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Week 8

After watching the lecture video and considering the challenges of implementing new social media strategies I was able to think about how my client may succeed and struggle. One thing that stuck out to me was the concept of how, “organizations focus on technologies when they should focus on achieving a purpose through those technologies.” I think this is something that my client and many others tend to blur the lines. Sometimes creating content for social media does not have to show how well you can use technology to make a post different from others, say with effects. Those special technologies and effects used do not mean anything if it blurs the purpose and objective you are trying to demonstrate collectively through social media platforms.

The biggest challenge I believe my client will face when implementing my recommendations is this idea of collectivism among social communities. Their main social media output is through Instagram. My recommendations included new ideas to generate engagement on all the current platforms they have. I believe they may have some resistance and willingness to improve all of the platforms they currently have. If they do choose to become more engaged on their lower engagement social media platforms another challenge I believe they may face is curating the content to that platform. Instagram, Twitter and Facebook are all different apps that have different formatting and so called “norms.” Though I have outlined recommendations to match those as Hootsuite also taught us the differences, I believe they may have a challenge in producing content that is different and fitting for each platform. As we have learned implementation is all in the hands of the consumer/client once we give them to them. The lecture video attested to that, that some companies get these recommendations and never end up using them. I will be interested to see what my client does with them and will remind them that I am a resource they can continue to come to.

autumnecockroft

Week 7

After completing modules three and four on Hootsuite, I learned what it takes to develop and share effective content. To my surprise, there is a lot that goes into social media content. Without effective content that will engage your audience, social media is pointless. The first thing an organization should do is create a content strategy. This will make sure that what you are posting is relevant and entertaining to your audience’s interests and goals. It gives your content a purpose and tells a story about your organization.

After you have a clear strategy, Hootsuite suggests creating a content calendar. This is a weekly/monthly calendar detailing what you will be posting, when you will be posting it, and what time it should be posted. This will keep everything organized, and it will allow you to observe how your content is doing. Here is an example of a weekly calendar I made for my client, Boomerang Backpacks, a non-profit organization geared towards feeding hungry school children.

Another point Hootsuite makes is to know your platform. In the third module is goes through trending social media platforms and describes what effective content looks like on that app specifically. For example, Instagram thrives off visuals, while Twitter is based on shorter statements.

All in all, posting effective content is so crucial because it is one of the first steps of becoming a social organization. Quality content brings your audience together-- it creates community. It will spark conversation, build trust, and build relationships. All of these things will then lead to the ability to reach business goals and objectives. Effective content and community building are vital to becoming a social organization.

melaniesartore

Autumn,

We had very similar takeaways from these modules! I also included the concept of a social organizations need for a calendar of some sorts. For my client paper I was able to do some research on social media management systems and found so many that offer much more advanced calendars. Obviously some organizations may not be at that level to invest in these but the cost benefit for larger ones may be super useful if they do not already have an internal program. I also liked how you mention that each social media is looking for something different, I liked that these modules show that instead of grouping them all in one. They really were able to teach us the strategies for each platform which I appreciated.

Nice work!

noahbtatumlogic

Week 7: Blog One Post

Hello Everyone,

After completing the Hootsuite/Podium modules 3 & 4, I have been able to expand my knowledge on many concepts related to content is displayed. The modules focused on the importance of how effective content is developed and shared. Effective content is developed through different strategies and shared through different social media channels. Each social media channel has specific ways to reach out to certain audiences. Content plays a crucial role in achieving business and social media objectives such as brand recognition, thought leadership, audience engagement, and lead generation.

My biggest takeaway from both modules on Hootsuite is the four key components of a social content strategy. The first two components are research and analysis of current content reception and strategy and your target audience identified by platform. Both of these components are super important when it comes to having a social content strategy. The next two components are a list of content-specific goals and objectives and lastly, plans for the distribution of your content. Both of these components allow organizations to stay organized and have a clear understanding of their goals, how they will meet them, and a timeline for these goals.

Becoming a social organization means you involve your community in the conversation in a meaningful way. Once a business or organization has a clear understanding of how to post effective content then this will eventually lead to them having a larger audience. Developing and sharing content is a form of communication that can be used to speak with individuals. Social media is a great way for businesses to reach out to consumers who are Gen Z and Millennials. Having Effective content will help the organization build long-term relationships with its audience, ultimately leading to an increase in revenue for your organization.

