#Spread the word of those who cannot speak for themselves and provide a platform for them to speak

[infamouslydorky]

You won't be able to solve every problem. Sometimes, things are out of your ability to make change. That does not mean you cannot focus on what you can do. It may not be in a massive scale, but change happens one person at a time, being able to do one thing at a time no matter how small. Please, do what's within your realm of capability to make the world better

[anguyen06]

Week 11 Blog Post #9 (due 11/04)

How does the internet and technology affect the way people use the internet and technology for a political or social movement?

Social media is one of the more popular ways to campaign a movement and spread information to a wider audience. It makes sense that humans utilize/control technology to their advantage and to their will. However, as Fuchs pointed out in the reading, “[The media - social media, the Internet and all other media-... can dampen/forestall or amplify/advance protest or have not much effect at all. Also, different media (e.g. alternative media and commercial media) stand in a contradictory relation and power struggle with each other” (Fuchs, 2018). To interpret this, social media has a hand in how humans act on these social media platforms. Take for instance how people talk about social movements on Reddit versus Twitter. Reddit is known to showcase toxicity and put down any opposing views. Twitter is more likely to be open to all ideas and respectful. During the Black Lives Matter Movement, people on Twitter were posting videos and threads of the event, while Instagram were posting black squares and hashtags. The format of each platform influences how people “support” or spread information about the movement.

How has the internet changed the way social and political movements happen?

The changes the internet allows one singular post to reach millions of users, expanding upon the growth and influence of the political movements. Instead of growing these movements through word of mouth or marketing through newspapers and signs, the internet allows for not only a rise in awareness over the matter, but also provides a platform for protestors to communicate and plan events. According to Vegh, “the Internet allows an activist to distribute a message to thousands of people all over the world at once and to publish information that is accessible from anywhere anytime with virtually no cost” (Vegh, 2013). Because of the productivity that the Internet provides with its efficient methods of communication, the Internet has become society’s number one option when it comes to the development of social and political movements. Not only does the Internet allow activists to spread information and awareness, but it also revolves “around organizing the movement and carrying out action” (Vegh, 2013). Since activists’ number one goal is causing change, they would want to apply a sense of urgency by taking action, something that the Internet is able to provide them with due to its convenience and wide-spread audience reach.

How has the media aided in the fight for racial equality?

Since many people are unable or unwilling to speak up in person even if it is to defend people of their own race, the Internet lets those who are being discriminated against to fight back and defend themselves. First off, the media can remind society of one of its greatest teachers, history. The history that media can remind society of the “histories of colonization, slavery, and imperialism” (Lee, 2017). Since the world has learned from its biggest mistakes and regrets, reminding society of these problems that occurred in the past proves to be an effective way to prevent society from regaining these negative ideas. Overall, modern media has provided minorities to stand up for themselves and their rights, keeping others from making the same mistakes that their ancestors have already made in the past.

Does communication the Internet provides lead to a more negative or positive environment?

Overall, the Internet provides a more positive atmosphere in society today. Although there may be a lot of hate and negativity spread by those with differing opinions, I believe that society can generally work together to fight against these injustices. Even though not everybody will agree with one another, people are still able to stand up for each other against those who cannot accept that others have different opinions. Trolling and hate crimes may make the internet a dark place, but instead of feeding into this negativity, users need to work towards unity in the way that people respond to one another, stating if they agree or disagree, then moving forward. Even though it may be irritating at times to see someone arguing for an opposing viewpoint, it is important to keep an open mind and understand their point of view because one can always learn from how others think and perceive a situation that you see in a different light. The positives of the internet are when minority groups are able to find a community online when their lives off screen are judgemental. It goes without saying that the internet may have its flaws, but there are many positives the internet provides that should be focused on.

References:

Fuchs, C. (2018). Communication Power in the Arab Spring and Occupy Movement. In Social Media: A critical Introduction (pp. 83-88). essay, SAGE.

Lee, L. (2017). Black twitter: A response to bias in mainstream media. Social Sciences, 6(1), 26. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci6010026

Vegh, S. (2013). Classifying Forms of Online Activity. In Cyberactivism: Online activism in theory and Practice. essay, Routledge.

[nahiyasha]

Millennials are the Woke Generation

published under The Westernian Advocate (Features, Magazine, 2018-2019)

Woke /wōk/ (adj.): (1) aware of and actively attentive to important facts and issues (especially issues of racial and social justice); (2) being conscious of what is going on in the community.

    We are natural empathic human beings. We weave tapestry of words through each other's minds with care as we begin to talk about things that really matter--yet not all of us are as empathic and socially informed as millennials of today. We Filipinos have let our old traditions to conform to a monotonous life; to only care and mind about the things that only affects us and forget about those that breaks our generation in some way. However, millennials are going to break that stigma and educate othersthat being woke is not a pretentious one.

Creating Marks

    Woke is a particular term from 1800's of African American culture--then evolved to the expression "Stay Woke". Its grammatical aspect refers to the consistentawareness of social issues which then came to the result of the Black Lives Matter Movement. However, because of the social media platform, Twitter, this term began to spread across the internet and was then used as an internet slang for millennials who always have a say about the main things.

    Based on an article on Refinery29, millennials are said to be internally and externally self-aware. They get conscious of anything that attacks the bare humanness of an individual—to unlearn the mistakes that are still fought from the past, and to evolve in emotional and intellectual intelligence. To shed some light on the complex intersection of being young and being aware of what is going on around us.

    “They are aware of the issues around at ganun dom anpit themselves, kaya lang they tend to neglect some important points for their awareness not to be wasted. They are aware of themselves but there are points that they do not know how to regulate themselves the right way. Possible na because of too much emotions kaya they are so vulnerable,” said Ms. Diane Lipat, RPM, Psychology Professor.

Stomping Grounds

    Millennials get labelled often as "entitled" or "lazy" bums especially the older generations who watch their every step in life. They are quick to put their cents in us because they compare and judge everything that we do with the tradition from the generation that they were brought up in.

    Society is still stereotypical even about his, but as millennials become more aware of social issues, they are more unwilling to submit to the status quo. There is a thin line of misunderstanding on the complex intersection between being young and what being socially aware actually feels like.

    “Comparisons will always exist between the old and young generations. For me, ‘yung view ng matatanda na tamad ang millennials is maybe because lahat kasi noon you need to put efforts para mabuhay unlike ngayon mas madali na ang lahat easy and fast na. ‘Yung halos lahat na gagawin for them,” said Ms. Lipat.

    The old and young generation always clash in each other’s opinion of who’s who—comparison between them is inevitable since there are polar opposites and differences upon which they generations they were brought up into.

Leaving Tracks

    To look past the provided narrative and examine one's privelege is millennial's wild card—there is more than one reality to life after all. Millennials put their attention through the ills of the world and have been upfront on activism. They protect those that cannot speak for themselves and of the things that are unspoken for.

    The empathy that millennials have today kills the selfishness that was once brought to us from repetitive teachings. Millennials understand that the things that they have not directly experience do not mean that they will not experience them at all. From empowering the young generations to speak and stand on what they believe, particularly in the injustices of our political system, the corruption of our government, the horrible crimes committed and the effects of horrible mental illnesses to its victims, and the list goes on. Because of the damaging social issues and society of today they begin to be hyperaware of the things that they should to to improve the injustices that we have now. As young people at work, they learn to value and to which to disseminate their time and ideas. Millennials redefined what it means to be successful and ittooka lot of anxiety to get there.

    “Dati kasi success means happiness. Madrama man pero that’s fulfilment before. ‘Yung basta nag-eenjoy ka. Natututo. Unlike ngayon, look around. This generation is exhausted. Parang lahat in competition with the standards na na-set ng society. But most of all kaya nakakapagod at toxic kasi ayaw man natin aminin, ang struggle ay ‘yung we are more of competing with the standards we set for ourselves. Masyado tayong namamadali. We tend to be so impatient na feel natin dapat ganito ganiyan. ‘Yung tyranny of the should ang nagpapa-toxic ng buhay natin,” said Ms Lipat.

Growing Pains

    Millennials are taking the reins to heal our communities since they grew up in a broken economy and are fiscally doomed by what the generations before them had left to fix. Millennials are the first generation to have less wealth that a lot of them are struggling. However, this does not stop them to thirst for knowledge—with or without degree.

    “Hindi mo naman lahat maiisisi sa results ng past. ‘Yung initial struggles posibleng oo, pero yung in the long run na wala pa ding pagbabago, for me, tayo na sa generation natin ang may responsibility. Kasi whatever it is na iniwan ng older generation, wala na masyadong bearing sa buhay natin ngayon. Kasi tayo naman ang magsisikap. Tayo ang magpapaunlad sa mga sarili natin. Kaya lang, in reality, nakasanayan na natin i-blame sa kung sino at bakit tayo nahihirapan,” explain Ms. Lipat.

    In fact, being technology surrounded in everyday life, millennials always have found a way to make money out of their creative ideas.

Shaking things Up

    The call-out culture of this generation empower others to speak their views--which is a good thing, since a lot of movements are now being fueled by their passion on speaking and standing up for genuine humanity. Millennials who encourage people to be socially aware helps to somehow beat racism, homophobic claims, social injustice, corrupt government, and the list just goes on.

    Being woke is not pretentious. Millennials are the generation who become the person for promoting and embodying change. One cannot just lift his fist in the air for the world to change, rather, he needs to become more empathetic, more critical, and more of the so many things that we lack today.

[queermediastudies]

Milk - It’s not just for cereal anymore.

Milk, is a biographical film based on the life of Harvey Milk, who was the first openly gay San Francisco politician, who was gunned down by a disgruntled city supervisor. This film was also not just about the life of Harvey Milk, it was also a film that depicted the time frame in which he lived in, the 1970’s, a time where men and women came together to fight the injustice and inequality that was being levied against the population of the city of San Francisco, and across the United States of America. The film follows the last few years of Supervisor Milk’s life, starting on his 40th birthday and follows him to his 48th birthday, as well as following his endeavor to incite change and provide for not only the LGBTQ community, but for everyone (seniors, minority, kids, and heterosexuals). Milk is the story of leaving a mark on society, and helping cause change that would affect the lives of the people around you.

The film originally started to gain traction when Oliver Stone showed interesting producing the film, in early 1991 (Gus Van Sant); however, after signing a director in 1992, the film production fell on hard times in 1993 and was not revisited until 2007, when Van Sant wanted revisit the biopic. Before filming, Harvey Milk’s life was heavily researched, and many one of the sources used to recreate the life of Supervisor Milk was the GLBT Historical Society in San Francisco, his personal belongings, as well as speaking with people who knew the City Supervisor. With several weeks of photographs, researching film, video, historic textiles and other resources ( The Times of Harvey Milk, a documentary that was released in 1984, directed by Rob Epstein, was a huge resource) Milk started filming until January 2008, after a second project, helmed by Brian Singer, met its demise due to a writer strike.

Milk provided a look into the life of the first openly gay city supervisor in San Francisco, however the cast was made up of primarily of a heterosexual cast. At the time, this was seen to be common place for Hollywood, however as the times are changing there is the potential for blow back of having a heterosexual actor portraying an openly gay politician. Was the issue of representation at the time? Or was it as Dr. Martin states “cisgender heterosexuals are “brave” in taking on roles different from themselves” (Martin, 2018)?

While the main plot point of Milk was that of equal rights for gays and lesbians, the production company responsible strayed from the belief that City Supervisor Milk strived for. Was the film more successful or successful because of the actors that were picked to portray their on-screen versions of their real-life counter parts? While the performances that were delivered in a manner that would be considered believable, if not true to the real man that the film was based off, were there not other actors capable of giving authentic performances as well. This topic is something that has just, in the last decade or so started coming to light, the casting of heterosexual actors/actresses. This has been a hot topic as there has not be fair representation of the LGBTQ community on television or film, but there is change coming, this change is due, and slow to come.  With equality balancing slowly for the LGBTQ community, more and more actors/actresses have been accepted in larger and larger films, they are no longer bottom of the barrel actors/actresses in mediocre movies, or low budget straight to DVD movies.

While watching the film, I also had noticed that there were minorities being represented in the film as well, but once again they were being represented by cisgendered heterosexual males. This did not bode well for LGBTQ community members who are a minority. While there was minority representation in the film, again the bigger roles were filled by the heterosexual actors, and unfortunately there was no way for me to ascertain if any of the smaller actors (extras) were of the LGBTQ community. However, as progress is being made with equality for those of LGBTQ community, the biggest being that members of the of the LGBTQ community are being included, nay, not included but being placed in positions on where they have the ability to put real life back into art. More importantly, they are putting themselves, their culture, on to the screen. In away they are educating masses, they are providing information on what was one considered to be a taboo, disgusting life style. As Milk took a chance to show us life back in the 1970s for members of the LGBTQ community had to face, but as mentioned before, progress has been made. Take for example, the show Pose, has been taking strides and advances to create equality at one level. “But there is something transgressive about what Pose is doing” (Fallon, 2018), they are placing trans actors in main roles, they are placing them in the writing rooms; Ryan Murphy, creator of show, chose a cast of actors and actresses who are breaking ground and creating a foothold in territory controlled by the heteronormativity. Murphy placed Janet Mock, the first openly trans woman of color, not just in the writing room for Pose, but also behind the camera allowing her to direct an episode of the popular show.

