Q.3.1-The social economy :Unlocking through social technologies

The Social Economy: Unlocking value through social technologies

There are many benefits as well as risks associated with the use of social technologies for individuals, corporates and communities.

Individuals

Benefits

Individuals benefit in a way that they can use the internet to use for research, reading material.
Able to communicate with distant relatives and friends over social media.
Able to access the latest news worldwide.

Risks

Understanding of the consequences of posting online.
 South African individuals tend to post personal details online such as location /cell numbers.

For corporate companies the benefits are that the companies can expand awareness of their products or services that they have produced and they can use technologies to keep in contact with their suppliers or their customers.

Risks of fraud and identify theft, therefore important for businesses to protect their private information. The fact that 90 % of companies use technologies that benefit, using the site LinkedIn.

Corporates: Social technologies can cause damage to a business’ image. This can happen if an employee or a customer portrays a bad image of the business on social media which can result in the loss of current and future customers of the business. Social technologies also present the opportunity for hackers to commit fraud as well as launch virus attacks.

Communicates benefit in the way that social media is simple and real time way of communicating with one another, example in my neighbourhood we have a whatsapp group called “ Lakeside Alerts “ for updates and the mountain men themselves are in it our security , alerting the community of robberies  / theft and any dodge people walking about.