Thank you,

Noah Tatum

melaniesartore

Hi Noah,

I loved that you shared the 4 key concepts of social content strategy! They really embody the biggest strategies of creating an effective social organization. I believe these say a lot about organization and persistence, I think at the core of a social network there needs to be a large effort to stay organized and to keep going even when results may not be what you want. This shows something needs to change and thats okay because it’s getting them closer to their organizations collective goal and image.

Great post!

Week 7 Blog

After completing Hootsuite Modules 3 and 4 I have been able to understand further the importance of creating a content strategy report as we have with our clients. It helps set the tone of what the overall goal is and the strategies laid out to help present that goal in the best manner. One of my biggest takeaway from module 3 was this concept of a social media calendar. I was interested to understand what they meant so I researched into what Hootsuite offers for free and found an excel temple shown below that any user can use on a weekly calendar basis.

This template offers users to practice using their own calendar planning for their social medias. It has daily tabs that allow you to write in times, the type of post and the overall topic. I think the most important part of becoming an effective organization is simply being organized. Planning out your week in advance will allow you to really curate the content and male sure it matches your goals. It allows you to think of timing as a relevant posting factor and think about how often you should be posting in a week to keep content relevant to the audience.

Becoming a social organization to me means becoming a more popular sought after organization. Module 4 goes very in depth of the importance of using advertising, which I think embodies the effort of becoming a social organization. Trying to get your name out there to others as much as possible, in the right matter. This means choosing over which platform and why that makes sense for your organizations goals. You can not become a social organization without the skills explained in modules 3 and 4 which are the most in depth over multiple platforms of ideas and ways to get audiences engagements.

noahbtatumlogic

Week 6: Blog One Post

Hello Everyone,

While completing chapters four and five in the Social Organization this week I was able to expand my knowledge on many concepts related to community building. I was able to take a deeper dive into how to form a vision for community collaboration and how to develop a strategic approach to community collaboration. I wasn’t aware of the importance of building your community and how it has such a significant impact on different organizations. Both chapters had tons of valuable and relevant information within them that will be able to apply to my client, Central Marketing Society.

After reading chapters four and five in the Social Organization I was able to learn more about effective principles on online community building with social media. It’s super important for organizations to interact and engage with their community as this helps their social media presence. My biggest takeaway from Chapter Four was the ‘Six F’ Model of Attitudes Toward Social Media. The six attitudes play a huge part in the success of your organization’s collaboration efforts. The ‘Six F’ model consists of folly, fearful, flippant, formulating, forging, and fusing. Each of these different attitudes has unique characteristics and can help organizations build their community and social media presence. My biggest takeaway from Chapter Five was the ‘No, Go, Grow’ model that is related to empowering community collaboration. The model is a way of systemically determining if and how a community collaboration effort should move forward. All three parts of the model help organizations have a deeper understanding of how their collaboration will work with the community.

After completing the Hootsuite/Podium module four I was able to learn more about concepts related to growing an online community. My biggest takeaway from the Hootsuite module this week was that it’s crucial to utilize different social media channels in different ways. All social media channels have different and unique ways for people to engage and interact with their community. It was awesome being able to take a deeper dive into the popular social media channels that are currently in our lives. I was able to apply what I’ve read and put that towards my recommendations that I have for Central Marketing Society. The main social media channels that Central Marketing Society uses consist of Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn. The Hootsuite module covered different features that can be used to interact and engage with your community and network. These principles apply to Central Marketing Society because I will be implementing all of these unique features within their social media channels. The organization hasn’t been utilizing all of these features which could help them with recruiting potential members and gaining traffic to their social media platform.

Thank you,

Noah Tatum

melaniesartore

Noah,

I liked that you brought up the six F’s model, it is a good way for organizations to kind of decipher the message they want from each post. Some may have more than one attribute they are trying to characterize, but I think it shows a larger idea on how social media content needs to have a goal and message to share. That message has to be consistent and concise to get the point they hope across, as social media is overall very useful messages can be taken the wrong way if not thought through. I think as far as our client project, though we know of some of these features we can use we don’t because it still may not be as popular among our age. If we utilize these features such as polls and lives more we can help our clients make a change that can only positively impact their engagement if done right.

