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The Great Firewall in China

The online population of China is approximately 800 million, yet this population does not have accessibility to Facebook, YouTube, and not even Goggle. The Chinese government has been controlling its internet accessibility through its largest system of censorship in the whole world – Great Firewall. To make this censorship work, China’s government allies with telecommunications and technology companies to reinforce its state rules on restricted internet (Dawson 2018).

So, to what extent does China restrict its online community’s internet accessibility? In 2017, China eliminated the function of anonymity to post social media or playing games, and even banished Winnie The Pooh when several bloggers depicted President Xi Jinping (President of China) as a Pooh. Even two of the GAFA (Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon), namely Apple and Google, where Apple had to fight for privacy control, and eventually built a local data center in China to fulfil the Chinese government requirements. The tech giant, Google, was told by the Chinese authorities to pull down around 2,290 items and other terrorism-related items in the year 2016 (Mozur 2018).

China also blocked the usage of Whatsapp service in China. A case of Mr. Zhang, a Chinese individual was under detention due to the action of spreading articles on Whatsapp. As Whatsapp messages are encrypted and run by American company, it is naturally assumed to be a more secured platform compared to China local messaging apps such as Wechat. However, when Mr. Zhang was sued for spreading articles on Whatsapp, Mr. Zhang’s lawyer was surprised that police presented them printouts of comments and articles from Mr. Zhang. They could not figure not how the police got the data and started wondering whether Whatsapp is still safe (Mozur 2018). Not only so, China citizens have been prisoned for giving offensive, ill-advised comments in private chats on China’s version of Twitter – Weibo’s (Dawson 2018). But really, how is it still called “private chats” when the conversations are being monitored by a third party? Apparently, there is no online freedom in China, not even online privacy.

Nevertheless, Chinese government believes that they did what they have to do. They proposed a Cybersecurity Law that would solidify their grip on controlling the flow of information online. They believe restricting online content allows them to maintain social order and most importantly, safeguard its national security. By restricting online content, Chinese government believes that they can provide necessary support for police investigations when required and keep the country out of chaos. In other words, it is their way to show that they care about the national safety and security (Wang 2015).

References

Dawson, S 2018, ‘The Great Firewall of China’, Bloomberg, 6 November, viewed 21 November 2018, <https://www.bloomberg.com/quicktake/great-firewall-of-china>.

Mozur, P 2018, ‘China presses its internet censorship efforts across the globe’, NY Times, 2 March, viewed 21 November 2018, <https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/02/technology/china-technology-censorship-borders-expansion.html>.

Wang, Y 2015, ‘How China’s national security and cybersecurity laws will further curb press freedom’, CPJ, 22 July, viewed 21 November 2018, <https://cpj.org/blog/2015/07/how-chinas-national-security-and-cybersecurity-law.php>.

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Are you a ‘gamer’?

What can you interpret when you see ‘social gaming’? Unfortunately, there is no definite definition of social gaming (maybe in the future who knows?) and everybody connotes the term differently. But there are some general characteristics that most would take into account when they see the term ‘social gaming’

Multi-player where players can either co-operate or compete against each other and social platforms indicating that a particular game leverages social platforms that allows communication and interaction between players. Some social games ‘piggy back’ on social media platforms like Facebook where players can leverage their existing Facebook social relationships as well as create new ones over the game whereas some game has their own in-game communication function such as Dota where you can either speak through a mic or there is an in-game chat function and ‘chat wheel’ to communicate and strategize with your team.

The market for social gaming is on the rise and I personally think a large driver in the increase is the availability of social games on mobile devices such as our one and only beloved smartphones! 

*not and ad for iPhone ;)*

This accessibility thus creates a larger market of gamers because not only it is easy to download the game into your smartphones, but even the gameplay is easier where the controls are all on your touchscreen (I mean how hard is it to press your screen) *there are mobile games which are hard too don’t get me wrong but you know the drill* compared to gaming on the computer or laptop where you need a hand on one mouse and a keyboard where your remaining hand and fingers need to work extra hard to press those keys.

This is especially not to say hard; but thrilling in first person shooter games like Call of Duty (COD) *MY FAV* and CSGO.

I experienced situations where my female friends don’t consider themselves as gamers when I ask them but ironically they play Mobile Legends (kind of like a mobile version of Dota) and now the famous PUBG –PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds. I see them eating chicken for dinner frequently *PUBG reference right here* 

I was taken aback when I see some friends who are not gamers and kind of have stereotypes on gamers, play PUBG and I am not kidding but I see about 6-10 of them posting on Instagram regarding their Chicken Dinner every now and again.

Here you can kind of see that there are different connotations on the word ‘gamers’. As mentioned in class, only another classmate and I raised our hands when the presenters asked if anybody play games but when Pokemon Go was raised, a few more hands showed up and yup you guessed it, they are females. 

