Social media has undeniably impacted communication at the local, national and global levels on a huge scale. We have access to information like never before, but more importantly the speed and efficacy of communication among the members of our communities characterizes the social media used by businesses, political campaigns and social awareness groups, not to mention personal relationships. We can reach other people at a rate we were not capable of before the internet and the social media interfaces. Already many studies have been performed which qualify social media as a major agent for social change and certainly sales in a widespread marketplace. There is plenty of room for the consumer, the participant and the producer, as well as analysts. The drawback is that currently a relatively limited percentage of the human population is represented on the internet. Globally speaking, there are more people without cell phones than with cell phones. By far most of what we see in social media is being produced in "the West". Still, more and more people all over the world are connecting to social media every year and are able to share ideas faster than ever before.
Since the 1990s, "social media has exploded as a category of online discourse where people create content, share it, bookmark it and network at a prodigious rate" (Asur, Huberman). Mass media studies are now a serious undergraduate major of study at several recognized universities in the United States. Information is now packaged, bought and sold virtually and at alarming speeds. The beauty of our new free-flowing communication at the push of a button is that it is easier to keep in touch and make a difference in other peoples' lives. The difficulty is that it only separates us more from the people who don't have access to the World Wide Web. Some people lose touch with the real issues facing humanity due to all the mass media agenda that sponsors many social media sites.