Now, as the bard say, here in lies the rub; the creation of shows and film that cast LGBTQ members, placing them in staring rolls, are great educational tools that don’t require the violence that has been exposed in the past. The history, the hate, the animosity that the people have faced is something that cannot be erased; more importantly it is something that can be untaught, but it will take time and patience. As the Stonewall riots brought a physical stand, the line that drawn in the sand so to speak, about equality rights; shows like Pose are just a new face on a prolonged battle equality.  In the third chapter of Stonewall and Beyond, it was brought to our, no my attention that there were shows in the past that were attempting to make the same head way as Pose, “the success of the 1972 TV movie That Certain Summer drew the attention of activists because of the potential it demonstrated for television to reach national audiences” (Gross,2002,p.43). This allowed for more people to become aware of the issues that men and women of the LGBTQ community were facing, I say this in the sense that it opened the eyes of millions to the fact that there were people hiding their true selves from the rest of the world, because of fear and persecution.

Watching Milk unfold on the screen in front of me has opened my eyes about a lot of things, and being a person who has seen themselves as a neutral party for my those of my friends who are of the LGBTQ community, I find myself trying to find a reason as to why people need to be afraid of difference. I am a minority, a member of the heterosexual norm, so to speak, of a near complete college education. I find that to me; it is neither my sexuality or my skin color that influences my engagement on this topic. It is, the education that I experienced in the real world. I have friends, I have served with men and women, who are members of the LGBTQ community; and it is from those men and women that I have learned my lessons. As a friend to these men and women, equality is starting to play a big factor into my understanding on how society runs and how we a species, are so willing to draw a line in the sand and shun people are on the other side of that line. Critically, looking at the movie, I am some what dismayed that Milk did not take the time to break more barriers at the time. Opening the door on a politically charged topic like equal rights, would have been a great platform on which one could have chosen actors who were of the LGBTQ community to be the cast of characters, creating a stronger foothold for which to spread the word of equality. Despite that, Milk was a great film, the story telling was complied with real new reel footage that was shot during the time of Harvey Milk’s rise and untimely fall, added more of a personal touch to the film, as well as having an actor who bore a similar resemblance to the late Harvey Milk. In the end, consuming Milk opened my eyes to one thing that has been, until recently, and that is “writers seem to continue you balk at the idea that queer characters of color are deserving of dynamic and standalone narratives” (Leiva, 2017). The research and writing that went into developing this film did not leave out any of the characteristics of Jack, portraited by Diego Luna, as Milk’s second lover in the film, who suffered from serious depression, alcoholism and suicidal thoughts. While, Sean Penn delivered an award-winning performance, and being able to humanize the character so that people unfamiliar with the plight of the LGBTQ community and the on-going battle for equality had a better connection to the story and struggle.

   Jr, A. L. M. (2018, August 2). Pose(r): Ryan Murphy, Trans and Queer of Color Labor, and the Politics of Representation. Retrieved from https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/poser-ryan-murphy-trans-queer-color-labor-politics-representation/.

Gross, L. P. (2002). Up from invisibility: lesbians, gay men, and the media in America. New York: Columbia University Press.

Fallon, K. (2018, June 1). 'Pose' Isn't Just Great TV. It's Making Trans History. Retrieved from https://www.thedailybeast.com/pose-isnt-just-great-tv-its-making-trans-history.

Leiva, L. (2017) TV Is Getting More Progressive, But It's Still Failing Queer People Of Color. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.bustle.com/p/tv-is-getting-more-progressive-but-its-still-failing-queer-people-of-color-64520.

[juenger-juenger-blog]

Ernst Jünger : On Nationalism and the Jewish Question

If one considers the two movements of national aspirations in our time—on the one hand the traditionally tinged one, in which civic, legitimistic, reactionary, and economic tones merge or diverge in various ways—and on the other hand, the revolutionary one—one finds that anti-Semitism is the cornerstone of correlations. While its joy of war-ornamentation is in one case more or less dismissive, it is in the other case overt. This may be unpleasant for the Jew and also, potentially, dangerous for him. 

The anti-Semitism of forces tied by kinship is, in its essence, the late and weak offspring of the feudal world. In the same manner as one likes to maintain a façade in front of burnt buildings from which the creative elements have long ago vanished, one considers it to be a cosmetic error to see the Jew in representative positions. This, however, does not prevent making use of the Jew and finding him often in real working places. In the course of the 19th century, he occupies more and more many of these positions and quite early exerts his influence—for instance in the manner of Professor Stahl—on the constitutional foundation of the legitimate powers, or furthermore—this is not unimportant—on the mending maintenance of that foundation and on conservative thought. In the course of the Wilhelminian Empire, in which the official access to the hierarchy remains difficult or closed for him, when one scratches the surface one still encounters him everywhere in the highest and most important spheres. Almost nothing has changed, as everybody knows, after the coup d’état.

Wherever one explores today the active forces in terms of moderate and legitimate reaction or of wide national civic restoration, it will not be long until one runs into the unavoidable type of the Jewish advocate—the speaking, writing, consulting or bargaining attorney—who uses men and powers, regardless to which movement they belong, with an unbiased manner that is characteristic of his race. This is clearly the case today—in order to be able to take a stand in this sense against liberalism, namely, to combat it with its own means and with its own vocabulary—resentment is much more essential than it was hundred years ago. The keyboard that can produce all gamut of tricks, from the idealistic burst of indignation to the anxious yells of the threatened culture— that is to say, above all the reflective tones—needs performers with extensive training in resentment that has become a part of them. Hence, the expert will not be surprised by the odd blossom of the well-cultivated conservative prose that nowadays flows more frequently from the Jewish pens. One encounters sharp pleas of defence for culture, witty mocking of the civilization enterprise, aristocratic snobbism, the Catholic farce, pseudo-morphologic interest in historical processes, inconspicuously deliberated soundness; it would be altogether mischevious to mention names. For this is too nice to be angry at—is one not delighted by the beautiful advertisement for the reputable cigarette merchant Overstolz who keeps accounts at his little Biedermeier-comptoir with dignified strictness? Here, the merchandise reaches such a degree of an “as if attitude” that it is almost impolite to moreover notice it any longer. In any case the Jew, who really has talent, who really has the ability to scent, currently argues conservatively. There are hidden here positions and intricate possibilities for mental attitude which has already been fought over with great astuteness. The Jew cannot complain about the attention he receives from the forces that represent today’s conservative ideas, and the question is whether or not he benefits from the anti-Semitic shiny surface of those forces. For he needs a basic mood for his rhetoric, which always has ethical structure because it cannot have a heroic one, a basic mood which can be described as the opposite of the pathos of the distance. Hence, he relies on persecution, on anti-Semitism; as likewise, according to the right remark, the Ghetto is a Jewish invention. Muted conservative attitude, which is broken in its root, can, however, provide this scope most cheaply, most painlessly and most invisibly, in so far as it can melt him into a fine conservative line, which is, in addition, very flexible regarding “efficiency,” “spirit” and, of course, money. Hence, neither the British Empire nor the Habsburg monarchy had ever, in modern times, a shortage of Jewish paladins. 

Of course, today there exists in the political language, besides the word “conservative” only one other word which is just as frequent and just as little convincingly used, namely, the word “revolutionary.” Both our so-called conservatives and our so-called revolutionaries lack originality to the same extent. What marks the originality of the conservative is that it must be very old, and of the revolutionary, that it must be very young. The conservatives of today are, however, almost without exception a hundred years old, and the revolutionaries are even older. In other words, the influence of liberalism is wider than one generally believes, and almost every debate takes place within its vicinity. The vocabulary of our great-grandfathers has revived in a spooky way, and with a dull repertoire of political terms—which one does not attempt to rebaptize and at which the naïve joy of discovery delights among contemporaries—spread out from all the platforms of the public opinion.

Here lies the lack of consistency that is part and parcel of the anti-Semitic nature of national movements which define themselves as revolutionary. Even if one overlooks those sects which create their world-view out of negation, one will be amazed by the lack of confident instinct from which the blow against the Jew often comes, often with great effort; but it is always too flat to be effective. The reason for this is that one tries to determine and destroy the influence of the Jew on German life in accordance with the methods of real individualistic thinking. Favored are the images of traditional medicine in which a neutralization of a swarm of single-cell attacking bacteria plays an important role. Against this, demagogically seen, nothing could be done—and demagogy plays an important role among the arts, if one suspects that behind that lies a priesthood which is superior to its profane doctrine. Thus, the praise of honesty is the highest thing that the critique has to grant.

The Jew, however, is not the father, but rather, child of liberalism, as he can play no creative role, neither positively nor negatively, as far as German life is concerned. In order to be able to become dangerous, infectious, corrosive, it was necessary for him to first have a status that enabled him to be in his new figure, the figure of the civilized Jew. That status was created by liberalism, by the grand declaration of the independence of the spirit, and it likewise will be destroyed again by nothing but the complete bankruptcy of liberalism. Any attack on the civilization-Jew [Zivilisationsjude] launched from the liberal sphere has failed, for exactly there, where it could succeed, its effect would simply be equal to external disinfection. And the liberal sphere reaches, as we said, much further than one commonly believes. Hence, it is not a coincidence that Italian Fascism is on good terms with the civilization-Jew, for fascism is no doubt nothing but the latter phase of liberalism, a simplified and abridged procedure, as it were, a brutal shorthand of the liberalist constitution which has become too hypocritical, too empty, and above all, too verbose. But for Germany, neither fascism nor bolshevism is proper; they incite, but will not satisfy, and one can expect from that land that it be capable of a distinct and stricter solution.

What justifies German hope is the will to Gestalt, the beginnings—scattered and yet strong—of the morphological thinking which stands opposed to liberalism, as water is to fire. It is a new sight of the inner Gestalt, of the character of the things that, still hesitating, trains in observing, and strives to penetrate into the depth, not through abstraction, but rather through originality. Although this posture, this new German posture as such, does not have to occupy itself with the civilization-Jew; it will encounter him with certainty in each of its steps as an opponent who immediately feels endangered by it—for the end of this will is the Gestalt of the German Empire as a power which lies on its original roots. Wherein the German borders lie, what German literature, German history, German science, German psychology really are, what the war, work, dream, and art mean to us—that this and much more is seen and recognized and becomes effective—this is the only danger which threatens the civilization-Jew. For all this confirms the first German principle, which the Jew always strives to deny— namely, the principle that there is a fatherland which is called Germany. One of the obvious consequences stemming from that principle is that there are Jews. The finest and most skillful efficacy of the civilization-Jew is seen in the uninterrupted proving that there is no Jew; in any serious Jewish theory one can sense this statement. The recognition and realization of the distinct German Gestalt separates visibly and clearly the Jewish Gestalt like clear und motionless water renders the oil visible as a distinct layer. At the moment, however, in which the Jew gets unmistakably seen as a distinct force obeying its distinct rules, he ceases to be virulent and thus dangerous to the German people. The most effective weapon against him, the master of all the masks, is to notice him.

The civilization-Jew still sticks en masse to liberalism, to which he owes everything. Admittedly, his dialectic—that endless feuilleton prattle of civilization—has become so dilute that it starts to disgust even harmless minds. As one of the penultimate efforts to maintain the old position, one can, with certainty, foretell the participation of the Jew in the legitimist restoration. To the same extent, however, in which the German will acquires sharpness and Gestalt, also the faintest illusion of the Jew to be German in Germany will become unrealizable, and he will find himself standing before his last alternative which is, in Germany, either to be a Jew or not to be at all. 

[published in “Die Kommenden”, 9 September 1930]

[clarencenicholsonata]

5 Awesome Examples of Affiliate Marketing on Instagram (and What You Can Learn from Them)

Affiliate marketing, if done right, is lucrative for both the merchant (the business running the program) and for the affiliate. According to digital marketing expert Neil Patel, a strong affiliate can earn anything from $10,000 to $400,000 a year. Super affiliates can earn significantly more.

Naturally, I don’t want to make any promises about income potential, as there are many factors at play in determining how much you earn. However, the numbers speak for themselves: affiliate marketing can be lucrative.

Affiliate marketing is not just for bloggers, either. There’s also a space with huge potential for social media influencers. Good influencers have a large and highly engaged audience that trusts them to provide recommendations. That means there’s tremendous potential for influencers to also be highly successful affiliate marketers.

In this article, we’ll focus on affiliate marketing on Instagram, one of the world’s biggest social media platforms.

Let’s dive in!

Why Do Affiliate Marketing on Social Media?

Social media is something businesses cannot afford to ignore. According to Statista, an estimated 3.6 billion people are using social media worldwide as of 2020. That number is expected to increase to an astounding 4.41 billion by 2025:

In other words, the audience you’re trying to reach is almost certainly on social media. That means that social platforms represent an amazing opportunity for both merchants and affiliates.

Before I end this section, I want to dispel a myth about the reputation of affiliate marketing. Although it is true there are a minority of unscrupulous marketers who engage in unethical practices, it’s unfair to generalize all affiliates in this way.

At its best, affiliate marketing allows influencers, bloggers, and enthusiasts to benefit from promoting the products that they use and love.

The vast majority of both merchants and affiliates engage in reputable marketing practices and value their audience’s trust over making a quick sale.

What You Need to Know About Affiliate Marketing On Instagram

So out of all the social media platforms available, why choose Instagram? There are currently over one billion monthly Instagram users. It is one of the most popular social media platforms in the world, beaten only by Facebook and Youtube.

Over two thirds of the total number of Instagram users are aged 34 and below. This makes it particularly attractive for marketers targeting that demographic - which is well worth doing, since the 18 to 34 group wields $1.3 trillion in annual buying power.

With Instagram, companies can boost awareness of and engagement with their brand, while increasing website traffic. By working with affiliates and influencers, their reach can be dramatically increased.

Choosing the right affiliate program

If you’re new to affiliate marketing, you might be wondering which affiliate programs to join. Don’t panic - the options can seem endless, but I’ve put together this easy cheat-sheet to help you choose the best one for you.

Read up on the best affiliate marketing programs in your niche and ask others for their input.

