Physical Distancing Doesn't Mean Social Distancing

Throughout the spread of CoronaVirus, healthcare professionals have stressed the importance of physical distancing, which is staying at least six feet away from other people in public spaces. However, they have still highly encouraged people to stay connected with friends and family virtually since they can’t be there physically. Social media and the internet as a whole has made not social, but physical distancing possible. 

One way people of all ages are staying connected during the CoronaVirus pandemic is Zoom parties. Zoom is a platform similar to Skype where multiple people can get together and video chat together. Whether it be for someone’s birthday, a holiday, or just to catch up, families and groups of friends are getting together to celebrate on Zoom. Of course we can’t forget about Zoom’s greenscreen feature that allows you to change your background to any photo or video you have saved on your device. The greenscreen feature is a great way to add some extra fun to your video chat. The possibilities for fun on Zoom in endless, according to Business Insider, some people even though murdery mystery parties over zoom.

I have personally been a part of many Zoom hangouts and birthday calls throughout the pandemic. I think that staying connected to my friends and family during this time is extremely important, and so do the professionals. Many doctors and other healthcare professionals say that talking to friends and family through text, email, phone call, or video chat are all vital to our mental well being. We are so used to seeing people at school, work, restaurants, movie theaters, and any other places we usually enjoy going to. But with CoronaVirus, physical distancing, and quarantining, these social interactions we once loved are now dangerous to partake in. Saying that CoronaVirus has been an adjustment for all of us would be an understatement, things right now in life are absolutely crazy. This craziness is all the more reason to continue to check up on our friends and family to see how they are doing and be there for them in any way we can, expect physically of course. 

Because of social media, there are more ways now than ever before to stay connected to people. Even though we have to physically distance ourselves from others, that doesn’t mean that our social lives have to entirely go down the drain. Call your aunts and uncles, text your co-workers, Zoom call your friends, do anything to stay socially connected to those you love through technology and social media. 

https://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-throw-zoom-party-custom-background-friends-family-2020-3#if-you-want-to-throw-a-zoom-party-you-need-to-have-an-account-to-set-up-a-meeting-1

https://www.adventhealth.com/blog/staying-connected-during-a-coronavirus-quarantine

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/wired-love/202004/social-vs-physical-distancing-why-it-matters

https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/at-home-dance-parties-are-helping-people-shake-off-the-self-isolation-jitters-1.4860419

#OwnTheCurve

Since CoronaVirus hit, it has certainly been the main topic in daily conversation, the news, and social media. Overall, the talk regarding CoronaVirus is negative. A lot of it is statistics of how many people are sick, how many have died, how many schools are closed, how many businesses have gone bankrupt, and how much the stock market has dropped. However, the hashtag #OwnTheCurve has taken a positive spin and is now all over TikTok, a social media app.

In April, Kaiser Permanente healthcare asked Campbell Edwadd, a marketing communication company, to encourage physical social distancing for the age range of 18-25 year olds in hopes of slowing the rate of CoronaVirus cases. Campbell Edwald recommended TikTok, which is very popular among this age range and allows for creators to post short videos, similar to the context of Vine. Campbell Edwald used the 19 year old TikTok star Addison Rae to help launch the trend of #OwnTheCurve. In just two weeks, #OwnTheCurve had over four billion views on TikTok. Addison Rae made the video with her family expressing the need to “stay home, stay fit, and stay positive”. The video is Addison rae and her parents doing a quick workout routine they use to stay fit while stuck in their home. #OwnTheCurve becomes an internet “challenge” where anyone can make a video of what they are doing during social distancing times. 

Since it’s launch on TikTok, the #OwnTheCurve challenge has spread to other social media platforms, such as Twitter. People have been posting videos and pictures of their own workout routine, dishes they’ve cooked/baked, their new garden, arts and crafts, and so much more. This challenge has encouraged people to take a look at the positive side of CoronaVirus and practice ways to cope with being stuck inside in a healthy way. In a worldwide pandemic, it certainly is easy to get sucked up in the depressing news and be disappointed that we can’t go see friends or family.But the #OwnTheCurve challenge is just one way that we can make ourselves and those around us a little bit happier and healthier. In this case, social media influencers really stepped up to help spread positivity when it was needed the most.

