PLACE OF TWITTER AS INTERPERSONAL COMMUNICATION MEDIUM

Abstract: There is no doubt about the fact that the world is completely in a global village as postulated by Professor Marshall McLuhan, according to him the world is now compressed into a single electronic room where information from far and near can be exchanged with a click of mouse. The study investigated the place of Twitter as interpersonal communication medium with specific focus on the students of Osun State University, Osogbo. The study was anchored on Technological Determinism Theory. A study adopted a survey research method. Questionnaire was adopted as data collection instrument to collect data from respondents who selected using quota sampling technique. The data were analyzed in frequency and percentage. Findings show that social media is one of the internet tools that facilitate effective, interactive and immediate feedback in communication among the people most especially the youth. Although many of the youth are now addicted to social media as 80% of the respondents are very addicted to the use of social media. It was recommended that users need to also make efficient use of such social media sites for other benefits such as education or business and also to create applications so that they can participate as full producers rather than consumers who only create content from a limited point of view.

Interpersonal Communication

medium

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Title Page

Certification

Dedication

Acknowledgement

Table of contents

Abstract

Chapter One: Introduction

1.1 Background to Study

1.2 Statement of the Problem

1.3 Objectives of the Study

1.4 Research Questions

1.5 Significance of the Study

1.6 Scope of the Study

1.7 Limitation of Study

1.8 Definition of Terms

Chapter Two: Literature Review

2.1 Introduction

2.2 Information and Communication Technology Era

2.3 Different Communication Breakthrough Era

2.4 Origin of Internet

2.5 History of Social Media

2.6 Twitter as a Social Media of Interaction

2.7 Different Communication with Social Media

2.8 Benefit of Social Media in this Era

2.9 Differences and Similarities between Social Media &Traditional Mass Media.

2.10 Negative Effect of Social Media

2.11 Why People Prefer Social Media in Society

2.12 Lost of Privacy and Security on Social Media

2.13 Theoretical Frame Work

Chapter Three: Research Methodology

3.1 Restatement of Research Questions

3.2 Research Design

3.3 Study Population

3.4 Sample Size

3.5 Sampling Design and Procedure

3.6 Data Collection Instrument

3.7 Validity and Reliability of Research Instrument

3.8 Data Collection Process

3.9 Rate of Return of Questionnaire

3.10 Data Analysis

Chapter Four : Data Analysis and Discussion of Findings

4.1 Data Analysis

Chapter Five

5.0 Summary, Conclusion and Recommendations

5.1 Summary

5.2 Conclusion

5.3 Recommendations

Bibliography

Appendix

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background to the Study

Social media is a form of electronic communication which facilitates interaction based on certain interests and characteristics. Social media are media for social interaction, using highly accessible and scalable publishing techniques. Social media use web-based technologies to transform and broadcast media monologues into social dialogues. They support the democratization of knowledge and information and transform people from content consumers to content producers.

The first unassisted off-Earth Twitter message was posted from the International Space Station by NASA astronaut T. J. Creamer on January 22, 2010. By late November 2010, an average of a dozen updates per day were posted on the astronauts’ communal account, @NASA_Astronauts. NASA has also hosted over 25 “tweetups”, events that provide guests with VIP access to NASA facilities and speakers with the goal of leveraging participants’ social networks to further the outreach goals of NASA.

In August 2010, the company appointed Adam Bain as President of Revenue from News Corp.’s Fox Audience Network. On September 14, 2010, Twitter launched a redesigned site including a new logo.

The company experienced rapid growth. It had 400,000 tweets posted per quarter in 2007. This grew to 100 million tweets posted per quarter in 2008. In February 2010, Twitter users were sending 50 million tweets per day. By March 2010, the company recorded over 70,000 registered applications. As of June 2010, about 65 million tweets were posted each day, equaling about 750 tweets sent each second, according to Twitter. As of March 2011, that was about 140 million tweets posted daily. As noted on Compete, Twitter moved up to the third-highest-ranking social networking site in January 2009 from its previous rank of twenty-second. Jack Dorsey, a co-founder and the chairman of Twitter, in 2009

Twitter’s usage spikes during prominent events. For example, a record was set during the 2010 FIFA World Cup when fans wrote 2,940 tweets per second in the thirty-second period after Japan scored against Cameroon on June 14, 2010. The record was broken again when 3,085 tweets per second were posted after the Los Angeles Lakers’ victory in the 2010 NBA Finals on June 17, 2010, and then again at the close of Japan’s victory over Denmark in the World Cup when users published 3,283 tweets per second. The current record was set during the 2011 FIFA Women’s World Cup Final between Japan and the United States, when 7,196 tweets per second were published. When American singer Michael Jackson died on June 25, 2009, Twitter servers crashed after users were updating their status to include the words “Michael Jackson” at a rate of 100,000 tweets per hour.

Twitter acquired application developer Atebits on April 11, 2010. Atebits had developed the Apple Design Award-winning Twitter client Tweetie for the Mac and iPhone. The application, now called “Twitter” and distributed free of charge, is the official Twitter client for the iPhone, iPad and Mac.