Nice work!

caitlynfranz

Week 6 blog post

After reading chapters four and five in “The Social Organization”, we read about effective principles with using social media to grow on online community. As chapter five goes through a couple strategic options, I wanted to go back to discuss chapter four and how the other parts behind the scenes of the strategies are also important. First, chapter four talks about when community collaboration is appropriate. This seems to be a big concept that needs to be comprehended as well. In my opinion, knowing when the best time is to look for community collaboration and engagement is crucial. I also think it needs to be seldom. Why? Because if you’re posting on your social media accounts 8-10 times a week looking for community involvement and interaction, you audience tends to lose interest. For example, there is a young entrepreneur that I follow on social media, and she is constantly posting things, always looking for interaction and it becomes too much. I actually had to put her profile on “do not disturb” so all of her posts would stop taking over my feed. There needs to be a happy medium. When looking to build a community with your social media, you don’t want to overwhelm your target audience and the people you have watching your posts. Community collaboration is great if you set goals and try to do it weekly, or maybe two times a week instead. You want it to be effective, just like the book said. You want the end result to deliver a value and actually gain feedback from your community. You do this by subtly making posts, but not shoving things down their throat also. This is why I think managing a community collaboration portfolio could be beneficial too. The objective for keeping a portfolio is to determine the optimal set, mix, and sequencing of community collaboration efforts. It helps to square things away and keep things in line.

Clearly, growing an online community takes work. You need to understand who your audience is, why they are there, and what they plan to do. For our client project, I am working with a small non-profit organization, that is a little shop downtown that allows young girls to go in and pick out/try on dresses that they can borrow for important dances such as homecoming and prom. I live in small town up north, where the average combined household is less than $30,000 a year. Therefore, parents don’t have a lot of extra cash laying around to go buy a new dress for their daughter to wear. So, Chelsea’s Closet was opened to give young girls a chance to feel special and find a dress that they love for free. Chelsea’s Closet is owned and operated by a woman named Jeanette, where she takes on all financial responsibility and does all of the social media work herself. She only utilizes Facebook and Instagram (Facebook being her primary focus) where she has gained a huge community of people from our small town and surrounding ones as well. So far, she has done a good job on her own. My suggestions for her include doing interactive live sessions on Facebook that will help with brand awareness while also creating that personal connection with her community/audience. I also think doing interactive polls every now and then about adding different features to the shop or expanding it will help gather actually information straight from her target market. They can show her things they would like to see happen with Chelsea’s Closet so hopefully she can get more girls in the shop. Hootsuite has made me realize all of the different features that come along with social media platforms that can be taken advantage of and used when it comes to the business side of things and growing your platforms. All of my accounts are used for personal pleasure, so I never got the chance to realize how helpful these tools can be for businesses.

Thank you,

Caitlyn!

melaniesartore

Caitlyn,

I love that you discussed how some times information can become too much. I find myself doing the same thing with people I follow, they post such long stories that either I stop watching or I click right through. This amount of content is actually losing engagement rather than gaining it. I love your client and think that social media could definitely benefit this non-profit to grow more. The uses of polls and lives is something big I took away from these chapters as well. If you think about it they cause a lot more active engagement than just clicking forward like we discussed can happen. I agree, though I only have personal accounts too, they are really a crucial beneficiary to companies now.

Nice post!

Week 6

After reading chapters 3 and 4 I learned about more in depth practices of social media content strategies. The importance in chapter 3 highlights a lot on creating and distributing content to build an online community. Some of the tools they highlighted really stuck out to me, such as taking polls, lives, and chat/direct messaging. This brings in an interactive part of social media that utilizes social media features to connect more with the audience, not just allowing them to see content but interact with it. In my own experience I love when companies I follow do this or that polls and you get to choose what you prefer. It does not even have to do with the brand, but the act causes more engagement and could even help give more of an insight into the audience.

Another affective online principle that I recommended in my client project was the concept of a calendar. Planning out when and what you want to post is as important as posting. Though social media trends and information is ever changing having a schedule mapped out helps the consistency given to your audience, so you are staying in their minds. I researched some tools for managing social media and there are a lot of platforms that will help you do this, as well as let you plan the application to send outposts when you want to in the future. An example is a social media management support Buffer, allows you to connect all your social media accounts and allows you to schedule posts to be sent out up to multiple times a day.

noahbtatumlogic

Week 5: Blog 1 Post

Hello Everyone,

While watching the video, “The Legal Side of Big Data” I was able to expand my knowledge on so many different concepts. The video discussed big data and hacking of this data that is within different businesses and the government. Prior to this video, I wasn’t aware of how often data is leaked within different businesses. There are so many different security breaches and leakage of personal information around the world. I’ve always been aware of how much of a significant impact big data has on social media but wasn’t aware of the legal side of it.

