Sharing your life online ; good or bad? (PART 1)

I wonder what my friends are doing right now...
Want to know what your friends are up to these days? Easy! All you have to do is visit websites like Twitter, Facebook, Myspace, Friendster, and Photobucket, and check your friend's account. This way, you can be tuned in to the latest and juiciest news.

So what do these website have in common? They are popular social platform where people generate, share and excharge information with other people. Since these platforms are readily accesible on the internet and inexpensive, people from all over the world are able to access or publish their own content.

Serious? Where can I get a piece of the action then?
Here are some of the popular forms of social media.

Blogs : Short for " web log ", blogs are websites that people maintain for personal or business use. Posts or commentaries are usually accompanied with pictures, photos, videos, music to make them more interesting and attract more readers.

Micro- blogs: No time to keep a blog or too lazy to write long blog posts? Try micro-blogging on websites such as Twitter and Tumbir where you can simply post a video or short sentences about what you are doing today. For example, Twitter only allows 140 characters so you'll have to really resourceful at squeezing all you want to say within the word limit!

Social Network: Interested in knowing more friends or locating a long-lost friend? Social network such as Facebook, My Space, Friendster may be your solution. These platform allow you to upload photos, share personal information and even play games while you interact with your friends online. They allow like-minded people to make new friends and even open up business opportunities!

Multimedia sharing : Youtube is just one of the many platforms where you can share or watch videos. Other websites such photobucket, deviantArt, Imeem etc also allow people to share different types of media like photos, artwork or music with from all over the world.

Online Games : Create an avatar of yourself and explore a virtual world to meet other characters while completing a quest or two. Sound interesting? welcome to the virtual life, a computer simulated environment where people go online or interact with other player and complete quests. Such virtual communities also have a thriving economy where players buy or sell items or enhance their character. popular virtual communities include Second Life, World of Warcraft, Defence of the Ancients (DoTa) and MapleStory.