Select companies with products that you already use and love.

Look for generous commission rates and high average earnings per click (EPC).

Choose programs with a minimum cookie lifespan of 30 days. Longer is preferable.

Choose a program with robust technical capabilities including postback tracking, dynamic product feed, and the ability to create deep links to any page on the merchant’s site.

I recommend that you don’t spread your efforts too thinly. Focus on just one or two programs to begin with. You can always scale and add more later!

Solving the “one link” problem

Instagram can seem problematic for marketers because you cannot include a clickable link in an image caption. You can also only add one clickable link to the Instagram bio.

Fortunately, linking tools like lnk.bio and Linktree allow an easy way around this. Adding one of these tools to your page allows you to create a simple URL that leads to a landing page hosting all your links. Here’s an example of how a simple Linktree page can look:

As an affiliate, you can use a linking tool for all your affiliate links. Once you have over 10,000 followers, you can also use the “swipe up” function to add a link directly to your Instagram Stories.

Taking your affiliate marketing to the next level

So you’ve joined an affiliate marketing program, your audience is growing, and the commissions are rolling in. Congratulations! What next? It’s time to take your marketing up a notch and boost your sales even more.

If you’re using an affiliate tracking solution like Anytrack, you can make use of it alongside a marketing system like Wishpond. This means you can learn more about your audience and segment them accordingly. By capturing contact, demographic, and behavioral data about your site visitors and customers, you can learn a huge amount about them and their preferences.

For example, you might wish to market different products to women than men. You would likely use different language when addressing young people and college students than you would when addressing an older audience.

If you’re capturing contact information such as email addresses (and you should be!) you can use this data to enhance your email marketing campaigns. Why not trigger marketing emails based on certain actions?

For example, if someone clicks through on one of your affiliate links but doesn’t buy, can you send an “abandoned cart” style email to encourage them to complete their purchase? If someone buys a certain product through one of your affiliate links, you can use that information to market relevant products to them in the future.

For example, let’s imagine you’re in the tech niche and someone purchases a laptop. You could use that data to market products like mice, keyboards, docking stations, and laptop cases.

You might also wish to start investing in paid posts on Instagram. This can get your content in front of a much broader audience. Even a relatively small financial investment can dramatically boost your engagement and, ideally, your commissions. There are three ways to use paid posts on Instagram:

Promote an Instagram post through the Instagram app (you’ll need a business account for this)

Connect your Instagram account with Facebook and create an ad through the Facebook Ads Manager system

Create an Instagram Stories ad using the Facebook Ads Manager.

Whichever option you choose, the trick is in how you set your audience parameters. Instagram’s platform allows you to define your audience based on demographics, location, and areas of interest, so you can finely tune who you’re targeting. If you wish, you can even run more than one campaign and use it to target different segments of your audience.

You can use the data gathered through your affiliate tracking system to determine what will resonate with which audience and what kinds of links they’re most likely to click on.

5 Awesome Examples of Affiliate Marketing On Instagram

Now that you understand how affiliate marketing on Instagram works and how to get started, let’s look at some great examples. I’ve picked out a few affiliates who I think are doing particularly well to inspire you.

Affiliate Marketing on Instagram Example #1: Erica Ligenza and Colleen Rothschild Beauty

This post is a great example of affiliate marketing on Instagram for so many reasons. First, there’s the personal touch in the caption when Erica Ligenza, an influencer in the fashion and beauty niche, refers to her 90,000+ followers as her friends. This automatically establishes a connection and increases the chances that her followers will trust her recommendations.

People prefer to buy from those they like and trust, after all, so take the time to build a real connection. Erica also tagged the company so that, when her followers become interested in the product, they can also check out the company’s Instagram page.

The sense of urgency in the caption was another great touch. By telling her followers that “today” is the last day of the salt, Erica pushes them to act fast. This is a classic example of FOMO, or fear of missing out, in action. Remember that your customers are more likely to take action if you make it clear they have a limited time to do so.

Lastly, the 3-step facial at home guide was a good finishing touch. With the step-by-step guide, Erica shows her followers exactly how to use the products. This allows them to imagine themselves using the items, increasing desire to buy them.

Affiliate Marketing on Instagram Example #2: Anna Everywhere

A secret to amazing Instagram affiliate marketing? The Instagram posts don’t need to be directly about the products being promoted.

This one, by travel influencer Anna Karsten (@anna.everywhere), shows Anna and her son wearing the clothes she is promoting. But the caption doesn’t even mention the clothes. Instead, Anna talks about her son Dylan and how he interacts with their pets.

Only by clicking the link will you find that she’s promoting children’s clothing items from Ralph Lauren, Saks, Maisonette, and Amazon. That’s a lot of affiliate mileage out of one post!

The reason this works so well is because the picture is eye catching and the content is engaging. By including a picture of her young son and a rabbit, Anna relies on the always-effective “awww” factor for this post. Additionally, the content tells a story and provides some advice for parents unsure about how their children will interact with animals.

Instagrammers who decide to go this route should make sure their captions are interesting enough to keep followers reading until the end, where their affiliate link is. Telling a story, sharing some advice, or giving your opinion on a subject are all great ways to provide engaging content.

The picture also has to be eye-catching and relevant. If you fail in either of these two tasks, followers won’t even get as far as clicking the link.

Affiliate Marketing on Instagram Example #3: Imjennim

This Instagram post, by fashion influencer Jenn Im, stands out thanks to its creativity. Instead of just taking a picture of the Creme Shop lipstick she is endorsing, Jenn went a step further and did a full photoshoot with herself as the model. The color scheme is aligned with the product she’s promoting, and the result is a glamorous vibe of the kind that would look at home in a glossy magazine.

What can you learn from this post? The concept behind an image should be compatible with the product that is being endorsed. Take the time to think about use of color, setting, and the way the picture is edited.

The caption is straightforward - it talks about the product and its stand-out features. It’s short, but it does what it needs to do. Additionally, the use of a relevant emoji adds a playful tone, which will appeal to Jenn’s young audience.

Notably, she uses her Instagram account to promote her Youtube channel, which is linked in her bio and where she also promotes her affiliate links. If you’re active on Youtube and promote affiliate products there, this is another way to drive traffic and increase your commissions.

Affiliate Marketing on Instagram Example #4: Mariano Di Vaio and Hair Bello

Long captions aren’t always necessary to get the attention of your audience. This one, from fashion influencer Mario Di Vaio, is really short. Not only that, but the first part isn’t even a real word!

The nonsensical opening to the caption denotes playfulness and identifies Mario as a fun, happy-go-lucky type of person. It also suggests incoherent excitement at how much he loves the products he’s advertising. Notice how his fans have responded to it.

The use of the discount code for his followers is also good practice. Discount codes are a great way to engage followers and encourage them to click that affiliate link and make a purchase. If you leverage fear of missing out by emphasizing that a discount is only available for a limited time, your clicks and conversions can soar.

Affiliate Marketing on Instagram Example #5:Laura Emily and Spicentice

This Instagram post from British influencer Laura Emily (@lauraemilyx) relies on a well-known social media trope: sharing pictures of what you had for dinner. Laura shows what’s possible with the product she’s promoting, in this case cooking ingredients, by showing off a tempting home cooked meal.

By sharing exactly what ingredients she used, she makes it easy for her followers to find exactly what they need to make the same recipe at home.

The use of hashtags is worth mentioning, too. With the hashtags, Laura categorizes her post and helps her target audience to find it. So anyone who is looking for content specifically related to that brand will see it, as will anyone looking for weight loss inspiration or postpartum weight loss tips.

Instagram marketers, take note. You should include plenty of hashtags in your affiliate marketing posts because they are a crucial part of Instagram’s sorting process. With the right hashtags, your target audience will find you even if they’re not yet following you.

Emily tops off this great post by sharing a limited-time discount code, which is ideal for spurring undecided buyers into taking action before they miss out on the deal. To help here are 150 Best Hashtags to Get More Likes.

Wrapping Up

Affiliate marketing is a great way for bloggers, Youtubers, and social media influencers to earn money. Anyone with a good online following and a few savvy marketing skills can make affiliate marketing work for them.

Social media channels are increasingly becoming a favorite among marketers thanks to an ever-growing number of users worldwide.

In addition, affiliate marketing on social media is highly effective because people trust the influencers they follow. For example, did you know that 49% of consumers rely on influencer recommendations, while 86% of women turn to social media for purchasing advice?

Despite its linking limitations, Instagram is a fantastic platform for affiliate marketing due to its potential for creativity, engagement, and building a real connection with an audience. Fortunately, with the advent of bio link tools, you’re no longer restricted by the platform’s one link rule.

There is, of course, a right and wrong way to do affiliate marketing on Instagram. Let’s recap some of the key things we’ve learned from these examples:

Casual language and an informal tone is usually best. Playfulness and irreverence goes a long way, especially if you have a young target audience.

Ensure you include relevant hashtags to get your content in front of the right people.

Captions don’t always have to be long, but they must be interesting enough to get followers to read through until the end, where the affiliate link may be located.

Telling a story, giving advice or a how-to, or sharing your opinion on an issue are all great ways to boost engagement.

Your images or videos must be eye-catching enough to entice people to stop scrolling, read what you have to say, and click your links.

Be creative and consider branding, mood, and tone when you create your content.

Make use of special offers, deals, and discounts to encourage customers to buy. If these are only available for a limited time, so much the better.

Remember that your Instagram can also work alongside other channels. For example, if you have an affiliate marketing blog or an active Youtube channel, you can use your Instagram to drive traffic to these and increase your sales that way.

Something to be aware of: affiliate marketing success won’t happen overnight unless you’ve already got a huge audience. I know marketers who took around three months to make their first sale, and this is not atypical. But with hard work, perseverance, and a few tricks up your sleeve, there’s no reason you can’t succeed with affiliate marketing on Instagram.

About the Author

Laurent Malka is the Co-Founder of Anytrack, a startup developing a conversion tracking software for affiliate marketers. He was born and raised in Switzerland, and now lives and works in Israel. He is a serial entrepreneur with over 15 years of experience in marketing and business development. Laurent has been a panelist and speaker at numerous digital marketing events including SEMrush and IG Affiliates. He prides himself on his ability to connect the dots across disciplines, industries, and technologies to solve unique challenges.

from RSSMix.com Mix ID 8230801 https://ift.tt/3rZJ6DW via IFTTT

[californiaprelawland]

Conspiracy Theories and Freedom of Speech

By Qian Chen, University of California, San Diego, Class of 2021

May 19, 2020

Coronavirus Conspiracy Theories

As coronavirus continues to rampage through the country, the internet has felt a surge of conspiracy theories surrounding the origin and many other aspects of the virus. Either intentionally or by accident, more people sharing those theories contribute to the rise of their popularity and creditability. The production and circulation of conspiracy theories mislead the public and undermine the works of professionals, who are combating the virus and saving lives on the frontline. As social media users who actively express ourselves in cyberspace, it is important to know what we can say and how speech on social media is held responsible.

Even with federal and local governments prioritizing resources to fight the coronavirus, there remain too many unknowns about the newly-emerged disease. Despite it has been half year since the original outbreak in Wuhan, China, the health community continues to debate about the origin of the virus, necessary health precautions, and standard treatment for patients. There are still questions about how the virus is transmitted and how exactly it affects the body. 

Popular conspiracy theories fill the gap with mostly false information or distorted news. Snopes, a fact-checks website, investigates, and collects conspiracy theories widely circulated on the internet[1]. Some claim that coronavirus was originally developed in a lab as a bioweapon for the Chinese government; or there is a rumor that 5G cellphone tower is spreading the virus; even conspiracy theorists postulate either governments or individuals deliberately transport the virus for their purposes. Those conspiracy theories gain further momentum when social media influencers start to believe them. A contributor at GOOP, a popular life-style company advertised by many influencers, claims that coronavirus probably does not exist[2]. Many of those conspiracy theories compose of baseless lies or distorted facts. Even they have been refuted or dismissed by the science community, it fuels the internet with inaccurate pieces of information and ignites mistrust toward certain groups and the government. The direct result is racism against Asians or Asian Americans, and hate crimes. It encourages people to disregard the quarantine orders. Most importantly, it divides society in a time where solidarity is needed most.

First Amendment

The difficulty of containing false information on the internet is that any government actions must consider the implication of the First Amendment. As recognized in Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union, the Supreme Court identifies the cyberspace and social media in particular as the “vast democratic forums of the Internet”[3]. In Packingham v. North Carolina, the Court strikes down a North Carolina statute that denies sex offenders access to social media websites, ruling that it violated the First Amendment[4]. As noted in the majority’s opinion, the Court protects the right to speak in a spatial context—“places where [all persons] can speak and listen, and then, after reflection, speak and listen once more”. Internet is, therefore, considered a forum for the exercise of First Amendment rights. The Court established that social media is a “protected space” for lawful speech. In other words, restrictions related to the content of the speech, as the case of false information, must pass the strict scrutiny test as outlined in footnote four in United States v. Carolene Products Co[5]. Only limited types of speech such as libel, Obscenity, fraud, fighting words, are not protected under the First Amendment.

The Court has found false statements little values in terms of which the First Amendment seeks to protect. In Hustler Magazine, Inc. v. Falwell, the Court admitted that “false statements of fact are particularly valueless”[6]. In Brown v. Hartlage, the Court stated that “falsehoods are not protected by the First Amendment in the same manner as truthful statements”[7]. However, falsehood itself is not enough to grant the government the power to censor speech.

