I would change the way that these social media networks handle and protect users' data. There's a lot of justified concern about this issue and if all of these social media networks could, at least, be more transparent about things like data collection people could have more control over securing their data.

I feel that since the internet labels itself as being a "free" space where you can do, be, and say anything people often leave behind the ethics frameworks that they operate with in their real lives. They almost forget about it since you can be essentially anonymous with your activity and there aren't many tangible consequences to certain "harmless" behaviors online. As we have learned in this class, that is not true and this class has reminded me to hold on to those frameworks in this "free-for-all" space as well. Even if there aren't many consequences to, for example, leaving a negative comment on someone's post, there is another person on the other side of the screen who might be hurt by what you say and, for me, that is consequence enough to not engage in that behavior.

This isn't new information per say, but more light is being shed on the situation and more attention is being payed to the people who suffer under this exploitation. The Democratic Republic of Congo has one of the largest cobalt deposits in the world. Cobalt is a key part of the manufacturing and function of most if not all electronics today as one of its uses is to make rechargeable batteries. The people in Congo who are mining cobalt are working in dangerous conditions, being evicted from their homes due to expansions of mines, and their human rights are being violated daily. Learning more about this once silent genocide makes me think differently about my technology consumption. I don't need to upgrade to the newest phone if the one I have is still perfectly functioning or if it means that my unnecessary spending on that new phone is largely going straight into the pockets of people who are risking the lives of others to deliver that phone to me.

Within the capitalist system, businesses and companies are privately owned and the profit made from those businesses and companies largely goes to owners, as well as shareholders. To completely contrast that, in the socialist system, the government owns and manages those businesses or companies. The goal with this system is to reduce wealth inequality for the entire community and put resources and services under a collective responsibility and benefit.

This question is extremely pertinent to what is currently happening in the world. Never before have we, as a global community, been able to watch real-time videos and images of violence and genocide. Right now, we have one side of this genocide using Twitter to spread heinously misinformed and objectively false propaganda that is inviting people who support that group to inflict violence and harassment on random, innocent people around them. Much like the situation involving Facebook in the linked article, to make moves towards reconciling its contribution to the spread of hate speech and violence, Twitter needs to redesign its core content-shaping algorithms to stop amplifying posts from accounts that post such content and inspire such behavior. Twitter could also donate to the humanitarian aid organizations that are offering medical aid, food, and water to the victims of this genocide. However, with everything that the owner of Twitter has recently said, that seems like too much to expect of him...

I think that when used carefully and respectfully, public criticism and shaming of certain systems, behaviors, and actions can work to benefit society. This approach is a very popular way that we as people create change (whether its positive or negative is relative to the specific context). However, when we forget to consider others' humanity as well as our own, sometimes public criticism and shaming can be taken too far in terms of things like violating others' privacy.

In the early days of social media, people used to think that harassment online wasn't such a common experience, Now, I see harassment online happening every day, particularly on TikTok in the comment section of nearly every video.

In the past, people could anonymously harass people through things like gossip columns or rumor sheets, which kept it to a fairly local level and were their own types of "pre-internet social media". Today, someone could make an anonymous post on virtually any social media platform and that post goes out to the world to see.

I haven't participated in crowdsourcing online, but I have participated in crowdfunding. It was in a more indirect way, but recently I've been using certain filters on TikTok to help creators make revenue off of their filters that they will then collect and donate to various humanitarian causes that are providing aid in Gaza.

I think this is a really interesting way of gathering the perspectives and ideas of people from all over the world. In regards to Wikipedia, people can contribute information to topics or events that they have personal experiences with and make edits to correct misconceptions or misinformation with their real-life, first-hand accounts.

I think that there are pros and cons to Wikipedia allowing users to contribute to its content. On one hand, being so accessible in terms of editing heightens the risk of misinformation being spread and making the site even more unreliable as a resource. On the other hand, in the case that misinformation has been input to a page, a person who has real life experience or knowledge about the topic of that page could come along, correct it, and post real and reliable additional resources for further reading.

When I used to make YouTube videos I remember the heavy warnings about posting content with copyrighted material, especially music. I'm not sure if the rule still applies, but at the time you couldn't have more than 30 seconds of a copyrighted song.

