this is a forum. it's not social media. if this is social media then every website on the internet is, meaning any law passed on social media is without exception a law passed on the entirety of the internet.

Social media refers to online platforms where users can share information and connect with virtual communities through text, video, photos, and other content.

this is a forum. it's not social media. if this is social media then every website on the internet is, meaning any law passed on social media is without exception a law passed on the entirety of the internet.

Forums are absolutely social media. What do you think the word forum even means? The whole point is a gathering place for people to interact, socially.

That’s the entire internet. Social media has no meaning if it just means “humans interacting”. That’s the whole fucking purpose of the Internet! We already have a word for it. It’s the Internet! Social media is not forums, it’s not YouTube, it’s not video streaming sites.

All right so what is social media by your extremely narrow definition? Because according to your logic I don't know what fits. I can't think of a single website that would fit the definition of social media according to you.

I mean if social media doesn't have anything to do with the word social or media then what does it have to do with?

I don’t care what the dictionary says, it’s a pointless definition if that’s the definition. That’s literally every website on the planet. It even includes websites like General Motors blog (that definition you posted comes from a 2010 article written by a business moron who lumped in Wikipedia and General Motors’ blog, in the actually published paper), so yes it’s an incredibly dumb definition. Social media does not mean anywhere you share information and connect through text. THAT’S THE INTERNET!

Social media is a derivative of social networking, a term that came about to describe the extremely specific niche that Facebook and MySpace filled, along with numerous copycats. Facebook evolved from social networking into social media. The words in the name have essentially nothing to do with what the words originally described, mostly due to the fact that words for computer systems very often mean something completely different when discussed outside of computer systems.

Essentially you need these things:

1. Real world identity (majority of interactions between users is non-anonymous posting)
2. You majority follow others that you know personally. You’re not following big all star names that everyone knows, like you would on YouTube. Have you ever followed all your friends on YouTube?
3. You are all posting, commenting on, or messaging people or posts. Facebook, MySpace, Friendster, Bebo, etc. were the prime examples of this. You created a network, you posted media (photos pictures etc), there were no lurkers who had accounts, if you had an account you were participating. Even if that participating was just private messages. Those were the precursors to social media, and where the term came from. It didn’t apply to YouTube (which existed at the time!), Wikipedia, etc, because those were all just a normal part of the internet.
4. The things being posted are not primarily text. Media as it relates to computers has always referred to video, image, and sound files. I can pretty much guarantee you’ve never said “let me open this media” and it’s a word document. Media outside computers means a lot of things, including paint and air, which means you’re once again just enveloping the world with a pointless definition.

An example of modern day social networking is LinkedIn. The majority of users aren’t posting things, when they are posting it’s always text, everyone has a real identity, and if you aren’t posting things, when you’re using the platform you are likely searching for a job by messaging others or commenting on posts.

An example of modern day social media is Snapchat. You have a group of friends you follow, you post photos and videos (media), only your friends see it, you are all going by your real name.

Social media never meant shouting to the world. That’s just how the internet works. You’re already shouting to the world. That’s why we didn’t bother describing it until people started forming these incredibly close private networks. We didn’t need names for BBS or Usenet because that’s just how the Internet works.

You would never say that watching the president talk on TV was social, even if they’re talking to 1 billion people. Even if you go and comment on the video on the government’s website, it’s not social. It’s all commentary aimed at one thing. In that same vein you can’t call YouTube social media, nor Wikipedia, nor blogs, etc. They’re all individuals shouting into a void, not humans corresponding at the same level.

These were the original definitions, until news companies started using the terms to define any website they didn’t understand. Now news companies and governments use it as a boogeyman to attack anything they don’t like to try to regulate it all under the guise of (whatever meets the current power meta).

Let’s stick to the original definitions, because expanding it any further just muddies communication and makes words meaningless. Social means real names, you know the people, and you’re not shouting into the void. Media means non-text (we’re in computer land, not physics land or news land). If it meant more than that then we would have been calling everything social media back then, and we definitely weren’t. It wasn’t until websites started making the news that the news co-opted the term and we’re in the hell hole we’re in today.

If reddit considers itself a social media website ....... How is that different from Lemmy?

Also who gives a fuck? Maybe take a second to ask yourself why you've written paragraphs on a social media site declaring what is and isnt a social media website?

Social means real names

Show us a dictionary or otherwise common usage of it meaning that. Because it absolutely has nothing to do with anonymity or names.

Because definitions lead to laws. Those laws affect the interactions you have on the internet. The current interaction you are having would be bound by laws in the UK, Nepal, the United States and more if forums were classified as social media. Not only that, but with the definitions posted elsewhere in this thread it would literally regulate Amazon under social media as well. Do you think that things that aren’t social media should be regulated as them just by an arbitrary naming convention?

Using social media to mean “the Internet” just means you lose your rights without noticing.