Businesses should be aware of many things when using big data due to the amount of data and information they have on individuals. First, they should be aware of all the data they have on individuals and the importance of the different data. Only certain employees who have been cleared within the company should have access to the data that is being kept on individuals. Consumers should be aware of many things when it comes to big data due to the number of leaks that are happening around the world. Consumers should be aware of the different leaks that are occurring in different businesses and understand how dangerous this is. Giving out any information puts you at risk for different hacks and security breaches. You should always have a clear understanding of where your personal information is being sent and where it is being kept to limit your chances of being hacked. The best way to balance the opportunities and threats presented by the development of big data is to find a way to keep this data more secure. If there are possible threats and ways for people to hack businesses, then they should work on having more secure servers. Different businesses need to do whatever they can to ensure the safety of individuals data.

After reading the article, “The Internet’s Original Sin” and watching Maciej Ceglowski’s talk I was able to expand my knowledge on so many different concepts regarding data surveillance, hacking, advertisements, and the internet business model. It was super interesting being able to take a deeper dive into these concepts as they have such a significant impact on society today. Internet business models influence surveillance and data gathering on the internet in numerous ways. The business model is set up for companies to use which makes total sense on what is happening behind the scenes. Advertisements play a huge part into the internet as well as social media platforms because companies are reaching out to consumers this way.

Thank you,

Noah Tatum

melaniesartore

Noah

I agree the video also enlightened me on much more privacy breaches that are contributed to the collection of big data. With such a large impact for companies and social medias well-being it is causing more harm individually for the users it collects from. I agree businesses should take much more of a responsibilities and value the importances of the data they collect. We have developed technologically but it seems to show the lack in personal human well-being. We are more educated on how to share this information than protected, so I believe as companies and educators we should start teaching how to be more secure and careful as the companies have lacked at doing this. Protecting ourselves is going to be the best way to prevent this going forward.

Nice work!

antoniostrong

Week 5 Blog

After watching “The Legal Side of Big Data,” many concerns have been brought to mind that more people should be aware of involving the exploitation of big data and how businesses need to be more aware. And if they already are aware should make it a goal to limit the risk factors involving this issue. Big companies and well-known businesses like Target and Home Depot have become the targets for big data compromise. We have been witness to many big data compromises that affect everyday users such as what happened with Facebook but it is rare for it to make the news like this incident. There are many big data breaches that go under the radar due to poor management from companies that do not accurately assess and think about the effects it may have on their consumers because it necessarily does not stop their profits but directly affects their consumers. Consumers are not aware of the dangers of big data and how it closely affects them until they are the victim of a cyber-attack caused by a corporation having their personal information online and available. In the case of the internet and its usefulness, t’s a dammed if you do, dammed if you do not type of situation

This graph displays information regarding cyber security breaches and theft reports over the past five years and the trend is linear for the most part

What i’m taking away from Reading “The internet’s Original Sin” and watching Maciej Ceglowski’s talk, has reinforced the notion that the internet was created for pure intentions but has progressed to be used for mass surveillance. The intention was not to be constantly watched with the internet but greed from companies to do things such as gather big data to optimize their profits led to the internet being the sinful as mentioned by Zuckerman.

LaLone, Doug. “The Legal Side of Big Data.” Panopto, 16 July 2015, https://chipcast.hosted.panopto.com/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=4fe95594-73e5-4b1a-8a3c-83896b88b6d9. Lecture recording.

Zuckerman, Ethan. “The Internet’s Original Sin.” The Atlantic, Atlantic Media Company, 14 Aug. 2014, https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/08/advertising-is-the-internets-original-sin/376041/.

https://spanning.com/resources/industry-research/largest-data-breaches-us-history/

melaniesartore

Antonio

As we advance technologies with the concept of big data the risk factories have also increased. The access to so much information that companies and social media collect have caused breaches to share information that can cause the affect of identity theft. I have seen this in my own experience, my credit card information has been stolen before and caused a hassle to solve. I contribute this to the collection of my information from companies that have not been able to keep up with their privacy technology as much as they are with collecting the big data. I like that you included the graphic because it really correlates with my own experience and that of the issue you have talked about.

Great work!

laryssa-f

Week 4 Blog 1

In my view the most important qualities for a social media consultant to are, first and most importantly, a passion for what they do. If I have someone working for me, I don’t want them to be miserable, I want them to enjoy what they are doing. In addition to that I think an overall understanding and knowledge on how social media marketing and just social media in general works. Those are the most important things to me personally however, being creative, understanding the industry, being organized, analytical, having good communication skills, and being efficient are all good qualities to have as well.

