HENRY~WWW

public MDA20009::digital_communities(102578431); // a lost CompSci student @Swinburne Uni

[henry-www]

a history and exploration of online harassment

Whether or not you have a positive experience on the Internet highly depends on what sites you choose to frequent. This is due to the idea of platformisation: For example, gaming on a console platform will result in a much different experience than gaming on a mobile platform. In relation to social media, some platforms are more civilised and moderated than others. However, regardless of what social media platform you use, there is always potential for online harassment to occur. Online harassment can be defined as: “deception and manipulation for lulz, often in jest and for the tacit fun of community members” (see lecture slide 8 for more definitions). However, online harassment can be used for far more sinister motivations than just mere fun. The unbelievable amount of hatred and threats that Anita Sarkeesian received during the GamerGate drama was described by Sarkeesian as a “cybermob”. Similarly, this article from The Conversation refers to the term “technology violence”, while this article from Markwick & Caplan discusses “weaponised harassment”. Finally, there’s the good ol’ “cyberbullying”, a more widely accepted term. Regardless of how you choose to label it: The Internet, as a platform in itself, affords personal or networked harassment with a low chance of real-world consequences.

Why don’t you take a seat: We need someone like Chris Hansen or the “Catfish” team to track down these cybermobs

Experiencing person-to-person harassment online is very common for many Internet users. This may be in the form of insulting someone through personal messaging, or by posting “revenge porn”. According to Markwick & Caplan’s article, the Internet allows people to “stalk, intimidate, harass, humiliate, and coerce intimate partners, particularly girls and women”. This old article from 2012 discusses the app “Girls Around Me”, which fortunately no longer exists. The app combined functionality from Facebook, Foursquare, and Google Maps to show its creepy male userbase the locations of nearby women. I remember hearing about this at the time and being disgusted at both the developers and the users of the app. The fact that this app was developed eight years ago demonstrates that stalking and harassing women via the Internet is nothing new, and unfortunately, this is still a very prevalent practice today. The aforementioned article from The Conversation also posits that people who are not as tech-savvy as someone who may want to harass them online (for example, a jealous ex-boyfriend) is empowered by their superior technological skills, hence justifying the term “technology violence”. A recent example of such a character is Joe from Netflix’s ‘You’, a show which explores how Joe, a deranged stalker, has the ability to control and gaslight vulnerable women that he is sexually interested in. “Gaslighting” itself is only a term that has become relevant recently, and is used to dismiss women who make accusations of sexual harassment as part of the #MeToo movement. This article defines gaslighting as the “psychological manipulation of a person in order to erode their sense of self and sanity.” Gaslighting is one of many tools in an online troll’s arsenal.

The show’s greatest achievement is how the handsome, psycho Joe remains the protagonist hero, despite his horrible actions (You, 2018) (BTW, WATCH THIS SHOW!)

As I mentioned earlier, online harassment can also be “networked”. Markwick & Caplan’s article summarises this form of harassment as such:

“harassing behaviour is often networked in that it is coordinated and organised”.

Networked harassment is generally much more serious and dangerous than person-to-person harassment, as it is much more difficult to ignore potentially thousands of online trolls and haters. One of the largest examples of networked harassment was directed at Anita Sarkeesian in the aforementioned GamerGate situation. Sarkeesian was threatened with rape and murder for her plans to create a YouTube series exploring how women were objectified by video games. I found it interesting in her TedX talk how she highlighted the fact that many of the people who sent her these vile threats were not just stupid teenage boys, but fully-grown men. This suggests that misogyny still runs deep among all generations of men, and that perhaps the Internet’s affordance of free knowledge has not made society as educated and sophisticated as hoped. I have also been on the receiving end of networked harassment, and even gaslighting, albeit to a far lesser extent than Sarkeesian. This occurred back in the early 2010’s when a forum thread was created about me, accusing me of cheating (“hacking”) in an online game. Dozens of anonymous gamers made mean insults and pushed me to confess that I was cheating. This was a lot to handle for a young boy who had no idea how to even “hack” a video game, and I subsequently quit playing this game and never returned. However, it’s not so simple just to “log off and walk away” when you are the victim of networked harassment on your public social media accounts, which is often where such harassment occurs. People have spent much time and effort on “visibility labour” in order to build their social media identities, and it’s unfair to throw all of this away just to avoid (usually undeserved) harassment.