“Were the Court to hold that the interest in truthful discourse alone is sufficient to sustain a ban on speech, absent any evidence that the speech was used to gain a material advantage, it would give the government a broad censorial power unprecedented in this Court’s cases or in our constitutional tradition. The mere potential for the exercise of that power casts a chill, a chill the First Amendment cannot permit if free speech, thought, and discourse are to remain a foundation of our freedom. “

Here the Court notices a common worry. If the government was allowed to limit speech to preserve truthful discourse, a broad censorial power could lead to abuse of power. As the Majority also noted in the opinion, the Court permits restrictions on false statements only when being associated with legally cognizable harm. While most social media conspiracy theories plant doubts and misguide the public, it is often hard to prove any cognizable harm, other than spreading falsehood.

The Communications Decency Act

Congress further grants broad immunity to social media sites and its users from being held responsible for the content that they share and spread. The standard of appropriate speech is mainly decided by social media company’s own internal policies, rather than by the legal community. A social network’s decision to remove or not to remove certain content is barred from lawsuits because of the immunity created in Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.

An interactive computer service is “any information service, system, or access software provider that provides or enables computer access by multiple users to a computer server.” Popular online platforms, such as Facebook, Twitter, are considered to be “interactive service” providers[8]. Section 230(c)(1) indicates that someone sharing or reposting a blog or a tweet should be not treated as “the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider”[9]. Also, the immediate Section 230(c)(2) excludes social media from civil liability for allowing or prohibiting certain information circulating on its platform. Although not always being emphasized, users of social media, such as influencers advertising non-original content, are also included in the exemption from civil liability. As far as the law is concerned, actions of internet users, such as sharing misinformation or spreading conspiracy theories, are first constitutionally protected, and even if for unprotected speech, users and service providers are not held civilly liable.

Internet Community

Several measures have been taken by tech companies to contain the spread of coronavirus-related misinformation. Facebook works with several fact-checking organizations and puts warning labels on misleading content. Twitter also introduces labels and warning messages on tweets with disputed content. Google is blocking coronavirus scam emails, and Google-owned Youtube uses its algorithm to prioritize videos coming from creditable sources. However, the social media community is unwilling to remove content simply because they are fabricated or false. As stated on Facebook’s website, fake news does not violate their community standards, and Facebook will remove fake news posts when violating their other policies, such as hate speech, spam, or fake accounts[10]. In Twitter’s updated policy, Twitter will remove retweets that “are likely to cause serious harm”[11].

While the Constitution protects our right to express ourselves on the internet without overarching government censorship, it is also important to keep in mind that our speech has an impact on others. During crises, such as the current global pandemic, the internet is an information battleground between facts and fake news. Internet users should be vigilant and keep themselves properly informed about the facts. Although the law grants internet companies with broad immunity, they too should carefully monitor online discussion and take actions against conspiracy theories and other forms of misinformation.

________________________________________________________________

Qian Chen is a rising senior at the University of California, San Diego, where he studies Philosophy and Politics with an emphasis on Law, Ethics and Society. Qian is always interested in the philosophy of law and the Consitution. He plans to attend law school or a master’s program in public policy after his bachelor’s degree.

________________________________________________________________

[1] Snopes Staff, “The Coronavirus Collection: Conspiracy Theories”. Snopes.com, Accessed 2020-5-18.

[2] Chelsea Ritschel, “Goop Expert Says Coronavirus Doesn’t Exist:’There is Potentially No Such Thing ”, independent.co.uk, Accessed 2020-5-18.

[3] Reno v. American Liberties Union, 521 U. S. 844, 868 (1997)

[4] Packingham v. North Carolina, 137 S. Ct. 1730

[5] United States v. Carolene Products Co, 304 U.S. 144 (1938)

[6] Hustler Magazine, Inc. v. Falwell, 485 U.S. 46, 52 (1988)

[7] Brown v. Hartlage, 456 U.S. 45, 60 (1982)

[8] Valerie C. Brannon, “Free Speech and the Regulation of Social Media Content”, Congressional Research Service, Accessed 2020-5-18.

[9] 47 U.S.C. §230(c)

[10] Facebook, “Community Standards”, Facebook.com, Accessed 2020-5-18.

[11] Twitter, “Synthetic and Manipulated Media Policy”, help.twitter.com, Accessed 2020-5-18.

[tacophish]

Liu Xiaobo, I have no enemies: my final statement*

June 1989 was the major turning point in my 50 years on life’s road. Before that, I was a member of the first group of students after restoration of the college entrance examination after the Cultural Revolution (1977); my career was s smooth ride from undergraduate to grad student through to PhD. After graduation I stayed on as a lecturer at Beijing Normal University. On the podium, I was a popular teacher, well received by students. I was at the same time a public intellectual. In the 1980s I published articles and books that created an impact, was frequently invited to speak in various places, and was invited to go abroad to Europe and the US as a visiting scholar. What I required of myself was: both as a person and in my writing, I had to live with honesty, responsibility and dignity. Subsequently, because I had returned from the US to take part in the 1989 movement, I was imprisoned for “counter-revolutionary propaganda and incitement to crime”, loding the platform which was my passion; I was never again allowed publish or speak in public in China. Simply for expressing divergent political views and taking part in a peaceful and democratic movement, a teacher loses his podium, a writer loses the right to publish, and a public intellectual loses the chance to speak publicly, which is a sad thing, both for myself as an individual, and for China after three decades of reform and opening up.

Thinking about it, my most dramatic experiences after June Fourth have all linked with courts; the two opportunities I had to speak in public have been provided by trials held in the People’s Intermediate Court in Beijing, one in January 1991 and one now. Although the charges on each occasion were different, they were in essence the same, both being crimes of expression.

Twenty years on, the innocent souls of June Fourth do not yet rest in peace, and I, who had been drawn into the path of dissidence by the passions of June Fourth, after leaving the Qincheng Prison in 1991, lost in the right to speak openly in my own country, and could only do so through overseas media, and hence was monitored for many years; placed under surveillance (May 1995- January 1996); educated through labour (October 1996 – October 1999s), and now once again am thrust into the dock by enemies in the regime. But I still want to tell the regime that deprives me of my freedom, I stand by the belief I expressed twenty years ago in my “June Second hunger strike declaration”— I have no enemies, and no hatred. None of the police who have monitored, arrested and interrogated me, the prosecutors who prosecuted me, or the judges who sentence me, are my enemies. While I’m unable to accept your surveillance, arrest, prosecution or sentencing, I respect your professions and personalities, including Zhang Rongge and Pan Xueqing who act for the prosecution at present. I was aware of your respect and sincerity in your interrogation of me on 3 December.

For hatred is corrosive of a person’s wisdom and conscience; the mentality of enmity can poison a nation’s spirit, instigate brutal life and death struggles, destroy a society’s tolerance and humanity, and block a nation’s progress to freedom and democracy. I hope therefore to be able to transcend my personal vicissitudes in understanding the development of the state and changes in society, to counter the hostility of the regime with the best of intentions, and defuse hate with love.

As we all know, reform and opening up brought about development of the state and change in society. In my view, it began with abandoning “taking class struggle as the key link,” which had been the ruling principle of the Mao era. We committed ourselves instead to economic development and social harmony. The process of abandoning the “philosophy of struggle” was one of gradually diluting the mentality of enmity, eliminating the psychology of hatred, and pressing out the “wolf’s milk” in which our humanity had been steeped. It was this process that provided a relaxed environment for the reform and opening up at home and abroad, for the restoration of mutual love between people, and soft humane soil for the peaceful coexistence of different values and different interests, and thus provided the explosion of popular creativity and the rehabilitation of warmheartedness with incentives consistent with human nature. Externally abandoning “anti-imperialism and anti-revisionism”, and internally, abandoning “class struggle” may be called the basic premise of the continuance of China’s reform and opening up to this day. The market orientation of the economy; the cultural trend toward diversity; and the gradual change of order to the rule of law, all benefited from the dilution of this mentality of enmity. Even in the political field, where progress is slowest, dilution of the mentality of enmity also made political power ever more tolerant of diversity in society, the intensity persecution of dissidents has declined substantially, and characterization of the 1989 movement has changed from an “instigated rebellion” to a “political upheaval.”

The dilution of the mentality of enmity made the political power gradually accept the universality of human rights. In 1998, the Chinese government promised the world it would sign the the two international human rights conventions of the UN, marking China’s recognition of universal human rights standards; in 2004, the National People’s Congress for the first time inscribed into the constitution that “the state respects and safeguards human rights”, signaling that human rights had become one of the fundamental principles of the rule of law. In the meantime, the present regime also proposed “putting people first” and “creating a harmonious society”, which signalled progress in the Party’s concept of rule.

This macro-level progress was discernible as well in my own experiences since being arrested.

While I insist on my innocence, and that the accusations against me are unconstitutional, in the year and more since I lost my freedom, I’ve experienced two places of detention, four pre-trial police officers, three prosecutors and two judges. In their handling of the case, there has been no lack of respect, no time overruns and no forced confessions. Their calm and rational attitude has over and again demonstrated goodwill. I was transferred on 23 June from the residential surveillance to Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau Detention Center No. 1, known as “Beikan.” I saw progress in surveillance in the six months I spent there.

I spent time in the old Beikan (Banbuqiao) in 1996, and compared with the Beikan of a decade ago, there has been great improvement in the hardware of facilities and software of management.

In particular, Beikan’s innovative humane management based on respecting the rights and dignity of detainees, implementing more flexible management of the will be flexible to the detainees words and deeds, embodied in the Warm broadcast and Repentance, the music played before meals, and when waking up and going to sleep, gave detainees feelings of dignity and warmth, stimulating their consciousness of keeping order in their cells and opposing the warders sense of themselves as lords of the jail, detainees, providing not only a humanized living environment, but greatly improved the detainees’ environment and mindset for litigation, I had close contact with Liu Zhen, in charge of my cell. People feel warmed by his respect and care for detainees, reflected in the management of every detail, and permeating his every word and deed. Getting to know the sincere, honest, responsible, good-hearted Liu Zhen really was a piece of good luck for me in Beikan.

Political beliefs are based on such convictions and personal experiences; I firmly believe that China’s political progress will never stop, and I’m full of optimistic expectations of freedom coming to China in the future, because no force can block the human desire for freedom. China will eventually become a country of the rule of law in which human rights are supreme. I’m also looking forward to such progress being reflected in the trial of this case, and look forward to the full court’s just verdict ——one that can stand the test of history.

Ask me what has been my most fortunate experience of the past two decades, and I’d say it was gaining the selfless love of my wife, Liu Xia. She cannot be present in the courtroom today, but I still want to tell you, sweetheart, that I’m confident that your love for me will be as always. Over the years, in my non-free life, our love has contained bitterness imposed by the external environment, but is boundless in afterthought. I am sentenced to a visible prison while you are waiting in an invisible one. Your love is sunlight that transcends prison walls and bars, stroking every inch of my skin, warming my every cell, letting me maintain my inner calm, magnanimous and bright, so that every minute in prison is full of meaning. But my love for you is full of guilt and regret, sometimes heavy enough hobble my steps. I am a hard stone in the wilderness, putting up with the pummeling of raging storms, and too cold for anyone to dare touch. But my love is hard, sharp, and can penetrate any obstacles. Even if I am crushed into powder, I will embrace you with the ashes.

Given your love, sweetheart, I would face my forthcoming trial calmly, with no regrets about my choice and looking forward to tomorrow optimistically. I look forward to my country being a land of free expression, where all citizens’ speeches are treated the same; here, different values, ideas, beliefs, political views… both compete with each other and coexist peacefully; here, majority and minority opinions will be given equal guarantees, in particular, political views different from those in power will be fully respected and protected; here, all political views will be spread in the sunlight for the people to choose; all citizens will be able to express their political views without fear, and will never be politically persecuted for voicing dissent; I hope to be the last victim of China’s endless literary inquisition, and that after this no one else will ever be jailed for their speech.

Freedom of expression is the basis of human rights, the source of humanity and the mother of truth. To block freedom of speech is to trample on human rights, to strangle humanity and to suppress the truth.

I do not feel guilty for following my constitutional right to freedom of expression, for fulfilling my social responsibility as a Chinese citizen. Even if accused of it, I would have no complaints. Thank you!

Liu Xiaobo (December 23, 2009)

[thejourneymaninn]

Januanders Day 9 - The Chantry explosion

The Chantry explosion is the one argument pretty much everyone throws around when it comes to criticizing Anders, claiming it is an unforgivable act that condemns him no matter what (spoiler alert: I don’t agree), so many people have written about it already, defending and explaining it a lot better than I could, and I doubt there’s any argument in defense of Anders that hasn’t been brought up (and, unfortunately, ignored) yet.

Thus, I’m only going to ramble about a few things that are of personal importance to me when it comes to this oddly controversial topic. And yes, I used “oddly” for a reason, because I honestly don’t understand how anyone could actually think this is something you should condemn him for.

I know Bioware had him use an explosion precisely because they knew what people would associate that with and because they wanted us to react that way, yet to this day, I still can’t believe that actually worked. Yet it seems it did, considering people that criticize (and often, downright hate him) keep insisting that “Anders blew up a church and killed hundreds of innocent people. He destroyed every possibility of a peaceful solution.” Which is especially frustrating considering that this is simply…not true.

 “Church”

Yes, Anders blew up a “church”, yet in Thedas, that term hold quite a different meaning than the one we tend to associate with it.

Everyone is completely terrified of the Chantry, just look at the Viscount’s reaction when you tell him Seamus has been lured to there. He leaves his son in danger (as it turns out, he even leaves him to die) because he “cannot be seen interfering in Chantry affairs”. He literally begs Hawke to go in his place, he is desperate and paralyzed with fear – and with good reason. Cross the Chantry, and you have an Exalted March coming your way.

