Week #14 Social media and my other classes

Being a Comms major I am always using social media. There is not one project that I have done this semester that does not involve using social media. I am in a class called Media and Society. This class looks at social media and how people are easily deceived by things they see on social media. Many people look to social media to find current events. Lets use the recent hurricanes for example.

During the time of the hurricane Harvey people were tweeting out pictures of the damage, flooding and others being helped to safety. An example of this can be seen in the picture below.

There were also fake pictures people were tweeting as well. The pictures, in my opinion, looked real. It made me realize people are really good at photoshop. These pictures were more or less used as a joke but some of them looked totally believable. The picture below is an example I found.

I saw this picture and had to look at it for a few minutes because it looks so real. Obviously, the picture is not real but it looks so real. This picture was retweeted thousands of times on Twitter. Heck I even retweeted it too because I thought it was funny. But after reading the Twitter thread that followed this picture many people though it was real. 

The problem with social media is that people are so easily deceived. Many people look to social media because it is the fastest way information is spread. It's a blessing and a curse. It's a blessing because we can get important information very fast, but its also a curse because false information can also be spread just as fast. This is one of the many things I have learned in my Media and Society class. My tip to you is to always fact check. If you see something that looks strange or doesn't sound right Google it. If you cannot find the information from a reliable source on Google then you will know it's fake.