If I was acting as a social media consultant for myself, some plans, and strategies I would advise in order to improve my professional social media presence include first getting to know my audience as well as I can. After doing that I would take note of where I am in terms of my social media presence now and then I would find new strategies, more tailored to my audience, to grow my platform(s) even more. I would make sure to set reasonable goals for myself and try my hardest to achieve them. I would also make sure to have a calendar/ agenda specifically for social media. Consistency is vital to growth these days so staying on top of daily posts and making sure they are all good quality should be a top priority when getting started and throughout the entire process.

melaniesartore

I loved that the first and most important quality you choice was passion. Just like any job I believe if you have no drive and true enjoyment of your work then the work output will show that. If I had my own consultant I agree with you I want their passion to show through when they are with me. I agree with you on getting to know your audience, the biggest thing for me with that though is how tailored you have to get for them. If you have a large somewhat diverse demographic of followers and engagement I just feel like it would be so much harder than a smaller audience. The rest of your ideas about organization and consistency are very valid and something I believe we all strive for in our professional life. Nice work!

anielaormanian

Week 4 blog post 2

The article “Three reasons junk news spread so quickly across social media” by authors Phillip Howard and Samantha Bradshaw was very educational. While reading, it opened my eyes to all of the junk news and the effects it has throughout social media. Everything we see on social media is powerful algorithms and calculated false information. We are all being analyzed on our technology, and given what “we want to see.” These Algorithms play a huge part in fake news. This is how social media companies track everything we do and use on social media as data. Social media is implementing this tactic on Instagram and TikTok heavily. These platforms hold a “for you” page or an “explore” page, when really these pages are actually calculated to show you things that interest you personally. I see fashion inspiration, which leads me to impulsive purchases! This is exactly what the companies want you to do! This is also a advertising tactic that helps companies get you to keep purchasing their products. This tactic can make you bias to a brand, and it shows that this brand will also keep popping up as long as you clicked, or purchased something from this company. There are so many different things I learned that are involved in everyday marketing, and not everything is “for the consumer.” There are many things going on behind the scenes for brands to manipulate you into buying, or supporting their brand. I think it is important for brands to filter content, but not make it so unrealistic that their entire brand is a lie.

melaniesartore

“Three Reasons Junk News Spread so Quickly Across Social Media” was a great follow up to the documentary Social Dilemma we watched last week. The young boy that portrayed how social media works when he was a hologram it really was like he was turned into the social media. There really is no line between a human and artificial technology. They both have a thought and path of their own that can no longer be separated because of these intense algorithms. I like how you mention “for the consumer” they say the customer is always right, but now the companies are doing it all right. They are planting the advertising so tactically that its for their benefit even more than it is for the consumer anymore. Great insight!

Week 4 Blog #2

Algorithms are an important part to most companies marketing strategies. Algorithms are a part of the new wave of technology it is something of new territory and how it has and will continue to affect the content that we see. We see algorithms at play in most of our daily lives on social media, our ads and suggested articles on Facebook and Instagram are all curated to our own personal preferences. It is no longer a free flow of relevant and credible sources but rather predicting the type of content that each individual will interact with the best. If you scroll through your Facebook while alongside a friend doing the same, not one ad will be the same. This is because the technology codes make the decisions for us based on our past behavior and interest we have looked up or clicked on. The drawback of these algorithms is that they hinder the flow of relevant and healthy democracy, instead of being educated or seeing all information individuals will stay more accustomed to their same ideas and interests.

The next concept in “Three Reasons Junk News Spread So Quickly Across Social Media” is advertising. Advertising is another concept that has evolved a lot with the use of social media, before when we think about advertising it was more directed to the largest audience it could reach. With newspapers, magazines, and commercials but now with the help of other tools such as algorithms it has become something to target more directly. This can be seen with the concept of clickbait; it attracts and manipulates someone into clicking said link. We see this once again in our own Facebook and Instagram, advertisements telling us click to find some exaggerated content. Once I click on the link, I am frequently prompted with questions about giving information or creating and account to see what had been advertised to me freely before. This concept is targeting and misleading and is being made not only for ads on products and services but now news that can impact our knowledge of what is relevant and what is not.

Now a lot of these uses of algorithms and advertising go into the last concept in this article, exposure. When it comes to junk and fake news it has a lot to do with their delivering of the information. There are three concepts of selective exposure the first is partisanship which suggest people pay attention to content that feeds their already decided ideology. The next is schemata this one this is really where people choose to have a more open mind, appreciating the exposure to new information and ideas. Lastly there is the concept of cognitive dissonance, meaning people have contradicting ideas and may steer away from exposure to news because they do not want to bring up those tougher conversations or views. This is most relevant to me when it comes to politics, often on suggested news article or even personal post on Facebook I am presented with the ones that correlate with my own views on the information. I do not see family posts as high on my feed when they are talking about some political view that may not correlate with mine. The other idea is also showing things I do not agree with, I believe this happens to evoke people to stand up and fight against news they dislike the outcome for. For example, when Texas new law on abortion changed, I saw it everywhere. Even though I do not support this I believe the advertising and filtering of information wanted to have that all over my feeds because it wanted my reaction and to click on it. So I would say the concepts of partisanship and schemata are used the most to attract exposure to current issues.

