Category: Facebook

Risks Faced by Young Users of Social Networks: Posts on Facebook and Myspace

Risks of Using Networks

Social media has become a huge part of how people interact with each other in our society. The majority of adolescents use one or more social networking sites. Facebook is still the big one, but other sites, such as Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, and TikTok are becoming increasingly popular.

Whether or not these sites are healthy social outlets is still debated. Some say that they are valuable tools for adolescents to hone their social skills. Others say just the opposite — as young people become more and more dependent upon social media as their social outlet, they are losing the ability to interact effectively in person. The debate rages on. However, social media presents other, more pressing dangers.

There are many risks faced by young users of social networks like:

• Cyberbullying
• Not protecting their own privacy
• sharing information with people who don’t know or trust
• losing control over a photo or video has been shared
• identity theft
• seeing offensive messages and images

Too much passive use of social network – just browsing posts – can be unhealthy and has been linked to feelings of envy, inadequacy and less satisfaction with life. Studies have even suggested that it can lead to ADHD symptoms, depression, anxiety and sleep deprivation.

Here are also some other dangers of using too much social media:

1. Sharing too much

While it certainly isn’t advisable for kids to post information about the school they attend or their upcoming whereabouts, typically speaking, online predators work in much more nefarious ways than showing up at a given location they found out about on online (more on that in a bit). On the other hand, identity thieves thrive on knowing the everyday details of people’s lives, as they can offer more info than posters realize.

Identity thieves love social media because people talk about their pets, their hometown, their favorite sports teams, etc., which are all usually the answers to security questions and passwords” It’s very easy for somebody looking on social media to steal someone else’s identity just by paying attention to the things they say and do.

2. Assuming private means danger

Kids think that when they use social media, they’re safe if they set it to private. But when they accept the requests of friends of friends, mutual friends, people they may know and people they played games with, it’s a different issue. Privacy equals control, and when a child posts a picture or a comment, they need to remember that they’re transferring control of that thought, feeling, special moment or image to all of the people that they are sharing it with, and there’s nothing to stop followers and friends from sharing it with others or even turning it into an embarrassing meme.”

3. Not having clear-cut phone rules

Regardless of when you give your child a phone, you want to restrict their use on it to avoid the issues above. Furthermore, drawn-out rules should be put in place from the get-go to avoid power struggles and arguments.

4. Online bullying

Online bullying, gossiping, and verbally abusive language can send a teenager into a profound depression or spike their anxiety beyond their ability to manage it, resulting in panic attacks, phobias, and obsessive-compulsive behaviors.

Children who create or post inappropriate, offensive or even illegal content in their own or others’ web pages could get them into trouble with their school, or friends, or even break the law, depending on the nature of the material. It’s also important that young people understand the longevity of posting something online. Once content is uploaded onto a website, it could potentially stay online forever. Regardless of whether the owner takes down the content, anyone who had access to that content could have copied it for themselves, kept it for their own records or distributed it further. Content which is uploaded online can be copied, altered and reposted by anyone and it is very diffi cult to ‘take back’ things that may be later regretted. This can damage reputations and even future prospects.

Perhaps most importantly, members create a listing of friends which allows them to communicate online and gives mutual access to more private content (such as photos). The potential threats of the social network Privacy Privacy is always a concern for any communication exchange carried out online and children often do not understand the risks involved in giving out too much personal information on the Internet. This is of particular worry when such information is given to an individual who your child does not know personally to; they may argue that someone is an online ‘friend’ but to all intents and purposes that person is effectively a stranger. To many children the online world isn’t the same as the real world and they can often behave in a way they would never do face to face, and say things they would never say, leaving them much more vulnerable in an online environment. They may also be less protective of personal details such as their mobile phone number or address, which could have undesirable implications for them. Age-inappropriate content The Internet provides access to all kinds of content at the click of a mouse – but not all of that content is suitable for children and young people to see. While you may have the appropriate parental controls set up on your computer your child may still be able to access inappropriate material if someone in their social networking circle makes it

Imagine someone born in the early 1900’s entering a modern-day classroom. They would likely be confused as to what televisions, computers, cell phones, and other electronic devices are. It is also likely that they would be overwhelmed by the instant access to information that the internet provides. Digital media has become a large part of people’s everyday lives especially with the rise of digital media in classrooms. Digital media is growing so rapidly that people who are not adapting to this shift in culture are falling behind and becoming victims of the “digital divide”, this is leaving people misinformed. Digital media has a large effect on the way that people communicate, this is especially evident in the way that students interact with one another and the information that they learn. The use of digital media often leads to students being misinformed and / or being unable to communicate positively with one another. Many people are unaware of just how large the effect that this technology has on their life because it has become such a normal thing.

The past two decades have seen dramatic change in the way that people interact, and this largely has to do with the rapid development of digital media. There are many different forms of social media, and all of these forms are constantly changing the way in which young people are communicating. This technology has become a significant part of the everyday lives of many students, both in and out of the classroom. The education curriculum has been slow in recognizing the trends of the internet.

One big negative of Facebook is that it does create a safety risk. Children can encounter child predators, which has already happened to teens and children all over the world. Kids on Facebook could also be exposed to foul language, inappropriate adult talk and pictures, and R-rated content. In addition, they could become the victim of cyber-bullying, or become the bullies.

There are people who lie. There are people who are under 13 [accessing Facebook]. Facebook removes 20,000 people a day, people who are underage. He adds that dealing with underage users is something the site works on all the time. (Tan)

In fact, the law provides some protection when it comes to children under the age of 13; it gives parents control over what information children can disclose. (Schaffhauser) To help protect children, there is the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, which requires parental consent before they can collect information and allows parents to view profiles. The Federal Trade Commission determines if the web site is directed toward children by the content and if they deem it is geared toward children, they must comply with The Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act. (COPPA) Another negative, is that children need to spend more time outside enjoying real life activities: hanging with their friends in the real world skating, playing ball, riding their bikes, and playing at the park. Hanging out in front of the computer is contributing to childhood obesity.

Consequently, being a parent comes with the responsibility of protecting and ensuring that our children are safe. Parents use to tell their kids not to talk to strangers, not to take candy from strangers, not to open the door for strangers are all well and good but now we have to add, watch out for strangers on the Internet. This can be proven to be even more dangerous, if we don’t monitor our children. Many kids on Facebook and MySpace post pictures, full name, addresses, and the school they attend and even cell phone numbers. Thus, all this information is easily accessible at the click of a button to anyone. These sites are providing child predators with the exact information they need to track down our kids, right at their own back yard.

In Feb. 2009, MySpace identified 90,000 registered sex offenders with profiles on the site, while Facebook declined to reveal how many were present on its site. (ProCon)Social networking sites can’t identify every sex offender. Therefore, parents can get software that can help monitor their children. Internet security firm Check Point released software that lets parents monitor their children on Facebook, it scans friends request and communications, and it alerts parents to certain words. Check Point vice president of consumer sales Bari Abdul said:

It’s about protecting your kids from the social threats out there, while still respecting their privacy and fostering open communication. We are offering Facebook users a simple way to embrace social networking safely. (Software)

Check Point cited a survey indicating that 38 percent of teenagers have ignored requests from parents to be friends on Facebook, and that 16 percent of children have only done so as a condition of using the social network.

