#ccdn331 project3

[millanovak331]

Final essay PDF for CCDN331 Project 3 (sorry please click on images for it to expand and focus)

[sarahclarke18]

Facebook Versus Reality: An insight into the destruction that is our virtual social life

Design is regarded as an industry that is based on and is directed towards culture, where within contemporary design, practice has become largely oriented towards catering for the western world’s consumer culture. Looking specifically into a key contributor to this issue, the social media platform of Facebook will be investigated in this paper in order to expose the destructive effects it has had on society’s desire to consume, as well as for contributing towards the identity crisis that is also being endured. Taking into consideration Facebook’s ability to draw today’s passive consumers into accepting the artificial “idealised” world that it proposes, the importance of contemporary designs being truthful to their intentions and claims will be stressed. Another important point that will be suggested for Facebook is that should address all positives and negativities of society in order to be considered a holistic representation of it. Contemporary design practice could be regarded as having an ultimate goal of bettering our lives in attempting to make it as easy as possible, through which technology is often regarded as being the solution. Technology forms such as Facebook could be regarded as one of these attempts with its ability to address mass scales, and enabling an ease of communication with the people in our lives. Although Facebook has created this sense of ease, it has also become an influential factor towards driving the consumer society in which we live. It assists in enforcing this society in proposing specific ideas on how our modern lives should be lived which are displayed through its advertising and exposure of others’ lives, determining elements such as what we should wear and how we should behave. As claimed by Cole that “the consumerist culture is marked by the pressure to be someone else” (2014), this therefore indicates a resulting sense of dissatisfaction with oneself, which due to these ideas proposed by the mass media forms such as Facebook, has lead to the motivation of an individual to change unique characteristics that they hold in order to “fit in with the crowd”. Although Facebook does not directly discourage exposure of individuality, it still neglects any encouragement of it either, as people are instead motivated to expose themselves in ways that would gain likes, a way of gaining acceptance. With design being an industry with intent to relate to and adapt with culture, this makes it applicable to cater for this consumerism and its fast-paced and demanding nature. With this culture being fuelled by the motivation for “belonging, social acceptance and status then survival” (Pope, 2010), contemporary design practice attempts to comply and provide for these supposed consumer requirements through inventions such as Facebook. As mentioned above of consumers’ desires to “be someone else”, Facebook therefore caters for this desire in providing the opportunity to allow people to give themselves a digital identity where they have the freedom to project themselves in the light that they desire. Being an interactive website with a lot of controllable features such as profile pictures, cover photos and statuses, gaining a desired perception from others is a simple process compared to the traditional method of gaining an impression face-to-face as it allows individuals to become an idealised version of themselves. Allowing people to confine their lives into a compact personalised profile, individuals feel inclined to put their “best foot forward”, in order to appeal to others. The problem with this opportunity is that there is nothing stopping someone providing a false representation of themselves, whether that may be that their profile picture claims to be but is not actually them, or providing incorrect personal details. Considering that people have the ability to do so, instead of being an online representation of reality, Facebook could be considered as just a mimicry of the real-world, providing an escape from undesirable, truthful existences. This is evident through the fact that “interfaces (such as Facebook) only focus on the positive and pleasing” (Foucoult, Mentis, Sengers, Welles, 2007) through how it only exposes insight into a small window of reality, and neglecting the exposure of the negativities in life “suggesting this leaves out important dimensions of human experience” (p.1557, 2007). Although this debatably perfect world that Facebook creates may sound pleasant, it is important for design to challenge the mind as well as be functional as this would create a more fulfilling experience for users, therefore adding a sense of criticality could be beneficial such as proposing a “dislike” button to offer more opinion. It is a common matter of fact that society is full of several issues such as corruption and political and economic difficulties, therefore being a key contributor to shaping societal identity. It has been acknowledged on several various occasions that Facebook as an organisation is does not support representation of such issues, in order to maintain their goal of making users “feel comfortable sharing things about their real lives” (Zuckerberg, 2011). This was evident, for example, when an image of a beheading From Mexico was punctually removed from the site at the time, with the claim that it would “review its policy on other distressing material also” (Casey, 2014), despite the fact that methods like this could act as a method to create awareness on heinous occurrences. Although this example is an unpleasant and difficult viewing, because these issues are undoubtedly present in our every day, they are consequentially important to be considered in contemporary design practices such as Facebook in order for them to be acknowledged as a representation of reality. For this reason, if Facebook wants to depict the real world, it should be accepting of these societal issues, as opposed to avoiding them because they are undesirable aspects of our lives or considered taboo. Alternatively, if a positively lit representation of reality is to be illustrated, then Facebook should declare that this is its intention, which is clear from current practice by how people are able to report posts that they do not want to see or be associated with, along with other available tools such as blocking Facebook friends. Consequentially in order to determine its own identity, Facebook should follow one of these two pathways to not only make its intentions clear, but also avoid any conflict with society’s identity and instead appreciate it as one that is multi-dimensional and a combination of both positive and negative occurrences. Choosing to disregard representation of undesired societal conditions, and aspects of peoples’ lives, this has in-turn resulted in the breeding of