The interpretation that I get is that the convenience of being able to play on their smartphones and how it is not as ‘heavy’ in terms of gameplay and duration when you play on the laptop kind of makes them feel like “nahh I am not a gamer but I am merely just playing games”. I also think that the fact that puzzle games like Candy Crush and Homescapes (I am addicted to this) are becoming more common these days contributes to this phenomenon where people who play games (especially females) do not consider themselves as gamers. An advertising company, Flurry Analytics found that on average, compared to men, women spent 35% more time on mobile games and the readings of the US gaming demographic showed that there is an increase in female gamers at 48% female to 52% male compared to a previous readings of 40% female to 60% male.

*The stats shown below is a different stats compared to the ones written above*

Try and google ‘gamers’ and see the definitions that pops up. Different definitions everywhere! I would simply define gamers as people who play games regardless of the type and mode of games as well as gender where the term ‘gamers’ are commonly especially associated with male players. 

Nowadays, I do not agree with this anymore as there is definitely a rise in female gamers even in games like Dota (and boy they are good) and I hope the stereotype of how female are clueless or ‘noob’ in playing games somehow disappear in the upcoming years because to me, gaming is a form of entertainment and a way to distress after a long day of studying, work and even to those who face difficulties like depression and to some of them gaming is a positive distraction to their thoughts and some even meet people online who gives them support and comfort, this is where I find social gaming remarkable. Even though you might not know them personally but if interacting or communicating with them gives you positive energy, why not? But at the end of the other spectrum, there are trolls and mean people who just love to negatively affect others online even in games (pathetic right?). It’s best to stay vigilant, be really careful and always trust your instinct!

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China in the 21st century

I have always known that social media works differently in China because I’ve heard a little about it from here and there and that Weibo and Wechat are mainly used there. However, when my dad went to China earlier this year, we had a hard time communicating with him because apparently everything (by everything I meant especially WhatsApp and Facebook because my dad only uses this) does not work or if it does, it was really really really slow. My dad was in Zhuhai near its border in Macau and only then, he had access to Facebook and WhatsApp.

To put it simply, international social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Snapchat, you name it...are all banned in China. Instead, China has their own version of social media platforms such as Wechat, Weibo and Youku. By providing these alternatives, the Chinese government can better monitor and control the citizens to protect itself.

China highly censors its Internet through the “Great Firewall” web filter, a surveillance and Internet censorship program aiming to neutralize critical online opinion and prevent the people in China from being ‘corrupted’ by views from people who the government thinks can harm the country (*coughs foreign culture). Its tactics doesn’t stop at censoring the Internet and shutting down websites, but China also jail dissident journalists, bloggers and activists.

Facebook has gained an approval to launch a subsidiary in the eastern province of Zhejiang but it was quickly withdrawn.

Despite the obvious reason of blocking the citizens from accessing foreign social media platforms to prevent them from politically sensitive information to safeguard political affairs , I believe that the banning of social media platforms is also due to economic reasons. Basically a monopoly on social media platforms.

Even though the people in China has little freedom compared to what we Malaysians have, I believe that one day, the citizens of China can eventually enact effective changes in their country. People are becoming more aware and using the Internet to voice out disapproval and forming online communities. With the people of China relying heavily on social media, who knows? One day.

A question that was asked during the presentation on this case study that intrigues me till now is “Do you think China is a strong country for technological development?”

With no doubt, YES. 

China is a leader in the field of Artificial Intelligence(AI). I’m sure most of us know about China’s social credit system which allows the government to closely monitor and scrutinize each and every one of its citizens (1.3 billion) based on their behaviours and activities. *I know the next thing that pops up in your mind is Black Mirror* Wow straight out of a dystopian episode of Black Mirror

It was announced back in 2014 and China plans to make it fully operational by 2021 starting with Beijing at the end of 2020 where the 22 million residents  in Beijing will be judged on data based on their social standing at the time. According to a government document, the system aims to reinforce the idea that “keeping trust is glorious and breaking trust is disgraceful”

It has that reward-punishment mechanism where reward credit will be given for pro-social behaviours like charity work, etc while citizens who do bad things like drinking under influence, smoking in non-smoking zones, posting fake news online will be punished. The system basically marks those who are found to have violated social codes or laws and the punishments are extensive. An example is restricted access to travel services.

The system is already being rolled out in some areas and the National Development and Reform Commission have already blocked about 11.14 million flights and 4.25 million high-speed train trips according to Global Times. Luxury options has also been clumped down where 3 million people are barred from getting business class train tickets.

Imagine being constantly scrutinized and surveillance

Things like how you behave in public transports, your driving skills, whether you have paid your bills on time,wasting money on frivolous purchases, playing video games too long are all taken into account! *mental breakdown*

The punishments are not detailed but other than restricting travel, internet speeds are slowed down, access to good schools for individuals or their kids are reduced, people are banned from certain jobs, bookings at certain hotels are prevented and people can even lose their right to their own pets!