However, some will argue, that with the proper adult guidance and monitoring, Facebook can be a safe and healthy place. Parents can set the account as private, and log in frequently to monitor their behavior. Or, they could even sit next to them and monitor them at all times while on the site. Also, there are some websites that have minimum age requirements to set up an account. MySpace, for example, requires users to be at least 14 years old, and the profiles of all users under the age of 16 are automatically set to “private” so they cannot be found during a general search. There some advantages of allowing a child to have a Facebook account.

It helps them become acquainted with using the computer and today’s technology. It can help children stay connected with their long-distance Grandma. They can get homework advice and can keep up with the happenings of other distant family. Also reported 50% of students with a social networking site, use it to discuss homework. (ProCon) In. addition, we can keep kids safe by letting them go on social network websites geared for children

Above all, it’s important to be a part of your child’s life. It’s hard when they want their own lives, and their moods change by the minute. But you are still their parent and they are still children in many ways. Whether their behavior indicates it or not, they need you. Truly, parents need to also open the lines of communication between their kids. The truth, parents are the ones who pay for the computer and continue to pay for the Internet each month. Therefore, we have the absolute right to ask our child about their sites and have the right to see their MySpace and Facebook accounts.

As a final point, MySpace and Facebook have changed society in many ways. It’s a parental choice to allow their children on Facebook. While there are disadvantages, with the right parental control, it can be a positive experience for youth.

Rhetorical Analysis: Consequences of Using Myspace and Facebook

Dana L. Fleming, a Boston area attorney that specialized in higher education law, is the author of the article “Youthful Indiscretions”, discusses the consequences of what young users post online and how institutions should take some steps to monitor social media usage of students and prospective employees. Fleming Opens the article by introducing social media giants My Space and Facebook. She states how making an online identity and friends is easy, as well as how these identities can be detrimental. Fleming continues by informing readers about the specifics of how easy it is to find friends and groups on these sites, and how this ease of access can lead to predators preying on young users. She then gives examples of students and potential employees losing opportunities because of what they have posted online. She illustrates how monitoring social media is somewhat difficult but not impossible. She suggests that instead of constantly monitoring all social media accounts, monitoring should be targeted. Fleming muses on whether schools and employers should limit access or regulate the information via laws and regulations.

In the article, Fleming brings to attention the hazards of sloppy social media practices, often by young users, and questions whether parents, school officials, potential employers, and law enforcement should monitor or regulate social media. First, she gives background information on two social media giants, My Space and Facebook, and describes how easy it is to sign up and make friends. She points out however that these “online identities and friendships come at a price” (paragraph 1). She gives examples of students and potential employees losing opportunities and jobs because of what they had posted online. She then details the dangers of social media to young users by presenting cases of sexual assault by online “friends”. Fleming brings to attention that “Forty-five attorneys general are pushing MySpace to adopt more parental controls and an age verification system” (paragraph 10). She suggests that college administrators should monitor and enforce social guidelines for social media users. Finally, she goes on to reiterate that what is posted online is not as privates as it may appear, and advises that schools “treat them like any other university activity, subject to the school’s code of conduct and applicable state and federal laws” (paragraph 18). Fleming appeals to ethos throughout the article with her verbiage, sources and examples. She appeals to pathos giving emotionally provoking cases of the victims who fell prey to online predators and ways to prevent these situations from happening in the future. In order to appeal to logos, she gives examples of ways that social media can be monitored and possible disciplinary action that educational institutions can do.

There is only so much credibility a law attorney specializing in higher education can attain for this subject, so, Fleming furthers her credibility vicariously through the authority of other sources. In paragraphs 1 and 2, she gives background facts and statistics on MySpace and Facebook to introduce readers into the main subject of her article, namely social media use. In paragraph 4, she tells readers what is needed to sign up for one of these sites along with what is commonly posted on these sites and the ease to which one makes “friends”; she follows this up with a statistic “Thirty percent of students report accepting “friend” requests from total strangers”(paragraph 4). Later in the article she cites attorneys general, specifically Connecticut Attorney general Richard Blumenthal. She quotes the office of student affairs at the University of Maine, though ““the administrators are not monitoring Facebook,” they may act upon any violations of law or University policy if it is bought to their attention” (paragraph 12). In paragraph 15, Fleming references “Cornell’s University’s “Thoughts on Facebook””. She touches on the advertisements targeted to young users through MySpace and Facebook, and explains the “Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act”

In order to draw in the attention of parents of students, Fleming shares cases of sexual assault throughout the country, most involving minors as the victims. In one case a “13-year-old girl from Texas … lied about her age on her MySpace profile, then agreed to meet one of her “friends” in a restaurant parking lot where her friend, a 19-year-old male, sexually assaulted her.” Her parents “blame MySpace for their daughter’s sexual assault and tried unsuccessfully to sue the company for negligence” however a “U.S. District Court Judge dismissed the suit” instead criticizing the parents (paragraph 9). The perpetrators who viciously raped and robbed Colorado man, were identified by detectives via MySpace.

Fleming took a different approach to reaching out to young social media users than she did with the parents of students; she forced these readers to take a cold hard look at the consequences of improper social media usage. One University of Chicago student learned the very harsh lesson that what is posted online is not at all private; an executive from the company in which he was going to have a summer internship viewed his Facebook profile and found that he enjoys ““smoking blunts”, shooting people, and obsessive sex” (paragraph 6), causing him to lose the internship. Another student defamed a college police officer on Facebook and was reportedly expelled. These were just a few eye-opening examples that Fleming used to grab the attention of students.

Logic dictates that actions have consequences. These actions can be positive such as if a student studies for a test, they will get a higher score. Or, the consequences can be the inverse; if that same student doesn’t study for a test, they will get a lower score. And yet, they can even be neutral. If a ball is thrown in the air, it will inevitably come down. Fleming focuses primarily on the negative consequences of poor judgment about social media use. When minors are put in danger, like the girl whose parents blamed MySpace for her sexual assault, communities and legislators feel the need to protect them. She cites Richard Blumenthal, Connecticut Attorney General (paragraph 10), who wants to see the minimum age requirements for MySpace increased from 14 to 16. She states that congress introduced several bills restricting access of social media sites in schools and libraries that receive federal funding.

Works Cited

1. Fleming, Dana L. “Youthful Indiscretions.” New England Journal of Higher Education, vol. 22, no. 4, Jan. 2008, pp. 27–29.

Survey and Analysis of Social Computing Development: Myspace Versus Facebook

History of Social Networks, Key Events and Major Contributors

Geocities was the first social networking site, produced in 1994, and this enabled users to form and customise websites they created. TheGlobe.com launched a year later and this enabled users to produce individualised content as well as engage with people with similar hobbies and interests. AOL Instant Messenger and SixDegrees.com were social networks launched in 1997 and this is when innovative features such as searchable profiles and instant messaging began, so users had the ability to interact with friends at their convenience.

MySpace soon came to the fore and garnered success due to it’s to videos, music and online hipper characteristics. It eventually gathered 75.9 million users at it’s peak in 2008 and it was the most visited website in the world in 2006, surpassing Google in the process. After MySpace got sold, it’s growth continued, and by 2008 it was producing around $800 million in sales. Nevertheless, MySpace lost market share to Facebook soon enough as a result of it’s easy to use format and additional functionalities. Another reason why MySpace lost market share is its 3 year advertising agreement with Google in 2006 that overloaded the website with advertisements and made the website more difficult to navigate around (Jesdanun, 2006). Despite the downfall, Myspace still exists.