Week 4 Blog #1

Hi Everyone,

I believe the most important qualities for a social media consultant to have are flexibility, creativity, patience, and adaptability. The lecture video stressed that each client we were to have is going to be very different. They will have different problems and goals that they want to achieve within their social media, so being flexible and open minded to each new project would be important. Creativity, I would not trust a social media consultant who did have ideas ready and discussing those when it comes to social media. A consultant should be brainstorming ideas of graphics, opportunities and goals that fit in the clients’ resources available. Patience because people can be quite picky. Not every client is going to be a good client, there will be times when you cannot change someone’s mind even if you were brought in to help. As a consultant you must stay calm and collected whether someone uses your ideas and advice or not. Lastly adaptability, every client is going to be different they will have different services and products, company policies and environment a consultant should be able to adjust as needed based on the client.

As a social media consultant to myself for professional purpose I would work on first impressions. My most professional social media use is LinkedIn, frequent updates to my professional site are how I plan to achieve this. Updating my experience, education and posting updates is how I can do this. I am up to date on my experience and education, but I have never really posted professional updates to share my achievements or job changes. This would be the thing I hope to change in the future, I would do this by educating myself on how to make an effective post by reviewing other professional accounts and learning through my communication classes. As far as all other social media I do not really consider them professional accounts, but I do keep them appropriate and in good taste as professional acquaintances or even bosses can look me up and see it. For the future I would like to keep my accounts on private as well as to not allow any preconceived notions be made based off my social media. I believe this is the smartest thing to do because we have talked a lot in business on how an image of one can be perceived and cause others to form an opinion. Therefore, I think social media if not made for a professional purpose should be kept to a small personal group once you are in or planning to go into the job market.

thehuntervining

Week 3 Blog Post

Big data is the storage and analysis of large amounts of data in a variety of formats collected throughout time. With the rapid growth of technology, organizations are able to collect a lot of information about people, sometimes without them even knowing. Being able to analyze big data sets can provide benefits to a lot of industries, like auditing and advertising, but can also pose risks to a lot of people.

The large amount of information in big data sets require a lot of storage, which can be expensive and hard to secure. This can increase the potential for a data security breach, which could lead to millions of peoples’ private information being leaked for anybody to see. And because big data is continuously being collected at all times, the need for storage of that information is only going to increase, which means data security is going to continue to be a problem.

Aside from security breaches, another issue involved in big data is the way that companies use our data. With all these companies gathering information about our private lives, it’s hard not to wonder about what they do with that information. They could use our private information to try to manipulate our decisions, relay personal information to employers, or target certain people. Not only do we need to think about how companies could use our personal information, we should also think about how they can use that information to predict our actions, decisions, and habits.

There is no way to eliminate the collection of big data from people, so to deal with the problems associated with big data, people should stay informed on the collection of big data nowadays; this includes keeping up to date with big data technology and issues. Personally, people should be aware that everything they do on the internet is being tracked, so beware what you put out there and what you do. For professionals using big data, they should make sure they fully understand big data and how to ethically use it. Professionals should only collect data on what they need, which would help to eliminate storage problems and privacy concerns. On a societal level, big data can help with a lot of things, including catching criminal activity, improving education, predicting traffic, assisting with national security, and contributing to public health. However, big data can harm society by targeting certain demographics, spreading fake news, and manipulating peoples’ decisions, amongst other ways. The best way for society to overcome these problems is to stay informed, design laws and regulations for data collection, privacy and security, and address the ethical and moral issues arising from big data.

melaniesartore

I just experienced by first security breach that I know of. My medical group at home was hacked and believed to have taken some forms of personal information. It makes me wonder at what lengths will people go to, to collect data, and why did they target my medical group? I have multiple platforms of social media it wouldn't be hard to find my age, name, etc. I agree it is hard to know what these companies are doing with our data, it scares me just as much as illegal breaching. Although I agreed to certain things with my data being used by these apps I have a hard time believing or understanding exactly what they need it for. How does the usage and collection of our data directly benefit multiple companies.

noahbtatumlogic

Week 3: Blog 1 Post

Hello Everyone,

While watching the Netflix documentary The Social Dilemma I was able to expand my knowledge on many concepts regarding social media companies. The Social Dilemma focuses on how big social media companies manipulate users by using different algorithms that encourage addiction to their platforms. The different platforms of social media that we have access to in our life have a significant negative impact on our lives. My biggest takeaway from the Netflix documentary The Social Dilemma is that there are people who are tracking our engagement times on each post we come across. In the simplest way, this doesn’t sit well with me and I find this to be super scary to think about. People are sitting behind their screens keeping track of every single thing we do while we use our social media.

