Holly's Digital Community

Expanding my social media horizons.

[deepesttyrantpieface-blog-blog]

The cyber world of online gaming provides users with an escapism, fantasy persona and location from day to day activities. It provides an environment where individuals can connect, share achievements, enact behaviours they may not be able to display outside a virtual world, and build a ‘superior’...

[hollysdc-blog]

It's interesting to read the facts and figures about online gaming and how it is perceived in modern society. Personally I think it might be an area of social media that is misconceived.

[jacksonjonesuniverse]

#7. From Snapshot to Snapchat: Photography and the Emergence of Visual Communities

(Klett & Wolfe2008)

Since the late 1800’s amateur photographers have been taking snapshots capturing events in an attempt to preserve memories and capture life events. This came about as cameras became less cumbersome, with flexible film negatives replacing glass plate negatives. Cameras became handheld, lighter and more portable than their predecessors. In addition, businesses were established whereby amateur photographers could take their negatives for development, rather than requiring expertise in darkroom development. This made photography more accessible to a wider market. Kodak estimated that by the 1950’s approximately 2 billion snapshots were being captured annually in the United States alone (National Gallery of Art 2007).

Read More

[hollysdc-blog]

It is interesting to read about the development of photography and how it is more accessible now, more so than ever before. It is now even more easier to share photos with friends and family as well, sharing experiences immediately with them that they wouldn't usually get to experience with them.

[kimmwoodland-blog]

As a product of digital technology, online gamingcommunities act like a microcosm of the larger virtual space in which it exists. Interestingly, they encapsulate many of the positive and negative aspects of society’s increasing reliance and preoccupation with the Internet and social media. It is...

[hollysdc-blog]

Thanks for your post - it was very informative and interesting to read. I'm not in to gaming and must admit I forget about the social interaction it can provide to those who do engage in it. You are correct in saying it is another way for people to connect on a social level and may be the way they prefer to connect with people rather than on other social media platforms.

[hollysdc-blog]

Tweets from Queensland Police during the 2011 South East Queensland floods.

Social media is well known to be a great way for people to connect with each other who may not have been able to connect otherwise, such as those who are geographically apart or those who haven’t seen each other for many years. White (2012) states that ‘it has revolutionized the way in which relationships are created and maintained as well as how groups of people link up and interact’. Social media is also increasingly being recognized as a beneficial tool for information dissemination during times of crisis such as natural disasters. An example of the benefit of social media to disseminate information can be seen in the 2011 South East Queensland floods crisis, which took place from 10 January to 16 January 2011. Twitter was particularly useful in this situation, especially because the ability of Twitter users to retweet important information, expanding the total reach of emergency services. Bruns, Burgess, Crawford & Shaw (2012) outline that ‘the Twitter hashtag #qldfloods quickly became the central coordinating mechanism for floods-related user activity on Twitter’. By including a hashtag, all users can search for it and know that it will provide all information relating to the Queensland floods. During this time the Queensland Police had an important role to play

in disseminating a lot of important information regarding the floods. To do this, they relied heavily on their Twitter account @QPSMedia. The Queensland Police were very proactive with their information sharing, even going one step further by correcting any information that was being sent out via other tweeters that was incorrect. To do this, they included the hashtag #Mythbuster (Bruns et al, 2012).

This is one successful story, among many, of instances when social media has been used to provide information to people during the time of a major incident. As White (2012) outlines ‘many organisations, agencies, and individuals within a variety of areas in the emergency domain are pioneering efforts, exploring strategies, and paving the road to help develop sets of best practices’. This are of use of social media will continue

to develop as technology does.

Bruns, A, Burgess, J, Crawford, K & Shaw, F, 2012, #qldfloods and @QPSMedia: Crisis Communication on Twitter in the 2011 South East Queensland Floors, ARC Centre of Excellence for Creative Industries and Innovation, Kelvin Grove, QLD.

Ford, H 2012, ‘Crowd Wisdom’, Index on Censorship, vol. 41, no. 4, pp. 33-39.

