blogs" for this site). Maybe with a slight lean towards some kind of permanence/readily searchable and viewable history that is intended to be used, which is why IM protocols which largely have their contents vanish into the aether, tend to be private to nearly all and could more be said to facilitate communications or maybe be the electronic equivalent of a conversation down the pub.
There are certainly some fuzzy edges with my definition; I already mentioned the IM platforms occasionally having a "stream yourself to as many as will watch" feature, I am not sure what youtube counts as (though almost all channels seem to get a "things that are happening in my life" bent so I can see it being one) and I am not sure I even want to start unpacking pinterest. Equally facebook seems to have gone the other way for some and is now an amusing picture stream and maybe a shitty version of email, or maybe shitty version of email that does mass invites slightly better if you are not versed in computers.
Also "Social media
... social networking"
Defining a term with what is almost the same term?
Dipping slightly into cynicism I would have gone with
Services designed to allow people to satisfy an exhibitionist streak, most commonly by means of a shared and somewhat open journal that aims to facilitate discussion of the entries, and while that is possible and even occasionally seen on the likes of forums like here and reddit it is generally not the intended use or even all that encouraged (see also all the various meanings behind "move it to the blogs" for this site). Maybe with a slight lean towards some kind of permanence/readily searchable and viewable history that is intended to be used, which is why IM protocols which largely have their contents vanish into the aether, tend to be private to nearly all and could more be said to facilitate communications or maybe be the electronic equivalent of a conversation down the pub.
There are certainly some fuzzy edges with my definition; I already mentioned the IM platforms occasionally having a "stream yourself to as many as will watch" feature, I am not sure what youtube counts as (though almost all channels seem to get a "things that are happening in my life" bent so I can see it being one) and I am not sure I even want to start unpacking pinterest. Equally facebook seems to have gone the other way for some and is now an amusing picture stream and maybe a shitty version of email, or maybe shitty version of email that does mass invites slightly better if you are not versed in computers.