LinkedIn was established in 2003 and it’s success was due to its more formal, professional and enterprised approach to social networking it had. Other social networks focused on instant messaging, gaining popularity, and displaying memorable events through a photo platform, but LinkedIn concentrated on building a database of employers and individuals with professional jobs. LinkedIn has over 500 million registered users.

Mark Zuckerburg created Facebook in 2004, and the main aim was to connect American college students. Initially it was for exclusive members only and the way to gain membership was to be invited. This feature was a hit and over 50% of Harvard students joined in the first month. 2 years later, Facebook become open to the public and by 2008, it became more popular than MySpace. Today, Facebook has over 2 billion registered users globally.

In March 2006, Twitter was created by 4 people including Jack Dorsey and Evan Williams. It’s individualistic features included limiting users to 140 characters per tweet. However, in 2017, it doubled this character limit. Being valued at $14.2 billion, it was listed on the public stock exchange in 2013 (Keith, 2019). Twitter now has 126 million users that are active on a daily basis.

In September 2011, Snapchat was created by Evan Spiegel, Bobby Murphy, and Reggie Brown (Keith, 2019). Its individualistic characteristic was that it enabled members to transfer pictures to each other that would no longer appear soon after being opened. Nowadays, Snapchat also allows people to message each other and share a “24-hour story,” giving users the ability to display and save photos for a whole day. Snapchat has around 186 million active users, being very popular among young people.

Generic Architecture to describe Social Networking and a Real World Example(Facebook)

Social Networking uses client server applications which are stored and hosted in the cloud. This requires the usage of advanced WIFI connectivity to interact with millions or

billions of members through mobile frontend technological mechanisms that can support 2 way interactions using enhanced multimedia. Such mobile devices and mechanisms are also enhanced with sensors such as GPS, microphones, speakers, cameras etc to identify geographical and environmental information. Innovations like these help to execute the most simplistic functions of Social Computing applications by forming the 4 application specific characteristics of Social Interaction, Share Content, Action Taking and Aggregate Knowledge. These 4 characteristics exist in all applications and it depends on the application which characteristic takes precedence over the other (Ginige, A. and Fernando, M, 2015).

When using these applications, the 4 application characteristics lead to to emergent characteristics that takes two forms; an emotion inside the user and a perception the user has towards the application both of which makes humans more motivated to repeat actions such as organising an event and meeting offline. Humans do act in these philosophical ways to satisfy pivotal human needs as provided in this Facebook example below.

The main application characteristic of Facebook is social interaction and this drives the other 3 applications. When the 4 characteristics work in conjunction, they lead to emergent characteristics such as trust, belogingness and acceptance. Trust can be gained in a person or business page due to likes, shares and reviews. The feeling of belonginess can be formed by joining a group that share similar interest in a particular sport, musical artist and political subject. Acceptance and inclusivity can be formed when friends or mutual friends invite one another to events or tag them on memorable photos, videos and important posts. These feelings that emerge in users are one part of the emergent characteristics (the emotion within the user as described above). The other part is perceptions they have towards to the application (Ginige, A. and Fernando, M, 2015). One perception could be the convenience of the application as a result of having easy access to a substantial variety of information on products and services . A perception of an efficient platform is created as a result of friends who live worlds apart being able to instantaneously connect. It is economic as there is no financial cost to use it as long as one has a device and business connectivity. These emerging characteristics lead to certain repetitive actions such as sharing information and organising an event. These actions are philosophically inclined to meet a pivotal human need as described in Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. Facebook users acted online by sharing and organising events whilst offline they phyiscally met in those events. By doing so, they socially interacted with peers hence built new and strengthened existing relationships. This relates to the level 3 of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs; belongingness.

Future development opportunities for Social Networks

The growth of social networks such as LinkedIn will only accelerate in the coming years as high-speed internet and mobile devices will go mainstream in several of underdeveloped nations of the world, who will hop onto the social and business computing bandwagon.

In addition to accelerating social growth, we could also see some shift in the popularity of different social media channels. Social networking market leaders such Facebook and Twitter could lose further market share to Instagram due it’s more mobile-friendly platform which gives it a narrower array of content type. The vast majority of social content is being consumed in a mobile environment, hence that structural advantage is significant.

Product discovery could ultimately become a social networking experience as traditional discovery channels such as online reviews and search engines lose ground to the growing emergence of social networking websites, which is highly popular among young people and probably future generations. This could lead to significant growths in social selling and social commerce in the long run. Major brands and small businesses already use and will continue to use websites such as Facebook and Twitter to advertise products and services as a result of it’s cheap marketing costs and ability to connect with mass numbers of customers.

The main determinant of social networking success will probably be video in the future. Social videos produce a mammoth 1200% more shares than text and images altogeter. Furthermore, 82% prefer to watch a live brand videos instead of reading their social media posts and 80% would prefer to view a live video instead of skimming and reading through a blog post (Hasan, 2018). Hence, marketers should tether to this demand by marketing products and services on video to remain competitive. Azriel Ratz, CEO of Ratz Pack Media, said that in 2018 ‘’LinkedIn plans to launch video ads, giving even more strength to its advertising platform: LinkedIn Ads’’ (Guidara, 2019). Generation Z is setting a social networking trend and businesses should look to exploit this by tailoring products and services through video resolutions since young people are statistically more likely to enjoy this visual form of marketing.

Part 2- Facebook Case Study

Below I will describe various technologies involved in Facebook. Although I have earlier explained how information is processed from a mobile phone to a Facebook platform and then described how this helps to meet fundamental human needs, I will be technical, also explaining how the technologies provide an enabling platform for information to flow through the system.

For Facebook, the Web front-end written is in PHP. Facebook’s HipHop Compiler then converts it to C++ and compiles it using g++, resulting in an efficient, scalable and high performing Web logic execution layer (Figuiere, 2019). This Static compilation helps to avoid dependency problems since the application can be sure the libraries are present and the correct version.

PHP stack ensures that automated backup feature for a huge social network such as Facebook occurs, which is important both as a security measure and to ensure customer and business sensitive data is not lost. In addition, PHP based solutions are quick which reduces business expenses. PHP is also open source and free.

Thift is used to expose Business logic as services. Business logic is the part of the software program that encodes the actual business rules that determine how data can be formed, stored, and adjusted. In other words, it is the programming that manages communication between an end user interface and a database. Thrift’s infrastructure provides a platform for the creation of cross-language services as well as the support of 20 languages (C++, Java, JavaScript, etc.). Another benefit of Thrift is that it can support multiple protocols on the same language. For example, the same service can communicate using binary protocol, XML or even JSON (Schoukroun, 2019). The binary encoding simplifies the manner in which substantial amounts of data are sent over internal networks. Therefore not only does Thrift ensure Facebook is multi-functional but it also promotes the transferring of large scalable data quickly so the social network runs smoothly and with few transmission errors.

Any services that are implemented in Java use Facebook’s custom application server rather than any enterprise server application. Initially this looks like a reinvented wheel but it is important to note that these services are exposed and consumed mostly using Thrift. The overhead costs of Tomcat and Jetty that come in conjunction with the usage of enterprise server applications do not provide value for money for these particular services.

Persistence programming, which can be described as data that outlives the process that created it, is done using MySQL, Memcached and Hadoop’s HBase (Figuiere, 2019).

