One aspect of social media that I am quite confident in predicting its future would have to be it's integration with smart phones. I have already touched on it in this blog, stating that it may just be ruining normal human interaction.Noff (2011), also agrees with that notion and believes that in the future 'Human Relationships will no longer be as physically dependent.'
In the future though, I don't see this obsession going away. Smart phones are here to stay and this idea of everything being mobile is exciting. Now in one device you can make payments and transactions, hold plane tickets, stay constantly connected with everyone and do pretty much just about anything else.
Quek (2012), claims that the latest upgrades and plans for smart phones are 'just a peek at the future which our smartphone can promise.' Meaning that there are still so many things that our phones may be able to do that we can't even imagine. Facebook's fate is a little harder to predict. It is the most popular social media site on the internet but because it is so popular, more and more copy cat sites continue to be made. I always thought MySpace was popular when I was 15 and then I blinked and Facebook was suddenly all the rage. Maybe Facebook will be the next MySpace and get left behind. All in all, social media is here to stay. No matter what sites people are using, this constant need to be in contact with everyone will not go away. Smart phones are only going to improve and they are a portal to these social networking sites and apps.
When I heard that in China the government had blocked Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and Google and then I also heard the country was 'leading the way' when it came to social media, I was very confused. But after watching a speech by Chinese blogger Michael Anti, it all became clear to me. China, as Anti says, likes to block and copy. Block all of these social networking sites and then create new copycat versions that are solely operated within China so that the government can access the information anytime they want.
Michael Anti's speech about the firewall in China
The firewall was introduced in December 2012. It blocks social media websites, certain Wikipedia and news articles and sites such as pornographic sites or religious sites. It is rumoured that there is over 30,000 internet police in China, closely monitoring searches and sites visited (backgroundcheck.org, 2013). And users that try hard enough to bypass the firewall can be reported to authorities.
So whilst in one hand it seems really bad the Chinese cant access world news and contact easily with people from other countries, in a way it also doesn't seem that bad, because they still use other versions of this site, they can just only communicate with each other.
Government censorship like this would not be accepted freely by citizens of Australia, as we are a democracy and it is our right to be able to access a fair level of information. But it seems that for many of the Chinese, it doesn't affect their little world too much.
I don't know what to predict of the firewall in the future, as it has not been running for too long now, but I would say that with a few improvements to leniency, it might just stick around for quite a while to come.
Whether its a white pride group or a group of neo-nazis, extremeists groups often use social media to promote their beliefs and gain recruitments. These are another example of online communities, as they bond over a mutual belief.
The NSM or National Socialist Movement is a global neo nazi extremist group that has a large online presence. On their site they have many videos including one to a song that includes the lyrics 'we want our country back now'. They have thousands of members and is the largest National Socialist party in America and was founded in 1967. They also join with other white supremacist groups and anti-jew groups in order to increase their member number. The website acts as a base for the community, detailing the latest news, showing videos and stating their opinions very opening against minority groups.
A video on the NSM site that is played to disturbing lyrics
Gerstenfeld, Grant and Chiang (2003) conducted a content analysis of extremist Internet
sites and found that only roughly half of the sites utilise multimedia content. NSM is one of those groups and utilises this type of media in order to appeal to possible new members, and will also be more appealing to children or teenagers.
One link on the site is to New Saxon an online social networking site for solely for white people of european decent. This again brings their community together, and had the potential to grow quite large.
This is why Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is a site that is dedicated to preventing this in justice. 'The Southern Poverty Law Center monitors hate groups and extremists throughout the United States and exposes their activities to law enforcement agencies, the media and the public' (SPLC, 2013).
So whilst the idea may be worrying that there are so many hate extremist groups throughout the internet, there are still organisations that help fight against them.
When you are playing The Sims, it is easy for time to get away from you. We all know the feeling of seeing the time and realising a couple hours had actually passed since starting The Sims. For those couple of hours, you were living a 'second life.' For those couple of hours you were living a hyperreality in a virtual reality world.
Hyperreality is 'a condition in which "reality" has been replaced by simulacra' (Baudrillard, 1988). Although the game may represent real life situations and locations, you (the user) are the real creator, you are essentially playing god. You get to control what you look like and how you are perceived by others, you get to control what your sim does next or what job they have.
The latest addition to The Sim's expansion packs
Does your avatar really look like you? Did you make your avatar skinnier, taller or more attractive than you perceive yourself? Lee (2003) suggests that it may be a projection of the ideal version of yourself. It seems that to some people, living a life that you have complete control over is much more appealing than facing the ups and downs of everyday life.
In the future, will we all live through online personalities? As social media and virtual hyperreality games continue to become more popular, it mean that ordinary interaction in real life situations is instead replaced with a chat bar on an online role-playing game.
Produsage, a term that has been made popular by Australian media scholar, Axel Bruns, is best explained in his own words as 'the collaborative and continuous building and extending of existing content in pursuit of further improvement' (Bruns, 2007). Produsers are the citizens that engage with this ever-growing online collaboration as they are users that are producing information: Producer + user = produser.