From September through October 2010, the company began rolling out “New Twitter”, an entirely revamped edition of twitter. Changes included the ability to see pictures and videos without leaving Twitter itself by clicking on individual tweets which contain links to images and clips from a variety of supported websites including YouTube and Flickr, and a complete overhaul of the interface, which shifted links such as ‘@mentions’ and ‘Retweets‘ above the Twitter stream, while ‘Messages’ and ‘Log Out’ became accessible via a black bar at the very top of twitter.com. As of November 1, 2010, the company confirmed that the “New Twitter experience” had been rolled out to all users.

On April 5, 2011, Twitter tested a new homepage and phased out the “Old Twitter”. However, a glitch came about after the page was launched, so the previous “retro” homepage was still in use until the issues were resolved; the new homepage was reintroduced on April 20.

On December 8, 2011, Twitter overhauled its website once more to feature the “Fly” design, which the service says is easier for new users to follow and promotes advertising. In addition to the Home tab, the Connect and Discover tabs were introduced along with a redesigned profile and timeline of Tweets. The site’s layout has been compared to that of Facebook.

On February 21, 2012, it was announced that Twitter and Yandex agreed to a partnership. Yandex, a Russian search engine, finds value within the partnership due to Twitter’s real time news feeds. Twitter’s director of business development explained that it is important to have Twitter content where Twitter users go.

On March 21, 2012, Twitter celebrated its sixth birthday while also announcing that it has 140 million users and sees 340 million tweets per day. The number of users is up 40% from their September 2011 number, which was said to have been at 100 million at the time. In April 2012, Twitter announced that it was opening an office in Detroit, with the aim of working with automotive brands and advertising agencies. Twitter also expanded its office in Dublin.

On June 4, 2012, Twitter announced the purchase of Washington, D.C. based web design agency Nclud. Upon the purchase, Nclud’s co-founder and director of brand experience, Martin Ringlein, was named Twitter’s new design manager. On June 5, a modified logo was unveiled through the company blog, removing the text to showcase the slightly redesigned bird as the sole symbol of Twitter.

1.2 Statement of the Problem

Twitter is ranked as one of the ten-most-visited websites worldwide by Alexa’s web traffic analysis. Daily user estimates vary as the company does not publish statistics on active accounts. It is recorded that at least 2 million and seven hundred Nigerians are on twitter, with a good number of them being young. (Twitter statistics, 2012) However, there is no comprehensive knowledge of their activities as well as how this form of media can impact on various aspects of life this thesis examines the relationship between social media and its usage by Nigerian youths. The study specifically focuses on the usage habits of young Nigerians and how social media has affected their communication and socialization habits.

1.3 Objectives of the Study

To examine the extent to which Twitter is used as social media for interpersonal communication.
To understand how the use of Twitter has influenced the social cultural behaviour of Nigeria youth.

1.4 Research Questions

To what extent does Twitter used as social media for interpersonal communication?
How has the use of Twitter influenced the social cultural behaviour of Nigeria youth?

1.5 Significance of the Study

Fundamentally, it is essential we understand current usage and behaviour and identify potential problems so that they can bead dressed. This can be seen in the amount of academic studies on social media within the last seven years.

However, Danah Boyd has gathered a collection of research about social net working sites that lists approximately one hundred and fifty research papers, three books, and seven research reports published in the years 2003-2010. (Boyd, 2010) None of these papers covers Africa. This shows a lack of research that concerns the African region and especially Nigeria where this form of media is greatly used. Therefore the overall motivation for conducting this study is to contribute to research about social media in Nigeria.

This research should also create a platform for further research in this field and how it affects business processes as well other spheres of life. This research should provide useful data for market researchers, marketing and product development professionals as well as educators as to how they can maximize social media for optimum benefit in their various fields.

1.6 Scope of the Study

The study which investigated the place of Twitter as interpersonal communication medium has been narrowed to Osun State University, Osogbo students. The geographical location of the study is Osun State. The choice of this study is Osun State University, Osogbo due to the proximity to the research.

1.7 Operational Definition of Terms

Social Media: A group of internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of web 2.0 and that allow the creation and exchange of user-generated content. (Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010)

Social Skills: Any skills facilitating interaction and communication with others. Social rules and relations are created, communicated and changed in verbal and nonverbal ways through a process called socialization.

Cyberspace: This is the electronic medium of computer networks, in which online communication takes place.

Blogs: A blog (a contraction of the term “web log”) is a type of website, usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in reverse-chronological order.

Vlogs: Video blogging, sometimes shortened to vlogging or vidblogging is a form of blogging for which the medium is video, and is a form of Internet television. Entries often combine embedded video or a video link with supporting text, images, and other metadata.

Instant Messaging: Instant messaging (IM) is a form of real-time direct text-based communication between two or more people using shared clients. The text is conveyed via devices connected over a network such as the Internet.

Twitter: This is one of the social networking service and microblogging service that enables users to send and read text based messages of up to 140 characters known as tweets.