Hadoop and Hive perform offline processing. Hadoop provides significant storage for various kinds of data as well as huge processing power and the ability to withstand many simultaneous tasks occurring together.

Data such as logging, clicks and feeds transit use Scribe.

Varnish Cache is used for HTTP proxying; one of it’s many benefits is its flexibility. The Varnish configuration language allows Facebook users to write policies on how incoming request should be received and handled. These policies dictate what information to serve, where such information can be obtained and the methods in which requests and responses are altered. This provides a smooth and hassle free experience for Facebook users, with few delays and timeouts. Other proxy servers are compatible with network protocol, FTP and SMTP, but varnish mainly supports HTTP, which is a better security protocol. Therefore Facebook user’s data is encrypted and less susceptible to hacking attempts.

Haystack, which is an ad-hoc storage solution produced by Facdebook, is what manages and handles billions of photos stored and posted by the users. Haystack brings low level optimisations (Figuiere, 2019).

Facebook has an automated system that quickly responds to monitoring alerts by launching the relevant repairing workflow. If the outage is not overcome, the issue can be escalated to humans.

Facebook Messages’ search engine is built using an inverted index stored in HBase whilst the typeahead search uses a custom storage and retrieval logic.

How user behaviours may impact on system performance.

• Facebook controls over 60,000 servers whilst 300 TB of data is saved in Memcached processes
• Their Hadoop and Hive cluster consists of 3000 servers with 8 cores, 32 GB RAM, 12 TB disks that is a total of 24k cores, 96 TB RAM and 36 PB disks. Hence, giving Facebook the platform to process data very quickly so Facebook can rollout out new products, understand user reactions as well as adjust designs in near real-time.
• In July 2010, Facebook averaged 100 billion hits per days, 3 trillion objects cached and 130 TB of logs per day. (Figuiere, 2019).

These Big Data statistics give insights into Facebook’s performance, efficiency of data processing and customer base.

Facebook has more servers than ever before to cope with the growing demand for it’s services. Many feel that Facebook has sufficient capabilities for real-time traffic to be transmitted in an efficient, rapid way without error correction and retransmission mechanisms.

However, this does not make Facebook immune to data outages. As recently as March 2019, Facebook blamed a ‘server configuration change’ for the severe outage it had for more than 14 hours. Nevertheless, a former Facebook chief information security officer, Alex Stamos, argued that the automated system that responds to monitoring alerts did not know how to handle the problem, and got stuck in some kind of loop that exacerbated the damage. Hence, human engineers are required to intervene and reconfigure a complex web of interdependent services on hundreds of thousands of systems (McCarthy, 2019).

Reasons for Facebook’s success

Facebook’s success can attributed it’s ease of use. It is very easy to update significant life events on your profile such as a new relationship, new schools or new homes, hence allowing friends to acknowledge occurrences in your life. It is also very simple to connect with friends and add friends to form a group hence Facebook can help a person achieve a part of level 3 of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs; belongingness. This is done by providing a platform that helps you build new friendships and strengthen existing ones.

Facebook consistently delivers upgrades to enhance customer experience. It is important to note that it avoids making too many drastic changes simultaneously as this would confuse and potentially upset the customer who is accustomed to a certain method of platform functioning(such as the method in which a photo can be uploaded). Facebook has added news feed, timeline, cover photos since it was founded. The security and privacy for Facebook has been developed since you can decide the people you want to share your posts and photos with by using a block list for each status. Hence, unfriendly stalkers can be avoided. Another new feature Facebook has implemented is Facebook Messenger which is a platform to video call free of charge. To sum up, Facebook has remained competitive in the social networking marketplace due to it’s continual rollout of new features.

Facebook is arguably an addiction for many young people. This is because the website alone offers a news feed, a video calling and messaging service as well as the ability to follow or like other people’s posts. Furthermore, there is an App Center, which is filled with third-party games, including Candy Crush saga. Cognitive neuroscientists have found from extensive research that rewarding social stimuli from receiving laughing emojis, positive recognition by colleagues as well as messages from adored family members can result in the activation of the same dopaminergic reward pathways that are activated when a user receives a hit of cocaine (Haynes, 2018). Facebook and smartphones have the ability to provide us with an almost unlimited supply of positive and negative social stimuli. Each Facebook notification, whether it’s a message or a “like” on a personal photo, has the potential to be a positive social stimulus and dopamine influx. In every human exists a dopamine-driven desire for social validation, and Facebook has exploited this until the point that hundreds of millions of young people have become consistent users. Social validation and Inclusivity is listed on the Maslow Hierarchy of needs.

Earlier on, Mark Zuckerberg emphasised the importance of a ‘’cool’’ and well-liked product over shareholder value; he did this by rejecting advertising clients as they were regarded as not ‘’cool’’. This proved to be a success, as Facebook garnered greater market share.

References

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9. McCarthy, K. (2019). Facebook blames ‘server config change’ for 14-hour outage. Someone run that through the universal liar translator. [online] theregister.co.uk. Available at: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/03/14/facebook_server_configuration/ [Accessed 31 May 2019].

Reflection on Watching the Gun Violence Live on Facebook

After watching the Gun Violence live on Facebook this event was about engaging the students about gun violence . I feel like this was a good forum, because gun violence is needed for us students on campus because it is not talked about a lot at all. It sucks that we have waited this long to talk about it, but with all this senseless and violence happening now we need to be educated with our legislators and police officers.

Being a young African American female I have observed countless glitches and gun violence currently that has been going on in our world today. We have poor people who can ‘t find work, an unbalanced budget, and more significantly, a problem with guns. Like every other person in this world, I am worried about being the victim of a accidental shooting.

In the most recent years gun violence has increased meaningfully in many parts of the world today. However, there are several cases of children and young adults in there twenties to early thirties that are engaging in vicious violence or getting mixed in the crossfire. There has been negotiation over whether gun laws are firm enough and what else can be done to condense such crime involvements from happening. With more and more people lives being affected on a steady basis, more worries arise as to how individuals can live safe lives when guns are being used in increasing numbers. It is discreditable to say that almost every day we are hearing about some kind of gun violence that is affecting people either in our hometown or in another part of the world.

Years ago gun violence had its problems but nothing like what’s going on in today’s current society. While there are several events that have happened that have been very outrageous, sad and senseless, comparable actions have happened decades ago; but then again the gun violence didn’t seem to happen as often as they have been lately. Gun violence has grown into an worldwide catastrophe. Some people feel like we should ban guns altogether, whereas others feel this would be intolerable. Getting rid of guns may help calm down the problem but it may not be adequate to make the problem go away. It’s sad to say that a lot of people fear going out and trying to enjoy life, because the are scared something might happen. We should be able to go out and enjoy life and have a good time.

I agreed with all the individuals who spoke. I also feel like we are living in the last days, the Bible also says this. The best thing for us to do is pray and get ourselves together. We are the future generation, so we must have an education to make an encouraging difference in the world. I feel like my generation are the upcoming leaders, but if we don’t have an education, we will not achieve anything. We will overcome, when we use our schooling to make the world a better place to live.

