Intro to Mass Communication Chapter 11 - Social Media

Decentralization

The principle that there should be no central hub that controls information flow. Instead, information is transferred via protocols that allow any computer to communicate directly with any other computer 

Broadband Internet Access

Higher-speed connections to the internet that make things like live video, audio, and file sharing possible 

Verifiability

The key to a source that is considered usable on Wikipedia. Verifiable information is credited to a specific author or reliable news organization, and has been previously vetted in some way - “truth” does not enter into the picture 

Net Neutrality

The concept that service providers should treat all online content equally, rather than developing a tiered system that allows companies to pay for faster delivery of information 

5%

2005 in America – _% of adults used social media 

75%

Early 2020s – __% of adults used social media

Military

During the Cold War in the mid-1900s, the US ________ was concerned about a nuclear attack destroying its ability to communicate 

• If all communication ran through a central hub, then one attack on the hub would disable communication 

• So, _______ looked for a communication system based on decentralization 

DARPA

1973, US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (_____) began research on protocols to allow its computers to communicate over a distributed network (a web of computers connected to one another, allowing inter-computer communication, with no one computer central to the process) 

Distributed Network

A web of computers connected to one another, allowing inter-computer communication, with no one computer central to the process

ARPANET

Early internet was called _______ (After US Advanced Research Projects Agency) 

Tim Berners-Lee

1989, ___ _______-___ (Oxford University graduate and software engineer at CERN) had the idea of using a new kind of protocol to share documents and information throughout the local CERN network 

Hypertext Markup Language (HTML)

Instead of transferring regular text-based documents, Berners-Lee created a new language called _________ _______ ___________ (HTML) 

• Hypertext was a new for text that goes beyond the boundaries of a single document 

• Can include links to other documents (hyperlinks), text-style formatting, images, and a wide variety of other components 

• Basic idea is that documents can be constructed out of a variety of links and can be viewed just as if they are on the user’s computer 

Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP)

New language required a new communication protocol so that computers could interpret it 

• Berners-Lee decided on the name _________ ________ ________ (HTTP) 

• Through HTTP, hypertext documents can be sent from computer to computer and can then be interpreted by a browser, which turns the HTML files into readable web pages 

World Wide Web (www)

Browser created by Berners-Lee

• Was a combination browser-editor that allowed users to view other HTML documents and create their own 

Tim Berners-Lee

___ ________-___ was knighted in the United Kingdom and Sir Berners-Lee is known as “the father of the World Wide Web” 

Proprietary Service

AOL (American Online) offered a “___________” _______ to view the World Wide Web – you had to pay for it 

• Web could also be viewed through a free, standalone web browser (but it wasn’t invented yet) 

Mosaic

• First of these AOL browsers to make its mark was ______ (released by the National Center for Supercomputing Application at the University of Illinois 

• Offered for free and grew very quickly in popularity due to features that now seem integral to the web (bookmarks – allow users to save the location of particular pages without having to remember them, images) 

Netscape Navigator

Developers who worked on Mosaic went on to create _______ _________, an extremely popular browser during the 1990s 

Internet Explorer

Microsoft (Windows software powered most early computers) created its own browser called ________ ________ that soon became the leading browser

• Had it preloaded on Microsoft’s ubiquitous Windows operating system 

• Made it so people now needed to download and install Netscape which many didn’t 

Mozilla Firefox

Netscape then converted Navigator into a free, open-source, easy-to-install program called _______ ______ 

• In 2010, Firefox became the second most used browser on the internet 

• Represented about a quarter of the market 

Google Chrome

2008, Google created its own browser, highlighted by its Google search box, and by the 2010s, the speed of ______ ______ and the vulnerability of Explorer to viruses upended the market

Chrome’s share often surpassed 60 percent of uses while Explorer went down to 15 percent, falling below Firefox 

Ray Tomlinson

Computer programmer ___ _________ is credited with inventing the naming system we have today, using the @ symbol to denote the server 