According to Beijing News, 17 people who refused to enlist in military service the previous year were barred from applying for high school, enrolling into higher education and the worst of all, barred from continuing their studies. A university denied a student his spot because of his father’s poor social credit score. For those who the country deems untrustworthy, everything and everywhere is limited.

On the contrary, I saw this video on Facebook where a woman said she was able to book a hotel without paying a cash deposit because her social credit score was good. People with good credit score can also get discounts on bills, rent without deposits and get better interest rates at banks.

Escaping it will be really difficult because in China, it is required to have a government ID to access services which are largely centralized by China Telecom and Alipay which will in turn link to phone numbers that act as an ID number.

It does not end there because add facial recognition on CCTV and NFC tagging of vehicles to that. China’s developing a facial recognition system for the social credit system with a database of 1.3 billion ID photos that can be matched within seconds and is 90% accurate. Escaping seems impossible.

I feel like some people have this misconception that China isn’t as technologically developed because of the country’s ban on social media which leads to some assuming that they are in their own world and not as exposed and also because of those uncultured behaviours of SOME that we often see in videos on Facebook. These people must have forgotten that China makes more than 90% of the world’s smartphones, 65% of all personal computers and 67% of smart TVs according to Bernstein Research.

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Are you a ‘gamer’?

What can you interpret when you see ‘social gaming’? Unfortunately, there is no definite definition of social gaming (maybe in the future who knows?) and everybody connotes the term differently. But there are some general characteristics that most would take into account when they see the term ‘social gaming’

Multi-player where players can either co-operate or compete against each other and social platforms indicating that a particular game leverages social platforms that allows communication and interaction between players. Some social games ‘piggy back’ on social media platforms like Facebook where players can leverage their existing Facebook social relationships as well as create new ones over the game whereas some game has their own in-game communication function such as Dota where you can either speak through a mic or there is an in-game chat function and ‘chat wheel’ to communicate and strategize with your team.

The market for social gaming is on the rise and I personally think a large driver in the increase is the availability of social games on mobile devices such as our one and only beloved smartphones! 

*not and ad for iPhone ;)*

This accessibility thus creates a larger market of gamers because not only it is easy to download the game into your smartphones, but even the gameplay is easier where the controls are all on your touchscreen (I mean how hard is it to press your screen) *there are mobile games which are hard too don’t get me wrong but you know the drill* compared to gaming on the computer or laptop where you need a hand on one mouse and a keyboard where your remaining hand and fingers need to work extra hard to press those keys.

This is especially not to say hard; but thrilling in first person shooter games like Call of Duty (COD) *MY FAV* and CSGO.

I experienced situations where my female friends don’t consider themselves as gamers when I ask them but ironically they play Mobile Legends (kind of like a mobile version of Dota) and now the famous PUBG –PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds. I see them eating chicken for dinner frequently *PUBG reference right here* 

I was taken aback when I see some friends who are not gamers and kind of have stereotypes on gamers, play PUBG and I am not kidding but I see about 6-10 of them posting on Instagram regarding their Chicken Dinner every now and again.

Here you can kind of see that there are different connotations on the word ‘gamers’. As mentioned in class, only another classmate and I raised our hands when the presenters asked if anybody play games but when Pokemon Go was raised, a few more hands showed up and yup you guessed it, they are females. 

The interpretation that I get is that the convenience of being able to play on their smartphones and how it is not as ‘heavy’ in terms of gameplay and duration when you play on the laptop kind of makes them feel like “nahh I am not a gamer but I am merely just playing games”. I also think that the fact that puzzle games like Candy Crush and Homescapes (I am addicted to this) are becoming more common these days contributes to this phenomenon where people who play games (especially females) do not consider themselves as gamers. An advertising company, Flurry Analytics found that on average, compared to men, women spent 35% more time on mobile games and the readings of the US gaming demographic showed that there is an increase in female gamers at 48% female to 52% male compared to a previous readings of 40% female to 60% male.

*The stats shown below is a different stats compared to the ones written above*

Try and google ‘gamers’ and see the definitions that pops up. Different definitions everywhere! I would simply define gamers as people who play games regardless of the type and mode of games as well as gender where the term ‘gamers’ are commonly especially associated with male players. 

Nowadays, I do not agree with this anymore as there is definitely a rise in female gamers even in games like Dota (and boy they are good) and I hope the stereotype of how female are clueless or ‘noob’ in playing games somehow disappear in the upcoming years because to me, gaming is a form of entertainment and a way to distress after a long day of studying, work and even to those who face difficulties like depression and to some of them gaming is a positive distraction to their thoughts and some even meet people online who gives them support and comfort, this is where I find social gaming remarkable. Even though you might not know them personally but if interacting or communicating with them gives you positive energy, why not? But at the end of the other spectrum, there are trolls and mean people who just love to negatively affect others online even in games (pathetic right?). It’s best to stay vigilant, be really careful and always trust your instinct!