So while technically, the building itself may be considered a “church”, it is far more than a “peaceful place of worship”. It is the gilded centre of power of the highest authority and military power in all of Southern Thedas (or, in this particular case, Kirkwall). And it also just happens to be the head of the army that controls and imprisons mages. It is their leaders that Anders attacked, and it is hardly his fault that they use religion as a means to control the world.

 “Peaceful Solution”

The argument that he should have found a peaceful solution is downright disgusting, for not only does it put the responsibility of ending oppression on the oppressed, it also essentially asks them to place the lives of the rest of the population above their own. It literally tells mages to wait quietly, let themselves at best (!) be stripped of all rights and imprisoned for life, at worst abused, killed or made tranquil, for perhaps another ten, fifty or thousand years so they won’t inconvenience anyone. Because the lives of others are deemed to have more worth than those of mages, or let’s be real, any worth at all. What a very Chantry argument to make.  

And as if that wasn’t bad enough, they are expected to do this despite not actually having means to achieve “peaceful change”. They are not allowed to leave the Circle, they have no rights, no voice, and if they do try to speak up…well, the consequences are listed above. And yet, they are expected to somehow gain freedom by smiling and bowing their heads.

 “Innocent victims”

Anders killed people. No one is arguing that. We can debate numbers, but I don’t think those even really matter, for a) No matter how high we go, they’d still be far lower than the number of mages killed if Meredith had gone through with the Rite of Annulment (which she had sent for long before the explosion), and b) the people he killed weren’t innocent (to be clear: I am in no way suggesting they deserved death, just that there are no “innocent bystanders” when it comes to the treatment of mages in Thedas.)

Elthina isn’t innocent. The way I see her, she is the biggest (and best) manipulator in the game, someone who knows exactly how to stay in power, and how to appear like a friend to everyone while you’re doing so. And even if she isn’t, if her “I feel for them, but I can’t get involved” act is genuine, she is in no way innocent. As Meredith’s superior, it was her job to intervene, and she chose to ignore it, knowing full well her inaction cost lives.

And the other people in the Chantry, or the people killed in the streets? Aside from  the fact that most of the deaths of people who were not in the Chantry are on the Templars (demons, fighting and abomination were a direct result of the invocation of the Rite of Annulment) – the general population is not “innocent” either. They are complicit in the oppression of mages.  “Let the Templars and mages solve their own problems” gets thrown around quite a lot in Inquisition, as if mages just appeared out of nowhere someday when they are in fact, a part of the population until their magic manifests and the rest of the population is only too happy to let them be taken away. Calling the Templars on mages, or outright lynching them as soon as they set foot into a village – the general population is more than willing to do the Templars’ jobs for them. If they didn’t participate, or at the very least ignore, the oppression, the Chantry would have a much harder time keeping the oppressive system in place.

And yes, the Chantry is largely to blame for the populations’ attitude towards magic. They keep them misinformed, poor, and struggling to survive. When you’re literally living in dirt trying not to starve, I doubt freeing mages is your biggest priority. They, too, are victims of the Chantry, but that doesn’t absolve them of their responsibility for their part in the oppression of mages (and elves, for that matter), and they have to face the consequences.

  Of course, you can make the argument that killing people is never ok, no matter the cause. I even understand that, to a certain degree; I don’t like the thought of death and destruction either. The only problem with this argument is that in cases of oppression and tyranny, inaction doesn’t cause less death. It just means the killings continue behind closed doors, where we don’t have to see them or deal with them.

Accordingly, Anders didn’t cause more violence. He just brought it to the people who up until then, had had the luxury of ignoring it. After a lifetime of having been taught the opposite, he finally decided that no, their lives were not worth more than the lives of mages. And I couldn’t agree more.

  As for how the Chantry Boom fit in with Anders’ character…. Well, after years of trying to change the way mages are treated, and the extra push towards action from Justice, I feel it made sense for him to do it. I don’t think it was something he wanted to do, though. He may not exactly regret it, but he certainly isn’t happy about it either. Anders spent ten years trying to find other ways, to make people understand and listen, because when it comes down to it, he is not a violent person. He didn’t want mages to have to fight a war for their freedom, he wanted people to understand that mages are people like everyone else and thus deserve that freedom. He wanted to make them understand so they would give mages freedom. After all he had suffered, after decades of having lived in the Circle, he still tried to believe it was possible.

I say”tried” because I am not sure he ever fully did believe it (looking at, for instance, banter he has with Bethany in Act 1), but he tried anyway. And of course, he eventually had to realize he was wrong. He could not convince anyone – the opinion of the population is controlled by the Chantry, and even if he’d had a platform to actually reach enough people, he wouldn’t have been able to counter the hate and misinformation they had been spreading for over a thousand years with just his smile and words (it’s a nice smile, but it’s not enough).

And while he did have some access to the people in power (the Chantry and in this specific case, Elthina), they had no interest in changing the lot of mages, as it is a huge part of where there power comes from. Fear of mages provides them with both an army of Templars, the mages’/tranquils’ workforce and their magic to aid their army. It also strengthens their role (and presumed necessity) as the “protector of the people” against the “curse of magic” - why would they be willing to give that up? I’m not entirely certain even Anders fully realizes just how much keeping people in fear of mages and mages themselves locked up benefits the Chantry, but I think by the time he finally decides to act,  he has come to the conclusion that they have no intention of ever doing anything to help mages.

I know a lot of people accuse Anders of “betraying” their Hawke and I suppose if you played a Hawke who didn’t fully support Anders’ views, you might feel that way. It’s true that he gets extremely manipulative if Hawke doesn’t agree to help right away; I can understand if people find that upsetting (though I’d still argue that the words he chooses leave little doubt about the nature of what he’s planning. He does lie, but he also makes it rather obvious he is planning something big).

Since my Hawke shared Anders views and agreed to help immediately, I didn’t have that problem; the only feeling of “betrayal” there might possibly have been was along the lines of “What the fuck, Anders?! I wanted to do that myself! Way to steal my thunder, bro.”

I don’t have to “excuse” what he did in order to like him, I fully believe he was right. And I wish the game had given my Hawkes the option to support him as wholeheartedly as I do.

[brucebclark86]

Understanding Influencer Marketing and Why It Is So Effective

Influencer Marketing: The Future Paradigm Of Online Marketing

If  I ask, do you engage yourself in social media? Your answer will be yes. Or if somebody asks you, do you follow people on social networking sites most probably your answer will be yes again.

 Now social media specifically social networking sites are becoming part of the life of each individual.

 As a result, it gives rise to influencer marketing that is designed to tap into an existing community of engaged followers on social media.

Now influencer marketing has got influencers who have expertise in their niche.

As they are the key leaders they can influence their followers so much that they can be proved to be the asset for the brands those seeking online buyers for their products.

The influencers are the common ones but having a full impact on their audience.

As we found above that the influencer marketing works as social media by influencer by spreading the word through their personal social channels.

 While it has got another form that is content marketing where the influencers campaign by carrying a content element created by themselves or given to them by those who want to market their product by influencers.

As both social-media and content marketing are part of influencer marketing yet they cannot be the same as influencer marketing.

Why Is Influencer Marketing So Important?

With the rising cut-throat competition on the internet every brand whether it is big or small moving fast towards influencer marketing to market its product and to ensure its future growth.

 Influencer marketing is becoming so important that it is becoming the future of online marketing.

Now why influencer marketing is important let’s discuss below:

Influencer Marketing Decoded

Influencer marketing involves collaborating with popular and compatible influencers in their niche for marketing their product with increased revenue.

 Influencers have got so loyal followers that can be helpful for brands as probable future buyers.

Also, influencers have knowledge about a particular subject that empowers them to motivate their followers and fans across several social media sites to take the desired action.

They have also got the idea that how to make a plan and when to implement them correctly.

Amplified Brand Awareness

While influencers have a far-reaching effect, they have the power to give rise to brand exposure and amplify brand awareness.

Endorsing of a brand by influencer gives a positive response from his followers.

As the marketers add-up with influencers, it becomes easy for them to attract their followers towards their brand.

This also helps the brand in getting increased visibility and meaningful online conversation about it.

According to a report around 67% of the marketers are engaged in influencer marketing.

Precise Targeting Strategy

Targeting the right audience is a crucial part of the marketing strategy for every marketer. Though, it is an assiduous process and requires an in-depth understanding of their potential customers.

Now here the influencer marketing makes the marketers transcend the steps as already been done by influencers.

Here marketers should confident of compatibility of influencers with their niche and his public image should coincident with the brand image.

That is why influencer marketing gaining popularity among business houses and marketers

Enhanced Credibility and Trust

The image and power of influencers depend upon the trust of their followers. While having this trust they develop a loyal fan following.

When influencers share their feedback about the marketer’s product or service, it is taken in a noticeable way. So collaborating with influencers take marketers close to their audience.

Consequently, increasing the brand awareness of marketers with increased returns on investment.

In addition to that  influencers can work according to marketers marketing objectives

The Ideal Influencer Marketing Strategy

Influencer marketing strategy plays a vital role. It helps us to build brand authority, and make connections with new audiences. It also gives the lead to their product and services.

The influencer marketing goals as below:

Brand awareness

Network Building

Audience building

Customer loyalty

Sales

Engagement

 Once you decided which goal you have to choose and which influencer marketing strategy you have to implement than the next step is to choose the right audience, for this you have to identify who is your target audience is, who gives you more lead by promoting the products and services.

For more engagement, you can organize a giveaway to make connections between the audiences and influencers.

The influencer marketing strategy includes:

Renewed content Strategy

While collaborating with influencers helps the marketers to redefine their content strategy and gives it a new perspective.

 It acts as a breadth of fresh air amidst the self-promotional content that they regularly post.

Moreover,  the content that shows influencers is usually more authentic and trustworthy.

If it makes a parallel connection with the audience they will obviously share it with their network.

This gives rise to the content of the brand and connects it with the audience that remained inaccessible otherwise.

Online summit

The Online summit is one of the most important strategies of influencer marketing.

 Here the summit is organized by one person and the power of other people is leveraged within their net and then all those people come in and speak as a speaker on this online summit.

While this summit last for a week where two or three speakers speak each day and the attendees get to watch different session for free and learn from each presenter for free. But then the presenter in exchange promotes the product or services they are able to provide.

 So by participating as a presenter gives the best opportunity to grab a large audience to market the product.

New Influencer Marketing Trends

Influencers marketing becomes a trend these days. The marketer spends lots of money on marketing strategies and it’ll get to the objective of $5-10 billion by 2020.

There are different trends seen in the markets as below:

Influencer marketing budget growing rapidly.

Tiktok, Instagram becomes the most popular influencer marketing medium.

Influencer event increasingly day by day.

Brands are investing more money in marketing strategies.

The price of Instagram, Tiktok, and Twitch influencers varies.

Gaming influencers are on peak special female gamers.

Influencer collaborates with brand partners to launch their products.

 In present-day influencer marketing is in trend, so the brand raised its budget of influencer marketing. As per the recent survey half of the marketing, budgets has been spending on influencer marketing. In 2019, 65% of marketers decided to increase influencer marketing budgets.

There are so many types of influencer found on Instagram one of them are Nano influencer which is growing more popular than other influencer tiers.

As last year’s survey disclose that 89% of marketers announce that Instagram is most important for the Influencer marketing strategy.

As we all know that Video is the best and easy way to get information, so brands are now approaching Youtube Influencers too. You can get the idea about how big is influencer marketing is? –  now more and more advertisers shifted towards Youtube for their brand awareness instead of billboards, print media, and television broadcast. That is why companies keep on evolving smart handsets to reach more and more people in less time.

Today as more and more viewers are using mobile, it becomes easier for marketers to make reach more viewers.

Also, Influencer marketers get high revenue for social media celebrity. In 2018 Youtube started paid subscription for their influencers which allowed fans monthly 4.99$ charges to access their contents.

In Conclusion

Ultimately, to get the most out of influencer marketing, marketers must remember that it’s more important to align with someone who shares their brand value and can truly influence their fanbase rather than to seek out a big personality with a huge follower count on social networking sites.

Also, they make sure that they have to speed up with the latest development and make ways with new technology, a platform to maximize their revenue.

from LMG Media https://lmg.media/understanding-influencer-marketing-and-why-it-is-so-effective/ from LMG https://lmgfashion.tumblr.com/post/622365963656052736

[esthercdolan29]

Understanding Influencer Marketing and Why It Is So Effective

Influencer Marketing: The Future Paradigm Of Online Marketing

If  I ask, do you engage yourself in social media? Your answer will be yes. Or if somebody asks you, do you follow people on social networking sites most probably your answer will be yes again.

 Now social media specifically social networking sites are becoming part of the life of each individual.

 As a result, it gives rise to influencer marketing that is designed to tap into an existing community of engaged followers on social media.

Now influencer marketing has got influencers who have expertise in their niche.

As they are the key leaders they can influence their followers so much that they can be proved to be the asset for the brands those seeking online buyers for their products.

The influencers are the common ones but having a full impact on their audience.

As we found above that the influencer marketing works as social media by influencer by spreading the word through their personal social channels.

 While it has got another form that is content marketing where the influencers campaign by carrying a content element created by themselves or given to them by those who want to market their product by influencers.

As both social-media and content marketing are part of influencer marketing yet they cannot be the same as influencer marketing.

Why Is Influencer Marketing So Important?

With the rising cut-throat competition on the internet every brand whether it is big or small moving fast towards influencer marketing to market its product and to ensure its future growth.

 Influencer marketing is becoming so important that it is becoming the future of online marketing.

Now why influencer marketing is important let’s discuss below:

Influencer Marketing Decoded

Influencer marketing involves collaborating with popular and compatible influencers in their niche for marketing their product with increased revenue.