Social media has exposed me to different communities of artists, activists, and educators that have helped me get closer to figuring out who I am as a person. I've discovered new hobbies that I enjoy and have been able connect with people who have similar positive motivations towards equality and justice for all. However, my mental/physical health have also been negatively impacted by social media. I've often felt as I've scrolled through TikTok that I should look like this person, that I should be at the same point in my life or career as that person who is also my age, or even think a certain way about things. Overall, I think that the the benefits and detriments of social media push and pull on my mental health daily.

I think another important question we should be asking here is where the idea that a person or, in the context of this section, a girl/woman should look or be a certain way come from? Where did that belief, and it is a full blown belief for some people, start? How has this ideology survived? This issue certainly didn't start with social media. It's existed for hundreds, if not thousands, of years where women specifically have been told by men and religions that they have to uphold specific standards of beauty or behavior determined by them. As technology developed and evolved to what we have today with social media, those standards have continually been promoted. I don't think that its entirely fair to blame or accuse people for wanting to look or be a certain way when the world has been telling them for centuries that they have to embody those standards to be accepted. And, as a young, teenage girl, who wants to make friends and be liked by others, it isn't surprising that having that content promoted to you wherever you go (in real life or online) would negatively impact your mental health/well-being.

Now that I've thought about it, many social media platforms operate on similar systems of modifying content. For example, X (formerly Twitter) and Tumblr both allow users to "quote tweet" or "reblog" a post and add their own thoughts/opinons to it, as well as new tags that can make the post reach a whole different audience than who the original post was intended for. So, there are advantages and disadvantages to this particular system.

Chain letters still exist in some form today. On various social media platforms, mainly TikTok, people will make posts saying if you skip the video, if you don't interact with the video in some way, or if you don't use the sound under the video then something good or bad will happen. This comes from the rise in practicing manifestation. However, people have flipped it on its head to gain followers, views, and likes. While this trend doesn't require paying for envelopes or stamps, it does cost some people a lot of unnecessary anxiety and stress if they don't interact with those types of videos

Individuals do have a responsibility over how they behave and interact with others online. In this instance you could circle back to trolling. If you interact with a troll and their content enough then similar content will be recommended to you. However, users can also combat this by filtering out that content and blocking it all together if they decide they don't want to see it or interact with it at all.

Like others, I can see the good and bad sides of recommendation algorithms. On one hand, social media platforms can collect information on users such as the types of videos or posts that they've liked and "tailor" their feeds to reflect that and push similar posts. This makes the user's experience on their platform more enjoyable because they're seeing the content that they want to see. However, if they're only seeing posts of things that they like or agree with, then they're trapped in a bubble without any input from opposite perspectives.

Alt text is something that I only recently learned about and I think it is a great innovation. I've also started noticing more users on Tumblr adding alt texts to their posts. And since so much of our lives leads us to interacting with technology and the internet, whether its for school, work, or our hobbies, it is important that everyone is considered.

I'm glad that this textbook mentions and considers invisible disabilities because they so often get overlooked. People do think that just because they can't visually tell if a person has a disability that they're faking it or even lying. Attitudes such as those can impede on the progress being made towards giving people with invisible disabilities the proper care that they need to also get through the days.

Financial gain is a huge contributing factor when it comes to social media companies violating users' privacy. They can sell all of that information to third parties and make a considerable profit from it. Being reckless with privacy can also result in a social media platform making or rather saving money. Not investing in proper security to eliminate the risks of hackers stealing information is a popular tactic.

The main thing that social media companies want from their users is trust. If users can't trust that the company will protect the information that they are going to willingly give them by creating accounts, people just won't sign up. That could lead to them telling other people not to sign up for an account on that social media platform, user numbers dropping and the ultimate failure of that platform.

There is an infinite amount of information that social media companies should not and do not need to seek out. If the information doesn't correlate to the platform then it shouldn't be collected. If there is a risk of that platform being hacked then it is the responsibility of the platforms creators/moderators to find a way to securely encrypt it to protect the information that they do have on their users.

