Lies in Social Media Platforms: Their Impacts and Potential Solutions

The Internet Lies: The New Social Media Culture
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The Internet Lies: The New Social Media Culture
Technology and the internet have spurred a new way of living that is marked by social publicity. Many young people are on social media platforms, where they pose intensive information about themselves. However, it is concerning that a huge part of the information posted online is not true. Despite the common practice of many of the social media users posting fake information about themselves, many of the audiences often believe about the posts made on social media. The pressure that results from the fake news is destructive and it continues to corrupt the perception of many young people on social media platforms. The problem posed by the extensive use of social media can only be resolved through public awareness on the possibility of many of the social media users posting fake information about their lives.
Lies in Social Media Platforms
Social media platforms operate on the premise of sharing one’s social life so that others can see about it. Such information is often assumed to be a real-time reflection of the life of social media users. The new way of life is marked as the new cyberculture that is deeply intertwined in today's contemporary lives (Lister et al., 2008) On the contrary, social media does not offer a mode of regulating the truthfulness of the information posted by users on their platforms. When a motif to life presents itself, many people post fake information just to create an admirable impression of themselves based on the lies.
Social media influencers often use social media to evoke a certain impression about a product or lifestyle they promote. Social media users capitalize on their high following and influence on various platforms to create an impression (Harrigan et al., 2021). In many cases, they are driven by external rewards in the form of payments, commission, and loyalty rewards from the brands they promote. Therefore, the influencers can easily post anything that is highly convincing, yet not entirely accurate.
Many social media users can now edit photographs before posting on social media platforms. The incorrect impression can easily be created, when one posts a photo that is edited to look like the person is in a given prestigious hotel or beach. Such a post often evokes a life about the lifestyle of the person, which is not correct. The new culture of a digital self is much different from actual reality, as noted by Poster (2006). Many of the followers that get to see such posts are led to believe that the post is true.
Social media platforms have applications that can help users develop edited images and addons to their graphical posts that are not true. The eventual post that is created is completely different from the actual image that was captured. Guest (2016) talks of the desire to imply a perfect self, that is far from the actual and real self. The adverse result of such edits is that the viewers of the post make an incorrect impression of users.
The Impact of Posts in Social Media
Many of the lies posted on social media platforms are meant to manipulate the consumers into buying a given product or brand. Such promotional L...