• Credited with writing the first network email using his program SNDMSG in 1971 

• This invention of a simple standard for email is often cited as one of the most important factors in the rapid spread of the internet, and is still one of the most widely used internet services 

Simple Standard

This invention of a ______ ________ for email is often cited as one of the most important factors in the rapid spread of the internet, and is still one of the most widely used internet services 

Internet Service Providers (ISPs)

________ _______ ________ (ISPs) packaged email accounts with internet access, and almost all web browsers included a form of email service 

Hotmail and Yahoo! Mail

Email services like ________ ___ _______ ____ provided free email addresses paid for by small text ads at the bottom of every email message sent 

• Free “webmail” services soon expanded to comprise a large part of the email services available today 

Usenet

One of the consequences of the spread of the internet was the founding of _______

• 1979 University of North Carolina graduate students Tom Truscott and Jim Ellis connected three computers in a small network and used a series of programming scripts to post and receive messages 

• In a very short span of time, the system spread all over the internet 

• Much like an electronic version of community bulletin boards, anyone with a computer could post a topic or reply on Usenet 

• Usenet was not only used for socializing but also for collaboration 

“GeoCities”

1995 David Bohnett (president and founder of Beverly Hills Internet) announced the creation of “_________” 

• Built its business by allowing users to create web pages in “communities” for free, with the stipulation that the company placed a small advertising banner at the top of each page 

• Anyone could register a GeoCities cite and subsequently build a web page about a topic 

• Almost all of the community names were centered on specific topics 

David Bohnett

1995 _____ _______ (president and founder of Beverly Hills Internet) announced the creation of “GeoCities” 

GeoCities

• Allowed users to do much more than post only text 

• Offered standardized pictures – like mailbox icons and back buttons – hosted on GeoCities’s main server 

• Standard icons were ubiquitous that they now have become a part of the internet’s cultural history 

Classmates

Launched in 1995 to help alumni of different schools find each other 

SixDegrees

Created in 1996 to help people network through the six connections that might link them 

Mark Zuckerberg

2004, ____ ___________ and friends at Harvard College create The Facebook to detail and organize their classmates 

• 2006, the site now called Facebook was available to anyone over 13 years old with an email address 

How Facebook Has Remained Prominent

Solid business model – collecting information on its users (who often readily give out such information to personalize their experience) and using that information to sell advertising perfectly targeted to an audience; Also has advantage of now-mature organization 

Google

• Attempted to break Facebook’s hold on social media

• Offered Google Buzz linked to popular Gmail, giving Buzz a built-in user base from Gmail contact lists 

• Google+ was another attempt 

2008

Every presidential campaign since ____ has been influenced by social media 

“Facebook Election”

2008 presidential election was called the “_________ ________” 

• Barrack Obama campaign which succeeded against Republican John McCain recognized the power of the still-young medium 

• One of Obama’s key strategists (Chris Hughes – Facebook cofounder) 

• Masterminded the Obama campaign’s highly effective web blitzkrieg – everything from social networking sites to podcasting and mobile messaging 

Russian Hackers

2016 election, the campaigns of Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump both used every social media outlet available – with Trump a constant presence on Twitter 

• Election also dogged by allegations that _______ _______, with dozens of disguised accounts, had posted false news stories to Facebook designed to discourage Clinton supporters and to mobilize supporters of Trump, who eventually won 

Algorithms

_________ of social media are designed to provide you with information (and advertising) that are aligned with your interests 

• When it comes to politics, the algorithms can work against people getting adequate information for voting 

“Filter Bubbles”

Argument is that depending on your political leanings, you will only see content that confirms what you believe 

• Situation leads to people placing themselves into “______ _______” that never bring them information that goes against their current beliefs 

Social Networking

______ __________ provides unprecedented ways to keep in touch with friends, but that ability can sometimes be a double-edged sword 

• Users can update friends with every latest achievement but may also unwittingly be updating bosses and others from whom particular bits of information should be hidden 

