By Dr. Caroline Kiarie
A recent conversation on how platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and X (formerly Twitter) have revolutionised global communication, community building, and digital marketing reminded me just how far communication technology has come and how social media remains at the centre of the way we communicate.
New technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI) continue to reshape how content is created, refined, and shared. Whether we are polishing a message before sending it to our loved ones or customers, generating visuals for a post, or building communities around shared interests, technology is no longer simply the channel through which we communicate. It is increasingly becoming part of the communication process itself.
A friend was sending her teenager a WhatsApp message and, before hitting send, asked ChatGPT to refine the wording so it would sound more appealing. Later, in the same conversation, we found ourselves asking AI to generate visual images that reflected our lives and personalities, which we then shared on social media.
We were not simply communicating through technology. We were communicating with technology.
We have already asked the question: “How is social media affecting us?” As we explore how AI will affect us, perhaps the more important question is: what will the two technologies do to us together?
Today, social media allows us to connect with individuals, communities, and businesses across geographical boundaries. We choose who we connect with, how often we engage, and what type of content we share. Whether through text, audio, images, videos, emojis, or GIFs, social media has given us countless ways of expressing ourselves. But it has also exposed us to serious challenges, including concerns around youth mental health, child exploitation, harmful content and misinformation.
This is a long way from the early optimism surrounding online communities in the 1980s and 1990s. Bulletin board systems, discussion forums and later services such as AOL Chat, Yahoo! Chat and MSN Messenger created spaces where people could have real-time conversations with individuals they had never met.
Then came the 2000s and the rise of modern social media. MySpace, Facebook, YouTube and later Instagram transformed online interaction by enabling users not only to consume content but also to create and distribute it.
After that, communication changed forever. Emojis, GIFs, voice notes, live streams and short videos expanded our ability to communicate emotions, humour and personality through digital channels. But as social media expanded, so did its darker side. Racism, child exploitation, violent content and misinformation became increasingly accessible. AI has now supercharged this already volatile environment, with deepfakes and AI-generated images making it harder to distinguish what is real from what is not.
Yet, as a communicator, I feel a responsibility to point out that social media and AI are not simply bringing doom and gloom. They also represent significant opportunities for businesses and individuals, particularly in the developing world.
Kenya’s social media landscape illustrates just how significant these platforms have become. According to DataReportal, Kenya had 18.4 million social media user identities in October 2025, with platform-level data estimating approximately 17 million Facebook users, 18.4 million TikTok users aged 18 and above, 12.1 million YouTube users, 6.3 million LinkedIn members, 4.99 million Snapchat users, 3.95 million Instagram users and approximately 2.09 million X users.
In Kenya, many young people have taken to TikTok and Instagram to start and run online businesses, earning a living through these platforms. For businesses, the more important question from a communication standpoint is: where are your audiences?
Effective communication requires meeting audiences where they already spend their time and engaging them meaningfully. The data generated through these interactions can also provide valuable insights into audience preferences, behaviours and emerging trends, helping businesses grow.
For individuals, the questions are slightly different. What kind of content are you consuming? What are you creating? And how are these choices shaping your relationships and online communities?
In an AI-enabled world, we must ask even more. If AI can help us write our messages, create our images, edit our videos and influence what we see online, how much of what we consume and communicate remains distinctly our own?
It may be tempting to view social media and AI as a Pandora’s box whose consequences cannot easily be contained. But that does not mean we are powerless. As users, creators, businesses and communicators, we still have a role in determining how these technologies shape our lives and those of the people around us.
I may be guilty of being nostalgic, or perhaps simply optimistic, but I believe the promise that accompanied the early days of online communities may still be possible. We can continue to use these powerful technologies to learn, connect, create and grow, while remaining vigilant about the risks that come with them and working together to overcome them.
The platforms may change. The tools may evolve. But our desire to connect, share, participate and be heard remains remarkably constant.
So, whether you are consuming, participating or producing, keep engaging thoughtfully. After all, we are all prosumers now.
Dr. Caroline Kiarie is an Assistant Professor at the Aga Khan University Graduate School of Media and Communications.
