Digital Discourse Database

Number of Posts: 60
Posts 51 - 60

Here's everything Facebook knows about you - and it's just plain creepy

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Newspaper | Mirror
Date | 8.11.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | Facebook, marketing, privacy
Summary | It is remarkable bordering on scary how much information Facebook has on its users in order to target them with specific advertising. Facebook is aware of such things as their users' gender, age, generation, parenthood, being a pet owner, knowing people who have recently had a wedding/birthday/etc., political affiliation, spending habits, housing situation (including square footage of their house!), traveling habits, consumption practices (groceries, liquor, cosmetics, etc), car situation (worth, likeliness to buy a new car and what kind, etc.), and what type of mom they are (soccer, trendy, etc.)!
Image Description | Reuters image of a male silhouette using a smartphone in front of a lit-up Facebook logo and a Getty image of a Facebook page reflected in a woman's glasses.
Image Tags | Facebook, female(s), hand(s), logo, male(s)

If manners maketh the man, then what is Donald Trump?

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Newspaper | Telegraph
Date | 13.4.2017
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | politeness, politics, social media, spelling, Twitter
Summary | One can dislike Donald Trump for many reasons, but for the author one of the main reasons is his overuse of capitalization in his Twitter posts as well as his carelessness (that he mixes up p's and q's). This carelessness translates directly into his general rudeness, his inaptitude for diplomacy, and the paradox in defending old values by spitting on political correctness which is technically just plain old politeness.
Image Description | Image of Donald Trump with his hands in front of his face and a portrait of the author.
Image Tags | hand(s), male(s)

Digital friends making you lonely? Here are 9 things to do other than check Facebook

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Newspaper | Telegraph
Date | 2.3.2017
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | (mental) health, Facebook, research/study, social media
Summary | Recent statistics say that more young people feel lonely than old people - despite those active social media lives. Psychologists are eager to explain that social media activity cannot replace real human companionship. There are many things one can do to exit the social media anxiety habit: joing a class or club too meet new people or to see good friends on a regular basis, have phone calls with friends, spend weekends with friends, learn to be happy while being alone sometimes - this can be achieved by meditation and mindfulness.
Image Description | A series of Alamy images showing a woman using a smartphone in bed, a woman holding a smartphone with a laptop in the background, and various images of social activities with no technological devices (dinner, birthday party, wine drinking, gardening class) as well as a man using a laptop and smiling while talking on the phone and a woman meditating.
Image Tags | computer/laptop, female(s), hand(s), male(s), smartphone, WhatsApp

Tackling abuse on social media is a monumental task - but billion dollar companies should be up to it

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Newspaper | Telegraph
Date | 15.3.2017
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | artificial intelligence, cyberbullying, law, social media, threat
Summary | Social media have a huge problem with trolling, cyberbullying, and sharing of criminal content. It is however extremely difficult for providers to find such content before it is reported or seen by many. Especially in verbal abuse, the line between joking and slander is blurred and human language is too messy to be able to flag down such instances with algorhythms.
Image Description | Getty image of the Facebook logo on a hand-held smartphone and a laptop and a photograph of a screen showing the Twitter logo.
Image Tags | Facebook, hand(s), logo, Twitter

The 15 phone apps that could make your life a whole lot happier

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Newspaper | Mirror
Date | 20.4.2017
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | smartphone
Summary | There are a variety of apps to make all aspects of life more convenient: an weather forecast app that suggests appropriate clothing, an app that helps you pack, apps that help you find the nearest public toilet cheapest gas station, your car in a carpark by retracing your steps (pirate treasure map themed), or cheapest flight, then an app that synchronizes your notes between your devices and with select contacts, an app that lets your friends or family trace your walk home at night, an app that lets you keep an eye on the whereabouts of your children or spouse, apps that remember your passwords and banking details safely, an app that helps you budget your finances or your time spent on your smartphone, and even an app that lets you know which parts of movies you can easily miss for a bathroom break.
Image Description | A Getty image of a man holding a smartphone and chatting on WhatsApp, and images of a toilet, a plane, some hands holding money, a packed suitcase, and a woman using a smartphone in a movie theater.
Image Tags | female(s), hand(s), male(s), smartphone, WhatsApp