Participants

Shrinking of privacy online can be traced back to conscious decisions made by ____________

• Putting personal information online, even if set to be viewed by only select friends, has become fairly standard 

Facebook

Close to 3 billion users, ________ is one of the primary battlegrounds for privacy on the internet 

• In earlier years, Facebook seemed to imply that people gave up their privacy so they could share information 

• 2009, company decided to make public information sharing the default setting on Facebook (previously could restrict public access to basic profile information like names and friends) 

• New settings made all this information publicly available with no option to make it private 

“Societal Norm”

Mark Zuckerberg claimed that privacy was no longer a “________ ____” 

Cambridge Analytics

2018, a London based data analytics company __________ _________ was able to collect personal data on up to 87 million people through Facebook 

• Possibly used data to try and influence outcome of 2016 presidential election and the Brexit vote 

• Made Zuckerberg face Congress and faced hours of questioning and promised to once again protect the privacy of Facebook users 

Advertising

Profits for social media come largely from ___________

• Companies turn to social media for advertising as it offers the opportunity to place a targeted ad in front of someone who recently searched for the product or posted about the product 

• Return on investment is much greater for advertisers on social media 

Traditional Media

Social media advertising model comes directly from ___________ _____

• As you scroll through the feeds of Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram, that media company is renting your eyeballs to its advertisers 

• Advertising isn’t just a way for social media companies to perhaps earn a little bit of revenue in between hosting family photos and personal musings; it’s the very purpose of the site’s existence 

Google

______ model is slightly different 

• Main business is advertising 

• Google’s search engine, Gmail, and Blogger give that single company an immense amount of information and a historically unsurpassed ability to market to specific groups 

• Google searches reveal much about you (desires, plans, fears, illnesses, interests, and more) 

• Google takes that knowledge of you and sells it to advertisers 

Profit

Good to remember that the purpose of social media is not pleasure but ______

Pew Internet & American Life Project

2002 survey by the ___ ________ & _________ ____ _______ found that 84% of Americans believed that they could find information on health care, government, news, or shopping on the internet 

• 37% of respondents were not even connected to the internet 

• Of the percentage of Americans without internet connections, 64% still believed that it could be a source of information about these crucial topics 

“Digital Divide”

Term used to highlight technical differences between society; By 2004, was already widely used and the goal of “bridging” it took everything from putting computers in classrooms to giving personal computers to some high-need students to use at home 

Bush Administration Report (2004) 

Stated that an “explosive growth” in sectors such as e-learning and virtual schools could allow each student “individual online instruction” 

Broadband Internet Access

People also expected the internet to provide virtually unlimited access to educational opportunities 

• To make this expectation a reality, paper called for increased investments in __________ _______ _______

• Called for access “24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year” saying it could “help teachers and students realize the full potential of this technology” 

Digital Divide

Created two Americas 

• One America had multiple computers, tablets, and smartphones and fast and convenient broadband, strong enough for numerous people in the home to stream movies, play games, and attend online classes 

• Other America (often in cities or rural areas) has few computers, flip phones, and a weak internet service that cannot handle a streaming video for an online class 

Lloyd Levine

Senior policy fellow at the University of California – Riverside

• “The internet is an essential, integral part of civic life in America in 2020. People who don’t have access to the internet at home suffer demonstrable educational and economic harms 

Free and Open

One of the founding principles of many public library systems is to allow for ____ ___ ____ access to information 

• One of major roadblocks to achieving this goal has been location 

• Those in rural areas or those with limited transportation access could not get to a library 

• With internet, the hope was that a global library would be created (an essential prospect for rural areas) 

Chugach School District

• Alaska School District

• 1994, district was lowest performing in the state 

• Over 50% staff turnover, lowest standardized test scores, and only 1 student in 26 years graduating from college 

• School board introduced dramatic measures which resulted in a complete overhaul of the system 

