What does online community look like today?

Beginning note: In the age of online information and fast paced technology, understanding how today's people communicate seems daunting. The Pathfinder talked to professors, law enforcement, mental health professionals and community members to better understand what being a part of social media means and how one can be a better consumer of this media. This four part series is divided into the origins and basics of social media, crime and misinformation online, identity and connections through social media and a guide on how to be a better consumer.

Lily Mercer walks around every day with Snapchat, Instagram and TikTok on her cell phone, often spending over six hours on the apps. The Condon resident and student at the University of Montana connects with people from her hometown, the university and people around the country. 

She uses social media to communicate, watch videos and catch up with friends. While she sometimes wants to log off for good, she also doesn't want to miss out on the online community.

"I think for my mental health I would delete all of it, just because it is really easy to compare yourself to everyone else," Mercer said. She added, "Once you delete it you feel like you are missing out even more."

Social media has encapsulated the United States for more than a decade. Online platforms appeared to become a part of American's daily lives, starting with what most Americans use, Facebook and branching out to niche apps which appear on millions of phone screens.

Though the first edition of social media one might know is Facebook, an app founded by Mark Zuckerburg in 2004, the earliest stages of online connection started as dating apps.

"Social media really was born in universities, as a way to meet new people and to build your sort of college network. It was about meeting people who were interested in going out," said University of Montana Professor of Journalism Lee Banvile. "What Facebook figured out first was, [the app] was about connections. It was about maintaining connections or developing new connections."

From its initial beginnings, Facebook is still the largest platform in the world with 2.3 billion users. In 2018, the company pulled in $18.49 billion.

Banville defined social media as a platform online where people can post content, whether that be photo, video or text. That content is then easily taken by other online users, and some media includes reactions or likes to a post. 

The social media wave created hundreds of apps and websites where people can interact with one another. Banvile said the way these companies can be successful is through two paths: specialization or wide scale enough to create multiple facets of communication.

A specialized social media company example is Linkedin. Linkedin is an online community for professionals who want to create a network for job searches and other career decisions. 

"It's very much about networking in the traditional sense where you want to know people who are going to help you in the future, then you help them in the future," Banvile said. "You don't go on LinkedIn to find out how your friends are."

The other way companies found success in social media was to design a platform where people have options to do many things in one creative space. On Facebook, users can send out pictures, text messages, event pages, group chats and even sell products all in one app. 

One local Facebook group, the Seeley Lake Community Watch page, has more than 1,200 members from in and around the area. Group creator and moderator Alyssa McLean said the posts and interactions are usually informational, though there are some outliers. 

"Its biggest use right now is for lost pets in town, which is awesome," McLean said.  "A lot of people try to turn the conversation political or antagonistic at times. And as the moderator I just monitor it and delete as appropriate."

Though there are Seeley Lake and Swan Valley Facebook groups designated for local news and local opinions, McLean observed that people want to reach as many people as possible through the platform. The three-year-old page is the largest Facebook group in the area and new users must agree to the conditions before they can join the group. 

Despite rule breakers, the page's clearly stated rules and objective monitoring by McLean caused page goers to be more focused on the community aspect of the page, rather than political messaging or advertisements. When people do break the rules, she is quick to the point. 

"It is easy to just send them a quick private message saying 'Hey you broke a rule and this is why I am deleting it,'" McLean said. "Nine times out of ten they are totally amiable to that and there is no drama."

Facebook is not the only app to be big. Apps like Snapchat, Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter, TikTok and Youtube all combine some form of online connection through posting images, words or both. 

Instagram started as a 13-person startup, which was later sold to Facebook for $1 billion in 2012. The app focuses on posting photos and videos online, with a corresponding caption for them at the bottom. The app also has many large scale features, like starting live streams, selling items or posting an "Instagram story" which lets users upload some sort of content for 24 hours.

Snapchat is focused on person-to-person online connection. The app uses a person's phone camera to take photos, which a person can send with text directly to another. Users can also call, text and video message other friends on the app.

TikTok is a relatively new and viral app formed by a former social media called Musically. It lets users lip sync songs and put them online. The new version lets people create short, 60 second videos, which can then be posted onto the platform, where other people can see them on an explore page.

Though these apps are technically different and have specialized fields, they all have similar features where people can post what they want, from political messages to sports highlights. They are also usually free to use, allowing anyone with an Internet connection and a smart device to join. 

Even though the apps are free to use, the social media companies are worth billions, and some, like TikTok, are growing exponentially. Banville said that while users are not paying monetarily, people are giving social media companies money through the selling of their personal information.

"The deal you make is that you're giving them lots of information about what you like, or don't like, whether you know it or not and they use that information primarily to sell you ads or sell ads," Banville said.

Targeted advertisements are the newest way for companies to directly send products to people interested. Instead of advertising to a large audience, like in a newspaper or television station, Facebook can take a person's age, location and interests, and then sell that information to an advertising firm looking to sell in that exact demographic. 

Advertisements can appear between scrolling posts in Instagram, or might appear as videos in Snapchat. Mercer said she usually tunes out these ads and is more focused on a friends post or responding to a person's Snapchat. 

"I am not a part of an online only community, but I do know people who find friends through Instagram or TikTok, and it's good for them," Mercer said. "That connection with people you don't actually see is good because it offers more perspective of the world that you wouldn't normally see."

In the next section of the series, the Pathfinder explores how Internet crime and misinformation is used through social media.