...heh, maybe I was hacking after all. I guess we’ll never know...

Anonymity has its pros and cons in relation to online harassment. On one hand, I suffered no real-world consequences over this video game incident, as no-one could link my real name to my gamertag. However, this concept works both ways: Anonymous harassers will also suffer no real consequences for their actions if no-one knows who they really are behind the computer screen. Doxing (leaking someone’s personal details on public social media) can also be used by either the harasser or the victim. Harassers can leak information about someone who does not want that information made public. On the other hand, victims can dox their harassers, which allows for the possibility of losing their job or respect from their friends, family, and other social media connections. An example of this is when Clementine Ford doxes men who abuse her online (although, she has doxed children and the mentally disabled, which is very disappointing). The final topic I’d like to discuss is regulation and moderation of social media and online forums. Personally, I believe that the less the Internet is legally regulated, the better. This is not due to anything regarding online harassment perse, but more indicative of my overall philosophy on privacy. Features such as anonymity have advantages far beyond the realms of this discussion on harassment.

Clem Ford has landed in hot water recently over her sexist COVID-19 comments (Twitter, now deleted)

I also have mixed feeling on moderating content online. I’ll quickly discuss two different attitudes towards moderation. Firstly, reddit is quite heavily moderated, and yet I do spend the majority of my social media time there. Moderation is left to elected community members called ‘moderators’, who can delete / lock posts, delete comments, ban users, and enforce the rules of each individual subreddit (community). This form of community moderation works very well most of the time, however it has been known to fail when moderators become power-hungry or corrupt. Facebook takes a different approach to moderation. Users can flag content which they believe breaks company policies, but content is ultimately deleted by employees, not community moderators. I’ve actually had a brief argument about this very topic on a Facebook comment section before. Someone stated that Facebook should regulate comments more heavily, as it is their own backyard. I pointed out that it’s kind of hard to keep control of a backyard with 1.73 billion people visiting each day. Overall, I prefer reddit’s moderation strategy, but ultimately there is no perfect solution.

Facebook founder “Zark Fuckernerd” may regret his recent statements after viral satire article from The Chaser (Twitter, 2020, tweet link, article link)

[henry-www]

[‘POST’, 6, ‘GAMING’]; <warning: long post>

Video games and the digital communities that form around them have always been a big part of my life. I fit into the description of the stereotypical gamer; I’m a young white man, and I feel comfortable discussing games or being involved with anything related to gaming. Anything. I have mixed feelings about this picture of a traditional gamer, however. I reject the notion that gaming communities aren’t as welcome to people of colour; perhaps some 12-year-olds enjoy expressing their ‘edginess’ by hurling racist insults, but those individuals certainly don’t speak for the gaming community as a whole. However, I can accept that LGBTQIA+ players do experience a disappointing amount of homophobic interactions while gaming online, as I’ve witnessed a lot of this firsthand. Additionally, I do not envy women gaming online, particularly in more competitive games; the ‘gamer girl’ stereotype is basically impossible to avoid.

This isn’t to say that us young white men are untouchable, however. During my many years of playing first-person shooters online, such as CS:GO and Overwatch, I’ve probably had every possible insult hurled at me many times over, and in turn I’ve also unleashed my own fair share of roasts and cruel banter. Some of our funniest memories involve beating someone and then insulting their mother, sister, or even father (no family members are safe). Gaming online can be a fantastic experience if you ‘fit in’ with everyone else and can handle the toxicity; but I know it can be a very disappointing and isolating experience if you can’t.

