Since the advent of the Internet, social networking Web sites have become increasingly popular among users. Social networking Web sites focus on self-made, personal content that people can update at a rapid speed, and the sites allow users to interact with many people easily and cheaply.

“These sites offer the most convenient known way to perform social functions such as inviting all of your friends to a birthday party, later posting the party pictures, and still later discussing all of the funny antics and expressions,” Anne Kellerman and Palmer Agnew, adjunct lecturers for the computer science department at Binghamton University, said via e-mail.

Social networking is fueled by the “network effect,” which basically means that increasing the number of users of a site will lead to high chances that other people will join the site.

Twitter, currently the No. 3 social networking site behind Facebook and MySpace, respectively, allows users to post “tweets” or micro-blog entries limited to 140 characters as well as the ability to post links or pictures to their page. Friends’ updates can be seen through the Twitter Web site, text messages and iPhone/iPod Touch applications.

“Twitter makes sending short communications so easy that typical users send them several times per hour (or per minute), as opposed to other social networking sites that require enough effort to limit users to a few uses per day (or per hour),” said Kellerman and Agnew. “A network becomes vastly more valuable to its users, not only as the number of users increases, but also as the number of messages increases.”

Twitter was created by 33-year-old software architect Jack Dorsey in 2006. Dorsey said he wanted to create a simple product based on simple ideas — to find out what his friends were up to. The site was constructed in only two weeks and launched in August 2006.

With the extreme lack of privacy from MySpace and the current controversy with Facebook’s terms of service, Twitter has become a more appealing option to social networkers who want to have complete control of who can see what.

“At Twitter, we ask one question, ‘What are you doing?’ The answers to this question are for the most part rhetorical,” reads the official Web site.

Kyle Doyle (Twitter username kyledoyle), a junior French major, used his Twitter to keep friends and family updated while he studied abroad in Paris.

“It’s a neat way to let people know what’s going on in your life,” Doyle said. “I also really like the simplicity of being limited to 140 characters to describe what you’re doing.”

Members of the site are not only able to “follow” their real friends, but also their favorite celebrities and public figures. Popular users are celebrities Britney Spears (britneyspears) and Ashton Kutcher (aplusk) who update followers on their personal and professional lives.

“The lives of celebrities captivate us for some reason, and I think it’s really interesting to see what they are up to through Twitter,” Doyle said. “Sometimes they write really crazy or entertaining stuff such as the time [indie singer and BU alumna] Ingrid Michaelson (ingridmusic) tweeted about boogers on her night stand.”

While people are using Twitter for entertainment purposes, news media such as the BBC, CBS and even smaller outlets, such as the Wichita Eagle, have started using Twitter to update followers of court cases and other news stories.

President Barack Obama (BarackObama) actively used Twitter throughout his campaign, letting followers know where he was on the campaign trail. Twitter has also become a platform for politicians — Congressman Neil Abercrombie (neilabercrombie) used his Twitter account on March 6 to make the official announcement that he was running for governor of Hawaii.

Twitter has also been used to get information out during emergencies such as the 2007 California wildfires, allowing friends to establish locations and statuses faster than ever before. Twitter is changing the way people live, blazing the way for new social media. Organizations like the Red Cross (RedCross) have also begun to use Twitter to keep people updated on local disasters at a minute-by-minute pace.

Doyle said he thinks Twitter is definitely leading the charge when it comes to new media.

“It’s so easy for people to get involved and connected,” he said. “More and more people are joining and even preferring it to Facebook.”