Haley Trecarichi
Social media has taken over our generation and it is inevitable this will only continue and escalate for generations to come. As we have discussed in class in the past, members of generation Z expressed they do not go one day without looking at their phone. I personally, always have my phone with me, and spend approximately around eight hours on my phone each day. What do I do on my phone all this time you ask? I spend majority of those eight hours on social media networks-Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, Twitter, etc. I use these platforms to socialize, as a form of entertainment, and as a source of information.
History shows that the newer the generation the increased time they spend on social media. Generation Z, the youngest generation, has never known a society without technology. According to The World Economic Forum, “North American, Latin American, and European Generation Z-ers lead in the number of social accounts they’re actively using” (1). Evidently from this quote, members of generation Z are active on social media around the world. This trend shows us that the next generation will only be more involved and active on social media. Generations after that will continue to increase. Therefore, this proposes an important question, how will social media activity and advancements affect future generations?
The Black Mirror episode, Nosedive, depicted a futuristic society in which social media is far advanced and integrated into everyday life. One example in the episode of social media advancements affecting their society is your phone and technology can scan any person you come in contact with. After it scans them, it gives you their profile that shares updates about their life and a rating out of five stars. This effects society in multiple ways. One of those ways is no one has to get to know each other or remember anything about each other because your phone has it all stored and instantly pops up all information you would need to know about the person. Secondly, the rating of stars that pops up instantly depicts your perception of someone. For example, a man offers Lacie a smoothie and he only has 3.2 stars which makes her question if she should drink a smoothie from him. Your star rating basically affects your entire life. It comes into play when meeting people, when buying a house, at work, etc. The star ranking takes over Lacies life, everyone she encounters depicts her based on her rating and one wrong move can lower her rating. She lets becoming a 4.5 star take over her life and it ends up hurting her because she tries to be someone she is not. I think the episode is much more into the future than just a few years. The advancements and the way everyone uses social media reflects that everyone in society has never knew a life without technology. Therefore I think it takes place in about twenty years.
One aspect of the futuristic society in the episode that I think will come into play in our societies future is how the virtual community has become all visual and photos. An article proves that “at least 50% of online searches will be carried out through image and voice by 2020″ (2). As in the episode, I believe typing will not be a thing anymore and your technology will be able to be used from your face. I think if technology is advanced in the complete way the episode shows it will have a negative impact on our society. Living now with social media I can already see how it consumes most of your day, but if everyone in society reflected and relied on a “rating” our society would be completely taken over by technology. This is negative because human interaction and first impressions are important. For example, in the episode she spills someones drink and her rating goes down, this doesn’t matter and it should be something which people perceive you on. To conclude, if social media plays a role similar to the one in the episode it will negatively change our society.
(1) “The graph tells us who’s using social media the most”, Ashley Viens, accessed March 29, 2020. https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/10/social-media-use-by-generation/
(2) “What Will Social Media Look Like in the Future?”, Anna Ni Chiaruain, accessed March 29 2020, https://blog.logograb.com/social-media-future/
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