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A hero 

‘Nuff Said (2018) Stan “The Man” Lee Dec 28, 1922 - Nov 12, 2018 Rest in Peace

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Rest in Peace Stan Lee

Thanks for all the great memories.

You did good kid.

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Relatable 

Being in a fandom means seeing the same post 20 times in a row because you and your mutuals all follow the same 5 blogs.

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Fandom & Fan Activism

Today, to most Internet-users, social networking sites are important tools for them but not all would consider themselves as members of online communities where interactions and connections between members occur almost exclusively online. Media fandoms have become prominent examples of online communities today. Fandoms can be briefly described as community of fans that share interests in books, movies, TV shows, bands, sports teams, celebrities and other types of media.

Fandoms have become a perceptible and prominent subculture where fans depend on social networking sites and fan forums to make connections by finding other fans online thus building networks of engagement. Communications online and its immediacy nature and global access provides fandoms the platform to quickly grow their networks and developing relationships with other fans around the world has never been easier!

However, fandom is not restricted to only online technologies despite it being the main platform of interaction. There are many examples of face-to-face events and activities such as comic conventions or normally referred to as “Comic con”.Comic con draws thousands and thousands of fans to meet and fandom-specific clubs have grown to be more common. One thing that I find interesting about fandoms is that since most of the interactions between fans occurs online, they transcend cultural, linguistic and international borders. 

According to Jenkins(1992),the fandom experience is “a community not defined in traditional terms of race, religion, gender, politics, or profession, but rather a community of consumers defined through their common relationship with shared text”

What is Fan Activism?

Fan activism can be defined as a form of civil engagement and political participation which emerges from fandoms and fan cultures’ passion.It can also be defined as efforts that are fan-driven to engage and address social,civic and political issues and these efforts are powerful modes of mobilization in supporting campaigns for human rights or social justice. Fan activism models numerous effective approaches of using social media to mobilize supporters and creating awareness and these approaches are also being adopted now by activist organizations and traditional charities in order to adapt to a networked society.

According to Bennett(2008),new forms of political and civic engagement are formed by younger generations which are tied to social networks and their personal interests.In this point of view,this participatory and popular culture unites people and mobilizes them to socialize.

Andrew Slack who is an activist, established the Harry Potter Alliance(HPA) in 2005 and this was inspired by Dumbledore’s Army, a student activist organization in the Harry Potter world and  HPA is an example of a fan activist organization.The organization uses parallels between the real and fictional world as a boost for civic action and has mobilized young people who are mostly but not exclusively, Potterheads (this is what we call Harry Potter fans) to work for different causes such as human rights,equality and literacy.

As you all know, Harry Potter is widely read and known and is loved not only by hard-core fans but also by those who are “not part of the fandom” making it a useful resource of bringing core concepts from the fictional and the real world together.

The HPA has organized numerous campaigns to raise money in order to achieve both civic and political goals. Jenkins’s definition of fan activism is clearly met by the organization as it uses the story world and is built heavily on the preexisting community of the Harry Potter fandom as a catalyst for social action.The shared perspectives and experiences of Potterheads are mobilized by the organization by connecting stories from Harry Potter to real issues.

Another example is the Invisible Children(IC) which is described as a movement that was built around a documentary.It focuses particularly on the hardships faced by child soldiers recruited into the Lord’s Resistance Army and efforts to increase public awareness of the human rights violations and genocide conducted by a warlord in Uganda. The documentary was a success and in response to that, the filmmakers established IC to inspire young people to use the power of the media to help end Africa’s longest running war. Recently, the campaigns are focused on raising awareness regarding the war in Uganda. It has also urged the US government to pass the Northern Uganda Recovery Act and the Lord’s Resistance Army Disarmament and in May 2010, this was successfully achieved.Now, the Invisible Children puts focus on Uganda’s long-term development and creating infrastructure in the Congo.

Unlike the HPA, IC requires us to have a greater understanding regarding fan activism. HPA was built on existing fan community and popular culture while IC was created by activists’ goals and has almost inadvertently built a fanlike public around a self-produced documentary. Despite that, the organization itself acknowledges that the members of IC resemble fans in many ways such as having an avid knowledge of its narratives and sharing enthusiasm for the media. The members also share a wide range of practices of collectively consuming and producing around IC media products. These two organizations provide us with different representations of the interrelations of fandom and activism.

“Isolated passive consumers” are what media fans have been stereotypically labelled as but I personally think that their consumption is rarely ever isolated or passive and many fandoms these days have become household names and has brought huge impact to people around the globe such as the Potterheads.They are more than just passive consumers because fans seek out content and integrate the cultural capital that they love into their daily activities and conversations.

