Digital Discourse Database

Number of Posts: 28
Posts 21 - 28

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

Innovation in AI could see governments introduce human quotas, study says

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 4.4.2017
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | artificial intelligence, law, threat
Summary | With the increasing development of artificial intelligence, we can expect that a lot of jobs will be done by robots in the not-so-distant future. It is possible that human quota will have to be introduced or labels such as "made by humans". It is also unclear who is accountable in the case of an accident involving a robot.
Image Description | Robot and human shaking hands.
Image Tags | hand(s), male(s)

Google's future is useful, creepy and everywhere: nine things learned at I/O

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 18.5.2017
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | artificial intelligence, Google, privacy, threat
Summary | Google presented their new technology and their main focus is artificial intelligence. Google's Assistant is now proactively listening and making suggestion (for instance to leave the house early because of traffic) without users having to activate it by saying "OK Google". It will also be available accross devices. Google are attempting to replace Siri on Apple devices. Google's Assistant is much better developed in being able to understand colloquial commands. They are also working on connecting their Assistant with the camera, so that one could hold up the phone to a restaurant and get reviews about that restaurant pulled up. This has huge potential for making the lives of visually impaired people easier.
Image Description | Reuters and Getty images of Google CEO Sundar Pichai, YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki, and the Google Assistant home speaker.
Image Tags | female(s), Google, male(s), YouTube

Facebook reportedly testing new tool to combat fake news

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 6.12.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | Facebook, fake news, threat
Summary | Facebook is apparently looking into ways to combat fake news spreading on their platform. They have had to face much criticism because of this. Users have started getting little survey questions after clicking on news media links posted on Facebook asking them to evaluate how trustworthy the article is. It is not known what Facebook will do with the results of this poll.
Image Description | Getty image of the Facebook logo on various screens and a tweet.
Image Tags | Facebook, logo, male(s), Twitter

2016: the year Facebook became the bad guy

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 12.12.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | cyberbullying, Facebook, fake news, law, threat
Summary | 2016 has been a bad year for Facebook. Many scandals surrounded the company. It became clear that Facebook is now longer just an advertizing machine with access to almost 2 billion people world-wide but that it also curates what news media most of these people perceive - whether Facebook wants to accept this or not. They no longer just have to deal with sensoring nudity and human rights violations content but also fake news. While Zuckerberg denies that the fake news bubbles have influenced the presidential elections, his company at the same time makes tons of money selling exactly this persuasive power to advertisers.
Image Description | The Facebook reaction emojis and dislike (thumb-down) emojis, glasses in front of like buttons, and a man holding a smartphone with the Facebook logo in the background.
Image Tags | emojis, Facebook, logo, male(s), smartphone

It may be shallow and salacious, but don’t blame Tinder for online misogyny

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 8.4.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | gender, online dating, research/study, social media, threat
Summary | A new study revealed that the dating app Tinder spreads sexism and ideals of beauty; however, according to the author of the article, such behavior is not new. The media tends to portray new technologies and new apps as responsible for numerous societal ills, thus being dangerous. This new research follows a similar discourse while blaming the dating app Tinder of misogyny. However, sexism and beauty standards also existed before the age of social media. Thus, sexist comments are not the result of new technologies/apps; they go well beyond our digital devices.
Image Description | Photograph of a smartphone with the Tinder app open; we can see parts of a woman's face and a big LIKE in green.
Image Tags | female(s), smartphone, Tinder

How Silicon Valley's parents keep their children safe online

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 2.3.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | childhood, smartphone, social media, technology-free, threat
Summary | Silicon Valley's parents explain how they deal with their children's use of internet. Since parents cannot control everything or spy on their kids, they talk to them and teach them how to use the internet. Some parents have more restrictions; for example, no screens from Friday night to Saturday night. As a result, parents and children spend more time together and do fun activities. Other parents only let ther children go online with an adult's supervision. A psychologist claims that social media have a negative impact on children; they drive them away from family and school.
Image Description | Photograph of a female child sitting on her bed and looking at a tablet.
Image Tags | female(s), tablet

Always practise safe text: the German traffic light for smartphone zombies

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Newspaper | The Guardian
Date | 29.4.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | smartphone, threat
Summary | The word "smombie" (smartphone + zombie) was recently added to the German vocabulary. It refers to a person walking in the street and using his/her phone. People who do that are oblivious and can cause accidents. As a result, a couple of German cities have invested money in the creation of new traffic lights. In the US, some cities have buses that "talk" and alert pedestrians. In China, you can also find streets with "phone lanes" (as opposed to bicycle lanes for example).
Image Description | Series of three photograph and one video: woman holding a phone next to a tram, tram stop with people, Chinese kids walking on a "phone lane", and street interview of several people in German.
Image Tags | female(s), male(s), smartphone

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