Facebook Messenger 4: Critical Analysis of the New Update

Facebook is a social networking site based in California, formerly names as FaceMash, used for you to easily connect and communicate with people online. It was launched on February 4, 2004, by its creator, Mark Zuckerberg. Its purpose was to help people become more aware of what was happening in the world. Mark Zuckerberg wanted to help people understand the world better. He wanted to create an environment where people could freely share and express any information they wanted. Making the world open was the main purpose of this application. In order to spread this advocacy more, Facebook Messenger was created. Facebook Messenger is a messaging app specially designed for Facebook users, originally developed as Facebook Chat in 2008. Its service was further developed in 2010.

Facebook has recently released a new version of Messenger, which is the new Facebook Messenger 4. The purpose of the messenger is to connect to people and instant messaging. It’s all about the easier-to-use and simple access messaging. The new update which includes color gradient chat bubbles, aim to provide more choices of personalization for their users. It provides easier ways to navigate through the application; powerful and new ways to personalize your conversations keeps things familiar and was created with the audience or users in mind. Messenger’s recent update focuses on how it would be easier for the user to find the features they like and allows the user to further personalize and bring out the creativity in the shared conversation. The redesign aims to make the chat client simpler. Nine tabs reduced to three that is easier to use. Chats are still filled with all of the functionality that’s come to Messenger (such as games, bots, and reminders), but much of this is now hidden behind a new four-dot. The last versions have plenty of icons to press and quite complex. The update of Messenger aims to satisfy the audience request and that is to use the application the messenger uncomplicatedly, able to navigate their messages, reminders and daily story.

Improvements are necessary for terms of mobile applications. Constant updates are important to ensure that the application satisfies the users. Recently, the messenger application had a new update that focused on the overhaul of the user interface. Upon updating, many users recognized the pros and cons of the new version. In the new update, many users were pleased due to the application becoming easier to navigate. From nine tabs, the navigation buttons were simplified to three tabs only which are the Chats, People, and Discover tabs. Another visible improvement was the cleaner and more user-friendly interface. The messenger’s design has a high contrast because the background is mainly white and the texts are mostly black in color. The placing of icons is also well-organized and a search button is present for easy accessibility of old messages. There is also a noticeable improvement in the quality of stickers, emojis, and emoticon. The newer version loads photos, gif, and other files relatively faster than the older version because of its simpler interface. Another upside of this update is that the file size of it is smaller than the previous version. Lags, glitches, and bugs significantly lessened in the updated messenger. For users who love the personalization, additional chat colors were included in the update. These additional colors consist of ombre pink, green, blue, orange, and blue-green.

But not all of the updates were pleasing to users. One significant downside of the update is that it no longer has a shortcut specifically allotted for group chats. This lessened the accessibility for older group chats because the user still needs to search for the name of their group in order to find it. Another disappointing fact is that the placing of advertisements was not improved and they are still alongside the messages which add confusion. There is also no improvement in terms of the degrading quality when uploading or sending photos using messenger which can be solved by placing a specific button that enables users to send original quality photos. Lastly, the biggest disappointment is that the promised dark mode stated by the developers before the update was not included. The dark mode is supposed to change the color of the messenger app to a completely black theme that makes it easier to view it in low lighting condition.

There are a lot of messaging applications available nowadays. Because of this, the demand to be able to satisfy users is heightened. Two of the most trusted messaging apps with video calling options are Facebook Messenger and Apple Inc. Facetime. These two applications are both compatible with IOS. The Facetime advantage to the messenger is that it has a smaller app size of 16.8MB than the 33MB file size of the messenger. Unfortunately, Facetime is not compatible with android devices and it does not support widgets, unlike Messenger. Messenger, on the other hand, is compatible with android and windows phone too. Messenger has fun stickers for people to choose from. Lastly, Messenger can send videos and capture photos that Facetime do not offer.

Messaging app is very important in today’s time because a lot of people are far from their loved ones. This encourages developers to make more on the messaging app. One of the messaging apps is Kakaotalk. It is a mobile instant messaging application with free text and call features. Kakaotalk is smaller in app size relative to its competitor Messenger for both IOS app which has a file size of 27.1MB and Android which has a file size of 13MB. It also has a built-in translator useful for discovering people when messaging. But messenger has its advantages too. The messenger has features such as commenting and tagging that Kakaotalk does not have. This means you can share content quickly and easily engage with a community. It is also helpful because you can message any people who are using the app. Another advantage is that android messenger has chat heads that are very convenient. Apart from their differences, the two also have similarities. They both feature personalization of chats that is useful for group chats. Lastly, they both can capture and send photos and videos that are important for people to be able to share what they are experiencing to their loved ones who are apart from them.

It is essential to be able to communicate with other people. One importance of Facebook Messenger in our daily lives is that it serves as a medium to be able to communicate with people, local or international. Also, this app sends messages instantly to people needed to be contacted. Another importance is that it can send photos and videos of significant events to our beloved ones that are far from us. Connecting to other parts of the country is hard but with the messenger, we are able to do that and also discover other people across the globe. As a student, there are plenty of requirements required in school specifically group works that demands being able to contact members of the group and with this app, students can send different types of files in messenger. Lastly, the messenger is also an additional form of entertainment for people who are idle and are experiencing boredom with the use of its built-in games.

The messenger app seems to be a necessity nowadays. A lot of people are using it to communicate with their loved ones, friends, and acquaintances. The messenger app is continuing to improve to fulfill the needs of the users in terms of communication. In further improving the application, there is always a battle between pros and cons. And for this update, there were a lot of improvements like the cleaner and better-looking interface, lesser lags and glitches, faster loading of the application and the additional chat colors for personalization. But there are also downsides like the omission of shortcuts of group chats, no improvement in terms of the placement of advertisements and degrading quality of photos, and unfulfilled promises of new features. Overall, the pros of the new Facebook Messenger update outweigh the cons. Even though there are still features lacking in the update there is always room for improvement in the mobile application world. Let’s just hope that the future updates overturn the cons of the latest version.

Effects of Monopolies of Large Tech Firms in the Digital Platform Markets

Over the last decade, the influence of digital platforms has generated great progress. Large tech firms (Apple, Amazon, Facebook, and Google) have changed people’s lifestyles by providing services. These services, often free of charge, have changed the way people communicate and interact with others, shop, and find information. There are many advantages to such large digital platforms, however, they have also gained considerable control of consumer information, which reinforces their market power. This has caused concern not only in terms of competition but also in consumer protection and privacy. Therefore, this paper analyses the effects of monopolies of large tech firms in the digital platform markets. This paper is outlined in three main parts. Firstly, it demonstrates why market power and monopolies are likely to emerge in the digital economy. Secondly, this paper displays the concerns about monopolies in the digital economy. Further, it explains what can be done to prevent the potential issues that can arise from monopolies in the digital platform markets. Finally, the paper ends with a conclusion summarizing the main points of this research.