During these crazy, uncertain times, listen to Addison Rae and remember to stay home, stay fit, and stay positive! Even if TikTok isn’t your cup of tea, make a workout routine to follow with the people you live with, pick up a new hobby that you can do from home, and keep in touch virtually with friends and family. In order to overcome CoronaVirus, we all have got to #OwnTheCurve. 

https://www.smartbrief.com/branded/7325D171-85C1-4A99-9773-4FE6659490B5/F921CE85-8D39-4D55-B078-B2D2864115AA

https://musebycl.io/health/how-kaiser-permanente-owned-tiktok-its-ownthecurve-covid-19-campaign

https://twitter.com/ReginaWebb_KP/status/1255636397400231939?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Etweet

https://www.tiktok.com/@addisonre/video/6816347867683310853?lang=en

Hey Siri

How often does Siri listen to you? It’s not only when you ask her questions. Siri, and Apple employees, can listen in at any time. “A small portion of Siri requests are analysed to improve Siri and dictation. User requests are not associated with the user’s Apple ID. Siri responses are analysed in secure facilities and all reviewers are under the obligation to adhere to Apple’s strict confidentiality requirements,” Apple claims when speaking to the Guardian. Apparently, less than 1% of Siri conversations are used for Apple’s grading purposes. However, the Guardian claims that “Apple contractors regularly hear confidential medical information, drug deals, and recordings of couples having sex.” Apple claims that they only listen into conversations when Siri is activated. However, with Apple’s fairly new “Hey Siri” feature, it happens more often on accident. Personally, I turned off the “Hey Siri” feature on my iPhone because there were many times where I would be having regular conversations or watching TV when my iPhone thought it heard the words “Hey Siri” and Siri would start talking to me. I found it annoying and that was why I turned it off, it never crossed my mind that Apple could and maybe was listening in at those moments.

After word of this got out, Apple apologized for their actions in August of 2019. They said that will make changes to their grading program so that Apple users have more control over how Siri goes about taking care of their requests and questions. I find this to be a major invasion of privacy. Even though there is no current reason for suspicion of Apple using any of this information they heard or selling it to a third party, no one wants their personal information to be heard by a complete stranger. Although Apple has said they will no longer randomly listen in on conversations not involving Siri, the fact that they have the ability to do so is reason for concern. Mainly because if Apple can do it, could it be hacked? Could criminals or governments listen into conversations or collect other information through the iPhone or other Apple products?  That is the part I find scary. Apple employees probably don’t care very much, if at all, about our personal lives, but other people might. 

One thing that Apple does to help you keep your privacy is whenever you download an app that wants access to your microphone, Apple sends you a notification asking if it’s what you want to do. You can also disable your microphone and camera for any app at any time if you ever change your mind about it. 

Is or was Apple listening in on our conversation to sell our information to criminals and governments? I highly doubt it. But privacy is always a reason for concern. We place our trust in our devices and the companies who produce them, they should protect our privacy at all costs because it is simply the right thing to do. 

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/jul/26/apple-contractors-regularly-hear-confidential-details-on-siri-recordings

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/08/28/apple-apologizes-for-listening-to-siri-conversations.html

https://www.cheatsheet.com/gear-style/is-your-iphone-listening-to-you.html/

https://appleinsider.com/articles/19/01/24/latest-ios-beta-hints-at-airpods-2-with-hey-siri-setup-screen

https://ios.gadgethacks.com/how-to/prevent-stop-apps-from-using-your-iphones-microphone-enhance-your-privacy-0191572/

https://www.wikihow.tech/Fix-Skype-Microphone-Problems-on-iPhone-or-iPad

Propaganda

The definition of propaganda according to the Oxford dictionary is “Information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote or publicize a particular political cause or point of view.” I feel like the first thing more people associate with the world propaganda is politicians. We all know the pain of watching endless political commercials on TV during an election year, and on local channels for state positions. It seems like most of the time the commercial isn’t even really supporting the candidate who’s funding it, it’s just making their opposing candidate look as bad as possible. This method of campaigning is propaganda.