I think the amount of personal information that can be collected from our activity online can be very scary. We're under constant surveillance and even under the guise of a private account people don't feel protected. Pardon this little "literature nerd" moment, but it really reminds me of George Orwell's "1984".

I often get told that I speak with a hint of an accent, but it isn't something that I've ever tried to mask or change because it's a part of who I am and it reminds me of where I'm from. However, I have noticed people who are from the same place as me change the way they speak to fit in to certain situations or with certain people. It actually makes me a bit upset to see that because they're covering up their true selves out of an insecurity that they won't be accepted as they are.

I remember when this happened and I thought it was an incredible display of digital activism and showed people how they can contribute to a positive movement (even in a funny way) if they can't join marches. I believe KPOP fans also flooded the "White Lives Matter" hashtag with videos because that hashtag was trying to flip the actual message of the protests to benefit people who supported that idea as well as take attention away from the real issue and again, make it about themselves.

I feel like this particular idea has also been flipped inside out through the way that we interact with social media today. For instance, if we're taking a selfie, an image that is supposed to authentically represent us, that moment is, for some, inauthentic. Its inauthentic because we're posing in a specific way or trying to make ourselves attractive in a way that isn't completely natural and genuine to our current state. Though, that isn't to say that there's anything wrong with wanting to look nice or present the best versions of ourselves. But by being "inauthentic" in that moment and posting that image online, we're actually being incredibly vulnerable and seeking validation for a version of ourselves that isn't completely authentic.

In the early days of YouTube and online social media in general, I could imagine that people weren't expecting the posts they were seeing to be inauthentic. Everything was so new and people were experimenting with the platforms. Today, after decades of experience with online social media, we expect some level of artifice or inauthenticity from creators. Now, we actively look for Photoshop or signs of production.

Would this be the ancestor of Reddit or even Twitter? I guess people have been seeking online advice, validation of their views (or even worries), and community for far longer than I had originally thought.

I think I agree with this statement. Anything can be social media. Stepping away from online platforms, a painting can be a form of social media. If a painting was being displayed in gallery it could draw an audience to see it and there people can interact or discuss the painting. The only difference is that people aren't interacting behind screens and rather, they're face-to-face.

As a person who is from Guam, a United States territory, and not from the continental United States, I have ran into this specific issue more times than I can count. Usually, I can select the US as the shipping country, but under the state section the only option for the territories is Puerto Rico. This has led me to having to call a company's customer service to find someone to help me reach a solution. It has been successful and companies have included Guam (as well as other territories) in their options on the spot, but that isn't always the case.

I think that using an integer for storing ages on a social media platform/network is the most efficient. I've found that most restrict the age range to 13 years old and up. However, depending on the type of platform/network it is, the age restriction should be set to at least 17 years old and up.

I think some users might want to be able to make bots if they recognize an issue on certain social media platforms that they personally use that isn't being addressed by the company. For example, filtering out certain keywords that bring up content that is harmful to or inappropriate for users (especially if a child is using that platform). If people know how to make bots they could make one that fixes that issue for them and other users.

People hold other people to higher moral standards than they do bots. They expect that because others are also moving through and experiencing the world that they should be able to process and understand what is "right" and "wrong". Bots don't have the emotional intelligence that "normal" users do (or should have) so they don't expect that from them even when they do something "wrong".

I agree with this ethical framework and I believe that it is extremely powerful. However, I am also completely aware that this framework and these words were not written with POC or women, like myself, in mind. Everyone should be recognized as equal and free. Everyone should have unalienable rights by who they recognize as their creator (which is a whole other discussion). Everyone deserves to live their lives with dignity.

I also have mixed feelings about this statement. I agree that much of the content posted online isn't entirely genuine or an accurate representation of "real life". It is something that people turn to if they have spare time or even to distract themselves. However, especially nowadays, people have taken advantage of people's "addiction" to social media and post content about things that are actually happening in real life like climate change, political news, and wars. I have also seen people make the opposing statement that we cannot escape the real world even on the internet because people are so adamant about getting others to see what is going on (at home and abroad) and to care about it. Maybe this sentiment had more backbone when the internet was starting to become commonly used, but I think social media really does have the ability to expose people to events happening in "real life".