Market Power and Monopolies in the Digital Economy

The most extreme form of market power is a monopoly. A monopoly is an industry in which only one company provides a good or service that cannot be replaced by another. The digital economy has a natural market power which occurs when a firm obtains market power through barriers to entry created by the firm itself. In this case, having a big network is a natural barrier for others. It makes entering the digital market difficult because the smaller firms will have issues establishing against a big network, like GAFA (Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon: the 4 largest tech firms). The natural barrier of digital economy is also the principal key of resources. Its network size can only provide value to users when it attracts the largest number of consumers. Its value increases due to network externalities which occur when the value of a product increases as more consumers begin to use it. Due to the network effect, market power and monopolies are more likely to emerge in the digital economy because of the increasing desire of people wishing to register on a digital platform and share with as many people as possible or be seen by as many people as possible. They have no interest in going to a smaller platform that has fewer users, which means less potential virtual friends. For example, Facebook has monopoly power in the social networking market and owns as a key resource that millions of users log in daily. Therefore, Facebook has a greater value than other social networking, such as Myspace, because it has more people using it. Subsequently, Facebook will always gain more subscribers and then more market power than Myspace or other platforms and therefore, a monopoly on the social networking market is more likely to appear. The same process for e-commerce platforms occurs where sellers and buyers are more likely to go on the platform with the most users to have the biggest chance to sell or to buy the products they want. Big firms will always get bigger. For example, the more people use Google Search, the more Google Search will increase its performances, the more people will use Google Search. When a lot of people use a platform, it creates a lot of data on users that the digital platform can monetize from advertisers and make revenues to invest in the platform. Therefore, they can improve the platform’s algorithm that generates more users. It is a vicious cycle, called feedback loops, that prevents small new businesses from developing and therefore prevents competition in the digital economy.

Competition Issues in the Digital Economy

As the largest tech firms’ market power is growing, strong concerns are rising too. Platforms benefiting from significant network effects and which are likely to lock a market because of their great market power are called ‘gatekeepers’.

Giant tech firms like GAFA, are ecosystems in the economy, they expand fast and in a lot of different domains. They may have a monopole in one service, but they still want to expand and be present on other platforms. Google proposes in 2020 several kinds of different products and services to its users. Google was first only a search engine, but now offers operating systems, G Suite productivity, devices, search and web browsing, specialized search, streaming, and navigation. Facebook also expended its services and products by offering social media, retail, devices, and streaming platforms. It makes them able to observe, collect, and combine even more data on users. These ecosystems make the competition in the digital economy more difficult because firms such as Google and Facebook already have more data on consumers than small firms. So, they start one step ahead of new companies that would like to enter the new market at the same time as big companies do. Over the last decade, Facebook made more than 60 acquisitions. Selling out young firms to a giant tech firm provides economic advantages: a generous pay-out, faster and more broadly technological advantages. However, the acquisition of young promising firms reduces the chance of potential competitors.

Another consequence of such a large market power is that companies can abuse their dominance by imposing excessive fees on consumers, tough contract conditions, or worsening the privacy terms and data collection offered to consumers. Monopolies mean no competitors, which means costumers cannot chose another product, thus the organization can raise their prices or change their terms because consumers depend on them. For advertisers to be able to advertise, they almost always must go through a digital platform like Google or Facebook, the gatekeepers, that controls advertisers’ access to users of their service. This is when abuse or exploitation can occur. The digital platforms will set excessive prices or set conditions for the use of the platform which are not clear or which are discriminatory. For example, in France, Google France was condemned because its Google Ads advertising platform had rules that were not transparent.

Even though there are a lot of negative consequences of monopolies for small new tech firms, there are some positive consequences for the users. By selling users’ personal data, consumers get many services for free (e.g., Facebook, Google) and get more choice because of their larger data base. Their dominant position in the digital market gives them more opportunities to invest in the research and development, which gives the users continue technological innovations.

Prevention Against Potential Issues from Monopolies in the Digital Platform Markets

In the United States of America, there is a law called antitrust law. This law has been in existence for more than a century. Its purpose is to regulate the conduct and organization of commercial companies and generally aims to promote competition for the benefit of consumers. This law is mainly composed of three acts: the Sherman Act (1890), the Clayton Act (1914), and the Federal Trade Commission Act (1914). The functions of these acts are the prohibition of price-fixing and the operations of cartels, the restriction of mergers and acquisitions of organizations, and the prohibition of abuse of monopoly power.

Although the antitrust law exists, this did not prevent the formation of monopolies in the digital economy. Certain digital platforms developed into monopolies due to the underenforcement by privacy and data protection regulators and by antitrust enforcers.

In June 2019, the Subcommittee on Antitrust, Commercial, and Administrative Law directed an investigation into the state of competition online and wrote a rapport in 2020. In this report, Congress relied on a wide range of guidelines to ameliorate the conditions necessary for fair competition. The report proposes as solutions to break certain dominant platforms apart from the companies’ other businesses and activities and demands that the platforms provide all users with equal terms for equal products and services. The report also calls for laws to be changed to impose a higher bar for approving future tech industry mergers and acquisitions and requests Congress to boost the enforcement powers of antitrust regulators, such as the Federal Trade Commission, and to increase the budgets of the Federal Trade Commission and the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division.

Conclusion

This paper has demonstrated that the market power and monopolies are likely to emerge in the digital economy because digital economy has a natural barrier, its size. The size of a digital platform is particularly important as its value increases due to network externalities. People want to be on the digital platform with the most users to have more potential virtual friends, buyers or sellers. And when digital platforms are getting more users, they are also getting more users data which they can sell to advertisers. With these revenues, large tech firms can expand even more, and make it difficult for smaller firms to compete. The fact that that dominant tech firms are getting too big and too powerful raises concerns. Large tech firms are acquiring smaller ones and are spending on other platform markets which reduces the chance of potential competitors. Moreover, certain dominant tech firms abuse their monopoly by imposing unfair conditions to their customers. There is already an American law that promotes competition in the markets called the antitrust law. But due to the underenforcement by privacy and data protection regulators and by antitrust enforcers, large tech firms developed into monopolies. That is why the regulators and enforcers want to reinforce the antitrust law and proposes multiple solutions to solve the lack of competition in the digital economy; for example, separation of certain large tech firms and ask firms to propose fair and equal conditions for their products and services to their consumers.

Monopolies in the digital economy have many negative effects for firms who want entry to the online market because of the winner-takes-all situation and the fact that dominant firms take advantages of their ‘gatekeepers’ status. On the other hand, a monopoly can have a positive effect for the consumer. It offers to the consumer a broader choice and as the giant firms are comparable to ecosystems, it makes finding a product or a service easier for users. However, due to missing competitors, monopolies tend to lower their quality, because users cannot choose another product.

Large tech firms should give the other new firms a chance to rise in the market. They should not acquire them just to become bigger and to have a larger power on the market. Furthermore, dominant platforms should not take advantage of their position by imposing unfair conditions to its consumers and they should be more transparent. It is understandable that it is challenging for authorities to manage such large firms, because they innovate and grow extremely fast. However, authorities should review the laws governing digital platforms, because it is a fairly new market that we still do not know everything about and that grows extremely fast.

