In our group, we focused our discussion on the surveillance and tracking of a population. China’s disregard for the privacy of is people is staggering. It seems that once a population reaches a certain size, its governing body treats its citizens less like people and more like data points. Moreover, some of the technologies we discussed were obvious like the cell phone and the laptop computer, but a more subtle pervasive piece of software technology is YouTube. We also discussed issues with social media as a whole while finally determining Instagram to be one of the most popular yet worst ones.
YouTube
Ledger of Harms
Attention: While it is a great place to learn a skill, it is very easy to get lost in the shuffle of interesting things and therefore can be considered a tool of distraction.
Mental Health: The comments section is a rather toxic place on YouTube and cyber-bullying definitely can occur there
Relationships: There’s not as much of an effect on relationships directly.
Democracy: During the 2016 United States Presidential Election, YouTube promoted videos of Donald Trump 20% more in the suggested video section. Which has a profound effect on the voting base.
Children: Suggested videos on YouTube are determined by an algorithm. However, some disturbing videos aimed to frighten children and expose them to adult themes have been found to be suggested after normal videos for children.
Do Unto Others: As YouTube has mostly free speech in its comments section, it often times is filled with hateful messages and opposing opinions.
Humane Design Guide
Emotional: The emotional drive to keep watching the content that you’d like, even late at night can inhibit and harm the sleep patterns of an individual.
Attention: There is no end point to YouTube and it is therefore a never-ending tunnel that one can go down while ignoring the outside world and the physical needs of the self.
Sense making: While YouTube does have content creators that are accurate and genuine, it also has those that would post propaganda wittingly or unwittingly, as well as those that would post manipulative content.
Decision making: Not as big of an issue, however, if the content that one watches on YouTube changes their outlook on life and therefore their intentions, it could cause them to change their actions.
Social Reasoning: The self-image of a YouTube content creator is definitely inflated so that it seems to the viewers of the content that the creator is living the best version of their life.
Group Dynamics: Whilst not as big of an issue as the others, YouTube does have the ability to unite groups of people based on the content they watch.
Potential Refinements
A simple change to reconcile this would be to forgo efficiency and instead of an algorithm sorting through all of the content uploaded, use a group of people to determine the viability of each video. Furthermore, by enabling an option to allow the user to set time limits for the amount of videos they or their child is allowed to watch would also help to increase the ethical altitude of the platform.
Ledger of Harms
Attention: Brings our attention from the outside world to the immersive digital world via new posts and sponsored content.
Mental Health: Instagram is a place to showcase each person’s version of their best self. However, this is oftentimes not the actual way a person is living. With the ability to Photoshop and filter out every bad detail, Instagram is a place to feel bad about everyone else’s version of their best self.
Relationships: As Instagram offers digital communication as well as picture sharing, this can lead to a distorted view of conversations. Furthermore, it can lead to misinterpretations of a person’s meaning, thus affecting the relationship.
Democracy: Polarizing views are showcased in a person’s comments and follows. Which can lead to some dismay among kit and kin.
Children: As younger and younger children join social media, specifically Instagram, their views on what is important will change. If children admire those who have found “fame” on Instagram instead of those who hold high moral values, the children are more likely to act as those they follow. While this is inherently a negative, it has the potential to be.
Do Unto Others: Instagram is a sharing platform and therefore, is viral in its very nature. As Instagram spreads to more and more users, it draws in others that will go through the same dopamine rush every time their post is liked.
Humane Design Guide
Emotional: Instagram can be emotionally draining as one can see their friends having a good time without them, doing better than them in terms of likes and followers, and seeing people from all around the world living amazing lives while the viewer is stuck at home or at work.
Attention: While its content is somewhat differentiated, it is mainly a mix of content that you have chosen to view and content that has been chosen to view for you. Furthermore, as Instagram is an endless feed, it is entrapping its users to mindlessly scroll on while laying in bed. Instead of sleeping as they should be.
Sense Making: Instagram is filled with so-called influencers that gain popularity and then sell products or are sponsored by companies that wish to promote their brand. Culminating into a page that is both an actual person and an advertisement.
Decision Making: Instagram has daily notifications that others have posted and if a person has uploaded content, that they have received likes and comments on that content.
Social Reasoning: Images on Instagram are almost always edited. Furthermore, the “value” of a user in quantified by their number of followers and by the amount of likes and comments the user gets on their posts. The more viral a post is, the more valuable a user is.
Group Dynamics: Instagram does enable users to come together via following each other and by having the ability to create large-scale group messages. However, this can feel exclusive if a user is not a part of a certain group.
Potential Refinements
A time limiter for this and other social media sites in general is a good first step in mitigating the effects of a large scale social platform. Moreover, an EDITED tag that is overlayed on a post that has been edited would be very helpful in discerning what is truth and reality in this digital age.
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