The use of propaganda has been dated all the way back to 515 B.C.E. from Darius I’s ascent to the persian throne. It was also used to manipulate wars throughout history. The most large-scale propaganda distribution occurred during World War I. Germany’s emperor Wilhelm would spread their propaganda to neutral countries in efforts to persuade these neutral countries to be on Germany's side. Propaganda was used to create hatred between countries and fuel the fire that is total war. However, it wasn’t only used to create tension, it was also used within one country to gain support of its people and encourage them to support the war.

It is important to note that although propaganda often gets a bad reputation, it is not always about spreading lies and hatred, but rarely portrays the full truth. The iconic Rosie the Riveter “We Can Do It!” poster of World War II is an example of a widely positive piece of propaganda. It spread a message of strength and independence to women that they could do just as much and just as good of work as men could. Certainly an inspiring message, especially for the time. But the reason for this poster and this message was since men were away at war, they needed women to work in factories and produce products for the war. The indirect goal of this iconic piece of artwork was to gain support and resources for World War II. This specific propaganda poster sends a positive message with an underlying controversial meaning of support for the war.

Nowadays, we often see propaganda spoken rather than written on posters, but the meaning stays the same. I think everyone has seen a political ad about some politician, whether it be state or national level, who supposedly went against some value that their political party stands behind. The issue with political propaganda is that they are almost always based on a single issue. The whole commercial focuses on the support or the illegalization of gun rights, abortion, immigration, and many other topics seen as controversial between political parties. These propaganda ads encourage voters to make their choice on a single issue rather than hear all the facts and opinions of all candidates involved.

Propaganda may not always be a lie, it may not always be used with malicious intent, but it is never the full truth. When information seems one-sided, exaggerated, or in any way biased, be sure to fact check and look into the other side(s) of the story. An effective way of fact checking is to watch videos and read information on people who are using propaganda or are victimized by it and most importantly gather this information from multiple reliable sources. 

https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/propaganda

https://ilab.org/articles/brief-history-propaganda

https://www.bl.uk/world-war-one/themes/propaganda

http://blogs.bu.edu/guidedhistory/moderneurope/europeanpropagandaduringworldwar1/

https://www.canva.com/learn/examples-of-propaganda/

https://www.defense.gov/Explore/Features/story/Article/1791664/rosie-the-riveter-inspired-women-to-serve-in-world-war-ii/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffRl9L-vBrI

https://www.factcheck.org/our-process/

Privacy Invasion

Prior to watching Catherine Crump’s TedTalk video about our privacy, I had no idea what kinds of things have been done. I didn’t know that license plate readers were posted at traffic lights. I didn’t know they were on cop cars. I didn’t know that the police could track anyone's whereabouts in this fashion. It is very concerning that the police can find basically any place that you visit frequently. Even if the places you are going isn't a reason for concern on it’s own, I feel like this type of tracking could create a lot of circumstantial evidence when it comes to crime and people could very easily become wrongfully accused. 

Christopher Soghoian mentions how our own government, any government, or any person really could hack into the surveillance systems of telephone companies can listen in on any phone call you participate in. However, things like text messages and FaceTime calls are actually private, which is a relief for many. He posed a very important point when talking about the safety of our country. Some may argue that the government should be able to listen in on conversations and read texts so they can prevent terrorist attacks. However, if the government can access the terrorists information, they can access anyone's information as well. In the past, when the American government has been able to access our information, so was the Chinese government. 

Finn Myrstad mentioned a toy, Cayla, that listened in on conversations and then shared that information with unnamed third parties. This is concerning because I know I had a lot of toys that talked back or responded to voice commands when I was a child. The toy Cayla was banned in Germany and taken off the shelves for many stores. I strongly agree with Mystrad when he said that technological devices need to have security and privacy measures in place before they hit the market to avoid issues like were experienced with Cayla. I also relate to him saying that we rarely read the terms. I have never once read the terms and conditions for a single app I’ve downloaded. This is mainly because not only are they extremely long, but they are hard to understand and make out exactly what the terms are. 