Is society’s idea of a stereotypical gamer outdated? (South Park, 2006)

PC gamers have a number of marketplaces to purchase games from: Steam (created by Valve) is obviously the primary choice, while Origin, Epic Games, and Humble Bundle are additional options. The Steam community is very simple to join – just purchase your first game and start playing – but it has a huge breadth of different ways to interact with other gamers. You can build your profile, find friends to play and chat with, live-stream your gameplay, post in community discussion boards, write reviews, and even create workshop content or ‘mods’ for your favourite games.

The modding community for PC gaming is huge and full of very dedicated and talented people. Modding is a particularly interesting subculture of the gaming community; like speedrunning, it doesn’t really exist in other art forms. The only comparable practice is writing a fanfiction, but this is creating a separate text, instead of building onto the original text. The Minecraft modding community is huge, and has vastly expanded the games’ possibilities and even influenced its official development. However, similar to how fanfictions exist outside of their inspired text, mods can also become entire, separate games if they are popular enough. Before this week’s lecture, I thought the biggest example of this was Counter-Strike, which started as a Half-Life mod. Hence, I was very surprised to learn that Dota also started as a mod – a WoW mod!

It’s fascinating that Valve’s two biggest IPs weren’t even created by them. An interesting characteristic of PC gaming that was created by Valve, however, was Steam’s community market. The Steam market is a platform where you can sell individual game items for real money. Items are treated as a commodity, and their price is not determined by Steam; prices fluctuate according to supply and demand. This marketplace is one of the reasons I became so interested in CS:GO, as the items from that game were always a big seller.

The market price for the ‘Prisma 2 Case’ on Steam. Comparisons can be drawn to the share market!

Of course, there are many gaming communities that exist outside of Steam. Unlike other online platforms such as Facebook or Instagram, there is no singular definitive website that all gamers congregate to. Steam is big, but only of interest to PC gamers. The single largest gaming community that I’m aware of is the gaming subreddit, with over 26 million members. But the community as a whole is very fragmented, existing over many websites and platforms. Some gamers may not consider themselves a part of any communities at all. Despite this, gaming is still considered a social activity. Here is a great quote from this week’s lecture that I’d like to highlight:

“Playing video games is a practice that is immensely social, cultural, and imbedded in our everyday lives.”

It is increasingly uncommon for one to have an asocial experience while gaming. Most games have online functionality, their own subreddit, a Discord server, or all three. Even single-player games aren’t really single-player games anymore. Throughout this lockdown, I’ve been playing the Switch remake of the original Pokémon Mystery Dungeon. You don’t encounter other players in this game, as it’s a single-player game. Despite this, there is actually some online functionality built in. You can ask for help online from other players if your party gets defeated, and in turn you can rescue other players that need help. But even if this mechanic didn’t exist, I’d still be having a social experience. I can chat to my friends on Discord about the game, or about what they’ve been playing. I can use online discussion boards on reddit or GameFAQs. Finally, I could make a YouTube video or stream my gameplay on Twitch. Despite how non-gamers may view gaming, it is a deeply social activity. In fact, gaming is far more social than reading a book, going to the theatres, or watching Netflix. Aside from social media, gaming is possibly the most social activity you can partake in online.

It’s safe to say that I like Pokémon (Pokémon S1 EP50, 1998)

Gaming is also more important in terms of social interaction than ever before, due to the lockdown situation. I imagine that almost everyone has feelings of isolation and anxiety that come with not being able to see our friends IRL anymore. As I said, I’ve been playing Pokémon to help take my mind off of the horrible situation. Another Switch game, Animal Crossing: New Horizons, has exploded in popularity during the lockdown, and is the best-selling game right now. More social than the single-player games I’ve been playing, Animal Crossing places huge importance on interaction with other players, and may be a helpful tool for players to combat feelings of social isolation. Overall, the lockdown is a fantastic time to be a gamer, whether you’re into Animal Crossing or not. DOOM Eternal has also been a big new release, and GTA V (which has a popular online mode) is currently available for free on PC. I really pity all of the extroverts out there who haven’t coped as well in terms of social interaction during the lockdown.

