Social media is increasingly influencing policy makers, politicians and bureaucrats in visualizing and shaping some of the key decisions that have a very comprehensive impact on all citizens. Mass media too these days is factoring social media reactions heavily in their analysis and in building their viewpoint on many issues. If we go by social media indicators, Trump was losing heavily, BJP was going to win a majority in Bihar and Delhi elections, and demonetization was to have some minor inconveniences to most of the people.
Social media has limited capacity to assess the impact or reaction of mass when you consider that it only represents a fraction of overall population. Only 36.5% people in India have access to internet (just to keep in mind that in majority of internet access surveys define internet users as those who have accessed Internet once, the percentage of regular users is very small). And, 71% of the internet users are male, and majority resides in urban and peri-urban areas.
Furthermore, the distinctly urban, male-dominated, educated and privileged profile of social media does not only result in opinions and views that only reflect beliefs and interests of dominant segments but also discourages others who do not have similar opinions from sharing their opinions, a phenomenon known as spiral of silence.
Another very interesting aspect of social media platform is how an idea or opinion is judged. It is all about likes, retweet and shares. And, everyone’s likes, retweets and shares carry the same weight; approval or disapproval is just a mouse click away. This is relevant and logical when we are talking about topics such as who is more popular Shahrukh Khan or Akshay Kumar, or whether you like a Mac or PC.But it takes a very interesting turn when we are assessing evaluating technical topics based on social media reaction.
Some topics, such as whether we should be going for genetically modified crops, we should set up nuclear power-plants, or what should be our approach to managing environment and forest, require far more technical understanding and expertise for discussion and cannot be judged on the basis of likes, dislikes or retweets. But on social media opinion (read approval/disapproval in form of a click) of an environmental expert is same as that of any other person. 1000 retweets and shares of a viewpoint/opinion do not make that valid if the opinion/viewpoint is technically flawed or invalid.