References

1. Acemoglu, D., Laibson, D., & List, J. (2015). Economics. Pearson Higher Ed.
2. Baker, J. B., Farrell, J., Gavil, A. I., Gaynor, M., Kades, M., Katz, M. L., … & Scott Morton, F. M. (2020). Joint Response to the House Judiciary Committee on the State of Antitrust Law and Implications for Protecting Competition in Digital Markets. Available at SSRN 3632532.
3. Kennedy, J. K. (2020, July 23). Monopoly Myths: Do Internet Platforms Threaten Competition? ITIF | Information Technology and Innovation Foundation. https://itif.org/publications/2020/07/23/monopoly-myths-do-internet-platforms-threaten-competition
4. Kerber, W. (2016). Digital Markets, Data, and Privacy: Competition Law, Consumer Law and Data Protection. Journal of Intellectual Property Law & Practice, 11(11), 856-866.
5. Lamoreaux, N.R. (2019). The Problem of Bigness: From Standard Oil to Google. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 33(3), 94-117.
6. Loertscher, S., & Marx, L. M. (2020). Digital Monopolies: Privacy Protection or Price Regulation? International Journal of Industrial Organization, 102623.
7. Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). (2016, October). Bringing Competition Policy to the Digital Era. https://one.oecd.org/document/DAF/COMP(2016)14/en/pdf
8. The Washington Post, M. G. (2020, October 6). Democrats Call for Congress to Rein In, Break Up Big Tech. The Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/courts_law/democrats-call-for-congress-torein-in-break-up-big-tech/2020/10/06/08166c76-0832-11eb-8719- 0df159d14794_story.html
9. Wikipedia contributors. (2020, December 6). United States Antitrust Law. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_antitrust_law#:%7E:text=In%20the%20United%20States%2C%20antitrust,for%20the%20benefit%20of%20consumers

Analytical Essay on Impact of Facebook on Society

People tend to not put that much thought into Facebook and its negative effects on happiness it is just part of their daily lives. In 2020, there were 2.7 billion active users on Facebook, and I wonder how many of those people have thought about the effects it has on happiness. I believe Facebook can have a negative impact on the pursuit of happiness because it can disconnect people from real-life interactions, consume valuable time, and lead to social comparison.

People’s addiction to Facebook and the need to check it takes people out of the moment without even realizing It. I am very guilty of this and try to check myself, but I often end up consuming on Facebook when I should be interacting with my daughter, and family, or at least doing something productive. Technology has changed the way people interact with everything, in “There Is No App For Happiness” Max Storm pointed out “The constant glancing into our smartphone to see if anyone has pinged us, while a friend is sitting across the table speaking to us, are indicators that we are addicted to something that is making us less considerate and more alienated. “. People feel the need to be in touch and share what they are doing on Facebook constantly because people feel like we need to project ourselves in a certain way and keep up that “image” on Facebook rather than real life. When people start projecting an image on Facebook, they do not want people to see them out of that light usually, so people avoid real interactions to keep up with it, disconnecting themselves from real life. When people are disconnected from real-life interactions, it stunts growth in communication and meaningful relationships. Therefore, when people lack in these areas it interferes with the pursuit of happiness.

Facebook also consumes our time, it affects our ability to do other things and tends to other parts of our life including health, relationships, and culture. The moment people pick up the phone they get sucked in by notifications from Facebook informing people whose birthday it is, who uploaded a new picture, and even a couple of messages soon all of a sudden you look up and have been scrolling for an hour. In “There Is No App For Happiness” Max Storm stated “Time is not only money, but it is also much more than that; it is the minutes and seconds of our mortal life. Your time is the finite resource from which you experience this world — everyone, everything, and especially that which you are devoted to and live for.” What I believe he is trying to say by that statement is what we invest our time in ultimately contributes to our pursuit of happiness. If we are too busy spending time on the wrong things that do not provide people with the basics or help improve our lives, then we are delaying/harming our happiness. We cannot get back time, so we need to use what little time we have wisely, and mindlessly scrolling is only taking away from actual things that deserve our time.

While the social comparison is natural, I feel that with Facebook people see it more as a daily competition between people they connect with. Social comparison is basically comparing life choices, abilities, and traits to others typically in our peer groups or people whom we are similar to. This has a negative effect on the pursuit of happiness because it damages our self-image by constantly comparing ourselves to our peers and their accomplishments and abilities. We feel our own accomplishments and abilities are no longer enough because we see someone a little further in life than us on Facebook and we feel like we should be there by now also. When people see other people doing better in life, it makes them feel behind and sad like they should have done something else and then they would be in equal situations which is usually never the case. People tend to only post their successes, good deeds, and material things; they create this image of themselves that they wish to portray to people on social media, especially Facebook. People tend to forget that people are doing the same thing as they are trying to do; portray an image. The image rarely includes the downfalls and depressing parts of a person’s life which most people understandably want private. Comparing ourselves to others when we do not see every detail and thing, they went through just is not fair to ourselves. We need to remember to focus on our own journey and successes and be proud of those to stay in the pursuit of happiness.

All in all, I believe Facebook can have negative effects on the pursuit of happiness. While a lot of people can argue the reasons why Facebook helps them in the pursuit of happiness, I think disconnection, consumption of time, and social comparisons are something to consider when using Facebook, so it won’t be detrimental to the user’s happiness.

Facebook Vs Twitter in the News Value Context: Compare and Contrast Essay

Quite a while past there was no Facebook and Twitter, individuals were getting data generally from papers, television, and radio. Presently we live on 4IR (Fourth Industrial Revolution) subsequently. It is not difficult to track down data. The two stages give news yet the inquiry is which one inventory is more helpful news.

From my perspective, Twitter is better at giving information. Twitter permits individuals to get presented with outside factors as such Twitter permits us to interface with numerous individuals. Facebook, I can say, we associate with our families and companions. Messages on Twitter are seen by all individuals like web journals, thus one needn’t bother with authorization to get to the data. Even though Twitter began as a help for individuals to post individual updates, it become a basic channel for media sharing. Individuals use it to discuss and connect to the things they’re perusing, watching tuning in to pondering. For sure individuals use it basically for sharing or discovering connections to stuff that interest them. Twitter has along these lines become a central member of the consideration economy, helping individuals spread the media and thoughts they care about. Consequently, the data is conveyed among those individuals.

Numerous individuals accept that Facebook is more helpful than Twitter, just because Facebook is the friendliest stage that individuals use each day. So, individuals think Facebook gives valuable news in light of the fact that it is utilized regularly. People like Facebook, however, Twitter is as yet the best friendly stage that gives helpful news. Many individuals left Facebook in the wake of understanding that Facebook is done giving valuable information. This diminishing number of individuals might be a marker for the difficult future of Facebook. Facebook is done focuses on web-based media for private and social uses, which is alluded to as a major jump given Facebook’s point of convergence in past years. Facebook lost 15 million users. People lost interest in Facebook. As the number of individuals leaving Facebook increases, the number of individuals enacting their records on Twitter increments.

“I like Twitter more than Facebook. Twitter is a great way to deliver and get news. In news writing, less is more, and 140 characters are great. If you cannot grab that headline in 140, then it is not a story. Viewers tweet all the and they tell what stories they like and do not like. It is great to interact with them and get that instant feedback. It is great for the viewer and the journalist”. Tom Llamas says he prefers Twitter since it has more valuable news, Twitter additionally has numerous journalists, as well as professional ones. I can say 90% of the information from the journalist is valuable.

Twitter turned into the best online media for giving valuable news. It has numerous professional journalists, they think of information so individuals accept their accounts. Beforehand Twitter has formed into go to support news from clients during crucial happenings around the world. Twitter has generally grown up and instructed individuals. They share the tales and tweet. Today Twitter has 192 million clients, and the number builds day by day, which shows it pulls in individuals by giving helpful news. Individuals get pulled in by sure perspectives.

So unlike Facebook, I think Twitter is consistently the best-friendly platform that gives valuable news and the number of people using this platform will increase every day. More experienced journalists will initiate their records and give the news to the people.

