Digital Discourse Database

Number of Posts: 19
Posts 1 - 10

Qu'est-ce qu'un chatbot?

(What is a chatbot?)

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Newspaper | Le Figaro
Date | 8.6.2017
Language | French
Country | France
Topic Tags | artificial intelligence, social media, texting
Summary | "Chatbot" comes from "chat" and "robot", and is a software that imitates human conversation and natural language. We can come across chatbots on certain companies' websites (e.g. SNCF, Orange, Fnac, Ikea). We can ask them questions online and they usually try to help us. Chatbots are particularly popular today, but the concept is now new; it started in 1960 a program called Eliza (from MIT). Today's softwares are more complex and powerful. They are increasingly used on social media and messaging apps.
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Se parler pour de vrai

(To talk to each other for real)

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Newspaper | 24 heures
Date | 25.6.2017
Language | French
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | language threat, social media, spelling, texting
Summary | We constantly 'click' and 'follow', but we don't talk to each other anymore. As a result, some people are trying to find new ways to make people talk again.
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Das Vong zum Sonntag

(The vong for Sunday)

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Newspaper | Welt
Date | 27.8.2017
Language | German
Country | Germany
Topic Tags | anglicisms, language threat, social media, texting
Summary | The German internet and social media have produced a new language in the last two years: the "vong" language, its main feature being an attributive construction of "vong (noun) her" which roughly translates to and the English phrase (noun)-wise with "vong" replacing the "-wise". It is a language between English and German, uses numericals wherever possible as is known from texting language and is highly influenced by hip hop jargon. Now a German artist has translated the Bible into vong-language.
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Names of the Brussels Victims Emerge Online, One by One

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Newspaper | The New York Times
Date | 24.3.2016
Language | English
Country | U.S.
Topic Tags | Facebook, social media, texting, threat
Summary | In the aftermath of the Brussels airport terrorist attacks, cell phone service was unreliable so people worried about their loved one's went on social media in search for missing persons. Entire bulletin boards were created on Facebook where people posted pictures of the missing family members and friends. Shortly after, deaths were being published on Facebook and other social media.
Image Description | A Getty image showing the airport evacuation in Brussels and Twitter posts with pictures of missing persons.
Image Tags | female(s), male(s), Twitter

Girls gang up on boys in new cyberbullying craze called 'roasting', expert warns

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Newspaper | Telegraph
Date | 25.7.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | (mental) health, cyberbullying, gender, social media, texting, threat, youth
Summary | "Roasting" is a new cyberbullying craze where girls pick on boys on WhatsApp, Instagram, or Facebook until they crack. Teenage girls and boys have already killed themselves because of cyberbullying.
Image Description | Photograph of three young girls using and staring at their smartphone
Image Tags | female(s), smartphone

Words are getting shorter due to social media as 'Jomo' and 'mic drop' feature on word of the year list

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Newspaper | Telegraph
Date | 3.11.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | social media, spelling, texting, word/writing
Summary | With social media and texting, it seems that words are getting shorter. For instance, “jomo” stands for the “joy of missing out”; the acronym has been included on the Collins list of words that have seen a significant rise in usage. Other terms are: mic drop, throw shade, sharenting, uberisation, or dude food.
Image Description | Photograph of a group of people cheering, video of Obama dropping his mic, and photograph of Trump smiling
Image Tags | female(s), male(s)

Rise of the defrienders: Nine in ten young people have been 'ghosted' by their friend or partner

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Newspaper | Mirror
Date | 6.5.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | smartphone, social media, texting, youth
Summary | “Ghosting” or defriending someone by text or social media is a new phenomenon. It seems that young people prefer using their smartphones and laptops to end relationships instead of doing it face-to-face. The term "ghosting" came from Katy Perry's song "Ghost" where she talks about ex-husband Russell Brand who had not spoken to her after demanding a divorce via text. Thanks to social media and the fact that you can hide behind your phone it is now easier to defriend people by ghosting.
Image Description | Photographs of two hands holding a smartphone, Russell Brand and Katy Perry, a man using his phone and looking at it, a hand holding a smartphone displaying the Facebook icon.
Image Tags | Facebook, female(s), hand(s), male(s), smartphone

How can women build better friendships? Start with the right words.

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Newspaper | Washington Post
Date | 11.6.2017
Language | English
Country | U.S.
Topic Tags | research/study, social media, texting, threat
Summary | Linguist Deborah Tannen has just published her latest book about how women build their friendships through language. Communicating with friends and negotiating the terms of the friendship is fraught with risks especially now that social media lets one know exactly when one is being exluded from group activities. Texting also complicates our friendships.
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Why Kids Can't Write

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Newspaper | The New York Times
Date | 2.8.2017
Language | English
Country | U.S.
Topic Tags | grammar, punctuation, school, smartphone, social media, spelling, texting, threat, word/writing
Summary | Many students struggle with writing despite various pedagogical models that have been implemented in past years to tackle that perpetual issue. This is all the more suprising considering that today's students may do moret voluntary writing than any generation before it. They text and post on social media a lot but the writing register is different there. The format's main principle is shortness so grammar, spelling, and punctuation take a back seat.
Image Description | GIF of a hand writing and a group of teachers in a workshop.
Image Tags | female(s), gifs, text

How I Learned to Love Snapchat

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Newspaper | The New York Times
Date | 22.5.2016
Language | English
Country | U.S.
Topic Tags | Snapchat, social media, texting, threat
Summary | The texting revolution, as with other major and rapid technological advances, has inspired moral panic. People think that we are becoming less social. It might be true, but we should also look at the advantages of new technologies. For instance, texting has allowed a whole generation to be free from the "stricture" and "inconvenience" of phone calls. Snapchat is one the latest technological trends and it goes beyond words. It's the most well realized way of expressing meaning. With texting, people tried to find ways to approximate normal human conversations (e.g. typing awareness indicator, or read receipt), but they are almost as awkward as phone calls. The author of the article talks about voice memos and the fact that they are becoming more popular. She also talks about Snapchat and how different it is from other social networks; Snapchat is the place where you can be yourself.
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