 Influencers have got so loyal followers that can be helpful for brands as probable future buyers.

Also, influencers have knowledge about a particular subject that empowers them to motivate their followers and fans across several social media sites to take the desired action.

They have also got the idea that how to make a plan and when to implement them correctly.

 Amplified Brand Awareness

While influencers have a far-reaching effect, they have the power to give rise to brand exposure and amplify brand awareness.

Endorsing of a brand by influencer gives a positive response from his followers.

As the marketers add-up with influencers, it becomes easy for them to attract their followers towards their brand.

This also helps the brand in getting increased visibility and meaningful online conversation about it.

According to a report around 67% of the marketers are engaged in influencer marketing.

Precise Targeting Strategy

Targeting the right audience is a crucial part of the marketing strategy for every marketer. Though, it is an assiduous process and requires an in-depth understanding of their potential customers.

Now here the influencer marketing makes the marketers transcend the steps as already been done by influencers.

Here marketers should confident of compatibility of influencers with their niche and his public image should coincident with the brand image.

That is why influencer marketing gaining popularity among business houses and marketers

Enhanced Credibility and Trust

The image and power of influencers depend upon the trust of their followers. While having this trust they develop a loyal fan following.

When influencers share their feedback about the marketer’s product or service, it is taken in a noticeable way. So collaborating with influencers take marketers close to their audience.

Consequently, increasing the brand awareness of marketers with increased returns on investment.

In addition to that  influencers can work according to marketers marketing objectives

The Ideal Influencer Marketing Strategy

Influencer marketing strategy plays a vital role. It helps us to build brand authority, and make connections with new audiences. It also gives the lead to their product and services.

The influencer marketing goals as below:

Brand awareness

Network Building

Audience building

Customer loyalty

Sales

Engagement

 Once you decided which goal you have to choose and which influencer marketing strategy you have to implement than the next step is to choose the right audience, for this you have to identify who is your target audience is, who gives you more lead by promoting the products and services.

For more engagement, you can organize a giveaway to make connections between the audiences and influencers.

The influencer marketing strategy includes:

Renewed content Strategy

While collaborating with influencers helps the marketers to redefine their content strategy and gives it a new perspective.

 It acts as a breadth of fresh air amidst the self-promotional content that they regularly post.

Moreover,  the content that shows influencers is usually more authentic and trustworthy.

If it makes a parallel connection with the audience they will obviously share it with their network.

This gives rise to the content of the brand and connects it with the audience that remained inaccessible otherwise.

Online summit

The Online summit is one of the most important strategies of influencer marketing.

 Here the summit is organized by one person and the power of other people is leveraged within their net and then all those people come in and speak as a speaker on this online summit.

While this summit last for a week where two or three speakers speak each day and the attendees get to watch different session for free and learn from each presenter for free. But then the presenter in exchange promotes the product or services they are able to provide.

 So by participating as a presenter gives the best opportunity to grab a large audience to market the product.

New Influencer Marketing Trends

Influencers marketing becomes a trend these days. The marketer spends lots of money on marketing strategies and it’ll get to the objective of $5-10 billion by 2020.

There are different trends seen in the markets as below:

Influencer marketing budget growing rapidly.

Tiktok, Instagram becomes the most popular influencer marketing medium.

Influencer event increasingly day by day.

Brands are investing more money in marketing strategies.

The price of Instagram, Tiktok, and Twitch influencers varies.

Gaming influencers are on peak special female gamers.

Influencer collaborates with brand partners to launch their products.

 In present-day influencer marketing is in trend, so the brand raised its budget of influencer marketing. As per the recent survey half of the marketing, budgets has been spending on influencer marketing. In 2019, 65% of marketers decided to increase influencer marketing budgets.

There are so many types of influencer found on Instagram one of them are Nano influencer which is growing more popular than other influencer tiers.

As last year’s survey disclose that 89% of marketers announce that Instagram is most important for the Influencer marketing strategy.

As we all know that Video is the best and easy way to get information, so brands are now approaching Youtube Influencers too. You can get the idea about how big is influencer marketing is? –  now more and more advertisers shifted towards Youtube for their brand awareness instead of billboards, print media, and television broadcast. That is why companies keep on evolving smart handsets to reach more and more people in less time.

Today as more and more viewers are using mobile, it becomes easier for marketers to make reach more viewers.

Also, Influencer marketers get high revenue for social media celebrity. In 2018 Youtube started paid subscription for their influencers which allowed fans monthly 4.99$ charges to access their contents.

In Conclusion

Ultimately, to get the most out of influencer marketing, marketers must remember that it’s more important to align with someone who shares their brand value and can truly influence their fanbase rather than to seek out a big personality with a huge follower count on social networking sites.

Also, they make sure that they have to speed up with the latest development and make ways with new technology, a platform to maximize their revenue.

from https://lmg.media/understanding-influencer-marketing-and-why-it-is-so-effective/

from LMG Media - Blog https://lmgmedia.weebly.com/blog/understanding-influencer-marketing-and-why-it-is-so-effective

[lmgfashion]

Understanding Influencer Marketing and Why It Is So Effective

Influencer Marketing: The Future Paradigm Of Online Marketing

If  I ask, do you engage yourself in social media? Your answer will be yes. Or if somebody asks you, do you follow people on social networking sites most probably your answer will be yes again.

 Now social media specifically social networking sites are becoming part of the life of each individual.

 As a result, it gives rise to influencer marketing that is designed to tap into an existing community of engaged followers on social media.

Now influencer marketing has got influencers who have expertise in their niche.

As they are the key leaders they can influence their followers so much that they can be proved to be the asset for the brands those seeking online buyers for their products.

The influencers are the common ones but having a full impact on their audience.

As we found above that the influencer marketing works as social media by influencer by spreading the word through their personal social channels.

 While it has got another form that is content marketing where the influencers campaign by carrying a content element created by themselves or given to them by those who want to market their product by influencers.

As both social-media and content marketing are part of influencer marketing yet they cannot be the same as influencer marketing.

Why Is Influencer Marketing So Important?

With the rising cut-throat competition on the internet every brand whether it is big or small moving fast towards influencer marketing to market its product and to ensure its future growth.

 Influencer marketing is becoming so important that it is becoming the future of online marketing.

Now why influencer marketing is important let’s discuss below:

Influencer Marketing Decoded

Influencer marketing involves collaborating with popular and compatible influencers in their niche for marketing their product with increased revenue.

 Influencers have got so loyal followers that can be helpful for brands as probable future buyers.

Also, influencers have knowledge about a particular subject that empowers them to motivate their followers and fans across several social media sites to take the desired action.

They have also got the idea that how to make a plan and when to implement them correctly.

  Amplified Brand Awareness

While influencers have a far-reaching effect, they have the power to give rise to brand exposure and amplify brand awareness.

Endorsing of a brand by influencer gives a positive response from his followers.

As the marketers add-up with influencers, it becomes easy for them to attract their followers towards their brand.

This also helps the brand in getting increased visibility and meaningful online conversation about it.

According to a report around 67% of the marketers are engaged in influencer marketing.

Precise Targeting Strategy

Targeting the right audience is a crucial part of the marketing strategy for every marketer. Though, it is an assiduous process and requires an in-depth understanding of their potential customers.

Now here the influencer marketing makes the marketers transcend the steps as already been done by influencers.

Here marketers should confident of compatibility of influencers with their niche and his public image should coincident with the brand image.

That is why influencer marketing gaining popularity among business houses and marketers

Enhanced Credibility and Trust

The image and power of influencers depend upon the trust of their followers. While having this trust they develop a loyal fan following.

When influencers share their feedback about the marketer’s product or service, it is taken in a noticeable way. So collaborating with influencers take marketers close to their audience.

Consequently, increasing the brand awareness of marketers with increased returns on investment.

In addition to that  influencers can work according to marketers marketing objectives

The Ideal Influencer Marketing Strategy

Influencer marketing strategy plays a vital role. It helps us to build brand authority, and make connections with new audiences. It also gives the lead to their product and services.

The influencer marketing goals as below:

Brand awareness

Network Building

Audience building

Customer loyalty

Sales

Engagement

 Once you decided which goal you have to choose and which influencer marketing strategy you have to implement than the next step is to choose the right audience, for this you have to identify who is your target audience is, who gives you more lead by promoting the products and services.

For more engagement, you can organize a giveaway to make connections between the audiences and influencers.

The influencer marketing strategy includes:

Renewed content Strategy

While collaborating with influencers helps the marketers to redefine their content strategy and gives it a new perspective.

 It acts as a breadth of fresh air amidst the self-promotional content that they regularly post.

Moreover,  the content that shows influencers is usually more authentic and trustworthy.

If it makes a parallel connection with the audience they will obviously share it with their network.

This gives rise to the content of the brand and connects it with the audience that remained inaccessible otherwise.

Online summit

The Online summit is one of the most important strategies of influencer marketing.

 Here the summit is organized by one person and the power of other people is leveraged within their net and then all those people come in and speak as a speaker on this online summit.

While this summit last for a week where two or three speakers speak each day and the attendees get to watch different session for free and learn from each presenter for free. But then the presenter in exchange promotes the product or services they are able to provide.

 So by participating as a presenter gives the best opportunity to grab a large audience to market the product.

New Influencer Marketing Trends

Influencers marketing becomes a trend these days. The marketer spends lots of money on marketing strategies and it’ll get to the objective of $5-10 billion by 2020.

There are different trends seen in the markets as below:

Influencer marketing budget growing rapidly.

Tiktok, Instagram becomes the most popular influencer marketing medium.

Influencer event increasingly day by day.

Brands are investing more money in marketing strategies.

The price of Instagram, Tiktok, and Twitch influencers varies.

Gaming influencers are on peak special female gamers.

Influencer collaborates with brand partners to launch their products.

 In present-day influencer marketing is in trend, so the brand raised its budget of influencer marketing. As per the recent survey half of the marketing, budgets has been spending on influencer marketing. In 2019, 65% of marketers decided to increase influencer marketing budgets.

There are so many types of influencer found on Instagram one of them are Nano influencer which is growing more popular than other influencer tiers.

As last year’s survey disclose that 89% of marketers announce that Instagram is most important for the Influencer marketing strategy.

As we all know that Video is the best and easy way to get information, so brands are now approaching Youtube Influencers too. You can get the idea about how big is influencer marketing is? –  now more and more advertisers shifted towards Youtube for their brand awareness instead of billboards, print media, and television broadcast. That is why companies keep on evolving smart handsets to reach more and more people in less time.

Today as more and more viewers are using mobile, it becomes easier for marketers to make reach more viewers.

Also, Influencer marketers get high revenue for social media celebrity. In 2018 Youtube started paid subscription for their influencers which allowed fans monthly 4.99$ charges to access their contents.

In Conclusion

Ultimately, to get the most out of influencer marketing, marketers must remember that it’s more important to align with someone who shares their brand value and can truly influence their fanbase rather than to seek out a big personality with a huge follower count on social networking sites.

Also, they make sure that they have to speed up with the latest development and make ways with new technology, a platform to maximize their revenue.

from LMG Media https://lmg.media/understanding-influencer-marketing-and-why-it-is-so-effective/

[major-final-project]

Today everyone on the internet wants their content to become viral. But what does it mean? More importantly, HOW do you get things viral? It’s not magic. If virality experts are to be believed, there is a method to the madness, which we call the science of virality

What Virality Experts Have to Say

The science of virality has been used by many entrepreneurs to build great viral products. Not just one or two, but many. So if you want to know these “secrets”, read on

Kevin Allocca, YouTube Head of Culture and Trends at Google, has great insights as to what makes videos viral.

As per Allocca, although a very tiny percentage of videos end up becoming viral or reach more than a million views, those which do have 3 things in common: tastemakers, communities of participation and or unexpectedness. 

Tastemakers are influential people who introduce average people to interesting things and help bring these things to the limelight. When a tastemaker or a group of tastemakers start sharing things on the internet, the process is accelerated and communities start forming around this “phenomenon”.

That is where communities of participation come into the picture. Communities are responsible for the rapid propagation of content and even addition to it.

In a world that is inundated with more content than anyone can hope to ever consume, virality is possible by only those creations which are unique and unexpected. Things which stand out get the attention that is necessary for virality

Emerson Spartz, founder of sites like MuggleNet, Dose and OMGFacts and a virality expert in his own right, says that the content has to connect with people, through emotion, nostalgia or humor, for them to share with others.

Things which do not connect with people emotionally, will not go viral. Getting people worked up about something helps in getting tons of shares too.

According to Spartz, virality depends on Virality Coefficient (number of people one is sharing content with) and Cycle Time (how long it takes one to share content with someone else). The higher the viral coefficient and shorter the cycle time, the faster virality is achieved. Cycle times are shortened when sharing something makes you look cool in front of others. Every time someone shares something on the internet, this is one factor that definitely weighs on his mind. Virality is also impacted by how relevant or popular the topic of the content is at that particular time.

Spartz also argues that originality is not necessary for virality, instead the focus should be to figure out what works and then spread that in clusters that have not been reached yet with that content. He infers, from his research that lists, short paragraphs and sentences and pictures work the best if you intend to make the content viral

If you scourge the internet for the science of virality, you will find the name of Wharton marketing professor and author of Contagious: Why Things Catch On, Jonah Berger all over. He is an authority on the subject of virality and he attributes 6 main reasons for the success of viral videos which he has given the acronym of STEPPS.

Social Currency – People share content that makes them look good or rather cool in front of others. After all, no matter what we might say, all of us care about what others think of us.

Triggers – Trigger is a stimulus that keeps people sharing your content. You might be hungry when you share a food porn video. Your hunger is the trigger here.

