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Scott Benson, ‘But I’m a Nice Guy’

Week 10 Blog

For our final discussion post, we looked into Digital Citizenship & Conflict: Social Media Governance. To me, this discussion revolved around how digital communities can often be exclusive and harmful, requiring governance in one form or another.

Throughout this unit, digital communities have widely been regarded as virtual safe havens, providing common ground between digital citizens. However, having read Marwick & Caplan’s 2018 piece, it’s clear to see real life prejudices can carry over and lead to harassment and exclusivity online. Harassment is an “umbrella term encompassing a variety of behaviours” (Marwick & Caplan p. 544), but could most potently be seen through “Gamergate” (Marwick & Caplan p. 547), whereby “feminist media critic Anita Sarkeesian” (Marwick & Caplan p. 543) was reviled online and in real life, in an organised and coordinated manner. This calculated harassment flows onto a key term for this week’s discussion, being “gaslighting” (Gleeson 2018), which put simply is “the psychological manipulation of a person in order to erode their sense of self and sanity” (Gleeson 2018). Despite the rise of this harassing and often misogynistic practice, Gleeson (2018), does not lament its use as a term as it “signifies a deeper understanding of what abuse looks like and the many forms it can take”, helping potential victims be more cognisant of such abuse.

Thus, having identified an epidemic of harassment, gaslighting and trolling online, people have looked towards social media sites to increasingly regulate the content on their sites. This is no small feat however, with YouTube globally employing 10000+ moderators, resulting in the annual removal of around “3.3 million channels and 517 million comments” (Reality Check Team 2020). Despite the scope of the issue, people have rallied for governments to crack down on laissez-faire moderation, demanding amendments to law and the terms of service for such sites. This push has resulted in changes in places such as the EU whereby “social media platforms face fines if they do not delete extremist content within an hour” (Reality Check Team 2020) as well as Germany where companies are mandated to report on their moderation. Overall, society would truly be a better place if these digital communities were allowed to flourish without the hinderance of online harassers, however finding out the best way to prevent this without impeding free speech will continue to be the heart of the issue.

References

Gleeson, J 2018, ‘Explainer: what does ‘gaslighting’ mean?’, The Conversation, viewed 23 May, <https://theconversation.com/explainer-what-does-gaslighting-mean-107888>.

Marwick, A & Caplan, R 2018, ‘Drinking Male tears: language, the manosphere, and networked harassment’, Feminist Media Studies, vol. 18, no. 4, pp. 543-559.

Reality Check Team 2020, ‘Social Media: How do other governments regulate it’, BBC News, February 12, viewed 23 May 2021, <https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-47135058>.

#MDA2000921 #gamergate #gaslighting

lovely-low-waster

Try to be conscious of where your donations are going. Be proactive to give your garments their longest life and use this too to help you shop responsibly.

(Photo credit to consciousstyle on Instagram)

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Some more consequences of fast fashion I didn’t initially consider

Week 9 Blog Post

This week we focused on a digital citizenship case study, being ‘Social Media Influencers and the Slow Fashion Movement’.

Before fully diving into this idea, it was important to remind myself as to exactly what digital citizen was and what the expectations put upon them were, whether that be economic, democratic etc. Having done so, the responsibility of digital citizens to embrace ‘slow fashion’ was made clear. Lai (et al. 2017, p. 83) presents a couple criterion for slow fashion, such as “child labour free”, “less harming to the natural environment”, “ethically and socially responsible” and finally fostering the “creation of long-term relationships”. For me, having read these overwhelmingly positive aspects I was certainly confused as to why slow fashion hasn’t fully been embraced.

This was particularly poignant when contrasted to the deleterious effects of ‘fast fashion’. Brewer (2019, pp. 1-2), outlines how “fashion is among the world’s most polluting industries” and is not helped by the “the prevalence of social media” which ultimately “fuels the virtually instantaneous movement of trends within communities and networks across the world”. As a result, the mass production of clothes to match fashion trends are “generating a significant carbon footprint and a host of social concerns” (Brewer 2019, p.1) overall accounting for “17–20% of global industrial water pollution” (Kant, cited in Brewer 2019, p.2) and 10% of theworld’s carbon emissions, with significant emissions through both production and its supply chain” (Conca, cited in Brewer 2019, p.2).