The Internet, media and social networking sites have become a huge part of our lives and it is unavoidable that social action would intertwine with them. If one of the primary purposes of the Internet has been the production and sharing of media, then it is an ideal setting for the formation of online communities based on media experiences.

Some fans resists the efforts of bringing politics into their fandom and that their fan activities are merely seen as a way to release pressures of everyday life or preferring the term “charity” over the more political term “activism” as a way to describe their pro-social efforts. However, fandoms are valuable and unique in their own ways.

Before I end my post, I would like to ask an important question 

Which fandom(s) do you belong to?

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this is not a parody account what the actual fuck

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No matter the situation, never let your emotions overpower your intelligence.

Jean Houston (via purplebuddhaquotes)

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Fake news on Crowdsourcing

Crowdsourcing in the context that I am going to write on can be briefly defined as the practice of obtaining opinions or information from a large number of people usually via the Internet and social media.

In this day and age,social media emerges as an important tool for journalists and the society for gathering various information from societal issues to the latest developments of breaking news(Phuvipadawat and Murata 2010).How is it possible?Social network platforms allow people with devices that have internet connection to share their opinions or update about unfolding events that they may witness in real-time.

Recently, the problem of ‘fake news’ on social media has gained significant amount of attention. There is little doubt that spreading of fake news are greatly facilitated by the modern information-sharing era.

One vital aspect to this issue is the roles and responsibilities of companies who own social media platforms that are increasingly mediating disclosure in public.The lack of systematic procedures to moderate posts by social media platforms allows proliferation of misinformation which causes people to put extra efforts to establish their veracity and provenance(Webb et al. 2016).

Users of social media is observed to often share their own opinions regarding the veracity of rumours via a collective action,inter-subjective sense-making when there is an absence of statements from authorities or when they want to debunk an ongoing rumour.However, its increasing tendency to give rise to rumours has prompt the development of systems that gathers and analyse the collective judgments of its users to reduce rumours and fake news(Lukasik et al. 2016).This is an example of crowdsourcing.

Research has shown that Twitter has a reputation of debunking inaccurate information well due to the platform’s correcting properties through crowdsourcing where Twitter users share their opinions,speculations and evidences.In 2010,there was an earthquake that happened in Chile and it was shown that the ratio between supporting tweets and debunking false news was 1:1 or in simple words it means there is one supporting tweet per debunking tweet.

But contrary to this, a study on the Boston Marathon bombings showed that Twitter users failed to distinguish between hoaxes and the truth. Remember when Reddit also had mistakenly identified a number of people which they picked from photos that was taken at the Boston Marathon,pinning names to faces causing innocent people to be in fear for their lives.People were confident that it is possible to figure out who the suspect was and incredibly they are also able to name them *wow*

Gotta respect the confidence but I can’t imagine how those who are innocent would feel and recklessly endangering people’s lives like that isn’t really what I would call ‘smart’.

The internet is a very good breeding ground for this kind of overconfidence because when crowdsourcing is done right, it can be super effective and bring so much convenience and benefits and is a fantastic use of ‘cognitive surplus’.This has brought us Wikipedia where people around the world can write,edit and even insert facts to give us information that is ‘correct’ and up to date.

Crowdsourcing obviously has its limits and add fake news to the equation and all hell will break loose.Sometimes like the Boston Marathon incident,it is best to leave it to the police and experts.

There is definitely no doubt that social media is a fantastic place for breaking news.As news can spread like wildfire on social media with just a few clicks, fake news can spread just as quickly.

Personally, I feel like this fake news is easier to spread especially on Twitter.

For instance, a tweet was posted from a parody account of Dan Wootton an ex editor of News of the World,with a breaking news that CNN has suspended Piers Morgan due to allegations of phone hacking.As users start retweeting the news, it gained traction to the point that even some journalists thought it is actually from Dan Wootton. In addition to that,people often tweak a tweet before reposting it and that was Channel 4 News’ Jon Snow did and this looks like he was reporting the news to his followers.

However, responsibility comes with the power of a large audience.Some journalists utilize their followers to assist them in establishing facts.Crowdsourcing on Twitter heavily relies on retweeting to pass information to others.In this kinds of situation it illustrates good interactions with audience and using knowledge from people to clarify news.

Nevertheless,there are some cons of crowdsourcing. For instance, the Jon Snow incident where a journalist spreads fake or unconfirmed news where his tweet was still being retweeted even after it was clarified and deleted.A journalist who is trying to establish the truth by using crowdsourcing method may accidentally take a rumour and spread fake news to a wider audience.

Fake news in crowdsourcing leads to questionable quality of work and undermines professional practice in journalism.

According to Fuchs(2013), both professionals and the society are increasingly leveraging social media as an information source about current affairs and latest developments.It also has great potential for news diffusion and there are times where we would learn about breaking news from social media instead of professional news outlets.I personally think the users here and I can relate to this trend and personally, I learnt about incidents like MH370 and the recent JT 160 through social media.

