Social media is everywhere. From advertising campaigns, to news stories devoted to what the Kardashian/Jenners are wearing, to the sometimes earth-shaking tweets from the President of the United States, whether we like it or not, social media is part of our everyday lives. Nonetheless, a mere ten years ago, we were only just beginning to talk about social media, and now-ubiquitous platforms like Facebook and Twitter were still in their infancies. How can we explain this boom in the importance and popularity of social media? What do we find so attractive about a technology that would have seemed preposterous a generation ago? On the most basic level, what exactly is social media, and what is it good for?