It is a concept that may take you a while to get your head around, so the best example that can explain it is Wikipedia. Wikipedia is an online portal of information on just about every subject, even produsage. Often looked down upon by scholars as a reliable reference of information, it is a site where all of the content is produced by the users of the site. Internet Executive, Mark E. Moran, says 'its [Wikipedia's] reliability and credibility fall well short of the standards for a school paper' and in an online article goes on to provide a number of reasons as to why it is unreliable.Wikipedia admits itself as not being completely credible or reliable.
(wikipedia.org)
Anyone can take part in editing the information on a subject and can add subjects themselves. So in reality, the information provided can be completely made up. However this community of online produsers, constantly wanted to update and improve information, usually fix up any misinformation fast. Many of the contributors to the site back up their information by providing furter references within the wikipedia article, showing that the information is based off more reliable sources.
Wikipedia is today. In this age, the contribution of so many different brains into one article seems reliable enough. Its a method of finding information that will continue to be used by students whether they choose to reference the site or not. Academics should begin to trust the site more as so many of the articles these days are fully referenced.
Do you understand the terms now? Wikipedia is the prime example of how an online community can work together to produce a unique source of information. Wikipedia is produsage.
If you still aren't 100% sure what I'm on about, read it straight from the man himself in Brun's book 'Blogs, Wikipedia, Second Life and Beyond: From Production to Produsage.'
In his book, ‘The Virtual Commnunity,” Rheingold (1993)
talks about how politicians can reach new audiences by appealing to ‘online
communities’ in order to grow support for their political parties. Rheingold
may have anticipated that politicians would continue to use social media
throughout campaigns in the future in his book, but surely he is surprised now
by just how much impact this type of media can have.
Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are the most utilized social
media platforms by politicians these days. One of the best examples of a
politician who makes the most of social media is Barrack Obama
(http://www.thesocialmediatrainingschool.com)
With over 31.5 million followers on Twitter, over 290 million
YouTube video views and 35 million likes on Facebook, it is clear the amount of
effort Obama puts into utilizing all of these different social media sites. It
could also be said that without this entire social media campaigning, Obama
would not have maintained the followers in order to be elected and re-elected.
In 2008, the year Obama was elected, there was the largestvoter turnout in the US in 50 years. This shows that obviously Obama targeted a
range of different people that would not normally vote and urged them to
support him. He focused on campaigning to a range of people such as gay and
lesbian groups and different ethnic groups, and was able to target these groups
more accurately via online communities.
(http://blog.petaflop.de)
Social media is imperative for any politician running as a
candidate these days and will continue to prove so in the future. This means
that younger candidates may just have an advantage as not only are they more
likely to have grown up using social media, but they will also appeal to the
younger voters. Candidates also need to incorporate some sort of humour or
entertainment in their campaigns to keep people engaged long enough on social
media sites before they hit refresh on their Facebook feeds or click a
recommended video on YouTube.
Politicians need to adapt fast to this type of
campaigning as the old conventional ways are becoming close to their use by date.
“Publishing improves transparency, and this transparency
creates a better society for all people. Better scrutiny leads to reduced
corruption and stronger democracies in all society’s institutions, including
government, corporations and other organisations” (Wikileaks 2006).
Founder of investigative journalism, I.F Stone (1990), believes
that “all governments lie.” There are many who question the reliability and
authenticity of their government and are curious to know what they are hiding.
Julian Assange, founder of Wikileaks in 2006, gives the public a chance to see
what the government is deciding not to disclose to them.
The site has withstood many political and legal attacks that
have attempted to silence Assange and his anonymous sources. It has been able
to stay because it supports our right to freedom of speech. It is an
anti-corruption tool that helps the public see what happens behind the scenes,
away from the television and newspapers.
Whilst newspapers claim to write only the truth, you can’t
help but think if that is really true. Rupert Murdoch and News Corp, own so
much of Australia’s media that if the government were to pay them to write
something, it would reach a large portion of Australians. This way the
information is unbiased as the original stories are also published. This is the
main difference between Wikileaks and investigative journalism. There is no
reason for Wikileaks to be biased as it is not for profit, and has a simple
goal ‘to bring important news and information to the public.’
The war in Afghanistan is something that regular civilians
no little about, besides what the media tells them. In 2010, Wikileaks
published a horrifying video showing 15 people being killed by US army
soldiers, whilst they laughed, cursed and encouraged each other to keep
shooting. This is something that would not have been available to the public
without the leak and gives insight into the true nature of the US soldiers.
(Original video footage of shooting)
Another important story Wikileaks published in 2007, was an
insight to living conditions of prisoners at Camp Delta. The "Standard Operating Procedures for Camp Delta"
handbook for soldiers dealing with the prisoners was released showing that
prisoners were denied necessities such as access to the Red Cross and even
toilet paper. This allowed citizens to discover the cruel and inhumane
processes that their government is actually allowing.
As
many other publications would not be authorized to publish these sorts of
stories, it’s important for sites like Wikileaks to remain available to the public
as it allows them to help prevent government corruption.
