Of all the popular social networking sites, Facebook is undoubtedly the favourite. Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter, and Pinterest, for example, have been rising in use, but continue to remain secondary to this media might. Facebook, however, is not static. Personal experience with my own Facebook demographic and statistical research posted on Forbes reveal a dynamic website. In terms of autobiography, Facebook users have generally been transitioning from textual representation to visual representation. Fewer users are creating posts to tell their friends they “-went to the beach today with Timmy” and more are posting photos of them and Timmy at the beach with both tagged. There is an overall decrease in commenting, liking, and content-making, and an increase in mindless scrolling of the News Feed. Facebook’s recent updates to allow photos and gifs in comments, as well as a wider range of emojis, reflect this transition as well. The growth of Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter, and Pinterest do the same. Each with a limited number of characters allowed per post, the focus is often on a photo.
Additionally, Humans of New York and Kim Kardashian West’s Selfish (a book of her own selfies) are two examples of popular visual representation. A trend in auto/biography towards the visual is a significant observation. It shows a possible change in representational thought (especially in the young adult circles that I live in) and perhaps a move toward greater understanding by an uninformed witness. Not only are photos easier for many viewers to grasp quickly, they can provide meaning that text alone cannot. A photo of a man and his dog will probably resonate deeper with audiences than a description of their appearance. On Facebook, viewing photos of a friend at the Galapagos Islands is likely more interesting and memorable than a status and location update. This movement from textual representation to visual representation could be an important one for spreading awareness of a cause or effecting greater change. The art installment protection by Carl Warner used this notion on behalf on asylum seekers in Australia. Hopefully the progression of social media will continue in this way and help to bring auto/biography further into the realm of social and political change.