White, C.M 2012, Social Media, Crisis Communication, and Emergency Management: Leveraging Web 2.0 Technologies, CRC Press, Boca Raton, FL.

[kimberljsal]

How much, is too much? Online gaming websites are known for encouraging excessive online consumption and according to McQuade, Gentry and Colt, can be described as a form of digital youth culture where users “share common beliefs, values and their own language” (McQuade, S Gentry, S Colt, J 2014,...

[hollysdc-blog]

It has been interesting reading your post as I don't know a lot about online gaming. It is interesting to consider the personality types of those who become addicted to online games and also what games they play and what is happening in their real life that they might be trying to compensate for (in some instances, not all of the time).

[humansofnewyork]

One of the coolest things about this fundraiser is that it originated with a young man on the street, who chose to tell a stranger about the love and appreciation he had for his school principal. His name is Vidal, and I had a chance to reconnect with him during my visit to Mott Hall Bridges Academy. He could not possibly be a more polite or charismatic young man. “I want to own my own restaurant,” he told me. “When I was little, I used to watch my mom cook. Then I started cooking for myself when I was nine. I’d get the ingredients myself at the corner store and make something for my brothers. I just thought it was a good thing for an older brother to do. I can make curry chicken, jerk chicken, curry goat, fried rice, macaroni and cheese, and all kinds of stuff.” “What would you say has been your biggest accomplishment?” “Getting publicity for my school.” #BrownsvilleBrilliance ———————————————————————— The fundraiser inspired by Vidal has been an overwhelming blessing for his school, and has raised over $570,000 to help provide much needed programs for his classmates. If you’d like to help expand upon its success, you can do so by contributing here: https://life.indiegogo.com/fundraisers/let-s-send-kids-to-harvard

[mammalingo]

Melissa: One of the best, most awe inspiring things to come out of social media since the Internet was invented by Al Gore in the 1920s is Humans of New York. That’s not all true but HoNY is the best thing on the Internet. That is true. And this new collaboration between Humans of New York and Mott Hall Bridges Academy takes my breath away. If you don’t know about Humans of New York, welcome back from life under your rock and start here. 

[hollysdc-blog]

Thank you for making me aware of this! It sounds like a great initiative and I will be following the stories that are posted. The internet is definitely not all bad (although some may want us to think that way) and there are great initiatives such as this emerging.

[hollysdc-blog]

Image courtesy of Spideroak

Nowhere to hide.

Bullying. Everyone thinks they know what it means but we all have different definitions of what it actually involves. There isn’t a universal definition for bullying however Swedish psychologist Dan Olweus’s definition is fairly comprehensive (Boyd, 2014). He outlines ‘three components that he saw as central to bullying in particular: aggression, repetition, and imbalance in power’ (Boyd, 2014).

Fifteen years ago the idea of bullying was traditionally thought to occur in the schoolyard in either a physical sense or a psychological sense such as name-calling. Since then, developments in technology have meant that bullies can now target their victims at home as well as in person. In some instances, online bullying is very public and can be seen by many people, however it can also be hard to monitor. As Keith & Martin (2005) outline, ‘nowadays, kids are always connected or wired, and communicate in ways that are often unknown by adults and away from their supervision’.

Boyd (2014) outlines that ‘the rise of social media

has prompted tremendous concern about cyberbullying’. Keith & Martin (2005) use Bill Belsey’s definition of cyber-bullying, which suggests it ‘involves the use of information and communication technologies such as e-mail, cell phone

and pager text messages, instant messaging (IM), defamatory personal web sites, and defamatory online personal polling web sites, to support deliberate, repeated, and hostile behaviour by an individual or group, that is intended to harm others’.

How do we try to overcome this sort of behaviour? By encouraging digital citizenship. McMosker (2014) defines digital citizenship as ‘usually concerned with ethical behaviour in online environments and takes aim at problematic or aberrant forms of participation’. Perhaps more importantly though, the bullying needs to stop before it reaches the online sphere.

If you have experienced any form of online bullying, you can seek support from those at Cybersmart.

Boyd, D 2014, It’s complicated: the social lives of networked teens, Yale University Press, New Haven, USA.

