Glossary of Key Social Media Terms

@ reply – Tweet addressed (publicly) to another user on Twitter, including @username so the other user will see it.

Analytics – Software that collects data about visitors and visits.

Author – The person who writes a specific post or entry on the blog.

Authority – A measure of how many other blogs link to a blog.

Avatar – A user's representation of himself or herself, in the form of a three–dimensional model used in computer games or virtual worlds.

Badge – An image designed to be downloaded and placed on someone else's site, linking back to yours to demonstrate affiliation (used by conference speakers, for instance). Compare widget.

Blog – A “web log” is a web-based publication consisting primarily of articles displayed in reverse chronological order, typically with a strong personal perspective.  

Blogger – A person who runs a blog.

Blogger – Blogging software, a hosted solution owned by Google.

Blogosphere – The collective network of all blogs.

BlogPulse – A blog search engine, particularly useful for its trend graphs. 

Blogroll – A list of blogs.  A blogger features a list of their favorite blogs in the sidebar of their blog.

Blogstorm – When a large amount of activity, information and opinion erupts around a particular subject or controversy in the blogosphere.

Bookmark – A stored link to a web location.

Category – A set of blog posts that share a common theme or topic (e.g.  book reviews).

Comment – A question, observation or opinion by a reader related to a specific blog post.

Conversion – A user performing some desired end action, such as signing up for a mailing list, buying something, or making a donation.

Cookie – A small file placed on your computer by a website to store information. Can be used to target ads across sites (third-party cookies) or for analytics or to store login information so you don't need to sign in every time you visit a site (first-party cookies).

Delicious – The major social bookmarking site. 

Digg – The main social news website, capable of sending enormous amounts of traffic. 

Diaries – Individual blogs written by readers that are part of a larger community blogging site that is typically controlled by a team of lead bloggers. 

Direct message – Tweet addressed (privately) to another user on Twitter, which others users do not see.

Facebook – A major social network site.

Feed – See RSS feed.

Flickr – The main photo and image sharing site. Owned by Yahoo.

Gadget – See widget.

Google Analytics – A free service for measuring website traffic and analyzing visitors.

Hits – The number of requests of files on a website is often referred to as hits. This is generally a poor metric to use in judging success of a website.

LinkedIn – A major social network site designed for professional connections.

Metric – Something you measure, often used in analytics and return on investment discussions. Raw traffic numbers are less useful than trends and conversions.

Microblog – A less formal, more social, shorter post length blog. The most popular site is Twitter; others include Jaiku, Pownce, Plurk, Tumblr, and FriendFeed.

Micromedia – Short pieces of content, generally including words (microblogging), audio, or video.

MySpace – A major social network site, particularly good for music and musicians.

Open source – A type of software licensing that allows anyone using the software to modify it. WordPress is an example of a popular open source software package.

Open thread – A discussion without a set topic that is open to definition by those commenting.  Common to blogs with large readerships and active comment threads.

Link – A selectable connection from one word or picture to another. The currency of the web.

Liveblog – A blog post or series of posts updated in real-time about an event in progress.

Live-tweet – Updating Twitter in real time about an event in progress.

Mobile – Using cell phones. See also text message, short code.

New media – The marriage of mediated communications technologies with digital computers.

Orkut – A major social network site owned by Google, particularly popular outside the United States.

Pageview – In analytics software, a record of a user looking at one page of a site.

Permalink – Short for "permanent link."  It is the link that readers can use to bookmark a specific blog post.

Ping – An alert that notifies the original poster of a blog post when someone else writes an entry concerning the original post.

Podcast – Radio shows or other audio programs available for download over the Internet.

Post – A single entry on a blog, usually consisting of at least a title and text.  A blog is made up of a collection of posts.

Resident – A participant in Second Life.

RSS – Stands for “Really Simple Syndication.”  A technical standard that lets content be re-published on other sites.

RSS aggregator – Software or online service allowing a blogger to read an RSS feed, especially the latest posts on their favorite blogs.

RSS feed – The file containing a blog’s latest posts. It is read by an RSS aggregator/reader and shows at once when a blog has been updated. It may contain only the title of the post, the title plus the first few lines of a post, or the entire post.

Second Life – A virtual world run by Linden Lab. Allows users to own objects they create in-world and maintains a currency exchange between Lindens and US dollars, leading to a complex virtual economy.

Session – In analytics software, a record of one user’s looking at a site, generally including multiple pageviews. Also called a visit.

Short code – A telephone number used for text messages, generally five or six digits in the United States. Used to subscribe to mobile alert messages and to communicate with mobile services such as reality show vote counters and charitable donation processors.

Social bookmarking – Saving sites (with tags and comments) in a way that is visible/usable by other users. Delicious is the major social bookmarking site.

Social media – Tools for sharing information between users. Usually cheap/quick to set up and start using.

Social news – Tools for sharing news stories between users. Users submit sites and vote others’ submissions up and down to determine top stories. Digg is a major social news site.

Social network – An online community, generally including users’ profiles and links between users (“friends”).

Splog – A spam blog made up of other people’s stolen posts.

StumbleUpon – A social network providing recommendations for pages a user may like. Owned by eBay.

Tags – Keywords or phrases that are assigned to blog posts (and other types of content on the Web) to improve the likelihood the content will appear in search engine results.  

Tag cloud – Visual representations of tags or keywords used in a blog.  Tag clouds may be used to organize content or analyze key topics.

Technorati – A blog search engine and ranking site, and the usual source for authority rankings. 

Text message – 160-character message between cell phones.

Thread – A series of comments or forum posts on a specific topic.

Trackback – A message that can appear on a blog post when someone else writes an entry concerning the original post.

Tweet – A message of up to 140 characters on Twitter.

Twitter – The most popular micro-blogging site. Users send text messages of up to 140 characters using the Twitter website, desktop programs, or mobile phones. 

Typepad – Blogging software, a hosted solution.

Viral – Something that starts spreading from person to person and quickly gains a large audience is said to be viral.

Virtual world – A computer-based simulated environment intended for its users to inhabit and interact via avatars.

Visit – In analytics software, a record of one user’s looking at a site, generally including multiple pageviews. Also called a session.

Vlog – A video blog; a vlogger is a video blogger (e.g.  someone who records himself interviewing people of a certain field).

Web 2.0 – The second generation of web development and design, often referring to social media sites and other user-friendly sites. Many competing definitions.

Widget – A small piece of code that can be embedded in someone else's site to show content from yours, letting them share your information. Examples are Facebook Applications, iGoogle gadgets, and Sprout Builder widgets. Compare badge.

Wiki – A collection of web pages designed to enable anyone who accesses it to contribute or modify content, using a simplified markup language (e.g. Wikipedia).

Wikipedia – The best-known wiki, a user-created encyclopedia.

WordPress – Blogging software for download (wordpress.org) or as a hosted solution (wordpress.com).

YouTube – A video sharing social network site. Owned by Google.