Big data is the collection and use of information from multiple sources to help companies make better decisions & projections. Big Data is such a powerful tool because it helps different companies generate valuable insights about their consumers. Algorithms are such a powerful tool when it comes to technology because they generate content that we enjoy the most. The different things that go into big data consist of our engagement times, which influencers we watch the most, how many friends we talk to on certain apps, etc. For example, on TikTok, if you’re obsessed with cooking videos there is a huge chance that you're ‘for you page’ will have tons of cooking videos. The different algorithms that are behind the scenes of these social media companies are accurate and precise with what the consumers like and want.

The dangers of big data consist of companies having all of this information about our private lives and being able to use it any way they want. They have access to anything we post and lookup for a certain amount of time. With this being said, companies can use our information to manipulate our decisions and this is something that should be taken very seriously. Lastly, all of this information that is being stored about their consumers have the potential to be hacked and have a detrimental security breach. The dangers of algorithms are insanely frightening to think about because all of the actions that we take online are being analyzed heavily. The different dangers with algorithms are so exact that they can exploit weaknesses in human psychology.

These problems can be dealt with on a personal level by ensuring you’re aware of what is truly happening behind the scenes of these social media companies. Once you’re aware of what they have access to then I promise you will try to limit yourself from social media as much. One thing that people can do to deal with these problems is to be aware of what you’re posting on your social media accounts as well as others. This is super important to be aware of because a lot of these social media companies keep what we send on file for a certain period. People can deal with these problems on a professional level by ethically using our private information in the correct manner. Different professionals should only have access to certain data that will help them have better projects about their business, the rest should be deleted and thrown away. Lastly, these problems can be dealt with on a societal level because these social media companies can help sometimes prevent a major crime or terrorist attack that is going to take place. Furthermore, moving forward in life I am going to try and limit my social media usage so I never have to worry about any of the things that were discussed in my blog post.

Thank you,

Noah Tatum

melaniesartore

I agree where you mentioned that someone is or tracking what we are doing everyday. The thing that is even scarier to me is that algorithms have allowed technology to become as smart as a person. It is not necessarily that someone is watching your every move but that they have created programming to act as a human. Computer systems can basically understand you on a personal level without even being a real person. It really makes me wonder if this data being collected on us can cause something much worse than we imagined. I personally do not believe they are just using it for marketing, there are a lot of ways to curate marketing, there has to be a bigger picture they are using this big data for. Nothing is specific and completely education on this and that is the scariest part to me

Week 3: Social Dilemma

Big data is collecting and storing information mostly for the benefit of some purpose, such as advertising and collecting personal information to help said collector. Algorithms are things we see almost every day; we look at a website or product and all the sudden we see it all around us. That is not a coincidence. The main components of big data are human beings, their personal information. What they like, view, and share on social media. Whether that’s your age or a post you like that data is being stored and used to curate content for you and a larger audience.

After watching The Social Dilemma, it was creepy to hear the things that are being watched and tracked from our social media. What image we look at, how long we look at it, they know our relationships and even feelings. Stating that they know when we are lonely or sad, when we are stalking an old partner, just quite personal information that I did not know was all able to be collected. I always figured it was more to do with our demographics, our age and what we look at or search. But it really makes sense to me now, especially with YouTube, my recommended videos are almost always a video I’ll click on because I’m interested. This is because YouTubes algorithms have collected date on me and artificially work to predict a pattern of what I would enjoy. My friends and I always joke that our phones are listening to us, for example just yesterday we were talking about getting Taco Bell. We had been watching a show on Hulu for at least 2 hours and Hulu has ads all the time and right after looking it up on our phone we got an ad for Taco Bell.