• Abolished grade levels, focused on achievement, and by 2001 increased internet usage from 5% to 93% 

• District thriving in the 2020s 

• Standardized test percentile scores rose almost 50 points in a period of 4 years in both math and language arts 

Florida Virtual School System

______ _______ ______ ______ allowed rural school districts to offer advanced-placement coursework 

• Students excelling in rural areas could now study topics that were previously limited to districts that could fill and fund an entire classroom 

Sharing of Information and Knowledge

The internet has brought rural areas even further into the global world, especially in regard to the _______ __ _________ ___ ________

Location

One of major roadblocks to achieving this goal of free and open access to information has been ________

• Those in rural areas or those with limited transportation access could not get to a library 

• With internet, the hope was that a global library would be created (an essential prospect for rural areas) 

Bad and False

___ ___ _____ reports are influenced by the fact that it has appeared right after a report from a friendly and trusted source 

Right-Wing News Reports

The biggest factor behind the spread of this belief (misinformation and disinformation) is _____-____ ____ _______ that find their way to social media feeds 

Amateurs and Hackers

Difference is that much of the information on social media is not the work of professional authors, but of ________ who have questionable expertise or people and _______ purposely trying to spread false information for their own purposes and profit 

“Filter Bubbles”

Makes false information problem worse 

• Social media feeds provide them with information that they want to believe or already believe 

• People will likely not see information that contradicts their theories and instead will be fed more information like that 

“Fake News”

Originally used by journalists and scholars to call out false stories created for political or economic gain 

Donald Trump 

• When president, turned the term back on the mainstream media, calling any story that he did not like “____ ____” 

While disinformation and conspiracies fill social media feeds, legitimate sources of information are disparaged as “____ ____” 

Donald Trump

When president, turned the term back on the mainstream media, calling any story that he did not like “fake news” 

Wikipedia

Nowhere has this cross-examination and cross-listing of sources been more widespread than with __________

• Founded by Jimmy Wales and the site began in 2001 

• Wikimedia Foundation (which hosts all the Wikipedia pages) often is among the top ten most visited site on the web 

Anyone

_______ can edit Wikipedia 

• Positive and negative side 

• Though anyone can vandalize the site, anyone can also fix it 

• Site can place warning at the top of the page stating that the information is not necessarily verified 

Verifiability

Organizations had long been trying to develop factual content for the web but Wikipedia went for ___________

• Benchmark for inclusion on Wikipedia includes outside citations for any content “likely to be challenged” and for “all quotations” 

• May seem like a step ahead of many other internet sources but there is a catch 

• Anyone can edit Wikipedia 

Neutrality Policy

Wikipedia __________ _______ is a way to mitigate the extreme views that may be posted on a page with open access, allowing the community to decide what constitutes a “significant” view that should be represented 

Wikipedia

_________ can be a useful resource that gives users quick access to a wide range of subjects as long as users do not take the facts on Wikipedia at face value and make sure to follow up on the relevant sources linked in the articles they read 

Errors Go Uncorrected

• Since every reader is a potential editor, a lack of readers can lead to a poorly edited page because _______, whether deliberate or not, __ ___________

• Lack of authorial credit can lead to problems with judging bias and relevance of information, so the same precautions must be taken with Wikipedia as with any other online source, primarily in checking references 

Openness and Freedom

Advantage of Wikipedia is its _________ ___ ______ 

• If you find a problem, you can either fix it or flag it on the message boards 

Commercial Internet Service Provider

Most internet users in the United States connect through a _________ ______ _______ ________ (ISP) 

Portals

Major players (Comcast, Verizon, Time Warner Cable, AT&T, and others) serve as _______ to the internet, providing a way for anyone with a cable line or phone line to receive broadband internet access through a dedicated data line 

Higher Tier

Service providers might be happy with this arrangement 

• Would love a new service model that would allow corporations or others to pay for a “_______ ____” service 

• ISPs see this as good capitalism – let people and companies pay for better service if they want to or can afford it 

