Additionally, white Americans often use images and gifs of Black people reacting and expressing emotions. This modern practice with gifs has been compared [l48] to the earlier (and racist) art forms of blackface [l49], where white actors would paint their faces black and then act in exaggerated unintelligent ways.

Evolution of cetaceans. November 2023. Page Version ID: 1186568602. URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Evolution_of_cetaceans&oldid=1186568602

The filter bubbles can be good or bad, such as forming bubbles for: Hate groups, where people’s hate and fear of others gets reinforced and never challenged

Zack Whittaker. Facebook won't let you opt out of its phone number 'look up' setting. TechCrunch, March 2019. URL: https://techcrunch.com/2019/03/03/facebook-phone-number-look-up/

Disabilities can be accepted as socially normal, like is sometimes the case for wearing glasses or contacts, or it can be stigmatized [j5] as socially unacceptable, inconvenient, or blamed on the disabled person.

Social model of disability. November 2023. Page Version ID: 1184222120. URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Social_model_of_disability&oldid=1184222120#Social_construction_of_disability

There are many ways inauthnticity shows up on internet-based social media, such as: Catfishing: Create a fake profile that doesn’t match the actual user, usually in an attempt to trick or scam someone Sockpuppet (or a “burner” account): Creating a fake profile in order to argue a position (sometimes intentionally argued poorly to make the position look bad)

6.3.1. Inauthentic Behaviors#

Inauthentic behavior is when the reality doesn’t match what is being presented. Inauthenticity has, of course, existed throughout human history, from Ea-nasir [f14] complaining in 1750 BCE that the copper he ordered was not the high quality he had been promised [f15], to 1917 CE in England when Arthur Conan Doyle [f16] (the author of the Sherlock Holmes stories) was fooled by photographs that appeared to be of a child next to fairies.

lonelygirl15. November 2023. Page Version ID: 1186146298. URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Lonelygirl15&oldid=1186146298 (visited on 2023-11-24).

5.5.2. 4Chan# 4Chan [e18] was created in 2003 by copying the code from a Japanese image-sharing bulletin board called Futaba or 2chan [e19]. 4Chan has various image-sharing bulletin boards, where users post anonymously. Perhaps the most infamous board is the “/b/” board for “random” topics. This board emphasizes “free speech” and “no rules” (with exceptions for child sexual abuse material [CSAM] and some other illegal content). In these message boards, users attempt to troll each other and post the most shocking content they can come up with. They also have a history of collectively choosing a target website or community and doing a “raid” where they all try to join and troll and offend the people in that community. Many memes, groups, and forms of internet slang come from 4Chan, such as: lolcats [e20] Rickroll [e21] ragefaces [e22] “Anonymous [e23]” the hacker group Bronies [e24] (male My Little Pony fans) much of trolling culture (we will talk more about in Chapter 7: Trolling) But one 4Chan user found 4chan to be too authoritarian and restrictive and set out to create a new “free-speech-friendly” image-sharing bulletin board, which he called 8chan.

Mark R. Cheathem. Conspiracy Theories Abounded in 19th-Century American Politics. URL: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/conspiracy-theories-abounded-19th-century-american-politics-180971940/ (visited on 2023-11-24).

Because all data is a simplification of reality, those simplifications work well for some people and some situations but can cause problems for other people and other situations. Thus, when designers of social media systems make decisions about how data will be saved and what constraints will be put on the data, they are making decisions about who will get a better experience. Based on these decisions, some people will fit naturally into the data system, while others will have to put in extra work to make themselves fit, and others will have to modify themselves or misrepresent themselves to fit into the system.

Twitter. November 2023. Page Version ID: 1187856185. URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twitter (visited on 2023-12-01).

Ali Vingiano. This Is How A Woman's Offensive Tweet Became The World's Top Story. December 2013. Section: USNews. URL: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/alisonvingiano/this-is-how-a-womans-offensive-tweet-became-the-worlds-top-s (visited on 2023-10-27).

What do you think is the responsibility of tech workers to think through the ethical implications of what they are making?