Some Recommendations on the Regulations of Social Media (Essay Sample)

SOCIAL MEDIA SHOULD BE REGUKATED
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Abstract
This report gives the detailed information of the social media, the ways and strategies that have been put in place to regulate it and some recommendations on the regulations of social media. Social media was initially made to give people a chance to connect and share content with one another from various parts of the earth. The aim of getting the industry popular has been achieved in many ways but now it seems the harmful and negative side of this media has taken over. Some of the main negative impacts of social media on the life of individual and as a society are discussed in this report and their possible remedies are highlighted too.
Introduction
Social media is one of the most growing industries of all time, and it started picking up from twenty-first century and today almost everybody owns an account from at least one sites even though some does not benefits from it. The industry of social media enables sharing of information amongst the individuals, businesses and prospective customers and organizations, in which case serves as an instrument for interaction and keeping in touch with one another. It has the major impact on the business promotions and marketing, politics alteration, the privacy of an individual and the sense of belonging. The sites enable friends and relatives to share the information through videos, photographs, messages and so forth by engaging them in a two-way participation and open feedback.
Web-based social networking is about people, which is the fundamental explanation behind fast extension. People who are alike in thoughts and characters can make friendship and communicate from various places of the world, and this is where revolution takes the course. Marketing and product promotion is done by business industries on social sites in every part of the world. It has emerged as the new channel of manufacturing and distribution means in day-to-day life. This is due to the advancement in digital technology and internet that allows people in businesses to create their content about their products and let people know it existence in the social media.
Besides all the benefits that the social media comes with, there are the negative sides of it. For instance, the information shared in social media like Facebook and YouTube may contain misinforming content that may lead people against the morals of a community. This information, regardless of its nature, can be accessed by anybody through the internet because there are no regulatory measures that are strong enough to filter this kind of information. It implies that even the children and young people may access the information that can undermine their morals and their mode of conduct in the community. For example, children can access the adult videos and criminal information from these social media, and apply what they have learned in real life. Therefore, these technologies call for new methods and rules for protecting young generations from the negative consequences of social media. Some of the regulatory that have been enacted by some countries to counter the problems that are associated with social media are discussed in the literature review in the next section.
Literature review
This section highlights the negative influence of the social media in the society and some of the regulatory schemes that have been applied by several countries and organizations to ovoid the consequences of these influences. In social media, such as Facebook, tweeter, and Google+ just to mention a few are websites where bad activities are done too. This is because the media allows and gives the freedom of expression and the users are the main controllers of the content they post on the media. Therefore, people share ideas and make collaborations that might not be good for government and yet the government may not have control over them.
The social media is used as a tool for public and law enforcement entities. Criminals, on the other hand, use social media too but for the wrong intentions. The criminal group may use social media to recruit a new gang and coordinate their activities through social media sites. Terrorists, on the other hand, have used the site several time indifferent parts of the globe to conduct and broadcast their threats and activities they were responsible for it. Due to these reasons, the sites of social media and its resources should be regulated. It should be viewed as the instrument in the law enforcement investigative structure, which should be used in a way to follow the same principles that govern all enforcement activities. For instance, the sites users should carry out their actions in a lawful manner to avoid posting and sharing any information that may compromise the law. The leaders of the law and investigators should have sufficient knowledge on how the social sites work, so that they can be able to intercept and capture the victims of lawbreakers. CITATION USD13 \l 1033 (Justice, February 2013).
The law enforcement leadership should all support the development of social sites policies and procedures to enhance the implementation of these policies so that the information gathered in the social media can be used during investigations. According to CITATION USD13 \p 10 \l 1033 (Justice, February 2013, p. 10), the policies should be written to strengthen the agency, agency person and the individuals as well as the entire community under considerations. This should help to regulate the activities that are unlawfully performed in the sites such as hacking and inciting the others with wrong information.
Business industry has utilized the increasing expansion of the social media, which has been fueled by the greater internet access and high technology of the devices used such as mobile phones. Spontaneity is the use of instantaneous information sourced from different parts of the world without any regulation or guards to guarantee the safe information in the sites like tweeter. Business organizations, with their objectives to gain access to many audiences, would want to use this information to advertise and promote themselves. This may influence either positively or negatively on the business. The information can be used against them by the wrong people or competitors because the sites do allow anybody to edit and share what others have shared. Also, some of this information posted in social media stay in the site permanently and cannot be removed. Therefore, for the sites to be safe and effective these privileges granted to the social media users should be regulated through enactment of some laws and policies. CITATION Soc14 \l 1033 (Cumbley, January 2014).
In addition, the children’s protection is paramount pivot in every society. The main mandate of the modern state is to ensure there is good moral, physical protection and good mental state in the new generation, by adopting measures from European level. These character trait required of the young people can be impaired by accessing inappropriate information and content from the internet and other sources. This means that measures to promoting citizen’s safe use of the internet content and opportunities associated with it are needed.
Trends in technologies raise an unusual condition, which requires new technique and approach for protecting children. The underage must be understood to be active user and creators of contents in social media except for being subject to special protection from the negative consequences on the sites. Therefore, the fundamental rights of speech in the democratic countries compromise this right of honor and dignity and with the right of children’s protection for physical, moral health and benefit. CITATION Chi13 \l 1033 (Chin, August 2013).
Drugs and drugs trafficking have also found it way in the social media. Facebook for instance allows one to great as many groups as possible, which facilitate the drugs, group formation where the dealers and consumers would interact and transact freely without being detected by the authorities. This facilitates and encourages young especially those in school to engage themselves in unlawful practices of drugs and consequently developing criminals and even terrorists in the societies. It is also possible to practice human trafficking and many other illegal practices in the social Medias because the supervision and regulations are not well profound in the industry. CITATION Ric16 \l 1033 (Ricciuti & Cruz, 2016).
Discussion and conclusion
It is logical to argue that the social media sites should be monitored and regulated based on the evidence presented in the previous chapter. Some of the organizations and states have tried to uphold the idea of regulating them. U.N. for example, has a mandate to coordinate between states and screen the use of social media by terrorists. U.N. has resources and legitimacy as an international body that give them power to solve many problems related to social media and the entire internet problems in general. It can also supervise state governments and make sure that there is no discretion abuse. U.N accomplishes all these duties in five ways namely: making certain that there are relational correspondences between benefits and costs, making accumulated choice preparation, violation monitoring, a system of graduate sanctions implementations and finally performing boundary creation. CITATION Pau15 \l 1033 (Wu, January, 2015)
In the recent years, the journalists who was beheaded by terrorists have been posted online and many people trying to join terrorist groups have portrayed that they use social media increasingly to spread their...