Crowdsourcing aimed for veracity leads to the collection of perceptions that are credible as ‘verifications’ often requires an extensive work of checking additional sources to validate the accuracy of information.Fake news and rumours alike will provoke social media users to exchange their views to find out the truth to a story.

Exponential proliferation of fake news is alarming and can really get out of hand, extending into mainstream news coverage, making it difficult to differentiate between what is real and fake.

In this modern era, focus is put on automated tools to combat the spreading of fake news by flagging identified hoaxes or using natural language processing techniques to automatically detect fake news.

Facebook introduced new features that allow users and third-party to identify or ‘flag’ posts that seems to be ‘fake news’.Facebook is experimenting with the newly introduced features which aims to solve the problem of fake news through crowdsourcing.

"We believe in giving people a voice and that we cannot become arbiters of truth ourselves, so we’re approaching this problem carefully," –Facebook- 

The feature enables users to flag false information that appeared on their news feed and can be done by clicking on the upper right-hand corner to the post and report it as fake news.

Posts that have been flagged as fake news is then reviewed by third-party organizations and according to The New York Times,they include Politifact,ABC News and Poynter and these organizations has collectively agreed to a fact-checking code developed by Poynter Institute,a non-profit journalism training center.

Users who share disputed stories on Facebook will be alerted with a warning as seen below.

Facebook has also eliminated the site’s ability to spoof domain to stop the production of fake news and prevent spammers from disguising as publishers of legit news. During the 2016 US presidential election, the amount of fake news created was insane and posting hoaxes like this are ways spammers can make money. Due to this, Facebook was criticized for becoming a breeding ground for fake news and biased reporting during the presidential election.

According to the Pew Research Center, it was found that 55% smartphone users receive news alert on their phones.An analysis by Buzzfeed found that the fake news that was most widely shared were regarding “Hillary Clinton selling weapons to ISIS and being disqualified from holding federal office”, “Pope Francis endorsing Trump” and Clinton Foundation giving the FBI director millions of dollars”.

It was claimed by a social media assessment that the 20 largest fake stories generated 8.7 million comments,shares and reactions compared to 7.4 million that was generated by 19 major news sites’ top 20 election stories.

A survey conducted after the election showed that 3,015 adults in America suggested that news consumers find it difficult to distinguish fake from real news. A survey by Chris Jackson of Ipsos Public Affairs found that American adults are fooled by fake news headlines about 75% of the time and that fake news are seen as credible and a portion of electorates still remember them.

Fake news are sometimes exaggerated and quickly disseminated through fake accounts or automated bots and there are bots that are designed to have malicious intents to purposely do harm by misleading,exploiting and manipulating social media discourse with slander,misinformation,rumours and spam.

This kind of information brings negative effect to election campaigns and perceptions of the public.

False information from fake news can be dangerous because it has the ability to affect electoral campaigns and public opinion.This can possibly enable controversial and discriminatory ideas to reach the public and treated as facts. Facebook may still feel like it is under pressure until more aggressive steps is taken to filter out stories that are misleading or fake with an internal team of editors and fact-checkers or using its own algorithm because of how quickly people these days believe in fake news and sometimes crowdsourcing seems to have a limited impact.After all,in the first place,users believed fake stories and by sharing them, eventually it will  go viral.

India for example has also been plagued by fake news and they include news on child abuse,cyclones and public health.Add these fake news to an equation of religious or caste issues,this has the potential to be a deadly combination which can lead to violence.There are people who have been killed when fake news on child abduction was spread on social media.This is just a tip of the iceberg to how fake news can harm the society.

Such as in what happens in crowdsourcing, when users see that a particular news is repeatedly shared, naturally they will be influenced by that and trust that news and obviously, this is what happens when fake news is also repeatedly shared.

However,crowdsourcing can also punch fake news in their faces.

Crowdsourcing can utilised by working with the society to help in the detection process or in other words, leveraging the ‘self-correcting’ crowd where posts or messages can be distributed to the crowd and ask them to rate the credibility of the posts.

Expertise of large numbers of users or readers on social media can be drawn through crowdsourcing to discern potential setbacks in news coverage and can be useful in dealing with fake news. The Guardian for instance made an effort to draw the crowd’s wisdom to assess the expenses of the Parliament member which was documented in 450,000 documents in the United Kingdom.To deal with the lack of personnel to analyse the newsworthiness efficiently, the newspaper created a website accessable to the public for them to read the documents and categorise them into (1)not interesting,(2) interesting but known,(3)interesting and lastly (4)investigate this.The citizens were able to help assess which documents are worthy of further investigation and eventually news coverage or in other words, problematic.

