10 Internet trends in 2013
Internet dictionary, NetLingo has compiled its top 10 Internet Trends list for 2013 with a few obvious candidates – but also a few surprises.
1) Big data – All of the news about the NSA leaks is bad, it is a reminder that no app is free; apps are paid for with privacy. Privacy is the right to freedom from unauthorized intrusion and it is eroding.
Not only is the widespread use of email, apps, cell phones, and spyware documenting every move, so are checkout scanners, electronic tollbooths, closed-circuit surveillance cameras, and other monitoring technologies.
All of these make it extremely easy for “big data” to gather enormous amounts of information. A digital footprint starts with the person.
2) Frape – An unprecedented amount of online violence dominated the Internet this year, from cyber-bullying suicides to YouTube chemical gas videos to tweets threatening rape.
Fraping is not as serious. Short for “Facebook rape,” it is when someone changes profile pictures, sexuality, or interests on someone else’s Facebook page when that person left the account signed in and unattended. Always sign out of online accounts.
3) Hashtag – Newly added to Facebook this year, the hashtag has truly gone mainstream. Originally the domain of Twitter, the hash sign (#) is added to a word or phrase that lets users search for posts that are similarly tagged.
4) Influencer – Leave it to online marketers to take social media and create another category: influence marketing carried out by brand advocates, specific key individuals who are active on social media sites and have “influence” over other users.
These other users are considered potential buyers by online marketers who then orient marketing activities around the influencers (rather than the target market as a whole).
In 2013 the adoption of social scoring in mainstream pop culture helped build personal brands that could generate millions of dollars in sponsored post revenue for the influencer, usually a celebrity.
5) Listicle – Last year was infographics, this year it’s all about listicles. A combination of the words “list” and “article” a “listicle” is a short-form of writing that uses a list as its basic structure, but is beefed up with sufficient verbiage to be published as an article.
6) Revenge porn – Revenge porn happens when people’s intimate photographs and/or videos have been posted on the Internet without their consent, usually by an ex-boyfriend or ex-girlfriend.
7) Selfie – A “selfie” is a self-portrait you post online.
Voted the “2013 Word of the Year” by Oxford English Dictionary, the term can be tracked back to 2002 when it was used in an Australian online forum.
8) TBT & MCM & WCW – Throwback Thursday, Man Crush Monday, and Women Crush Wednesday are each considered Internet theme days on social media sites like Instagram, Tumblr, etc.
TBT is when people post old pictures of themselves, MCM is when both men and women post a picture of a man they have a crush on (usually a celebrity), and WCW is when both women and men post a picture of a woman they have a crush on.
9) Twerk – Miley Cyrus’ performance at the VMA’s generated an online buzz about twerking, a dance movement characterized by a rhythmic gyrating of the hips in a low squatting stance meant to elicit arousal or laughter in one’s dance partner and/or audience.
10) 3-D printers – Once the stuff of science fiction, 3-D printers have rapidly evolved becoming smaller, faster, and cheaper. A basic, microwave-size 3-D printer now costs less than $1,000, making almost anyone a potential manufacturer, as was the case this year with the making of the first 3-D printer gun.
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