Cybersmart, viewed 25 January 2015, http://www.cybersmart.gov.au/teens/how%20do%20i%20deal%20with/cyberbullying.aspx

Keith, S & Martin, M.E 2005, ‘Cyber-Bullying: Creating a Culture of Respect in a Cyber World, Reclaiming Children and Youth, vol. 13, no. 4, pp. 224-228.

McCosker, A 2014, ‘Trolling as provocation’, Convergence: The International Research into New Media Technologies 2014, vol. 20, no. 2, pp. 201-217.

Spideroak, viewed 25 January 2015, https://spideroak.com/privacypost/online-privacy/protecting-kids-from-cyber-bullying/

[hollysdc-blog]

Activism or slacktivism?

Social media platforms are commonly known to help connect people to others, whether it be with people they haven’t seen for many years, those who are geographically dispersed or maybe even people they have never met before but who have similar interests as them. These social media platforms provide people with a way to connect that they haven’t had in the past.

More and more social media platforms are being used to reach people regarding social causes such as animal welfare campaigns and online petitions for various causes. These are launched on social media due to the reach social media platforms have to a wide group of people. By targeting online users, it is less labour intensive and more cost effective for those running the online campaigns. Gerbaudo (2012) points out that ‘social media can be seen as the contemporary equivalent of what the newspaper, the poster, the leaflet or direct mail were for the labour movement’. Youmans & York (2012) go further to say that these platforms are ‘indispensable to reformers, revolutionaries, and contemporary democracy movements’ because they are used as tools for the ‘shared expression of dissent, dissemination of information, and collective action’.

However, how effective is this relatively new way of communicating with people on such subjects? Is it as effective as traditional means of involving people in such campaigns?

It has been suggested that the probability of people supporting initiatives online and following these campaigns through with further support in the form of attending a protest or similar is very low. In these situations, a majority of people may feel that they have already contributed to the cause; that they have already done their bit and that they do not need to contribute anymore. This is commonly referred to as slacktivism. Kristofferson, White & Peloza (2013) define slacktivism as ‘a willingness to perform a relatively costless, token display of support for a social cause, with an accompanying lack of willingness to devote significant effort to enact meaningful change’. This is challenging campaign owners to make their online social media reach more compelling to ensure people follow through with their support, not just online.

  End Slavery Tenessee 2014, viewed 21 January 2015, http://www.endslaverytn.org/slacktivism-or-activism/

 Gerbaudo, P 2012, Tweets and the Streets: Social Media and Contemporary Activism, Pluto Press, London, viewed 22 January 2015, http://web.b.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.lib.swin.edu.au/ehost/ebookviewer/ebook?sid=0fda52e8-186e-4ff4-a794-d1fb26f5bed3%40sessionmgr113&ppid=pp_1&hid=118&vid=0&format=EB

Kristofferson, K, White, K & Peloza, J 2013, ‘The Nature of Slacktivism: How the Social Observability of an Initial Act of Token Support Affects Subsequent Prosocial Action’, Journal of Consumer Research, Inc, vol. not provided.

Youmans, W.L & York, J.C 2012, ‘Social Media and the Activist Toolkit: User Agreements, Corporate Interests, and the Information Infrastructure of Modern Social Movements’, Journal of Communication, vol. 62, no. 2, pp. 315-329.

[hollysdc-blog]

How often do you post something to your Facebook page, Instagram account or Twitter account? Now, how often do you consider what you’re posting and how it will appear to others in a week, two years or fifteen years time? It is easy to forget that what we post on Facebook or in the Twittersphere will remain online for others to see. In this sense, your online posts can sometimes come back to haunt you. During a public appearance Barack Obama has been quoted as saying ‘I want everyone here to be careful about what you post on Facebook, because in the YouTube age whatever you do, it will be pulled up again later somewhere in your life’ (Jericho 2012). This sort of mistake has been known to catch some high profile personalities and politicians out previously.