Emotion – “When we care, we share”. People tend to share stuff that is emotionally arousing. Content with positive emotions is shared much more than that with negative emotions.

Public – If something is popular already, chances are it will shared further. If the participation in that thing can be made public, even better. If you are not sure how to feel about your Mayor or his performance but there is a popular opinion doing the rounds, chances are you will end up propagating that opinion further. We all like to be part of a community and feel accepted.

Practical Value – Practical, useful stuff gets instantly shared. That is why “How to” videos work so well.

Stories – People love stories, especially if they are emotionally arousing. If you can tell a compelling story through your content, people will recognize and share it.

Berger says all viral content will have five traits in common: Surprising, Interesting, Intense, Positive and Actionable. The most shareable content will evoke strong positive emotions and offer practical, actionable advice. As an emotion, awe works the best. Although anger and anxiety work well too, awe is a more shareable emotion than the others.

Seth godin

According to American author and entrepreneur/marketer Seth Godin, only those ideas which are “remarkable” can spread. They can be remarkable in terms of look, value proposition, marketing etc. but they need to stand out from whatever has come before. Instead of making average products for the average buyer, who according to Godin, have become experts at ignoring advertisements thrown at them, companies should target innovators and early adopters.

These are the folks he calls Otaku or those who have insane passion for the products they love. Otakus can drive for miles to get the coffee they love or stand in queues for hours to get their hands on their favorite phone before anyone else. These are the people who become not just customers but rather promoters of a brand or product they truly love. They are the ones who help make things go viral

While a study by Elon University says there is no magical recipe for viral videos, the most viral ones share certain characteristics between them such as short runtime, a short length of the title, an element of surprise, irony or laughter and musical qualities

Upworthy, as a company and website, has mastered the art of virality. It managed to get the same number of followers in a period of a few months that its competitors took years for. So it made sense to study what they think made them so successful. According to the folks at Upworthy, it is the perfect framing of content that gets it clicks from people. Truly viral content will have high shares per view and high clicks per share. The best platform for viral content is Facebook and thus the content on any site should be easily shareable on it.

If one cannot create amazing content, one should find it and share it. What makes great content? Great content will have an emotional story arc and an inspiring meaningful message. People love good guys winning over bad guys. People love great production value but a great story even more. People love surprises. People love raw, honest moments. Speak to the audience in as human as way as possible and then frame the content with a headline that has a curiosity gap. Do you now get why you see headlines like “2 guys met at a bar. You won’t believe what happened next”? While you might think of these as click-bait, the creators end up getting thousands of views and shares and laughing all the way to the bank. But your content does not have to be deceptive. You can actually help people learn new stuff

Josh Elman believes virality is of different types and there are different methods of virality for different products or ideas. Every product cannot be approached in the same way. If you want to make things viral, you must know which category it belongs to so as to engineer its features in that manner.

Word-of-mouth Virality – When your product is so good that people themselves talk about it with others and make it go viral. For such products, make the product features easy to describe.

Incentivized word-of-mouth Virality – It is similar to word-of-mouth but you also provide a little incentive to people for referring your product to friends and family. It helps the company and the customers equally. You get new customers and customers get discounts or incentives.

Demonstration Virality – When you use it, you show it off. That is demonstration virality for you. Products like Instagram, Pinterest and even Uber have benefitted from this.

Infectious Virality – This type of virality works when you get more people to use the product you already use and thus are able to build a community around it. It ends up becoming a great deal for both the parties. It is similar to word-of-mouth but here you are referring the product for your benefit too. You spread infectious virality through invitations. That is how most social networks like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn came to the forefront in their initial days.

Outbreak Virality – Some things are so fun that they have to be shared with the next person. That is how they gain ultra-fast virality. That is why memes go viral, that is why the cute cat video got viral and that is how Pokemon Go got viral too

What Works

Positive Emotions (humour, awe, wonder) – Negative emotions like anger work extremely well for virality but something that makes us laugh or gape in awe has even higher chances of getting shared.

Uniqueness or Quirkiness – Let your content stand out. Sometimes even egregiously bad content becomes viral too, thanks to how uniquely bad it is.

Element of Surprise – Shock them, surprise them, jolt them out of slumber. Be controversial. There is just too much material on the internet for you to be noticed by being normal and boring.

Current Trends – Current, trending topics get shared much more than old content. People are constantly searching for latest trends on the internet. So you should aim to land on those searches.

Visuals (Lots of Them) – The more visual it is, the less text it has, the better.

Lists – Of course they work. We all love top 10s and top 20s. Countdowns even more. YouTube channels like Watchmojo have built their existence around such lists.

Memes (We LOVE them) – Memes spread like wildfire. Yes, there are too many of them on the internet but the beauty of it is that every month, you get a new trending meme, which would be fresh, quirky and shared all over social media. With so many blogs, pages and groups sharing them, you can have multiple cycles of viral content and very effectively reach more people than ever possible earlier.

What DOES NOT Work

Loooong paragraphs – Most of us have an attention span of a 5-year old. Need we say more?

No Heart – Emotions drive virality. Make people inspired, happy, amazed or even angry but do not make content no one would care about. If your audience goes “Meh!”, it sounds the death knell for your content.

Sleep-inducing material – Keep people entertained. The more fun they have, the more they will share.

Endless Self-Promotion – Unless you are a Kardashian, refrain from excessive self-promotion. People like it when your content addresses them and their problems, instead of you blabbering about yourself till eternity.

Complexity – Keep it simple, silly! Content which gets shared the most can be consumed on the go without stressing the grey matter of the brain too much. Of course, sometimes, complex content can get you viral too if you can generate enough awe. But in such cases too, although the topic can be complex, your handling should not.

[immigration-pols155-blog]

Interview Reflections

Once we accumulated background research on our topics, it was our turn to use it-- we were to interview two separate political actors who were involved in our field. I picked two separate activists, one from a local on-campus club and the other a professor in Southern California who is dealing with a whole different set of immigration issues. Below is the full paper with citations.

I learned a lot from having to apply my knowledge in a practical fashion; it made me feel mature and accomplished, and I felt like I could do this again in the future more easily if I had to. It reminded me that the best way to change situations and to understand them is simply through communicating; talking brings the humanity back into situations that are innately human, but get so blown up and argued over that we often lose the main points.

My name is Clare Keech, and my policy area of interest is immigration. In the time I have spent this semester studying the topic, I have been closely following the history and impact of DACA; it has become apparent that our nation needs to introduce an immigration policy that not only seeks to replace DACA, but can provide a clear path to citizenship to put an end to renewals and constant states of limbo for undocumented students. During the course of my interviews, I changed my stance and learned even more. I now have a clearer goal to push for: the Clean Dream Act needs all the support it can get, and to do that information about it needs to be spread. In addition, allies need to be vocal for their undocumented neighbors, and if possible undocumented citizens need to share their stories in ways and places that make them feel most safe. My interviews led me to interview one student activist named Radhika Kataria on campus who works through SQE. I also travelled home to Orange County and interviewed a Political Science professor at my old college named Jodi Balma.

Radhika Kataria is a student at California State University, Chico. She is a Public Administration major, with a minor in Women’s Studies; she became a member of SQE after seeing hate, discrimination, and oppression on her own college campus (R. Kataria, personal correspondence, November 16, 2017). SQE uses the platform of creating a more equalized learning space to also push for de-privatizing the CSU system as a whole. As such, fighting for the rights of undocumented students is just one of many topics that this student-powered organization tackles. I wanted to interview one of my peers who was in my age group, is also a student, and can additionally be an active voice in more political circles. I think that all young adults should be active, in some way or another, in pushing for change to our political systems. This is what will shift politics to a more humanist, equal playing field and will hopefully bring an end to the major forms of oppression we have currently experienced as a nation.

Second, I interviewed Professor Jodi Balma, who teaches Political Science and coordinates the Honors department at my previous community college (Fullerton College). She has been teaching for twenty years, seventeen of which have been at Fullerton College; her primary focus is Californian politics, and she has been invested in the lives of undocumented students for the past sixteen years ever since her students began to share their stories (J. Balma, personal correspondence, November 20, 2017). When I first started college, I became involved with the Fullerton College Honors department and I met Professor Balma. I admired her for her passion within her field, and her passion for inspiring her students to become critical thinkers and active voices in their community. She has never been afraid to speak her mind, and I knew she would be a wise voice to reach out to. The point of view of an educator is one that I deeply value, and I trust her knowledge of this tumultuous political scene which we find ourselves living in.

The first important thing I learned about was the Clean Dream Act, which I learned about through my interview with Radhika (personal correspondence, November 16, 2017). She did not mention may details about it herself; however, she later mentioned the Dream Center we have on Chico State’s campus. They are a department on campus, and as such do not push anything too heavily political such as running tables that would directly support their position; but, I was able to gain some information on the Clean Dream Act from them. The Clean Dream Act is up for vote in March; it is an immigration policy which would cover those covered by DACA and allows a path to citizenship. Previously, those under DACA had to renew their status every few years, but under the Clean Dream Act no more renewals would be necessary. Radhika mentioned some events that SQE hosted, such as a large banner drop and public speakers. The goal of these events was to raise awareness of the plight of those who are affected by DACA, and what it means to have DACA repealed; they were seen as successes not only because they gained members for their organization, but also because they now have students who return to them for information about DACA and the current atmosphere surrounding immigration and Trump’s administration (personal correspondence, November 16, 2017). In addition, they are raising more awareness about the Clean Dream Act, and urging those able to vote or raise awareness themselves (personal correspondence, November 16, 2017). I also believe that the Clean Dream Act is a very important piece of legislation at this point in time.

When meeting with Jodi Balma, she had similar sentiments about spreading information. She discussed what Fullerton College has done in past years, and stressed that they have always been an ally and a resource for undocumented citizens, even so far as allowing them the comfort of taking the platform themselves (personal correspondence, November 20, 2017). This is rare in more rural areas, such as Chico, where the undocumented population feels much less secure and therefore has their voices stifled. Fullerton College has worked to keep students informed, and recently has provided legal assistance to make the process of renewing statuses or knowing where to go next to gain citizenship a much less confusing one (personal correspondence, November 20, 2017). She made an interesting comparison, as well, in order to highlight the importance of allowing undocumented persons to share their personal stories, rather than speaking as an ally. She discussed the parallel between this situation and the early climate of the LGBT community. It is important to humanize the very difficult choice to immigrate somewhere in a rush or without being able to go through long bureaucratic processes, and Harvey Milk had similar thoughts regarding the situation of many LGBT citizens: “...[O]nce and for all, break down the myths, break down the lies and distortions. For your sake. For their sake” (personal correspondence, November 20, 2017). Professor Balma empowers undocumented people, urging them to share their stories no matter how hard it may be to do so; only then will the cause be truly strengthened, because the more human side will no longer be deniable. It is important to note, as I did earlier, that this is a privilege of more heavily populated areas. But, Professor Balma has a more accessible track; spread the word, and encourage others to vote. Even if you are unable to do so, be vocal about the importance of voting. This is important with things such as the Clean Dream Act, but also with members of Congress and our State Representatives. This parallels Professor Morris’s encouragements in class to be informed not only about those up for election, but who is supporting them ad influencing their decisions.

I learned a lot more than I expected to during these interviews. There are many ways to be active and stay involved with immigration decisions, and I have changed my original goal posed in my Talking Points assignment. I realized that even that goal, to follow Xavier Baccera’s court case against the Trump administration, is too distant to really push. On campus, every day, students can share information; especially in an area like Chico, a smaller town, this is important because you cannot know how many undocumented citizens you can provide a voice for if you are able to. Students can also support organizations such as SQE and the Dream Center through volunteering or attending events. Closer to election dates, voting drives can be held; leading up to elections, it is important to get the campus informed on which acts are important for our undocumented peers, and why. These are all much more accessible acts for students to run and participate in, and can have a direct influence in our local and national political legislature.

Balma, J. (2017, November 20.) Email Interview.

Consideration of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA). (2017) U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Retrieved 11/11/17.

Kataria, R. (2017, November 16.) Email interview.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. (2017). Official Website of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Retrieved 11/15/17.

[itscosplay-dontbesalty-blog]

#2. Trolls and Cosplay

Cosplay, just like any art form, will have an audience that will analyse its work. However, what makes digital spaces difficult for the artist and the cosplayer is that it is no longer simple to determine who is giving healthy, critical advice and who is simply being a troll.

Trolling is rife in the online cosplay community because cosplayers who post their work online are opening the door for strangers to comment on their work – and these comments aren’t always friendly phrases of advice. In order for one to determine who is a troll and who is not, one needs to firstly define what a troll and troll culture is and how the troll functions in the digital space. From this one will be able to determine what is a troll and what it is not and provide advice on how to handle trolls as a cosplayer.

There are many definitions of what a troll is. Corinna and Escartin (2015: 169) define a troll as someone who takes part in an online conversation with the intention of being disruptive and to provoke an emotional response from others for their own entertainment. These conversations have the characteristics of being time consuming and without progression, as well as being aggressive (Corinna & Escartin 2015: 171).  Trolls undoubtedly undermine the participatory-democratic-communication model in new media, as this model believes digital media can serve as a place for citizens to engage in debate and discussion (Banda, Mudhai & Tettey 2009: 23). Trolls prevent this type of democratic involvement as conversations cannot develop and participants aren’t able to deliberate or reflect on the argument due to the troll’s inflammatory remarks. Trolls do not allow for respectful listening and logical discussion, which are the criteria for a critical debate (Dahlberg 2001: 84).

These trolls can be seen as  being significant in terms of culture and politics as trolls can take away freedom as well as advocate it (Philips 2015: 710).  This means that trolls can represent the silencing of those who are in the minority yet also can work as the minority themselves, acting as both an agent of freedom of speech or a preventer of it.