With new DOOM and Animal Crossing releases, there’s something for everyone (YouTube, link)

I want to further explore our understanding of what a ‘typical gamer’ is. So far, I’ve only mentioned PC or console games. Our idea of a typical gamer may be somewhat accurate for PC and console platforms, however we must acknowledge the elephant in the room; mobile games. Everyone knows that mobile gaming is a huge market, and like the gaming community at large, will only continue to grow. However, a lot of mobile gamers may not realise the amount of mobile games they play. I’ve read several MDA20009 blogs already by people who claimed they haven’t played a video game in years. I was very surprised to read this, considering that 50% of smartphone users play games on their phones. I’ll pose this question: do non-traditional gamers consider mobile games to be ‘real’ video games? Personally, I think they should; mobile gamers are as much of a gamer as any hardcore PC player. But who exactly is a mobile gamer? Is it our typical young white man? Apparently not; 49% of mobile gamers are women. This statistic shows us that women are enjoying mobile gaming just as much as men are. Anyone can play a video game if they want to; you don’t have to be man to enjoy them. Hopefully, women who enjoy playing mobile games will also embrace gaming on other platforms, so we can rid ourselves of the masculine-dominated culture sooner rather than later.

Bloons is a popular mobile game series (Bloons TD6)

A very popular subset of mobile games are social media games, or ‘social games’ (although I think this term can be inaccurate in its simplicity). Unlike traditional online gaming, where you might play with a few friends and a lot of randoms, social games can be played entirely with friends. This is because they rely on your existing social media friendship network, instead of an algorithm which randomly pairs you up with players in your region. Popular social games include Farmville or 8 Ball Pool, but generally these games have a tendency to come and go in terms of popularity. Unlike PC or console games, who have a more dedicated community of fans that may stick around for years, social games are more casual and have less strings attached. That’s not to say that some people can become long-term regular players of social games. My Dad and my sister play Scrabble together using their Facebook accounts on a daily basis, and they show no signs of getting bored.

I’d be remiss to write about social gaming without mentioning Pokémon Go. PoGo launched in 2016 and took the world by storm, with over 500 million downloads in 3 months. Players enjoyed the incredible AR (augmented realtity) functionality, as well as the core mechanic of playing the game in the real world. Although it’s not as relevant as it once was, it has evolved over time and still has lots of players today, myself included. IMO, PoGo is the most social video game that there has ever been, and only perhaps VRChat (an MMO “social platform”) comes close (at least, until someone hurries up and develops the Oasis). Games like Farmville are social in the sense that you’re playing with your friends, but PoGo allows you to make new friends too. I’m involved in the PoGo Hawthorn community, and we have a Facebook chat of hundreds of people. I may have never have met any of these people if not for our shared interest in walking around town and enslaving cute little pocket monsters. PoGo proves that not only are games inherently social, but they can even advance our social connections.

VRChat users playing Dungeons & Dragons - a game within a game (Steam, 2017, link)

Finally, I’d like to discuss one last area of the gaming community: live streaming. As I mentioned earlier, gaming is an inherently social activity, and it would continue to be social even without streaming. However, streaming has really taken it to the next level. Firstly, let’s talk platforms. Twitch is the first platform that comes into anyone’s mind when streaming is discussed, and rightfully so. Last week, there was an average of over 2.2 million people watching at any given time, and there was an stunning 1.79 billion hours of content watched in the month of April. Twitch exploded in popularity for many reasons; anyone can start streaming their favourite game, watching top players gives one a better understanding of the game, and unlike T.V, viewer / broadcaster interaction is essential.