The dangers and abuse of this range far and increasingly worse. Physiologically manipulating users for a personal benefit and thus the user receiving some sense of dopamine trigger from social media. Social media allows you to see who saw your post, who tagged you, who liked it, when someone is typing and when they stop. It curates’ quick responses and remembers how or what you say frequently. There was an awfully awaking concept, “there are only two industries that call their customers ‘users’: illegal drugs and software.” (Edwards Tufte) Imagine social media software being so addictive and detrimental to mental health that people compare it to using drugs. America and the worlds youth are using something so unsafe to your health that is compared to drugs, that is when you know something needs to change.

I’ve mentioned this in a previous post but how to combat the growing dangers of social media, but one thing could be censoring more heavily. I mentioned labels on when a photo has been altered, this could help both on societal and personal levels. When it comes to professional and businesses the same thing I believe should happen. We have already seen countless lawsuits on platforms that have invaded privacy laws and not notified their consumers of this, like Facebook has. Yet I feel as if even after every lawsuit there is still another one that comes on invasion of personal privacy in concerns to data. I believe the only other way to solve and protect our society professionally and personally really, is to regulate these with much more in depth laws for the companies creating social media. It is not a necessary tool; it is a desire and used with no real purpose other than changing your daily life. It seems changing your life for the worse, even correlating media usage among ages with suicide rates, having a correlation. If we want to change and deter these issues we need regulation, on what can be shared in what ways, commenting regulation and in some way somehow usage regulations.

I did not find it possible for me to do multiple hour long periods of time without my phone in general, so I have a few options I did for two days.

1. Spend one hour of the day to sit down and read

2. 30-minute sessions of no phone use

3. 2-hour long spans of time not using a certain platform (Instagram, Snapchat, etc.)

Method 1:

Though normally I would have liked to read something purely for enjoyment, but I already had a book to read for my cultural management class. I found it to be all though I got more reading done than I normally do when I read this book, but I was distracted. I found myself wanting to just see if someone texted me or do a quick scroll like I normally do when I take a quick homework break. The second day reading an hour straight, I compromised with myself and played music in the background and felt it a little more enjoyable. Maybe it was because it was an assigned book and not quite one for pleasure, I was not able to become super invested and had more pull to go on my phone. I will note that like I talked about in my last post, I tend to read a lot in the summer because I have no obligations. Being here at school with everyone back on top of work and schoolwork I am more tempted to check on what others are doing than I am in summer.

Method 2:

This method was a bit easier to me, I simply would set a timer on my phone for thirty minutes and then put it on do not disturb. I did this 2 times the first day and 4 times the second. I mostly did it while I was doing schoolwork, but the second day I did one 30-minute session at work. Normally at work I am not super invested on my phone, but we have a loose policy on using it, so I always have the option to reach for it. Work has always been somewhat of a relaxing time because it truly is the time, I spend most away from my phone, hence why I did not really have to make myself not use it at that time. After the experiment is over and I didn’t have this timer or thought in my mind about my usage as much I noticed more when I picked up my phone. It really was for the stupidest reasons, no one had texted me or anything but I was bored with homework, so I just started scrolling. After I caught myself do that, I would just put down my phone. There was literally no reason for me to use it because nothing had to keep my attention at those moments.

Method 3:

This experiment was my most difficult. I did slip up a few times like I said in the last method, randomly picking up my phone to scroll and then stopping myself. It is like a reflex. So basically my 4 biggest social media outlets are messaging, TikTok, Instagram, and Snapchat. I did two a day. My first day I did messaging and snapchat, 2 hour spans of time without those apps but each at a different part of the day not at the same time. This day was the harder one, texting is my main form of communication, I get 100s of text a day, some quite unnecessary others important stuff concerning, my sorority positions, group project, friends, and family. During this time, I just tried to focus on my schoolwork and got three assignments done in 2 hours, which is pretty good. The next day was easier doing TikTok and Snapchat. I made my TikTok time limit in the middle of the day because I could not fully give up my night scroll on TikTok and then Instagram I overall do not use a lot except for those random aimless scrolls a few times a day.

Summary:

Overall, this experiment made me realize that our generation and the ones growing up now are totally overstimulated. When I am focused, background noise does not bother me, but if I am not, it is a complete distraction. This showed through when I was reading, I hated doing it in silence in my room alone, so I had music play in the background. A lot of those random pickups have no pressing need for them, it is a reflex. I simply do not think I could go without my phone for a day, but one day I’d like to try. Or maybe even delete some apps for a few days, as adults we need to train and hold ourselves accountable for our bad habits. Yet kids are growing up learning this is normal, my younger cousin literally depends on an iPad to keep her entertained. I hope that as we see this advancement in technology, we start to learn about factual side effects and downfalls of it, as the ones I have found in myself, and learn how to deal better with them because technology will only ever keep improving.

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