Digital Discourse Database

Number of Posts: 17
Posts 1 - 10

UK millennials second worst-hit financially in developed world, says study

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 19.2.2018
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | youth
Summary | According to a study, UK Millennials are in a bad financial situation; they are doing worse than young people in other developed countries, besides Greece. Although home ownership is falling in the UK, young people can still find jobs (which is not the case in some Southern European countries).
Image Description | Photograph of four young girls looking at their smartphones.
Image Tags | female(s), smartphone

Ban mobile phones in schools to protect pupils' mental health

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 26.9.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | (mental) health, childhood, school, smartphone, threat
Summary | According to Shannon Turner, schools should ban smartphones to protect their pupils. Screens and social media can have a negative impact on children's health, which is why some schools have already put in place new rules (e.g. give children 6 hours of digital-free time).
Image Description | Photograph of two pupils in a classroom; one of them is showing her friend a smartphone and the other is giggling.
Image Tags | female(s), school, smartphone

Are smartphones really making our children sad?

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 13.8.2017
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | (mental) health, addiction, childhood, smartphone, threat, youth
Summary | Children's relationship with screens has become a contested topic; not everyone agrees with what should or shouldn't be done. Last week, the Atlantic published an excerpt of Jean Twenge's book (the Atlantic article was titled "Have smartphones destroyed a generation?"), which initiated very diverse reactions. Jean Twenge, who is an American pychologist, said that social media have a negative effect on young people. Twenger then answered some of her critics in this Guardian article.
Image Description | Photograph of a group of teenagers all staring at their phone or tablet.
Image Tags | female(s), male(s), smartphone, tablet

Technology can save lives, not just improve them

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 11.7.2017
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | smartphone
Summary | Much has been said about the negative effects of new technologies. However, technology can save people's life. For instance, Bristol Braille Technology is an enterprise that created a braille electronic reader for blind people. Chatterbox is another tool that was created by a refugee in order to offer language tutoring. Within the "health" category, someone created a wireless sensor that makes physiotherapy exercises more fun, and someone created a tool to improve cancer diagnosis.
Image Description | Photographs of two men using a braille electronic reader, a man and a woman talking, and three women staring at a smartphone.
Image Tags | female(s), male(s), smartphone

Is it wrong to let my child play on my smartphone?

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 10.8.2017
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | (mental) health, addiction, childhood, smartphone, technology-free
Summary | The author of the article sometimes feels guilty when she lets her 2-year old son play on a smartphone. When young children are glued to a screen, they are so captivated by what they're watching. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, children younger than 2 should have no exposure to screens; it can hinder their language and social development/skills. The author of the article also claims that her kids already show characteristics of "addicted" behavior. For instance, they scream and are irascible if someone takes their screen away. She also says that what is dangerous is not so much when kids are on screens, but rather when parents are.
Image Description | Photograph of a kid using a smartphone next to an adult.
Image Tags | female(s), male(s), smartphone

Now anyone can build their own version of Microsoft's racist, sexist chatbot Tay

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 31.3.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | artificial intelligence, social media
Summary | Microsoft now lets people build their own chatbots. Bots are the new app, and developers will soon be able to create bots that respond to chat messages. Big tech companies are now trying to build their own bots (e.g. Facebook, Google, Amazon, Slack, Microsoft).
Image Description | Digital image of a smartphone screen displaying a female face (Tay).
Image Tags | female(s), smartphone

Are teenagers having less sex – and is social media the reason why?

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 10.3.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | addiction, research/study, social media, youth
Summary | Teenagers are having less sex; is it because of new media? One theory says that it might be because young people spend more time in their bedroom in front of their screen and less time socializing and getting drunk with friends. The drop in teenage pregnancies is also accompanied by a drop in teenage drinking levels. A US report claims that teenagers spend 9 hours each day on social media, and kids between 8 and 12 spend 6 hours online each day. Japan has one of the lowest birth rates in the world, and they even coined the word 'sekkusu shinai shokogun' which means “celibacy syndrome”.
Image Description | Photographs of a boy looking at a tablet, girl wearing sunglasses (we can see the Facebook logo in the reflection), two girls sitting back to back using their smartphone, classroom with students and teacher
Image Tags | Facebook, female(s), headphones, male(s), smartphone, tablet

The rise and rise of international diplomacy by WhatsApp

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 4.11.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | politics, privacy, texting, WhatsApp
Summary | WhatsApp diplomacy is a thing: when leaders gather to talk in the same room, they can exchange emojis and other documents to other people without the whole room knowing. WhatsApp is more secure than other government information systems and has been used at the UN and EU headquarters.
Image Description | Photograph of a group of diplomats looking at their phone, screenshot of a WhatsApp chat, photograph of a man holding a phone and a woman standing next to him (both are looking at the phone)
Image Tags | female(s), male(s), smartphone, text, WhatsApp

No, wealth isn't created at the top. It is merely devoured there

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 30.5.2017
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | politics, social media, threat
Summary | The new rising technology firms like Facebook, Airbnb, and Uber are the new class of rentiers. The do not create anything new, they claim control over goods and services and cash in on transactions made on the platform they provide. That is all they do: provide a platform. It is only profitable because people willingly share content and offer their services on these sites. But these firms also have not invented the technology (internet, computer devices, etc.): that technology was developed with the tax payer's money. So technically they are just selling and reselling already existing goods - like a rentier.
Image Description | Getty image of a protester, an iPhone, the Facebook campus, a bunch of bank signs, and a Mexcan capitalist.
Image Tags | female(s), male(s), smartphone, text

Welcome to Twitter city: is there no limit to Jakarta's social media obsession?

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 21.11.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | Facebook, social media, Twitter
Summary | A Parisian study found that the city with the most active Twitter users is Jakarta. The city with 10 million residents is said to retain the mentality of a village through the extensive use of social media. Because of Indonesia's history of corrupt politicians and frequent natural as well as anthropogenic catastrophes, Indonesians have developed an unbreakable sense of humor in the face of terrifying news. Especially since the end of a dictatorship which censored free speech, Indonesians are excessively going to social media to post memes and otherwise poke fun at politicians.
Image Description | Getty image of many people on their smartphones in Jakarta, a satirical cartoon, as well as a few internet memes featuring politicians as well as Isis leaders.
Image Tags | female(s), male(s), meme, smartphone

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