Two very interesting communities have been formed on Twitch. Firstly, there’s Games Done Quick (GDQ), a charity organisation that broadcasts speedrunners blitzing through their games of choice, while viewers donate to either the Prevent Cancer Foundation or Doctors Without Borders, depending on the event. Over $25 million has been raised thanks to GDQ, which demonstrates that streaming as a platform can be used for so much more than just entertainment. However, one Twitch community that was designed solely for entertainment is Twitch Plays Pokémon (TPP). There really is nothing else like TPP; a “social experiment” where viewers don’t chat amongst themselves about the stream – they collectively vote on each in-game action and somehow navigate through the world of Pokémon by themselves. If you consider streaming to just be T.V with a live chat, then TPP completely nullifies that definition. There is no host streamer who narrates to the chat or tells them what to do; the viewers make all of the decisions. In that sense, TPP could be considered the very opposite of film or T.V.

Twitch Plays Pokémon. The game screen is on the left, and viewers are casting their votes on the right. For example, ‘SampleSpace’ wants to select the Up arrow

Other streaming platforms include YouTube Live, Facebook Live, and Mixer. Personally, I’ve never been on Mixer, and the only news I’ve ever heard about it was Ninja’s huge exclusivity deal. Similarly, PewDiePie’s recent deal with YouTube Live was also big news, and a significant way to promote the platform. Interestingly, streaming is beginning to go down the same path that social media, PC gaming marketplaces, and non-gaming streaming services followed. A huge new idea revolutionised the norm, and slowly but surely other competitors appeared and became relevant with the help of exclusivity deals. To quote from T.L. Taylor (from this week’s readings):

“The platform as well as gaming and media more broadly continue to transform and change, often quicker than any of us can keep up.”

With the amount of money that their competitors have, Twitch had better hope that its other big names don’t abandon ship as well. Fortunately for Twitch, the vast majority of eSports tournaments continue to be streamed there, including the Overwatch League (OWL). I think the OWL is a particularly interesting example, as it has seen success in crossing over to T.V, unlike most other eSports tournaments. OWL games are simultaneously broadcasted on Twitch and T.V, which is an interesting model. It allows for professional eSports to be introduced to viewers who might not be the target demographic. After all, watching eSports is not significantly different to watching physical sport; it’s the practice of lesser-skilled casual fans watching and learning from high-skilled professionals. This provides for the sharing of knowledge about the game, and also forming social connections with other fans of the game through your shared enjoyment of the tournament. It’s no surprise that many big-budget games nowadays are developed with streaming and eSports in mind. Development companies recognise and embrace the fact that streaming is an area of interest to a significant portion of gamers.

Overall, the gaming community has come a long way since the original Pong was developed. In the years and decades coming, I expect the community to continue growing further, not only in its core popularity, but also in new ways that will further diversify how we enjoy games, just as Twitch has done.

Overwatch League grand final: Philadelphia Fusion v London Spitfire (2018)

[henry-www]

POST 0b101::GENERATING { ‘awareness’ } AND ACHIEVING YOUR { ‘goal’ }

A crucial part to a successful campaign, whether political, social, or business-related, is to create awareness. You have to convince someone of your message, whether it be the general populace or legislators in parliament. Nowadays, I don’t think its particularly difficult to generate awareness for a cause. Videos, stories, and causes go viral all the time. If that doesn’t work, you can always round up some friends and shutdown some streets, like in last years’ Extinction Rebellion protests. However, actually achieving the goals of the campaign is significantly more difficult than generating awareness for it. Clicktivism can be a major problem faced by campaigns; people will ‘Like’ a post or sign up to a change.org petition, but many campaigns require much more IRL participation in order to achieve their goals.

Extinction rebellion protests (Melbourne, 2019)

Generating a huge amount of awareness about a political issue will hopefully spur a government into action, but this strategy doesn’t always go to plan. A prime example of this is the 2011 Occupy Wall Street movement, which protested “financial greed and corruption”. Despite tens of thousands of people in the ‘99%’ marching throughout NYC for the Occupy cause, the campaign was ultimately a failure. In fact, wealth inequality in the U.S has continued to grow since 2011. Both the top 10% and the top 1% continue to grow richer, the number of U.S billionaires has increased from 413 to 705, and the richest man in 2019 has almost double the net worth of 2011’s richest. To better understand why Occupy failed, we can try to understand their theory of change: IF we occupy Wall Street, THEN wealth inequality will decrease, BECAUSE the government cares equally about all of its citizens. Of course, the BECAUSE doesn’t make any sense, but neither does the IF; occupying Wall Street created awareness, but it didn’t directly help the campaign to achieve its goals.

