One of the blogs that I follow is written by Eszter Hargittai, a professor at Northwestern University who studies social networking.
This week (yes, I'm just now catching up on the week's feeds in my "other researchers" category) she wrote a post following up on some of her earlier research and presenting some of her newer findings which essentially confirm her earlier research about the demographics of MySpace vs Facebook users. Some readers of her earlier study said that with time these demographics would change, but she's finding that two years later that change has yet to happen.
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It's interesting to see the differences in demographics between first year college student Facebook and MySpace users. I initially got a Myspace account two years or three years ago to keep up with my sons who were using it extensively (one is in 25 and in the military, the other is 22 and a senior in college).
ReplyDeleteBoth of my sons are now on Facebook much more than they are on MySpace and I have really begun using Facebook in the last six months to do more than keep up with them. I use it to reconnect with old friends and other family members and have joined several social networking groups (golfing and creative writing related) as a result.
I wonder why it is that economic class (parental education indicator) and race so obviously impact usage of these two sites. I wonder if a wider study were conducted (other schools, other age groups, adult usage, etc.) what the demographics would look like.
One has to remember WHY and WHEN each was originally created.. MySpace was out there first (2003) and really was the 20/30 peoples place but then was discovered by the teens and populated. Facebook (2004) was soley for Harvard students and then explanded to other college students with an email addy ending in edu. This created a divide from the start and so those in the lower socio/economic group found a home at MySpace and have stayed.
ReplyDeleteI think we need to wait alittle longer to see who really migrates as Facebook has open so widely that people of age 80 are now there. We also have remember that MySpace has the connotation for the "preditor" so those families where parents do oversee internet use tended to censor MySpace. What socio/economic group does not have internet savy parents trying to protect them?
There are a number of social networking sites for Blacks and my students at FAMU (an historically black college) are both on Facebook but also on the Rattler specific social networking www.rattlerroundup.com (which came out of Alumniroundup.com where 15 HBCUs have untied) that was set up for the FAMU alumni group.. does FSU alumni group have its own social networking site?
People flock to groups that share their values or a common experience and in time who knows where people may migrate to as I too started at MySpace but moved to Facebook because of friend from another activity invited me to be there...
It is interesting research about competing two popular blog tools in US. In Korea, only one site is taking power of connecting people each other. It is Cyworld. I believe there is website for US users. It has cute small space for personal album, diary, music box, and so on. You can look around mine: http://www.cyworld.co.kr/woonjee Almost every bloggers in Korea are using this. Cyworld might be the communication pathway with celebrities. In addition, it had used for Korean president election campaign in 2007~8.
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