user dissatisfaction. This once again could be closely linked with our consumer culture and materialism, where Facebook provides an optimum opportunity to display material wealth and an attractive image- goals of which consumers are determined to reach in order to gain “status and social rewards” (Easterbrook, Wright, Dittmar and Banerjee, 2014, p.349). Also in true consumerist nature, individuals feel the need to update their image due to this ongoing dissatisfaction, which is brought upon by Facebook’s marketing abilities containing cookies (that provide individuals with constant suggestive advertisements, drawn from personal information available online) as well as the fact of being surrounded by constant life updates by friends. Therefore the never-ending , and fast paced operation of Facebook influences users to follow occurring trends seen on Facebook in order to gain the “self-affirming feedback from others” (Leary, Price Tangney, 2005, p.133) where its “like” ability represents this and acts as a digital form of appreciation and recognition for a person, and therefore standing as an ultimate goal for users to achieve. However, self-satisfaction acquired from Facebook likes is only momentary because of these constant updates, meaning that this cycle of dissatisfaction and aspiration for individuals to improve their image is ongoing. With this constant feeling of expectation to provide updates, identity complications in contemporary culture have occurred where our roles and identity as Facebook users also become bound with those within our real lives. Because we have become such a technology-centred society, social media influence has become an accompanying feature that has imposed on culture, however , because as noted above that Facebook provides opportunity to create an idealised, personalised world, this has proven to be hard to live up to in reality. Essentially (also noted prior) because Facebook demonstrates a preferred version of ourselves that we feel is fit to appeal and gain positive attention from others, a resulting identity crises occurs “because we aspire to a role that proves to be beyond our ability or resources” (Baran and Davis, 2014,p.303). A consequential confusion of identity is therefore the outcome of this, where our Facebook identities as potentially more confident and debatably more attractive versions of ourselves are at the centre of our aspirations, as opposed to focussing on who we actually are. What can be drawn from this point is just how subconsciously we have taken on this technological identity, therefore demonstrating Facebook as an exemplar of contemporary design that has such minimal amount critical or thought provoking dimensions to it. Considering the evident impact and control that Facebook has over its users that goes unnoticed, this is an area of concern as a particular framework of identity is being imposed on individuals to follow, whereas in order to be a more accurate depiction of reality, Facebook should add some criticality to its practice. Baran and Davis theorise in their work the future of social relationships and how “high culture would give way to mass culture so people’s existence would be degraded and dehumanised” (2014,p.306), where Facebook already plays this role through encouraging prevention of face-to-face contact. Although it claims to be a tool that assists in connecting individuals with important people in their lives, through its several communication methods, it ultimately detours from the idea of physical interaction, and encourages the idea of online communication as a suitable and convenient means of socialising. Although this may seem beneficial for the busy lives that we lead in current society, features such as “constant status updates may inadvertently discourage more meaningful and sensory interactions that can only take place offline”(Snow, 2011). This discouragement could be placed upon facts that it is not only(currently) impossible to engage all five senses via a screen, but also that a large majority of these communication tools are made public to the rest of your Facebook community, therefore making it less personal and intimate with the people you are communicating with. Due to these limiting factors, Facebook interaction does not have comparable memory-making ability, and resultantly cannot vastly contribute towards building upon a person’s existing real-life identity. Therefore, instead of being an alternate means of communicating, Facebook’s design interface should aim to focus further on complimenting and reiterating people’s social lives, as opposed to creating its own that claims to be representative of reality. This could be achieved through the means of Facebook being encouraged as more of a reflective output (in a journal-like manner) where people can share stories of their experiences after they have occurred, as opposed to disturbing their real-life experiences in the moment. Being an industry that represents and depicts the culture that it exists within, it is important that design practices provide honest and reliable representations of that culture, as opposed to idealised versions of reality. Looking at Facebook as an exemplar of contemporary design practice that debatably does not abide by this idea, insight has been provided into how its current practice has caused destruction upon individuals in terms of their roles as consumers, as well as on their identities. In providing points on Facebook’s practice and how it is fuelling our desires to be someone else, dictating our personal decisions, as well how it neglects representation of undesired societal conditions, it is evident that Facebook does not demonstrate a true of a portrayal of reality that it makes out to. With a society already facing several issues, contemporary design practice should be assisting in confronting and resolving these, as opposed to avoiding them and providing an alternate idealised world as current Facebook practice does. From this gained insight, contemporary design practice should purely epitomise culture in manners that are thought evoking and critical in order to challenge the minds of mass consumers as opposed to encouraging passive consumption. Works cited Baran, S., & Davis, D. (2013). Mass Communication Theory: Foundations, Ferment, and Future. Stamford: Cengage Learning. Cole, N. (2014). Consumerist Culture Zygmunt Bauman's Notion of Consumerist Culture. Retrieved from http://sociology.about.com/od/C_Index/fl/Consumerist-Culture.htm Casey, P. (2013, October 28). Facebook heads trapped in an idealised world. Retrieved from http://www.independent.ie/life/health-wellbeing/mental-health/facebook-heads-trapped-in-an-idealised-world-29704180.html Easterbrook, M., Wright, M., Dittmar, H., & Banerjee, R. (2014). Consumer culture ideals, extrinsic motivations, and well-being in children. European Journal of Social Psychology,44(4). (2014, April 3). Foucoult, B., Mentis, H., Sengers, P., & Welles, D. 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