Social Confluence and Everyday Decisions

 Look at any kind of advancement around you and you will soon realize that they somehow allow you to lead a much comfortable life. But now, after all those materialistic comforts, the next big wave we are seeing is about ‘Social’. What is this social by the way? Don’t rush to define it, for it is yet not fully revealed.

But as I understand, it is certainly about connecting and bringing your network closer to you. Recently Facebook released a research report, claiming that Facebook has helped bring the world closer; while earlier everyone was connected with about six degrees of separation, it now is only 4. With this closeness comes the proven support system, which has worked for human beings for ages, from the time our nomad ancestors relied upon community’s seniors to guide them on where to hunt, till today, wherein we want to know how haggle well in a roadside market. And now, this phenomenon is evolving further; we have our social networks, where we can seek advice, learn from others’ experiences or simply explore the world around. There is already a plethora of information available around us in traditional as well as digital formats. Perhaps Knowledge is also another piece of information if we don’t get it when needed. However, social networks are redefining that. They not only filter what information reaches us but they also help us decide what we do and what not. This process is fundamentally different from self-located information on search engines like Google because there is a degree of authenticity and personal recommendation that inherently comes from social networks. The advent of social networking is helping us in everyday decision and it can be conveniently called ‘Social Confluence’, which is about bringing together of people and ideas on a common social platform. We can see where our friends are going out for party via Facebook Places – Check in and whether we should consider going to a new Malaysian restaurant that our friend likes on Facebook. You will also notice when most-anticipated movies are launched, a lot of people write about them on social networks. I remember reading reviews of ‘Ra.One’ and then dropping the idea to go for it since many of my friends had already given it Thumbs-Down. Reading the trend just in time, Washington Post (a prominent western newspaper) launched an application called Washington Post Social Reader; this application shows you what your friends – using this app – are reading and hence you could consider reading. The ideology is simple – your choices are intricately related to those in your social network. This app is already a huge hit with about 5 million monthly active users. And we must not forget that ‘Kolaveri-D’ was super-hit not because it was sung by Rajnikanth’s son-in-law but because people had already viewed this song more than 5 million times on YouTube and traditional mediums like Television and Radio couldn’t but had to broadcast it then. Even ‘BookMyShow’ (a popular online ticket booking portal) has launched social integration into its booking process, which allows its users to share the information about movies they’re watching; so the next time you bump into your boss in a theatre, don’t ask them ”Sir, you, here, how come?” Chances are that you have read this article because your friend has liked it on Facebook… Welcome to social confluence! For More Information, visit Magnon Solutions