“Common Carriers”

2015 Federal Communication Commission (FCC) under Obama administration 

• Reclassified ISPs as “______ _________” that can be regulated under the Communications Act 

• Under this re-categorization, the internet is treated as a public utility – the internet is public and does not belong to any private company – and thus the ISPs cannot offer premium rates for some and slower service to others 

Public Utility

Under this re-categorization by the Communications Act, the internet is treated as a ______ _______ – the internet is public and does not belong to any private company – and thus the ISPs cannot offer premium rates for some and slower service to others 

Net Neutrality Rules

FCC called these ___ ___________ _____ that were designed to enable a free flow of information, requiring ISPs to provide equal speeds to all content providers and applications that use the internet, allowing our current ‘open internet’ environment to persevered 

• Main reason is that without them small companies or internet startups would not have the ability to grow their businesses 

• Defenders of net neutrality contend that small businesses would be forced onto a “second tier” internet service, and their content would naturally suffer, decreasing inventiveness and competition among internet content providers 

Deregulation

2017 under Trump administration 

• FCC followed path of _____________ and eliminated many of the regulations 

• ISPs did not implement many changes and by 2020 Joe Biden was in White House and new FCC chairperson, Jessica Rosenworcel (supporter of net neutrality) 

Growth

One future of social media is _______ along with more regulatory control and legal scrutiny 

Data Privacy and Data Security

____ _______ ___ ____ ________ will not go away in the 2020s 

European Union

_________ _____ does not accept the “free market rules” that have allowed social media companies in the United States to escape and undue scrutiny as they gathered, used, and sold private information 

Create and Enforce

Social media companies argue that policies are difficult to ______ ___ _______

• Difficult for humans and algorithms to distinguish between hate speech and commentary or general statements or a call to arms, like “fight to the death” 

• Some companies argue that the burden should not be on them to write US rules and actually have called for government regulation 

Social Commerce

Explained by marketing site, Hootsuite as “... the process of selling products directly on social media. With social commerce, the entire shopping experience, from product discovery and research to the checkout process, takes place right on a social media platform” 

Social Commerce Example

Example: On Facebook scrolling through feed; click on an ad; make the purchase right on your Facebook feed while not leaving the app 

$89.4 billion

Hootsuite says social commerce is a $__._ ________ market as we start the 2020s 

• Projected to grow to $604.5 billion in the next 7 years 

Video Content

_____ _______ has proved to be one of the most engaging forms of social media and adaptable 

• Mobile technology has driven much of this success 

• Easy and fast now to shoot, edit, produce, and upload video and even easier to watch it 

TikTok

Short-form videos found on sites like _______

YouTube

Long-form content and videos found on sites like _______

82%

Some studies suggest that in the 2020s, __% of all online content will be video 

TikTok

Became “a needed dose of silliness during the pandemic – and more recently, a unique home for grieving and activism” 

• For Times, TikTok is more than just silly videos 

• “TikTok feels familiar, but its soul is unlike that of other social media that came before it. It can be mindless fun, but it’s also a force to pay attention to. TikTok is the first entertainment powerhouse born in and built for the smartphone age – and it might change everything” 

• TikTok about visual expression but not in a traditional television, film, documentary style, or any other style 

ByteDance

TikTok itself might undergo challenges in the 2020s, especially surrounding its ownership by the Chinese internet conglomerate _________ 

Augmented Reality (AR)

• It will be prominent in the 2020s 

• AR is simply the use of any technology or software to edit, improve, enhance, and augment original content 

• Filters (dog, baby, etc.) are now being used on major platforms like Snapchat and Instagram 

Sephora

Beauty and makeup company that uses AR to allow customers to try on different kinds of makeup 

IKEA

Uses AR so customers can choose furniture for their living rooms

Big Tech Companies

___ ____ _________ have seen the potential of AR and are looking to capture the market on how it is created, which will be a large benefit to social media companies and their users