Karolin Schwarz, a German business consultant and her friend Lutz Helm decided to create and launch an online platform aimed to debunk fake news called Hoaxmap.The trigger to this? Schwarz saw an insane number of reports with minimal or no-fact checking on social media of supposed refugee crimes. From a personal effort to go against hate speech and fake news,it quickly turned into a crowdsourced initiative.

According to a local German newspaper,Sueddeutsche Zeitung,an estimation of 240 hoaxes where 187 of them is from Germany and the remaining from Switzerland and Austria was collected and debunked by Schwarz.

There is a map on the site where alleged locations of where the ‘news’ happened is pinpointed and users read the incident’s summary with a link provided where the news are refuted. These fake news contributes to a hostile atmosphere which can trigger physical violence and hate crimes.

"The debunked cases marked on the map range from thefts and assaults to manslaughter - but one of the most common topics is rape," -Schwarz-  

Social media platforms like Facebook are commonly used to spread fake news and this calls for punitive actions where Facebook has launched “Online Civil Courage Initiative”,a new campaign to counter against extremist and hate speech on the Internet. Facebook pledged about 1 million euros for the campaign and it consists of three main pillars which are financial support to NGOs that are already countering extremism online,academic research initiatives to understand the roots of hate speech and extremism and governments and other online services.

In conclusion, I think this works both ways depending on the issues in a particular news and the people who are interested or is somehow involved in the news. Fake news can either successfully ride on the perks of crowdsourcing causing them to spread even further which may lead to harmful situations or people can use crowdsourcing to go against fake news and provide people with the truth.I think the latter should be emphasized and that people should learn and think on how to utilize crowdsourcing to go against fake news.

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How we should react to trolls lurking online 

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MOOD

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Week 7:Twitter’s susceptibility to trolls and hate

Troll??

Troll in the social media world means a person who creates discord or conflict on the Internet by posting messages that are controversial and provocative in order to start fights or evoke emotional response from people on the Internet or in simple words,to offend them. Yes it is unfortunate that this kind of terrible people exist. #sadfactoflife .However,to make things worse,the Internet has provided these people the platform to spread hate and malice easier, with almost no consequences in the real world.

If you’re an active social media user, chances are that you’ve experienced trolling in one way or another.

Trollers and the rest of the fandom argue that the insults,threats or provocations are merely forms of mischief and humour and emphasizes on the freedom of speech but for many,the personal nature and the ferocity of the abuse verges on hate speech.Given the right to free speech does not mean you should do it.

Trolling in its extreme form can be a criminal offence. Sean Duffy posted offensive videos and messages on tribute pages on young people who died and one of his unfortunate target was Natasha MacBryde, a 15 year old who was killed by a train. One of his insensitive and thoughtless messages he left on the Facebook page was ‘I fell asleep on the track lolz”.The consequences for being an insensitive idiot : he was jailed for 18 weeks.

Unlike the trolls you see in fairy tales, trolls on social media lurks in the open instead of under bridges or in caves, they wait for the best time to come out with every keystroke,striving to provoke and incite hatred.

According to a research done on comments on CNN, there are two major factors that influences people to troll and the first factor is a person’s mood. It was found that people who were in negative moods were much more likely to troll and this is in sync with the mood patterns of humans which ebbs and flows with the day of week and time of day.

The research shows that trolling happens least frequently in the morning and most frequent late at night. It does not stop there but the heights of trolling is at its most frequent on Mondays.

A discussion’s context is the second factor. I’m sure all of you agrees with this or may have seen this “banter” happening on Facebook or Twitter. Posts that begins with a “troll comment” are more likely to be joined by other users compared to posts that does not begin with such comments. Not only that, the more troll comments there are, it attracts more and more troll comments from users. Trollolol.

It was possible to forecast when a person is going to troll approximately 80% of the time by using machine learning algorithms.The two factors put together is a much stronger indicator of trolling compared to pointing out specific individuals as trolls. Basically,trolling occurs more due to the influence of nurture which relates to the person’s environment compared to any inherent trait.

Ordinary people like me and you *winks* can also be influenced to troll as such behaviour can rub on others.It is due to the emotional response to such comments perhaps written by someone who woke up on the wrong side of the bed leading to comments that reacts towards it and end up having heaps and heaps of troll comments! *tragic*

If such behaviour is left unchecked, trolling can end up becoming the norm in the society.Predicting when trolling will happen can be done better by understanding possible factors that leads to such act.

However, it is vital that we know how to differentiate a troll comment and a comment from someone who just need some help in communicating their ideas better.

The findings of a study shows that high percentage of online abuse happens on Twitter and this is probably due to the anonymity of the platform when compared to other social network sites like Facebook which require users to present their real identity.A study done on 134,000 abusive mentions on social media showed that 88% of them happens on Twitter and the remaining small percentage happened on Facebook and other sites(Edwards 2015). 

