Here’s How Social Media Has Changed Everything

From digital advertising to crowdfunding and social justice, ever since the inception of MySpace, Facebook, and Twitter social media has changed the way the world communicates. A newly released infographic “The Conservation Prism 5.0”  might be the key to grasping today’s complicated and ever crowded social media landscape. 

Originally launched in 2008 by Brian Solis, an author and digital analyst at Altimeter Group,  the aptly-named “Conversation Prism” — designed with creative agency JESS3 —  continues to be a popular frame of reference among the digital marketing community. 

The Conversation Prism is best described as a visual map of the social media landscape. While it hasn’t been updated since 2013, The Conversation Prism is an ongoing study in digital ethnography that tracks dominant and promising social networks and organizes them by how they’re used in everyday life. 

In the latest rendition, Solis removed 84 companies, added 141, and created four new categories: messaging, crowdfunding, travel and hospitality, and connecting IRL.

One thing that has remained the same is the center of the Conversation Prism….You! 

“It’s meant to remind the viewer that social media is about the people in the center of their online experiences. Social media is much more than a series of broadcast networks. You shape the experiences of others as they shape your online experiences,” Solis said in an interview with Mashable.  

The next ring indicates how “you” can interact with a network,  how  you can impact the networks, while the outer ring shows all the categories of the networks, which “you” can interact with to create your own brand and community. 

Check it out below!