Digital Discourse Database

Number of Posts: 17
Posts 1 - 10

Als die Server zusammenbrechen, fliessen die Tränen

(As the servers break down, the tears start )

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Newspaper | Tages-Anzeiger
Date | 27.7.2017
Language | German
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | game, smartphone, threat, virtual reality
Summary | Pokémon Go is a hugely popular smartphone video game that lets players catch virtual Pokémons in their real surroundings by means of augmented reality. A huge public Pokémon Go event was held in Chicago with 20'000 attendees. At some point the inevitable happemned, the servers collapsed and the app would not work any more. Many players became very upset and Pokémon Go reimbursed all attendees who paid to be at the event with a rare Pokémon.
Image Description | An image of a park with Pokémon, a screenshot of a Pokémon Go map, and a hand holding a smartphone with Pokémon Go open on the screen.
Image Tags | hand(s), smartphone

Quand le smartphone fait de l'ombre au bébé

(When smartphones eclipse babies)

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Newspaper | La Tribune de Genève
Date | 13.6.2017
Language | French
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | (mental) health, addiction, childhood, smartphone, technology-free, threat
Summary | More and more parents take a lot of pictures of their newborn before holding him/her for the first time. As a result, a hospital in the Swiss German part of Switzerland decided to impose a new rule: no screen during mother-baby nap. The problem especially affects the younger generation (under 30). Parents seem to pay more attention to their smartphone, which is alarming. For instance, mothers post pictures of themselves in labor. There are no special rules in Geneva, but doctors and midwives are thinking about alternatives. An excessive use of smartphones can also have a negative impact on children's development.
Image Description | Photograph of a hand taking a picture of a newborn with a smartphone
Image Tags | hand(s), smartphone

Der Computer lernt Mundart

(The computer learns Swiss German)

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Newspaper | Appenzeller Zeitung
Date | 29.6.2017
Language | German
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | smartphone, translation
Summary | The SBB app should be updated so the users can just speak their destinations and they will verbally receive the transport information. The developers say that the voice recognition software should be able to understand most dialects of Swiss German despite never having been enhanced with a Swiss German vocabulary. Lots of it is similar enough to German so that the software can detect the connection or it otherwise reports words that it does not understand so that they can be manually entered. Users should be pleased because it is just nicer when one does not have to speak Standard German to one's smartphone.
Image Description | Image of a hand holding a smartphone.
Image Tags | hand(s), smartphone

Wenn das Handy antwortet: So zahlen wir in Zukunft

(When the phone responds: this is how we will pay in the future)

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Newspaper | Handelszeitung
Date | 2.3.2017
Language | German
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | artificial intelligence, Google, marketing, smartphone
Summary | Various companies like Google and Amazon are coming up with new conversational commerce solutions, i.e. (voice command) chatbots with which one can conversationally make purchases online. Making payments via smartphone apps is very common in China while Switzerland is lagging behind. Some companies like Mastercard are already working on further ways to pay, namely by verbal cues. This means that people will only have to say it to secure the payment.
Image Description | Two informational videos and a series of photos from a technology convention.
Image Tags | female(s), hand(s), male(s), smartphone, tablet

Ein Update für Emoji-Fans

(An update for emoji fans)

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Newspaper | Tages-Anzeiger
Date | 13.12.2016
Language | German
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | emojis
Summary | The new Apple update includes 70 new emojis entered by the Unicode Consortium: various new animals, vegetables, bacon, doner kebab, a scary clown, a pinocchio nose, as well as a facepalm emoji. Thanks to the new pregnant woman emoji, pregnancy announcements can now be made with a minimal character count.
Image Description | Keystone image of hands holding an iPhone and another iPhone lying next to it.
Image Tags | hand(s), smartphone

Schweizer Firmen setzen auf Bots

(Swiss firms put their money on bots)

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Newspaper | Tages-Anzeiger
Date | 27.12.2016
Language | German
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | artificial intelligence, Facebook, privacy
Summary | Many companies in Switzerland are testing out chatbots to replace their telephone customer service. Many company chatbots can be contacted via the Facebook messenger. They are quite useful because they can organize tasks according to content and delegate them to the appropriate departments or help the customers themselves. Experts demand full transparency about what happens to customer data created in chatbot uses.
Image Description | Getty image of a woman's torso holding a smartphone, some chatbot chat screenshots and graphs.
Image Tags | female(s), hand(s), smartphone, text

Facebook und WhatsApp in der EU erst mit 16 Jahren

(Facebook and WhatsApp only after 16 years of age in the EU)

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Newspaper | Der Bund
Date | 16.12.2015
Language | German
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | law, Facebook, privacy, social media, youth
Summary | The EU has renewed the laws tied to data privacy originally made in 1995. The new laws now enable users of online platforms such as Facebook to sue these companies in their home country rather than having to travel. Also, some countries lift the legal age required to join social media from 13 to 16 years old. Young people under the age of 16 are legally not allowed to enter into a contract around data privacy with Facebook.
Image Description | Photograph of a hand holding a smartphone.
Image Tags | hand(s), logo, smartphone

Das sind die neuen Funktionen von Whatsapp

(These are the newest functions of WhatsApp)

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Newspaper | Der Bund
Date | 7.7.2016
Language | German
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | Snapchat, WhatsApp
Summary | New image editing and music features are supposed to be added to the messaging app WhatsApp. Funny filters, the possibility of adding stickers and drawing on pictures might be incorporated into WhatsApp – functions which are mainly known to be Snapchat features. Users will also be able to share music through the app and listen to it without having to download it. Further, it will be possible to join a group simply by clicking on a link.
Image Description | Photograph of a smartphone screen with different icons (WhatsApp, Skype, Viber) and a finger pointing to the WhatsApp icon. Screenshot of a Twitter account that mentions the new WhatsApp features.
Image Tags | hand(s), logo, Skype, smartphone, Twitter, Viber, WhatsApp

Government secretary tweets nude ‘selfies’

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Newspaper | The Local
Date | 7.8.2014
Language | English
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | pornography, selfie, sexting
Summary | A Bernese office employee had been tweeting nude images from her office to her 11'000 followers. She works for the Swiss government, whose employment policies ask employees to only post thing on social media that they would be comfortable sharing with their co-workers and supervisors as well and to keep the Swiss government's reputation in mind even when they are off the clock. The secretary in question, who has participated in several hundred amateur porn films as is now confirmed, claims that her private life does not interfere with her professional life in any way and that they should be kept seperate. It is unclear how her employers will handle the situation.
Image Description | Getty image of a woman taking a selfie.
Image Tags | female(s), hand(s), selfie, smartphone

Jeder 7. Teenager arbeitet besser dank Multitasking

(Every seventh teenager works better thanks to multi-tasking)

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Newspaper | 20 Minuten
Date | 24.10.2014
Language | German
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | brain, research/study
Summary | An American study shows that 85% of students cannot focus well when multitasking. The participants in the study were solving cognitive tests on a computer, listening to music, and checking their messages. Interestingly 15% of students focused better while multitasking and these 15% had previously been assessed as students with expert/experienced multitaskers. The researchers assume that it is because digital natives’ brains have adapted to new media.
Image Description | Photograph of a teenage girl using her phone; the shot does not show her face entirely but focuses on the phone.
Image Tags | female(s), hand(s), smartphone

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