While this might make some politicians weary of social media, other politicians have embraced it to different degrees. Jericho (2012) explains that ‘similar to what happened with journalists, many politicians enjoyed the first flush of the medium, and then retreated as those online took the opportunity to tell politicians exactly what they thought of them’. However, if politicians really embrace Facebook and Twitter as platforms to converse with others, they will find they will gain more benefit from it than others (Walter et al 2010). Walter et al (2010) suggests that ‘politicians are noisier than Australians in general on Twitter, though this is due more to broadcasting than conversing’.

I’ve personally found Twitter a great way to stay up-to-date with what is happening in the Australian political world. In particular, @aus_politics provides me with all the latest Australian and international political news.

[hcheeandpcat]

Crowdsourcing in Times of Crisis {Week 8}

Coined in 2006 by Jeff Howe “crowdsourcing” was relatively unheard of, with the exception of Wikipedia and experimentations by NASA. Defined as “the act of taking a job traditionally performed by a designated employee and outsourcing it to an undefined,...

[hollysdc-blog]

It is interesting to think of the many examples when mobile devices and internet connections have been able to assist in such critical situations. Many people often criticise the use of mobile devices, however I'm sure they would be glad to have them in such situations!

[kimmwoodland-blog]

When reading about Tristan Barker or Michael Brutsch, there is little doubt that potentially illegal, malicious and unprovoked online assaults by Trolls and Cyber Bullies can have devastating impacts on victims and should be met with punishment (Feinberg 2014).

Mr Barker and Mr Brutsch are...

[hollysdc-blog]

I agree with you - I don't think that online activity has increased the amount of bullying taking place, I just think it has increased its visibility. People can now see it more due to the public nature of social media and this may make them think that it is happening more often.

You have made some interesting points on trolling and cyber bullying.

[hcheeandpcat]

Crowdsourcing in Times of Crisis {Week 8}

Individuals with a mobile device can record video and take pictures, potentially becoming a news source via user generated content.

Watch journalist Paul Lewis tell two stories that show us the future of investigative journalism (Citizen journalism: Paul Lewis at TEDxThessaloniki)

[hollysdc-blog]

Thanks for sharing this! It's really interesting to listen to a journalist explain the importance of citizen journalism in getting to the truth of some stories. Obviously citizen's stories need to be thoroughly researched, but it is my understanding that journalists do this with their stories anyway.

[hollysdc-blog]

To blog, or not to blog

With the rise of the Internet came with it the rise of blogs. Individuals now had the ability to express their opinions and views online to a wide range of people and they didn’t necessarily require any qualifications to do so. Adding to the ease of setting up a blog, it was becoming really easy for individuals with the help of tutorials such as this. Individuals could now follow a simple tutorial of how to setup a blog and start posting content about whatever they thought important.

Drezner & Farrell (2004) define a weblog as ‘a web page with minimal to no external editing, providing online commentary, periodically updated and preserved in reverse chronological order, with hyperlinks to other online sources’. The presence of blogs online grew quite quickly, with the number of blogs online in 1999 being estimated at under fifty, compared with at the end of 2000 with an estimated number of blogs into the thousands (Drezner & Farrell, 2004). Cross (2011) suggests that ‘today an estimated 20 million bloggers of every description and ideological stripe put out news bulletins and op-eds on a relentless daily basis in America’.

Blogs can be written about anything and everything you can think of. DailyTekk have compiled a list of the top 100 blogs from 2014, which can be found here. These range from comedy, to art and design, through to technology. One area of particular interest is in politics and current affairs. Mark Penn suggests that bloggers ‘are becoming the Fifth estate in America, giving the Fourth, the press, a run for its money’ (Cross, 2011). Cross (2011) goes on to say that ‘on the internet, the blogosphere has a wider reach and a larger audience than any media have ever had’ adding to the idea that bloggers are currently challenging the press. 