In the case of cosplay, one can look at DeLa Doll’s (2016) article, which was formerly analysed in the blog on Blackface and Cosplay.

In the case of blackface, one can see that blackface will always be political and these political views spread on digital platforms. Therefore, when one looks at DeLa Doll’s article on her experiences of being trolled by those who she attempted to teach, one can see how trolls prevent debate and discussion, bully people into self-silencing (the act of oneself choosing not to speak due to fear of getting trolled or bullied), and how racist politics filters into the trolling and cosplay cultures.

DeLa Doll’s (2016) article explains why wearing dark make-up to represent a dark skinned person (known as blackface) is racially insensitive and also looks bad. The second part of her article shows how she has been trolled for it.

Firstly, the direct reply from the blackface cosplayer, MiYu, is filled with passive aggressive replies such as “I get your cosplay is not the same as where I am living” (MiYu cosplay in DeLa Doll 2016).  The cosplayer also places the name of ‘troll’ onto DeLa Doll by accusing her of being a bully and that DeLa Doll is rude (MiYu cosplay in DeLa Doll 2016). The cosplayer also claims DeLa Doll is making her depression worse (MiYu cosplay in DeLa Doll 2016). This type of wording is commonly found in what is known as reverse apartheid discourse, where a previously advantaged person claims victimhood in order to justify their behaviour and make it seem that they are at a disadvantage (Wambugu 2005: 64). Despite DeLa Doll’s non-aggressive reply, MiYu already took on a troll persona by implying her cosplay was better and more accurate than DeLa Doll’s and by accusing her of bullying and taking on the victim label in order to try silence DeLa Doll.

However, MiYu cosplay was a small troll compared to the trolls who came next.

After DeLa Doll’s opinions, views and thoughts were out in public, rational debate did not occur.

Trolls came forth posting on DeLa Doll’s Facebook page. One troll said DeLa Doll’s cosplay of white Harley Quinn (a cosplay that placed in a competition) was not good enough to place in a competition (DeLa Doll 2016). This troll is trying to belittle DeLa Doll. Another troll accuses DeLa Doll of being uneducated or insolent by saying “do you even know what racism is”. (DeLa Doll 2016). Accusing someone of being less smart or uneducated because of his or her opinion is trying to maliciously hurt a person and invoke an emotional response of aggression, making this person a definite troll. As Corinna and Escartin (2015: 180) state, trolls attempt to discredit a post. This is being done here by questioning DeLa Doll’s intelligence.   

This is not the worst yet. These comments were attacking DeLa Doll personally and as a cosplayer. The next comments however take on a very racist discourse, showing how trolls and troll culture are significant in political areas.

A troll posts a picture of the famous character Rubi Rod on DeLa Doll’s Harley Quinn make up test (DeLa Doll 2016). This act is utterly racist as the troll is saying that DeLa Doll, a black cosplayer, looks like she’s doing a Rubi Rod cosplay (Rubi Rod is a famous black character). This shows that this troll feels that one, the Harley Quinn cosplay isn’t good, and two, that if she is black and cosplaying it must be Rubi Rod. The result of this is that on a broad scale this troll is assigning one face to all black characters and one character to black cosplayers. Instead of being an individual, DeLa Doll is reduced to being every black character. This troll used an image to provoke an emotional response and troll DeLa Doll. The fellow trolls however used more racial slurs by calling DeLa Doll “Mrs. Banana and “Lil Ape” (DeLa Doll 2016). These words are clearly racist as they reduce DeLa Doll to being an animal and othering her by making her ‘less than’ the trolls (Wambugu 2005:62). These words are also very similar to the discourse found during colonial times of black people being ‘closer to nature’, ‘more natural’ and ‘primitive’ (Burke 1992: 203-205).

In the case of DeLa Doll (2016), one can see that trolling in cosplay can range from attacks at ones work to personal attacks unrelated to the topic in order to suppress an opinion that counters ones own and to cause emotional responses.

However, not all troll attacks are like this. Other cosplay attacks can simply be “you’re ugly as fuck” as seen from Instagramer Ameatyourservice (2016).  In fact, hurtful comments about a cosplayer’s appearance are so common, ‘fat shaming’ among the favourites by trolls. These comments do not come in the form of healthy criticism but are simple hurtful comments meant to create an emotional response of anger or sadness in the cosplayer. 

 This then brings to question what is healthy criticism. If trolls prevent rational discussion, critical debate and a mutual sharing of ideas (Dahlberg 2001:84), then healthy criticism would be comments that encourage rational responses, keep to the topic of cosplay and the materials and not physical features of the cosplayer, and are not emotional or aggressive in nature.

In conclusion, one can see how trolls operate in the cosplay community online, using Facebook and Instagram accounts to say hurtful comments that can range from attacking cosplay quality to personal attacks on a cosplayer. These personal attacks can embody racist discourse as seen with DeLa Doll (2016). In order to combat trolls and understand what is healthy criticism, one must determine if what the perceived troll says is relevant and not aimed at causing an emotional response. One must be careful of assigning the label ‘troll’ to those with a different opinion, as seen in DeLa Doll’s (2016) article. However, if the comment is done with the intention to troll, the best action is to not reply as trolls set out to take ones time in pointless conversation and create emotional responses that bother oneself more than the troll.

 References:

Ameatyourservice. 2016. ame.at.your.service Instagram Account Instagram. Retrieved 29 October, 2017 from the World Wide Web: https://www.instagram.com/p/BGg8uFhEdMW/?taken-by=ame.at.your.service

Banda, F., Mudhai, O.F., Tettey, W.J. 2009. New Media and democracy in Africa – a critical interjection. In. Banda, Mudhai and Tettey (eds.) African Media and the Digital Public Sphere. London: Palgrave. 

Burke, T. 1992. Nyamarira that I loved: Commoditisation, consumption and the social history of soap in Zimbabwe. Collected Seminar Papers. Institute of Commonwealth Studies. 42, 195-216.

Corinna, M. Escartin, P.D. 2015. Rogue Cops Among Rogues: Trolls and Trolling in Social Networking Sites. Philippine Sociological Review. 63: 169-190.

 Dahlberg, L. 2001. The Habermasian public sphere encounters cyber-reality. The Public. 8.3. 9-27.

 DeLa Doll. 2016. Blackface Is Ugly, And I’m Being Harassed: A Tale Of Cosplay And Cosplayers Gone Wrong. Huffington Post. Online. Retrieved October 30, 2017 from the World Wide Web: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/blackface-is-ugly-and-im-being-harassed-a-tale-of_us_57d00f10e4b0273330ab68aa

 Philips, W. 2015. This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things. Technology and Culture. Cambridge: MA: MIT Press. 57: 710-711

 Wambugu, J. 2005. When Tables Turn: Discursive constructions of whites as victims of affirmative action in a post-apartheid South Africa. Psychology in Society. 31: 57-70.

 Images:

 Gndungan. 2016. gndungan Instagram Account. Instagram. Retrieved 29 October, 2017 from the World Wide Web: https://www.instagram.com/p/BDWNPp0BDHG/?taken-by=gndungan

 Nox Zander. 2017. liquid_stargazer Instagram Account. Instagram. Retrieved 29 October, 2017 from the World Wide Web: https://www.instagram.com/p/BSAE1JSBeQ-/?taken-by=liquid_stargazer

[m3dta-blog]

Week 43 - Truth or Consequences

By Christine DeLorey

The numerology of calendar WEEK 43 is busy and diverse, and while the pace of life on Earth continues to accelerate, we are in a cycle that is trying to slow us down.

Week 43 is a 7 WEEK, (4 + 3 = 7), which is the number of learning. But unless we slow down to a pace that allows us to study the details of one situation before rushing into another, very little can be learned, and our minds become more prone to distraction and manipulation.

7 is the number of the mind, analysis, and the flow of information. 7 is also the number of secrets, scandal, conspiracy, and exposure. Both 4 and 7 are truth-seeking and error-correcting numbers, and Week 43 is the 4th week of a 10 week cycle in which all the Week Numbers begin with 4.

4 = limitation

3 = communication

7 = knowledge

Calendar Week 43 begins on Sunday, October 22, 2017 (1/22/1) which is a 6 Day – and represents justice, education, healing, family, home, and responsibility. 6 is the number of the dictator or tyrant – the number of control. The patriarchal system from which we are evolving, with all its extremism, austerity, and cruelty, is a product of under-developed 6. But this is also the number of the loving father, and the evolving man who promotes equality and fairness. While 6 can take us to extremes, it is also the number of BALANCE.

Master Number 22 focuses on a larger picture and sheds its enormous light on how ‘the few’ affect ‘the many’. This numeric mixture reminds us that humanity is one family, and Mother Earth is our home. 22 provides enormous potential to improve conditions for people (and all life forms). But in the wrong hands, it can result in incompetence, selfishness, and sheer spite. 22 is the most balanced form of 4, but when balance is lost, inflated egos become extremely dangerous, especially when supported by deflated egos.

On Thursday, October 26, your personal weekly forecast repeats as a daily forecast. This repetition occurs when the month and day add up to 9. (1+0+2+6=9). On these ‘double dose’ days, conditions, memories, and feelings intensify. 9 represents ‘letting go’ in order to move forward. Be sure to re-read your personal forecast on Thursday.

October 26, 2017, also has a 10/1 vibration (1/8/1) which focuses on the power of the individual, the abuse of power, and the need to maintain our free will amid such great efforts to stifle it. This is a day to be super-conscious of the rise of fascism in the world, and use this week’s 4 energy to develop your determination to keep yourself, and those you care for, free and safe from this very real threat. To ignore it is ignorance. And we live at a time in which ignoring or denying the truth can create dire consequences.

Friday, October 27 is the 300th day of this 10/1 Year. October is an 11/2 Month, and October 27, 2017 is an 11/2 Day (1/9/1). 11 illuminates what we most need to see. These two 11s are connected to the 22 energy we experienced at the beginning of the week, making this an entire week of connecting dots and producing a bigger picture and a deeper understanding. 2 is the number of connection. In this energy, suddenly we realize something important after a period of oblivion. Suddenly the penny drops – and we finally ‘get it’.

Feminine 2 is the number of the new millennium which is why feminine energy, all over the world, is now rising so visibly, vocally, and effectively. The timing is right. The male-driven 1000s are over, and 2 will bring balance to what has always been a ‘man’s world’. Feminine energy is humanity’s WILL, which has never been free, but is rising to free itself now by expressing – without guilt or shame – just how badly it has been treated in the course of time.

Allow your fear to work for you, not paralyze you. Allow its messages to transform themselves into courage and resolve. The opposite of love is not fear. The opposite of love is hate. The opposite of fear is confidence – and the belief that no matter what, you will find your way.

In this week’s busy numeric blend, nothing is quite as it seems. 3 provides a platform, and amplifies communication. This includes the way you communicate with yourself, so be careful not to react impulsively or believe everything you hear. 3 fuels all the arts, including illusion. Remember that denial, deception, distraction, and diversion are arts unto themselves.

3 also enables us to speak from the heart – which then touches the hearts of others. One of 3’s qualities is to spread and expand, sometimes as rumor, gossip, and hearsay, but also as truth, inspiration, excitement, and incentive.

3 is such an important vibration here in the early 21st century (2+1=3) because it provides the sustaining energy of optimism – which is another word for hope. Hope is a vital lifeline – something to hold on to as we move through this rough uncharted territory.

27 is a form of 9. It activates our intuition by merging emotion (2) and mind (7), which provides a more balanced appreciation of what is happening – in an atmosphere in which reality is being deliberately blurred. Yes, we are up against a lot as we struggle to hold onto our WILL and rescue parts of it that are already enslaved to this collapsing system.

Life is an ongoing story, and we must constantly determine whether we are dealing with fact or fiction, truth or lies – and this is not an easy task! However, despite this week’s contradictions and ‘strangeness’, we are likely to unearth NEW information that can make the task a little easier. And the way we react to what we learn is most important too. FREE WILL – the ability to express outwardly what we are feeling inwardly – is at stake here.

Controlling the Will Of The People starts with controlling women – and most specifically, women’s bodies – because it is the physical body, both female and male, that enables us to FEEL our emotions. That is why so much effort is being put into preventing free expression, and why the whole issue of free speech is so prominent at this time. 27/9 urges honest and open response to experience.

At the same time, the innovative 10/1 energy of 2017 shows us alternatives and solutions – and attention to detail is essential. But only a greater awareness – an expansion of consciousness – can accommodate all the different factors at play. This is something you have to want so strongly that you literally WILL it into being. You cannot force your mind to open. Only when it opens is there space for new understanding to come in. Open-mindedness has nothing to do with being gullible or easily led. Open-mindedness requires a deep desire to learn, to know, to understand. And of course, desire is a feeling.

2 is the number of PEACE through diplomacy, not force. On October 20th, Donald Trump, signed an executive order which expands his authority – and the Department of Defense headed by General Mattis, to declare a national state of emergency. This is an addendum to a George W. Bush Executive Order made after the 9/11 attacks which makes it easier to call up Reserves and retired military personnel, at short notice, for indefinite duty. At the time of writing, one can only speculate what this could mean, but it does not bode well.

EXECUTIVE ORDER 13223 = 11

Signed 10/20/2017 = 10/20/10

On Saturday, October 28th, we are once again in 10 10 10 10 energy. To better understand this quadruple-10 vibration, please read my article for Week 41, entitled: “PAY ATTENTION”.

Decade = 10.

Year = 10.

Month = 10.

Day = 2+8 = 10.

10  10  10  10 = 40.

The very next day, on Sunday, October 29, (10/11/10=3+1=4), we enter the ‘master energy’ of WEEK 44.