This environmental negligence has not gone unnoticed with socially conscious people protesting this lack of ethics since as early as the 1960’s (Lai et al. 2017, p. 81). However, it has been made clear that the problems with the law and favouritism towards big business has hampered the ability to make change. Despite this, a number of fashion-related businesses have seen increased popularity as citizens place more important into “the concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR)” (Brewer 2019, p.6). One such example is Depop, who describe their product as “the fashion marketplace app where the next generation come to discover unique items” (Depop 2021) with the goal to “make fashion more inclusive, diverse and less wasteful” (Depop 2021). Depop is a small part of the modern movement which is “democratizing fashion” (Brewer 2019, p.3), something which is urgently needed if we are to prevent this industry from continuing to wreak havoc on the environment.

If you want to contribute to this cause I would heavily suggest that you look into their website: https://www.depop.com/

References

Brewer, M 2019, ‘Slow Fashion in a Fast Fashion World: Promoting Sustainability and Responsibility’, Laws, vol. 8, no. 4, pp. 1-9.

Depop 2021, What is Depop, viewed 10 May 2021, <https://www.depop.com/>.

Lai, Z, Henninger, C & Alevizou, P 2017, ‘An Exploration of Consumers’ Perceptions Towards Sustainable Fashion – A Qualitative Study in the UK’, in C Henninger, Alevizou, P, Goworek, H & Ryding, D (eds), Sustainability in Fashion A Cradle to Upcycle Approach, Palgrave Macmillan, University of Sheffield, pp. 81-101.

#mda2000921 #fashion #depop

Week 8 Blog Post

KesThis week we looked into some content that was particularly interesting and relevant to me, being ‘Gaming Communities, Social Gaming and Live Streaming’ and I took away a number of learnings.

Firstly, if you had asked me what the definition of gaming is I probably would’ve said something around the ideas of leisure and winning, hence I was surprised when I discovered that “playing a game is the voluntary attempt to overcome unnecessary obstacles” (Suits, cited in Paddick 1979, p. 41). I found this particularly interesting as people tend to game or watch other people game as a form of relaxation, but in truth they are just providing themselves with more obstacles, perhaps with the thought of overcoming them providing the relief/satisfaction.

Moreover, I really took interest in the debate as to how conducive gaming is to social interaction, building communities and overall cohesion. Kestler (2019), outlines how “through history that video games have always been something of a social and shared experience”, and I believe this started with arcade gaming . I was not around for this era, but I can imagine children flocking to arcades, gathering around machines, bragging about their scores on the schoolground fostered a social culture. Moreover, when consoles saw popularity it began with local multiplayer, bringing friends home, strengthening connections via gaming and “sharing interests” (Kestler 2019). However, nowadays, this multiplayer takes place online, with couch co-op almost phased out of the gaming experience. It is this experience that forms the most contentious point of the debate, with some arguing that they are meeting more people than ever online, whilst others contend that this new form of gaming is lonelier than ever.

Countering this we have the rise of the streamer, particularly on “Twitch” (Taylor 2018, p. 3), often capitalising on the growing market of “esports” and “variety” (Taylor 2018, p. 1). For some, these channels followers have formed their own digital communities, overcoming social stigma and signalling the importance of gaming in communication today. (Taylor 2018, p. 12). It is the rise of these sorts of streamers that underline how “there has long been a quest to see gaming make the shift to television” (Taylor 2018, p. 3), which for me would gift the gaming industry and individual gamers huge amounts of success and media attention, perhaps at the cost of fan connection.

References

Kestler, A 2019 ‘In The History Of Games, The Social Evolution of Video Games Unfolds’, StudyBreaks, 16 January, viewed 6 May 2021, <https://studybreaks.com/tvfilm/gamespot-social-video-games/>.

