Over the past decade, the use of social media has increased rapidly. What started as a single trend has mushroomed into countless media sites absorbing the attention of our population. After Friends Reunited premiered in 1999, people became accustomed to using their keyboards rather than their mouths and seeing a screen rather than a face (University of North Carolina). Whether increasing usage benefits or harms society has been declared controversial. Some say the sites have broken the boundaries of communication and privacy, while others say the benefits of fast, endless chat have ushered in a new era of technology. Even if both sides have valid evidence, the pros outweigh the cons. Social media has made it easier to interview job candidates, increased voting percentages, and even given teachers an outlet to help their students outside of the classroom (Procon.org). Social media as defined by Oxford Dictionaries is “a dedicated website or other application that allows users to communicate with each other by posting information, comments, messages, images, etc. » (Oxford Dictionaries). The first social network to become known was created in 1999 by Great Britain. Its goal was to help old school friends reconnect. In 2002, Friendster was opened to American audiences and quickly gained popularity; there were 3 million users in the third month. The following year, a similar site was created, MySpace. In 2004, MySpace was the most popular networking site in the country. However, in 2008, Facebook surpassed MySpace with its total monthly visitors and remains the most popular site today with 1.11 billion users (University of North Carolina). Many teens and young adults carry smartphones that allow access to social media with a swipe and press.