These were the TedTalks that stuck out to me the most because I feel like they apply the most to me. I drive past police cars all the time, they probably have hundreds if not thousands pictures of me at places I have been. The government has had the ability to hear every single one of my phone calls. I have absolutely no idea what the apps on my phone know about me because like many others, I have never understood much less read the terms and conditions. I feel as if this lack of privacy doesn’t necessarily scare me or make me angry because, as I mentioned in previous log posts, I feel like I have nothing of value for the government, it still gives me a bit of an uneasy feeling. If we know all of this is happening, it makes me wonder what else governments and third parties are doing that we don’t know about yet. 

1730.m3u8

2149.m3u8

2314.m3u8

25727.m3u8

2204.m3u8

26922.m3u8

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-39002142

Diffusion of Innovation

I found the diffusion of innovation theory a very interesting way to look at new innovations. The theory answers the questions of how, why, and at what rate these new ideas and technological advances spread. The writer of the book Diffusion of Innovations, Evertt Rogers, states that there are four main elements that create and push the influence of these new innovations. The four main elements are the innovation itself, communication channels, time, and a social system. According to Rogers, he saw this system is heavily reliant on human capital, which I believe is something we can all agree is true. In addition, Rogers also has multiple categories of adopters worked into his theory. His categories are early adopters, early majority, late majority, and laggards. 

I have decided to take Evertt Rogers’ diffusion of innovation theory and apply it to a somewhat new technological innovation that is highly popular with my generation today, Snapchat. Snapchat was created in July of 2011by Evan Spiegel and Bobby Murphy, although it was originally called Picaboo, but was changed to Snapchat in September of that same year. Throughout the years they continued to make updates to include not only the ability of their users to send photos, but also videos, send chats, create stories, and private stories. Some of their more recent additions to the app include filters that can be applied to photos and videos as well as the memory feature which allows the users to save snaps they take in the app instead of their normal camera roll. 

Looking at how Snapchat has evolved through the eyes of the diffusion of innovation theory, I can make multiple assumptions of how and why Snapchat became so popular among my generation. For starters, I can go through Rogers’ four main elements that have influence. The innovation itself of Snapchat is desirable to my generation. It allows easy and quick communication with people. It also gives the security that photos, videos, and chats cannot be saved without your knowledge. If you were going to share private information with a friend over Snapchat, you would be notified if/when they screenshotted the message that was sent to them. This feature discourages screenshotting and saving content the sender wants to disappear. Second to discuss are the communication channels. I believe Snapchat had a very wide variety of channels to be talked about on, mostly other social media platforms. I was only 10 years old when Snapchat first came out, but I got the app when I was in sixth grade. People who were in middle school and high school when Snapchat came out were likely already Facebook users. Therefore, when they got Snapchat, I can assume that they talked about it on Facebook or posted their Snapchat username so that their Facebook friends could add them on Snapchat as well. For the people who were my age and a little younger, some had Facebook accounts or maybe their first social media platform was Facebook. But, another popular form of social media during this time was Instgram, which was my first social media account. Instagram users did very similar things to Facebook users, posted about Snapchat and we posted our Snapchat usernames so that our Instagram followers could also add us on Snapchat. As of right now, 90% of snapchat users are between the ages of 13 and 24. As for time, Snapchat became popular very quickly. Probably largely due to the audience it had. It was directed towards teens who loved social media and highly valued privacy, which is most teens. This ties into the last of the four main elements, the social system. Combining what I have previously mentioned with the high amount of peer pressure and feeling the need to fit in brought upon middle and high school students, Snapchat received a lot of downloads very quickly. Because Snapchat sounded “risky” to parents because the messages and photos disappeared, I knew many kids that weren’t allowed to have the app until later on in high school. Because of this, Snapchat became a sort of “right of passage” into being one of the cool kids if you were allowed to have it or managed to hide it from parents. 