Reference List

Blogpost Tutorial, online video, 22 September 2012, viewed 3 January 2015, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pwjjHngOsLY

Cross, M 2011, Bloggerati, Twitterati: How blogs and Twitter are Transforming Popular Culture, Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data, Santa Barbara, California 

DailyTekk, viewed 3 January 2015, http://dailytekk.com/2013/11/18/the-100-best-most-interesting-blogs-and-websites-of-2014-2/ 

Dresser, D & Farrell, H 2004, The power and politics of blogs, American Political Science Association, Chicago

[jacksonjonesuniverse]

#4. The New Activist

(Invisible Children 2014)

In 2012 the world watched as filmmaker Jason Russell—on behalf of the Invisible Children organisation—called us to action to help stop a war in Uganda. His aim was to ‘make famous’ the child-abducting warlord responsible for atrocities against Ugandan citizens by the so named Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA). The objective was to make the world aware of Jacob Kony and his actions, which would in turn cause action to be taken by world governments to stop Kony. The message was spread by way of social media, and in particular, a controversial documentary video that reached 100 million people in less than one week. The video was Kony 2012 (Corazzelli 2012). But why were there so many activists for this cause?

Read More

[hollysdc-blog]

I can remember the Kony 2012 video and also remember sharing it via my online social media pages. I must admit I did not follow up or hear anything further after that about what was done and if any improvements to the situation were made. Thank you for making me consider the way I participate in such campaigns - I think I should put more thought into it!

On another note, I think the images you used for this post are great and really make readers think - what does a 'like' really achieve?

[hollysdc-blog]

Twitter. Express yourself in 140 characters or less.

Tweet, tweet. From Jack Dorsey’s first ever Tweet on 21 March 2006 (MacArthur, 2014), Twitter has grown to have 284 million monthly active users (Twitter, 2014). It is a medium that ‘allows users to maintain a public web-based asynchronous “conversation” through the use of 140-character messages (the length of a text message) sent from mobile phones, mobile Internet devices, or through websites’ (Murthy, 2013). It provides another platform for individuals to connect with others who share similar interests to them, to keep up-to-date with what their favourite celebrity is doing and to read the latest news, just to name a few. Hash tags allow for tweets to be connected to a thread of trending topics.  The trending hash tags are displayed on an individual’s Twitter homepage so they can keep up to date with topics trending around the world at any given time.

Some people often question the usefulness of Twitter. The unfortunate series of events that took place in Sydney this week and the social media trend that followed may be seen to answer these questions though. The Sydney Siege involved a man taking individuals of the public hostage in a café in the Sydney CBD. Soon after these individuals had been taken hostage, the man made them hold up an Islamic flag in the window, for all of the world to see. While everyone was concerned for the safety of the hostages, it did not take long for a large majority of the public to become concerned about the repercussions of this man’s actions on the wider Muslim community.

One story soon came out on social media of a Muslim lady removing her hijab because she didn’t feel comfortable or safe wearing it in public following what was happening in the Sydney CBD. Twitter user Sir Tessa tweeted later in the day using the hash tag #illridewithyou to show her support to the Muslim community (Ruppert, 2014). The hash tag brought with it meaning that if any Muslims felt uncomfortable riding public transport or being out in public by themselves, these individuals would provide them support. The hash tag soon went viral, with over 90,000 tweets featuring the hash tag (Rice, 2014).

In a time when a lot of people are questioning social media and its negative effect on community, this is an example that shows how social media can strengthen community. 

[jacksonjonesuniverse]

#3. Politics and the Twittersphere

Image: (91.7 WVXU 2013)

In October 2014, Twitter had almost 2.8 million unique visitors in Australia alone (Cowling 2014), so why wouldn’t Australian politicians want to tap into this growing social resource? They are. In fact, Kevin Rudd and Malcolm Turnbull have been tweeting since 2008 (Jericho 2013). But how effectively are Australian politicians utilising the access to such a diverse and growing audience?

Twitter is a social network that allows individuals to keep track of family, friends, organisations, or anyone else on the network, via posts of no more than 140 characters. It is an online media platform that is relatively new to the world, and consequently, it is new as a political publicity option as well, with the evolving platform only being released to the general public in 2007 (Fitton, Gruen & Poston 2009).

Read More

[hollysdc-blog]

Great post! It would be interesting to find out how many politicians actually post their own content to social media, and how many have media teams posting the content as well as how many politicians actually know the exact content being posted to their social media platforms.

[hollysdc-blog]