The 1% couldn’t evict the 99%; but the opposite was also true

Occupy garnered a huge amount of awareness and IRL participation, but it was still unsuccessful. If a movement of that size couldn’t succeed, it makes you wonder how you could ever effect change? I’d like to discuss two environmental campaigns that started online and had different levels of real-world interaction. Firstly, Trashtag was a movement that began last year on reddit, and encouraged people to clean up trash in their communities. Trashtag is basically the opposite of clicktivism; it is centred around going outdoors and achieving the movement’s goals. However, posting about your clean-up is still an integral part of participation, and some people may primarily be incentivised by the positive online attention they receive. TeamTrees is another environmental movement that utilises financial clicktivism; people donate $1 to plant 1 tree, and they’re done. Donators don’t actually have to go and plant the trees themselves, which makes it easy to participate in. This strategy proved to be hugely successful, with 20 million trees planted in under 2 months. Unlike Trashtag, which spread virally due to participant’s posts, TeamTrees spread through memes and celebrity endorsement.

The video that spawned TeamTrees (YouTube, link)

I think that both of these movements succeeded because the general populace feel strongly about protecting the environment. Even climate change deniers cannot argue against cleaning up litter and planting trees. This is in contrast to Occupy, which was unlikely to garner much support from wealthy citizens. Overall, the failure of Occupy and the success of Trashtag and TeamTrees leads me to believe that the primary obstacle that campaigns (particularly with a progressive message) face is governments who are unwilling to invoke radical social change. A tool that once proved useful against such governments, sousveillance, seems to have lost any power it once held. Why? Trump made over 16,000 “false or misleading” claims in three years and is still in office. The time of holding our leaders accountable for their actions seems to have come to an end. What does this mean for the socio-political campaigns of the future? I think that these campaigns won’t brand themselves as such; they’ll have to be more politically-subtle and meme-friendly in order to gain the favour of the Internet.

[henry-www]

Instagram influencers: setting a bad example

Becoming an ‘influencer’ on Instagram is increasingly being recognised as a real career, and a key part to success as an influencer is how much money you can make. Like YouTubers, influencers primarily make their money through ads. A popular category of product for influencers to promote is health products. Kim Kardashian-West, who has been dubbed the ‘Leader of the Influencers’, has made a lot of easy money by promoting products such as ‘Appetite Suppressant Lollipops’, Fit Tea, and Skims. These advertisements, and the objectifying aesthetic templates that they adhere to, promote wholly unrealistic expectations in regards to body image. Unfortunately, Kim’s highly impressionable fans may not realise that using the products she promotes won’t cause you to look anything like her – unless you also have a personal chef, dietician, personal trainer… the list goes on.

Celebrity Jameela Jamil calls out Kim K over her advertising practices (Twitter, 2018, link)

Of course, the posts created by Kim and her clone army of sisters don’t cause all of the trouble on their own. The problem is that less successful influencers (microcelebrities) and even younger aspiring influencers and ‘prosumers’ will follow the aesthetic templates that the top-dogs have created. For women, this means posting a lot of sexualised and borderline pornographic photos, as they believe that this type of content will help them increase their influence. Instagram could be considered the opposite of Tumblr – everyone is trying to blend in and adhere to these heteronormative templates, instead of standing out and being themselves. The result of all of these influencers posting sexualised content is that it sends a terrible message to younger female users of the platform – that they also have to be sexual to succeed.

Male influencers are just as bad. Stereotypically ‘masculine’ ideals are popular on Instagram, such as being strong, dominant, and arrogant. Personally, I would not associate these terms with my idea of masculinity – toxic masculinity, perhaps. Interestingly, gay men can have trouble finding mainstream success as an influencer. Due to the aforementioned heteronormative templates that rule over Instagram, gay men have trouble mixing masculinity and femininity to create a successful brand. Overall, the current landscape on Instagram is filled with unhealthy body images and over-sexualised content. Perhaps the less you are influenced, the better.