Paddick, R 1979, ‘Review Essay - The Grasshopper: Games, Life and Utopia. By Bernard Suits’, Journal of the Philosophy of Sport, vol. 6, pp. 1-8.

Taylor, L 2018, ‘Broadcasting ourselves’, Watch Me Play: Twitch and the Rise of Game Live Streaming, Princeton University, pp. 1-23.

#mda2000921 #streaming #arcade

hyeocakee

Ransom in a puppy filter 🥺

spilling-the-digital-communi-tea

Can’t get away from filters!

Week 7 Blog Post

This week’s content revolved around ‘Face Filters’, delivered by guest lecturer Lauren Miller, which circled around similar themes to last week, whilst also supplying some more in-depth and specific consequences of body-modification.

To me, these face filters are at the more severe extent of changing your image, with some of these augmented reality filters serving as digital masks that can completely change your self-perception. In her work, Coy-Dibley (2016, pp. 1-2), introduces the resulting idea of “digitised dysmorphia”, which is most prominently seen through “modifying and fixing the visual and virtual appearance of an individual’s self through various apps”. The intriguing aspect of this ‘dysmorphia’ is how it is inherently “socially conditioned” (Coy-Dibley 2016, p. 1), and as such it should be no surprise as to how there is only “a very small body of literature growing around the subject” (Coy-Dibley 2016, p. 1).

Considering this, the most contentious issues arising from the use of face filters alongside digitised dysmorphia is the idea that they are inherently racist (Barker 2020, p. 208). Put simply, these face filters are lightening up the images, suggesting that lighter faces are more beautiful and marketable than darker skin. I truly believe this to be a damaging issue as it is propaganda that can cause young and impressionable people of colour to think that their natural skin colour needs to be adjust, harming their self-perception. Another issue is how these filters signal the ‘takeover’ (Barker 2020, p. 211) of social media forms such as Snapchat. Personally, I still use Snapchat and very occasionally use filters at all and and continue to just send funny images to my friends, supporting my opinion that these filters are not all encompassing and can be ignored by the right user.

Ultimately, this points towards Coy-Dibley’s belief (2016, p. 2), that in our “hyper-sexualised society”, these digital images and face filters have some positive potential, in some cases “provid[ing] the freedom to express a self that would otherwise be overlooked”.

References

Barker, J 2020, ‘Making-up on Mobile: The pretty filters and ugly implications of Snapchat’, Fashion, Style & Popular Culture, vol 7, no. 2, pp. 207-221,

Coy-Dibley, I 2016, ‘”Digitized Dysmorphia” of the female body: the re/disfigurement of the image’, Palgrave Communications, 2:16040 doi: 10.1057/palcomms.2016.40.

#MDA2000921 #snapchat #augmented reality

Week 6 Blog Post

This week we delved into the idea of Digital Citizenship and Health Education: Body Modification on Visual Social Media. Having completed a related past unit (‘Networked Selves’) I came into this area with a good foundation of knowledge.

I believe the main crux of the discussion this week was as to the morality of pornification, aesthetic templates, microcelebrity culture, etc, with regards to people’s health and wellbeing. As observed by Dorfman (2017, p. 332), “the Internet and social media have become ubiquitous in the world of plastic surgery”, with Instagram being the frontrunner of this, due to its “uniquely visual” nature. This is because due to the rise in popularity of microcelebrity culture, people are increasingly encouraged to adhere to aesthetic templates for their gender and ‘pornify’ their posts for maximum interactions and status online. If people do not subscribe to these new social media norms, Armitage (2019) suggests that they may suffer a loss in followers and inability to keep up with the “pressure to continually make content and post on a regular basis”. Despite this, there are some people within these plastic surgery hashtags that exist for educational purposes, encouraging predominantly women to be more confident in their image, however, within the hashtags “the vast majority of these posts were for self-promotional” (Dorfman et al. 2017, p. 332).

