Survival of the Fittest

Evolutionary Theory is a concept that was created by Charles Darwin. While I am not a fan of the theory nor do I personally believe it to be true, there is one aspect of the theory that I believe applies to social media. The concept of the survival of the fittest has been used to describe the piece of Darwin's theory called natural selection. Natural selection is the process of eliminating weaker species or versions of a species. The favored ones must outdo the weaker one in order to survive. In other words, something greater and stronger must exist for another species to be wiped out. Thus, the survival of the fittest.

I believe that this theory is applicable in the world of social media. Social media is constantly changing and adapting. New platforms pop up constantly. The question is, what makes a social media platform so popular? What makes one completely die out? 

Facebook has been one of the most popular social media sites for the past several years. However, could it be on its way out? This is a hard thing to determine as there is no real studies on this kind of matter. The world of social media and internet is such a place of rapid change that it is nearly impossible to collect any real data on it. 

Before Facebook, MySpace was the big thing. Everyone had one. It was the place to connect with people. But then it died out and now it isn't even as much as an afterthought in people's minds. Does Facebook's future hold the same destiny? 

You see, in my personal opinion, all of the new and exciting social medias that came out after MySpace killed it. These sites include Facebook, Instagram, Twitter. While some studies have shown that there has been a dramatic decrease in active Facebook users, this does not entirely mean Facebook will just simply die out. People need another source to exhaust all of their social media-ing energy on. People won't and probably can't just give up Facebook to have absolutely nothing. They've already gotten a taste of it and they simply can't go without it.

One question that has been inquired is if platforms like Instagram, Snapchat, and Twitter will take it's place. I don't know if a single one of them has the power to overtake it. However, maybe all three together could. 

One argument in favor of Facebook being here to stay is that it's always adapting and changing. It's always adding new features. The question I must ask is, is it really changing or is it just stealing ideas from other good social media platforms? For example, Facebook stories were quite clearly taken from Snapchat, which was the first form of social media to have them. Now Facebook has a marketplace feature that is very similar to the popular shopping site Etsy. 

Now if people want all of these features in one place, Facebook is clearly the way to go. But what if people actually enjoy having different places to go for their specific need at that moment? What if people want to get their news from Twitter, and see pictures on Instagram, do their stories on Snapchat, and their shopping on Easy. People enjoy kind of adapting to the crowd they are in front of at that moment. An individual might give his or her self a different image on each platform because they might have different people that they follow or are friends with on each one. 

I believe that similar to Darwin's theory of natural selection, something bigger and stronger will have to come along in order to defeat Facebook and wipe it out. Whether that be one huge new and innovative platform that we haven't seen yet or whether it be a combination of the ones listed earlier in this article, something will have to take Facebook's place. 

So who will survive? Who will be deemed the fittest, the strongest, the greatest social media platform? Only the future will tell.