Cause and Effect Essay about Facebook

Considering the influence of Facebook on the 2016 US presidential election

In order to consider the influence Facebook had, if any, on the 2016 US presidential election, I will be analyzing the social media site in two different ways. Firstly, I will explore how the existence of Facebook as a platform allowed the spread of information and misinformation (Fake news) during the lead-up to the election. I will analyze how this spread of information affected citizens and if ‘news’ on social media (real and fake) was enough to influence their decisions when voting. Secondly, I will delve into the effect of the collection of data by Facebook. Focusing mainly on the Cambridge Analytica case study in which tens of millions of Facebook users’ data was harvested and used to micro-target individuals in an attempt to influence their decisions when it came to voting. By analyzing Facebook in these two different ways, I will attempt to understand if a social media site can have a real-world effect as immense as influencing who the next president of the United States will be.

As social media has grown massively in its influence, politicians have started to look at it as a more viable way of reaching possible supporters. For example, in the run-up to the 2016 election, Trump spent $44 million on Facebook ads1, which is 12.9% of his total campaign budget2. This significant spending on Facebook ads alone shows how trumps team saw Facebook as an effective way of campaigning and according to one study it increased the probability that a non-aligned voter would vote for Trump by 5%.3

Politicians now seeing Facebook as an effective and even essential tool to reach citizens arguably shows its influence. With two-thirds of American adults now going to social media as their main news source 4, it is no wonder politicians are putting increasing funding into online voter targeting. I would argue Facebook’s influence on society and its citizens is immense and as a platform, it does have the power to influence voter decisions. Out of the two-thirds of adults using social media as their primary news source, 43% of those primarily use Facebook.5 In a study, 21% of a sample of American adults claimed Facebook was the most frequently visited site for politician information, the most popular site after this being Fox News, Fox news is the most popular news channel in America and only 6.3% of this sample said this was their most frequently visited site6, demonstrating how popular Facebook is as a news source. Users can also be targeted by political ads more precisely using the data collected on them by the site, increasing possible influence on voters.

However, ‘truthful’ political ads and credible reporting on Facebook in the run-up to the 2016 election were not the only information voters were exposed to. This period of time saw a large increase in ‘Fake news’, misinformation spread across Facebook regarding politicians and events which were important to the election.

Content posted online is subject to much less scrutiny than traditional reporting and theoretically, anyone could make up a fake news story along with a website and Facebook page supporting it. This relaxed quality control and relative ease in which information can be made to look authentic creates an opportunity for fake information to be easily spread and endorsed, with research showing false information is 70% more likely to be shared than true information (Vosough et al, 2018). Although ‘fake news’ was a common term in the run-up to the election, “Exposure to deceptive messages is not tantamount to belief in them” (Garret 2019, p.2). The question must be asked that even though many Americans may have been exposed to fake news information on Facebook, was it enough to actually influence their decision-making when voting? When choosing to vote an individual makes a choice on what they believe, so surely constant exposure to fake information could change their judgment if these news sources seem reliable?

This has been subject to large debate in the period post-Trump election in 2016, with people arguing exposure to fake news on Facebook played an important role in his success whilst others arguing against its effectiveness. A Study was conducted in the USA in the 1940s called “The Peoples Choice”, assessing the effectiveness of political campaign propaganda on citizens (Lazarsfeld et al 1948). Findings suggest that citizens tend to use a “host of strategies to protect and reinforce their predispositions” (Garret 2019, p12). This study is used here by Garret to argue that the effect of fake information on voters is little due to pre-existing positions meaning that they will maintain beliefs and attitudes even when exposed to propaganda (fake news). However, although individuals such as Garret use this study to support their argument against the effectiveness of fake news, this study was conducted in the 1940s. Since then the world has changed, including how this propaganda reaches citizens, today being through social media, namely Facebook. This change in platform I would argue changes the receptiveness of fake news as individuals are now being targeted much more precisely and much more frequently than they would have been in the 1940s, increasing effectiveness.

Facebook not only provided a platform for information, real or fake, to be shared but also facilitated extreme micro-targeting of voters. I will be focusing on how Cambridge Analytica (CA) used the data from Facebook user’s profiles in order to effectively target Facebook users with political ads in the run-up to the election.

Cambridge Analytica was a data collection and political consulting firm that came to light during the Facebook Cambridge Analytica Scandal. Dubbed a ‘full-service propaganda machine” (The Guardian 2018), they aimed to do extreme micro-targeting of individuals for political campaigns. They aimed not just to target individuals as voters but to target them as personalities, they did this by creating a detailed psychological profile in order to better target them with ads. These profiles were created through the use of data collected from Facebook. Apps were installed by users which gave permission to collect all that user’s data, such as likes, and status updates, and even had the power to read some private messages. These apps not only gave permission to read the data of the person who installed the app but also gave permission to harvest everyone on the friends list information, without them knowing or giving permission. This meant they only had to get the app installed by a few hundred thousand people to reach the data of tens of millions of users, by 2015 CA claimed to have collected data on 220 million Americans7. With this information collected from Facebook they could build detailed psychographic profiles which meant the ads you were seeing would be tailored specifically to you. With the profile, they could learn what kind of messages you would be susceptible to, including how to frame the ads, what topics and content to include, and what kind of tone to write in to get you to engage. They also had enough data collected through Facebook to learn how many times they would need to ‘touch’ you with an advert to change how you think. The reach this company had was scary, to say the least, and it was only possible due to Facebook. Users were unaware their data was being harvested which was then used by powerful algorithms to target them in ways they could not understand. This was a powerful tool which I argue had an effect on voters’ decisions as the targeting of them was so specific and detailed. The use of CA I believe definitely had an effect on the 2016 election, therefore Facebook also had an effect on the election as they facilitated the creation of CA through the data used by CA on Facebook users.8

Social media as a whole in today’s society plays a huge part in people’s lives, with the majority of people in the modern world using social media in some form. People use it to socialise, connect and as mentioned before a large majority of adults use it as a news source. People are constantly exposed to social media and the relative freedom of the internet means anyone can share or create information that has the possibility to be shared by possibly millions of people. Therefore, when attempting to consider the effect Facebook had on the election, it is useful to look at how social media as a whole influences individuals. It plays a huge role in the lives of people today and I would argue it deeply influences people’s lives in many ways, positive and negative.

The information available on Facebook, in some cases, would have little effect on some individuals but to others would have had the opposite. Especially when it comes to fake news, some people will actively question information they are exposed to whilst others accept it as truth. The misinformation spread around Facebook in the lead-up to the election contained “propagandist elements” which likely activated “heuristic rather than systematic psychological information processing” (Khudejah, Khawaja, 2020). As I referenced earlier, during the election Facebook was seen as a political tool to effectively reach potential voters. Politicians saw the possible influence they could achieve through its use, spending millions of dollars on political adverts on the site. Voters were also precisely profiled and then targeted through Cambridge Analytica, a dystopian tool that could predict user actions with the ultimate aim of changing their decisions. All of this was made possible through the use of Facebook data.

I would consider the influence of Facebook significant in the 2016 election, it was a new battlefield for political opponents and allowed the spread of real and fake information and targeting of voters in ways they couldn’t fathom. The heavy usage of Social media in today’s society meant citizens had constant exposure to Facebook, which I think without a doubt had an effect on their decision-making.

1. Garret Kelly – KG., 2019. Social Media’s Contribution to Political Misperceptions in the U.S. Presidential Elections (Online), p1-13. Available from – https: journals.plos.orgplosonearticle?id=10.1371journal.pone.0213500 – Accessed on 301220