Another consequence of body modification on social media is Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD), in tandem with identity dissonance. It is the combination of these issues that do prompt the aforementioned public health and educations campaigns, which help to tear down the unrealistic body expectations smothering impressionable users. Ironically, for males, subscribing to female aesthetic templates or pornifying their own content can often reap negative consequences, with the lecture suggesting that gay influencers are becoming a marginalised group on social media. I will conclude my reflection on this week with a quote from an external reading that I think that people should take into consideration with concern to their online identity - “Twenty years from now you’ll be able to look at a photo you took and reminiscence about that moment; you won’t remember your follower count or how many likes it got” (Armitage 2019).

References

Armitage, A 2019, ‘I Stopped Posting to Instagram for 90 Days and This Is What Happened’ Fstoppers, 16 January, viewed 20 April 2021, <https://fstoppers.com/originals/i-stopped-posting-instagram-90-days-and-what-happened-328351>.

Dorfman, R, Vaca, E, Mahmood, E, Fine, N & Schierle, C 2017, ‘Plastic Surgery-Related Hashtag Utilization on Instagram: Implications for Education and Marketing’, Aesthetic Surgery Journal, vol. 38, no. 3, pp. 332-338.

#MDA2000921 #influencers #instagram

Week 5 Blog Post

This week I’ll be discussing this week’s content, what I took away and what ideas/discussions stood out to me specifically.

Beginning with digital citizenship and its relevance to literal citizenship, it’s important to acknowledge how a democracy is based on public participation. With this in mind, there has been a clear increase in political discussion due to online spaces which reflects a more politically aware populace and embodies the concept of being a digital citizen. In contrast, this has normalised previously “unconventional forms of participation” (Vromen 2017, p. 3), ranging from online fundraising to social media activism through hashtags. As a result, Vromen (2017, p. 2) notes a “decline in… the traditional” and an irrevocable change in “political engagement” overall, epitomised by the US elections.

However, one aspect of political discussion taking place online that is concerning is where it leaves those without this literacy/access. In what has been labelled the ‘digital divide’, those with little or no internet access are becoming even more marginalised as they are vulnerable to legislation changes which will negatively impact their rights or beliefs but they are unable to contribute. Noticing this alarming issue, GetUp!, a progressive non-profit, was created with the idea of “bring[ing] participation back into our democracy” (Schulz 2017). These sort bodies are key to educating citizens in the idea of digital citizenship, as opposed to keeping these people in the dark with concern to prominent political issues.

Another topic touched on this week was platformization. Put simply, this is the process whereby a digital network site is transferred into an influential social media ‘platform’. The idea of platformization is becoming increasingly key to businesses trying to gain a foothold and voice in society. In my eyes, this concept is the subject of some concern as it signifies businesses, who truly prioritise profit, becoming more ingrained and normalised as power players in societal discussion. Moreover, citizens and consumers are armed with so few tools (one below) for dealing with the growing empire of such brands that they are left to succumb to these businesses inherent bias.

References

Schulz, M 2017, ‘Sophisticated, cashed-up, feared - how GetUp grabbed your attention’, GetUp!, viewed 6 April 2021, https://www.ourcommunity.com.au/general/general_article.jsp?articleId=7364.

Milne, E 2021, ‘Lecture 5: Digital Citizenship’, MDA20009, Digital Communities, Learning Material via Canvas, Swinburne University of Technology, 29 March, viewed 6 April 2021.

Vromen, A 2017, Digital Citizenship and Political Engagement, Palgrave Macmillan, London.

#MDA2000921 #election #silence brand

Week 4 Blog Post

Hi, having enjoyed hosting the week 4 tutorial around this topic I hope I have something extra to add to the discussion!

To me, one of the biggest points of contention from this topic is how positive the societal impact of reality TV truly is. As mentioned in the lecture, reality TV’s popularity is counter-intuitively met with a general distaste, starkly contrasted against well-liked genres such as comedy. The hatred for reality TV is something that is not hard to fathom, with Wills (2013) calling it “not real” and “a scam being perpetrated right in front of me, and the victims are both the participants and the viewers”. In addition, the contestants are competing for attention and continue to sell out long after their fifteen minutes of fame. This environment is not helped by “a never-ending sea of gullible people” (Wills 2013), meaning that existing stars get worse contracts and the competition is ever increasing. Ironically, this competition means that most of the action is not happening on our televisions and instead takes place on social media and beyond, leading people to believe that the discussion spaces for such programs are simply littered with irrelevant gossip.