It should be noted that online communities can be a benefit to public health by spreading accurate medical information, such as the Facebook group of medical professionals mentioned in this article. Unfortunately, social media is also used to promote and spread the awareness of pseudoscientific or dangerous medical practices. For example, see the below screenshot of anti-vaccine groups, which have found a home on Facebook. The idea of expensive and vain medical procedures also thrive on social media, with plastic surgery and facelifts being the most popular of their kind on Instagram. Personally, I see a whole lot of ill-researched and inaccurate medical beliefs presented on social media, so I think it’s best to take what you read with more than a grain of salt. Don’t even get me started on Goop.

Some anti-vax groups I found... unfortunately, there are so many more (Facebook, 2020)

[henry-www]

Slow 🐢 Fashion v Fast 🏃 Fashion

As a 19-year-old guy, I am proud to say that up until recently I knew next to nothing about the fashion world, let alone the raging ethical war between slow and fast fashion. If you’ve been living under a rock as well, allow me to explain. Fast fashion is all about cheap, low quality clothing that can be produced quickly. Popular brands include Forever 21, H&M, and Zara, with the latter being the pioneer of the movement, thanks to the ideas of its founder, Amancio Ortega. Fast fashion is a very profitable model; Ortega is worth an astounding 94 billion AUD. But fast fashion comes at a cost; as this fantastic Teen Vogue video says:

“Fast fashion works on exploitative labour conditions and is destroying the environment.”

Obviously, many socially-responsible fashionistas are at odds with these companies, and instead support an alternative that is rapidly growing in popularity – slow fashion.

Yeah, I’m into fashion.

Influencers are a force to be reckoned with nowadays, especially on Instagram and YouTube. Some influencers may simply treat social media as a job, and thrive off ads and product placement. These influencers may lend themselves more to the fast fashion world than the slow fashion world, and that’s understandable. However, a more socially-responsible influencer may instead choose to promote brands or companies that share their ethical views. Rent the Runway is a store where you can rent clothes, instead of buying them. This is both cheaper for the customer and better for the environment. Big Sister Swap is a smaller online service where you can send in 1 or 2 kilograms of your old clothes and receive an equal amount of new clothes. By supporting these companies instead of the fast-fashion titans, influencers can use their platform to educate their audience about slow fashion.

OliveAnkara, a slow fashion brand from Singapore. (thehoneycombers.com)

I think it’s important that influencers continue to make socially-conscious choices, including choosing to promote eco-friendly brands. Australia throws out a staggering 501 million kilograms of used clothes each year, and this figure is only growing. If you want to escape the vicious cycle of buying and throwing out cheap clothes, there are many ways to practice slow fashion for yourself. Despite the pre-conception that slow fashion is more expensive and less convenient, this is not the case if you’re willing to put the effort in to learn. Here are some tips to get into slow, sustainable fashion:

★  Buy second hand, vintage, or handmade clothes ★  Support local brands or seamstresses ★  Buy fewer, high quality clothes made from natural fabrics ★  Mend clothes when they get worn out; don’t throw them away.

Making your own clothes is also an option. (Howl’s Moving Castle, 2004)

Before I sign off, it is worth noting that fast fashion can be achieved without totally compromising socially responsible practice. The most prominent example I know of is Kmart and their Indonesian factory. I encourage you to read more about this here.

[henry-www]

Post 1 -> ‘Digital citizens in a digital world’

It’s not exactly an achievement to become a ‘digital citizen’ – buy a smartphone, sign up to Facebook, and you’ve done it. So how come only 59% of the world’s population actively use the Internet? That’s over 3 billion people who are missing out on what is perhaps mankind’s greatest invention. Unfortunately, access to the Internet is a privilege, not a guarantee. Purchasing a smart device and an Internet plan is expensive, and many elderly or impoverished people have never been taught how to use the Internet. Additionally, around 56% of Internet content is in English, while only 20% of the world’s population can speak English. This means that even if you can access the Internet, you might struggle to understand what’s going on. The Internet has been around for decades now, but there are still many obstacles to overcome before you can be a digital citizen.