After looking at Snapchat through this theory, it makes sense how it managed to gain such a large footing in the social media world so quickly. I don’t really see any negatives to Snapchats rapid growth. I think that the growth of users on the app only pushed the creators to continue bettering their innovation. It created a need for more creativity, more ideas, and more technological growth. After Snapchat released Snapchat stories in 2013, it wasn’t long after that Instagram released a stories feature in 2016 and then Facebook in 2017. This cycle of innovation is what builds us as a nation and as a world. The competition of creativity is an extremely positive thing in my eyes. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diffusion_of_innovations

https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/history-of-snapchat

https://www.omnicoreagency.com/snapchat-statistics/

https://www.garyvaynerchuk.com/the-snap-generation-a-guide-to-snapchats-history/

https://techcrunch.com/2016/08/02/instagram-stories/

https://buffer.com/library/facebook-stories

Auditing my Online Presence

After reading the article about a 13 year old girl quitting social media, I found some things I agree with and some things I disagree with. First of all, I agree with how she made it a rule that her mom and sister couldn’t post about her online anymore unless they had her permission to do so. I understand this because I know I hate it when my mom tags me in bad photos of me on Facebook and then it shows up on all of my friends pages to see. I think that she made a smart and reasonable request of her family. However, there are also a few things that I felt were blown out of proportion. In the article, the girl got so worked up  over old photos of her, like photos of her as a toddler. I personally found this unreasonable because it’s not like her friends were on Facebook as fellow toddlers to see these “embarrassing” pictures of her. In most cases, embarrassing stories and photos become funny ones after some time has passed. I for one am thankful that my mom basically documented my entire childhood on Facebook because I can also go back and look at all of the memories my family and friends had together from when I was young. 

I googled myself to get a sense of what my online presence was. When I went to images, I had to scroll down a ways until I found a photo of myself, which was one of my senior pictures I got done at the end of my senior year in High School. I don’t find it embarrassing or in any way inappropriate to have out for the world to see, I’m actually glad that's the first thing that comes up about me. I have a Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, Pinterest account and many other forms of social media that I post many pictures on so I was shocked when I could only find one photo by searching my name. However, I realized that a lot of my accounts aren't under my full name Delaney, they’re under what my friends call me, Del. Oddly enough, not a single photo of me came up when I searched Del Wilson either. After various searches of not finding anything about myself, I tried googling my Instagram username and that brought up a few photos, but now many recent ones. It pulled a photo of me from last summer which is my twitter profile picture, my current instagram profile picture, another senior picture, two old selfies from three years ago, and a lot of pictures of my friends Instagram and Twitter profile pictures. I thought it was weird that photos of my friends alone came up when I searched my name, so I tried searching my friends' names to find pictures of me. Sure enough, tons of photos that I’m in show up, mostly pictures from high school like football games or proms. Overall, I am very happy with my online presence. I didn’t find anything embarrassing or disturbing about myself online.

I think that social media as a whole has done great things for us as a society. Of course everything has its downfalls, and social media can have a negative effect when people abuse it or get too attached to it, but overall I find it very positive. It is a great way to stay connected with people, create new connections, create a brand for yourself, and organize your memories. I think that social media does an amazing job at bringing people together, especially in times like this. Due to corona, I can’t see any of my friends or extended family so social media is the only thing we have to keep eachother updated about our lives and how we are doing. Without social media people would be much less connected. 

A lot of people nowadays are concerned about their privacy, but I honestly am not that worried. To me, I don’t see how invading my privacy benefits anyone. My privacy is essentially worthless to anyone of power. A common worry is people who say Apple can read all of the texts you send. Well, what texts are you sending that Apple would actually care about? What texts are you sending that anyone outside of your friends and family or the person receiving the text would actually care about? Even if Apple or the government are invading my privacy, I have nothing of value to them, so frankly I don't care if they are. Most of the “private”information they collect is used to help us anyways. For example, we all know that Instgarms listens to you whenever you have the app open so that it can find your keywords and promote more relevant ads to you. I appreciate it because it shows me ads for things that I actually care about. I don’t really see all of this as an “invasion of privacy”, but I understand how many people may feel different. 

https://www.fastcompany.com/90315706/kids-parents-social-media-sharing

https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/online-presence

https://www.fastcompany.com/section/the-privacy-divide

https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/01/facebook-users-still-dont-know-how-facebook-works/580546/

https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2019/04/facebook-asked-some-users-for-their-email-passwords-because-why-not/