The five lessons I learned from breaking my smartphone

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 24.1.2017
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | brain, research/study, smartphone, technology-free
Summary | After dropping her smartphone in the sink, the author lives without one for six weeks and discovers that she sleeps better without a smartphone, enjoys being unavailable, few things need to be tended to urgently, that she spends less money, and her memory suffers from having a smartphone. Studies have also confirmed that it is detrimental to one's sleep pattern to sleep next to a smartphone because notifications release dopamin in the brain similarly to a nicotine or recreational drug addiction. She values the time she now has to just not be available for messages from work because we tend to respond to any and all messages as if they were urgent when really they are not. The author reports to spend less money because she can no longer do online shopping on the go without a smartphone. She has also realized how dependent on Google she has become. Neurological studies confirm that our brains are adapting to the constant accessibility of all information by remembering how to find it and googling again if necessary rather than remembering the little snippets of information.
Image Description | Getty image of a woman's hands holding a smartphone.
Image Tags | female(s), hand(s), smartphone

Geek Mythology: Apps such as Snapchat show it's the medium that's the message

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Newspaper | The Independent
Date | 7.5.2014
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | sexting, Snapchat, threat, youth
Summary | Snapchat seems to be designed specifically for sexting because all sent photographic material auto-destructs itself after a few seconds. These would ensure that one's nude images do not get distributed further. Snapchat however has a 'best friend' function which displays to everyone with whom users exchange the most snaps - this would be a hinderance in maintaining a clandestine sexting relationship. Also, teenagers use Snapchat most and surely not all of them sext. After all, only because the medium faciliates a specific activity does not mean that it will be used in that way.
Image Description | Photograph of a smartphone, held by a hand, video calling a group of people in a restaurant background.
Image Tags | female(s), hand(s), male(s), smartphone

The graphic selfies from inside the Swiss parliament

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Newspaper | BBC News
Date | 24.8.2014
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | politics, pornography, sexting, WhatsApp
Summary | Switzerland saw two nude selfie scandals in and around politics this summer. A secretary working in the parlamentarian offices had been tweeting nude selfies taken on the premises. Parlamentarian and city mayor of Baden in Switzerland, Geri Müller, had been sexting with an online friend via WhatsApp, including an abundance of written messages and nude selfies. The Swiss public had been debating whether Müller's #selfiegate should have been newsworthy at all. What ultimately emerges is a double standard: the secretary lost her job within days and the mayor is still representing the Swiss people in parliament.
Image Description | Portrait of Geri Müller, Anthony Weiner, and a Thinkstock image of a hand holding a smartphone presumably taking a selfie.
Image Tags | female(s), hand(s), selfie, smartphone

Darian Leader: how technology is changing our hands

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 21.5.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | addiction
Summary | Today's digital era is marked by the effects of new technologies. For instance, space and time do not have as clear boundaries as before, and relationships have changed too, whether it is a good or a bad thing. One of the ways in which new technologies impact us is related to the use of our hands. We use our hands and fingers for new movements, and as a consequence, more people suffer from hand problems now. We have always used our hands and kept them busy; they are a very important part of us. As some movies exemplify, our hands sometimes act without our will. The same thing happens with new technologies; it is almost as if we cannot help touching our digital devices. Hands are agents with power. When people are addicted to something (e.g. smartphone), they cannot control themselves.
Image Description | Series of five photographs: Michelangelo's "Creation of Adam", poster of the movie "The Hand", screenshot of Elsa from the movie "Frozen", keyboard with silhouette of a hand, screenshot of a scene of "The Hunger Games".
Image Tags | female(s), hand(s), male(s)

Does quitting social media make you happier? Yes, say young people doing it

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 21.9.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | (mental) health, addiction, Facebook, social media, technology-free, youth
Summary | Interview with young people who decided to quit social media; they explain why. They mostly talk about deleting their Facebook account and how better they feel now. Some of them report feeling less depressed, happier, free, more productive, and enjoying meeting their friends face-to-face. Having a Facebook account was a lot of pressure for them; they didn't like the idea of having to report everything on the platform, to read articles they were not interested in, or to wait for other people's approval or "like".
Image Description | Series of three photographs: close up shot of hands holding smartphones, Snapchat icon, and Twitter app.
Image Tags | hand(s), smartphone, Snapchat, Twitter

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