However, I believe this view diminishes the social function of reality television, undermining their importance in fostering powerful digital communities, which are reminiscent of intertwining public spheres. Reality television is particularly good in creating such communities as it has lower barriers to entry, in terms of available programming, summaries within the show, etc. These mean that anyone can tune in and feel like they have something to contribute to a particular issue, with comparatively less background knowledge required. In the case of the show RuPaul’s Drag Race, on screen it “regularly confronts homophobia and other forms of bigotry and oppression” as well as featuring a “gender transition during an episode, while others have publicly acknowledged their HIV-positive status (Brennan & David 2017, p. 2). This progressiveness empowers fans of the show to go onto social media and share their own experiences, creating a safe space of equal contribution, signalling the potential for reality TV to do good by society and its citizens.

References

Brennan, N & David, G 2017, Drag Culture, Global Participation and RuPaul’s Drag Race, University of Tampa, Palgrave Macmillan.

Milne, E 2021, ‘Lecture 4: Reality TV Case Study Lecture’, MDA20009, Digital Communities, Learning Material via Canvas, Swinburne University of Technology, 22 March, viewed 1 April 2021.

Wills, A 2013, ‘Why I Hate Reality TV (And a Brief History of Manipulation), The Verve Life, 30 May, viewed 1 April 2021, <https://www.thevervelife.com/why-i-hate-reality-tv-and-a-brief-history-of-manipulation/>.

#MDA2000921 #rupaul #realitytv

Week 3 Blog Post

When considering the question of how Tumblr functions as a digital community, it is important to quantify exactly what this concept is. Building on Habermas’ concept of a public sphere, Bruns and Highfield (2020, p. 99-103), contest that digital communities are “multiple coexisting and competing public spheres at the same time”, with the goal of achieving “mediated political communication”.

With this in mind, Tumblr’s unique features allowed it to achieve the idealistic qualities of this smaller intertwining public sphere. Firstly, the “low barriers to entry for a larger number of participants” (Bruns & Highfield 2020, 113) satisfied the participation aspect of a micro-public. However, it also provided a home for those “who are too often ostracised by a traditional, capitalist workplace” (Ashley 2019, p. 361), encouraging those who weren’t “societal elites” (Bruns & Highfield 2020, p. 100) to contribute all the same.

Moreover, not requiring your identity to make a Tumblr allowed the user to “revel in anonymity, say[ing] whatever you want without fear of it going on your permanent record” (Reeve 2016). This secrecy therefore enabled people to “be vulnerable, public enough to feel seen...free to share and overshare. (Ashley 2019, p. 359). This empowered the user to subvert societal norms, overcoming the biases that plague other social media as they seek to accommodate the traditional consumer.

For Ashley, (2019, p. 359) this empowerment meant that she “didn’t have to be the cookie-cutter image of a porn star I’d had in my head”, with her work being made “not primarily for the consumption of men but often for the support and validation of our friends” (Ashley 2019, p. 360). This freedom from institutional influence reflects how the alternative social media Tumblr was able to foster a digital community, in this case NSFW and queer audiences, through its unique features.

References

Ashley, V 2019, ‘Tumblr porn eulogy’, Porn Studies, vol. 6, no. 3, pp. 359-362.

Bruns, A & Highfield, T 2020, ‘Is Habermas on Twitter? Social media and the public sphere’, in Enli, G, Bruns, Larsson, O, Skogerbo, E & Christensen, C (Eds.), The Routledge Companion to Social Media and Politics, Routledge, New York, pp. 56- 73.

Reeve, E 2016, ‘The Secret Lives of Tumblr Teens’, The New Republic, 18 February, viewed 24 March 2021, <https://newrepublic.com/article/129002/secret-lives-tumblr-teens>.

#MDA2000921 #tumblr

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