A British TV host Sue Perkins, quit Twitter after receiving death threats due to other people’s opinion that she might be a good replacement on Top Gear in place of Jeremy Clarkson.This occurrence of famous people leaving Twitter due to death threats happens very often and the stats of it happening on Twitter compared to Facebook is just beyond words!

I’m sure the question that pops up is why does Twitter face this problem and Facebook does not?It is related to “real identity” where other social network sites require you to show who you really are and this does not really work on Twitter especially.Anybody can sign up with a fake name and an anonymous email address.A trend I find on Twitter are accounts created with a famous person’s name and the content are filled with disses and spiteful comments and so called “banters”.

Facebook prevails when it comes to troll removal. Even though all platforms allow a person to report behaviours that are abusive,Facebook’s follow up is the strongest. You have full control over the comments on your Facebook page where a deleted comment will be vanished from everybody’s eyes unless the troll decided to repeat the same thing. Accounts that are created with fake names or accounts created for the sake of harassing purposes are taken down quickly.I’ve experienced an imposter of myself messaging my friends for a verification code and my friends and I reported the account and in a few minutes,the account was immediately removed!

Trolls value anonymity and seldom confirm their emails or phone numbers and they tend to use the default photo on Twitter which was formerly the famous egg icon.The egg icon was dropped as it has become heavily associated with online abuse which is not fair to those genuine users who are new and have not selected their profile photo.Accounts created to harass others are often not personalized as they don’t really have the time to.However, you can exclude these trolls from your feed by simply going to the Privacy section and select Notifications and mute people who uses a default photo and users who hasn’t confirm their phone number or email.With just a few clicks,you can change your feed from being exposed to all the toxicity.Yes they are still roaming free but why would you care if you can’t see them. Ignorance is bliss. *sometimes*

Twitter is making changes to address abuse and malicious automated accounts in the face of criticism it doesn't do enough to curb harassment and manipulation on its service.

Each week,there has been a dramatic rise in the creation of spam or automated accounts on Twitter. Nearly 10 million potential fake or spam accounts were created weekly, identified by Twitter’s machine learning tools.This is an increase of 3.2 million in September.

Twitter announced new rules where users who wants to join Twitter are required to either confirm a phone number or an email address when signing up on Twitter.Twitter hopes to reduce spam accounts’ visibility by removing their accounts from engagement counts and follower figures unless they confirm their identity(Musil 2018).

Jack Dorsey,Twitter’s CEO asked users for recommendations on how to fix the platform after recognizing that Twitter can be extremely toxic and that his team and he had underestimated the consequences it can have in the real-world. He recognized and has witnessed harassments,abuse,armies of trolls, manipulations and divisive echo chambers that are increasing.

Particularly over the past few years, Twitter takes the center stage for various abuse such as death threats, attack mobs, revenge porn and privacy violations.

Some ways to handle trolls :-

1)Handle them with humour

IMO, humour is the best weapon a person can have! By making light of a troll’s tweet, you’re basically acknowledging and defusing the situation simultaneously.

A grocery chain in the UK, Sainsbury’s, responded to a criticism regarding their chicken sandwich in a lighthearted manner and their response is top class.What’s important here is they did not ignore the customer’s tweet.They apologized,recognized the problem and replied in a witty manner.They managed to turn a criticism into an engagement opportunity.

2) Feed them with facts

A way to debunk trolls and their ‘tales’ is with facts and ‘tales’ here can include rumours and posts with false information or inaccuracies. Do you guys remember when Apple released the iPhone 6 and there were posts and rumours about it bending in your pocket?Thus the birth of the hashtag #bendgate with a lot of trolling on the side.

Many trolls lurking in the Internet was very creative about it and inspired to post their version of it.

Apple took a stand and responded to the criticisms by admitting that it could bend but wouldn’t normally happen with normal use.(obviously anything can bend/break with such force that you don’t usually do to a phone LMAO) #BendGate turns out to be a much ado about almost nothing and Apple received only 9 complaints and openly shared the stats. Addressing the issue head-on was Apple’s tactic to stop further controversies(Rampton 2015).

P.S. I personally think the best way is to just ignore the trolls. 

References

Edwards, J 2015, ‘One statistic shows that Twitter has a fundamental problem Facebook solved years ago’, Business Insider, 17 April, viewed 23 October 2018, <http://uk.businessinsider.com/statistics-on-twitter-abuse-rape-death-threats-and-trolls-2015-4/?IR=T>.

Musil, S 2018, ‘Twitter ramps up effort to combat abusive bots,trolls’, CNET, 26 June, viewed 23 October 2018, <https://www.cnet.com/news/twitter-ramps-up-effort-to-combat-abusive-bots-trolls/>.

Rampton, J 2015, ’10 tips to dealing with trolls’, Forbes, 9 April, viewed 22 October 2018, <https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnrampton/2015/04/09/10-tips-to-dealing-with-trolls/#1b4703bf54f4>.

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