Uhh... how do I work this thing? (Cowboy Bebop)

Let’s say you’re one of the lucky ones who does have the opportunity to use the Internet on a regular basis. One of the more meaningful or impactful things you can do on the Internet (as opposed to browsing memes and watching Netflix all day) is to get involved in political discussions. Not many of these discussions are civil, but there are certainly lots of arguments to join. Conversations can be easily found in the comment sections of news articles, the #auspol on Twitter, and even subreddits such as r/Politics or r/AustralianPolitics. Possibly the most effective way to engage in political discourse is to interact directly with the politicians themselves. This is now possible through social media platforms, especially Twitter. Nowadays, Googling a politician’s name often returns their Twitter account in the top results, so it’s crucial for them to take social media seriously.

Two ordinary digital citizens having a crack at the Liberals. (Twitter)

Some politicians have been more successful than others when it comes to using social media. It seems that people tend to appreciate when politicians take a more casual and authentic approach. This is a strategy that – intentionally or not – helped Trump beat Clinton to the White House back in 2016. It is possible to take a hybrid approach – appear to be both relatable and professional. However, this is difficult to pull off, especially when commenters have this meme in their arsenal (see below ➘). On the other hand, people are always quick to point out disingenuous tactics, like when Scott Morrison used the bushfire crisis as an opportunity to advertise how great government assistance was. Repliers harshly described him as a “fool”, “narcissist”, and a “waste of space”. Digital citizenship not only empowers us to exercise our right to political communication, but allows us to truly engage with both our fellow citizens and leaders.

’Scotty from Marketing’ attempting to connect with younger voters. (30 Rock)

[henry-www]

post[0] = “How does Tumblr function as a digital community?”;

A ‘tumblog’ is a short blog post that often includes multimedia content such as images and videos. Tumblr is the most popular tumblogging site, and its community is centred around its users’ love for this style of short yet expressive blog posts. Community exploration is facilitated through three primary methods: the search bar, hashtags, and the dashboard. The search bar and hashtags both serve to introduce the user to different, yet potentially relevant microspheres that exist within the Tumblr community. For example, searching for ‘Studio Ghibli’ returns related content for interaction within this particular community. However, the hashtags on these posts, such as #music and #anime, present the user with options to explore different, yet overlapping microspheres. Hence, the Tumblr community is strengthened through users interacting with posts across a wider array of topics.

Tumblr’s creative and somewhat eccentric culture is defined by the type of ‘social self’ forged by its community. Like redditors, tumblers forgo their real names and instead adopt an alias. Blogs often seek to be artsy, humorous, relatable, or all three. The kind of identity that we create on Tumblr is generally controlled by our creative side. Consequently, it can be difficult to “stand out” in a community where everyone is trying to stand out. Post success can be easily judged by the number of ‘notes’ received, which functionally differs to Facebook and Instagram who now hide the numbers of likes on each post. Tumblr’s community has remained strong, in numbers and in spirit, thanks to the mutual understanding across the user base of what type of platform Tumblr is – the creative one. As Tumblr’s sign-up page claims, it’s a place which will “connect you with your people”, cementing the importance of the community from the user’s very first step.

As a digital community, Tumblr does not solely exist here on tumblr.com. Members of, and content relating to the Tumblr community can be found all over the web. Of course, Tumblr has official accounts on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, among other platforms. On each of these sites are also countless fan-made pages and accounts relating to Tumblr-themed content, such as this Facebook page which mostly shares memes or humorous posts from Tumblr. There is also a subreddit dedicated to all things Tumblr which receives tens of thousands of upvotes per day. When trying to understand how Tumblr exists as a digital community, it’s crucial to think outside the box and see how Tumblr content is shared and enjoyed on all platforms.