A woman shoots a video of the sign at the entrance to the Facebook main campus. AFP/Robyn Beck
Internet use in general and social media sites in particular have been under the microscope in recent weeks with study after study highlighting
their potentially detrimental effect on users' lives. This latest State Farm distracted Driving survey, out this week, found that 36 percent of young people were using their smartphones to update their status on social media sites when driving, while new research from Tel Aviv University's Sackler Faculty of Medicine and the Shalvata Mental Health Care Centern authored by Dr Uri Nitzan, found a link between social media and psychotic episodes.
The Social Me app is designed to analyze how we interact with Facebook and spits out revealing results that should help users understand how long they really spend on the site, what type of person they are -- based on language used, likes, status postings and interactions and the subjects and themes that most engage them. It can even break down how many words a person types, how often they post and from where, what times of the day or night they are most active in addition to assessing linguistic and grammatical skills against those of other users and friends.
Designed with the aim of helping people to better understand their social media personality and behavior, the app was launched as a beta version in August and is gearing up for its offical release before the end of the month.
Rumor has it that the company is also working on another app that uses the same analytical techniques to measure how compatible a user is with his or her friends.