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Zeynep Tufekci: Twitter and Tear Gas (Reasons for such Policies (Business…
Zeynep Tufekci: Twitter and Tear Gas
Network Effect
(Network Externalities)
More audience a platform has the more attractive it is for the user
Some cases this has been transcended
Facebook over MySpace
Google over Yahoo and Altavista
Existing companies collect enormous user data
Networked Gatekeeping
decide who gets people's attention
keeps changing algorithms to retain audience attention
control user experience
Using these "privately owned"
"public networks" -
a bit like shifting political action to shopping malls
the shopping malls mediate both
audience
and
content
role of the
coffee shop
in the development of the
public sphere
Finance by Ads
Low revenue from individual ads
easily avoidable
Large platforms can break even
Targetting based on User data
Relation between
similar to
Sherpas
and
Climbers of the Everest
may not be fully equipped
boosts
can
carry extra Oxygen to help
cannot
help in case of
sudden storm
delays
avalanche
tech malfunction
Networked Protests
and
the Internet
allows movements to
grow dramatically
requires no prior building of formal or informal organisation
should be seen as a the initiation of a movement and not the outcome
Istanbul 2013: Gezi Park protest
self organiasation
rejection of formal politics
believed to be
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volunteers ran every thing
communal kitchens
libraries
clinics
sharing economy
helped by digital technologies
horizontal participation
without formal hierachies
adhoc approach to organising tasks etc.
Other groups that used internet to organize and propagate
ISIS
White-supremacist groups in US and Europe
Some as political organisations
Podemos in Spain
Syriza in Greece
pre-organisation work in pre-social media era
create collective decision-making capabilities
helped create resilience in movements to survive and thrive in the long term
eg. Civil Rights movt. US 1955-1964
IN the Civil Rights movement activists knew that
television coverage
was crucial to a movement
Social Media has reduced dependence of activists on mass media and their editors
Yet they use Social Media to draw attention from/ compel mass media to cover their protests/ movement
Social movement have dependent on a very small number of corporate platforms
informal leadership structures
Response of governments
Govts that don't understand networks
"Shoot at them all, and let terror sort them out"
Govts. less willing to engage in mass violence
learnt to control the networked public sphere
govt supporters or paid workers
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Social Media
Case of Egyptian blogger "Hani"
ran immensely popular blog
Six years in prison for insulting Mubarak
Released in 2010
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similar case with Iranian "blogfather" Hossein Derakshan
Facebook's "real names" policy
Zuckerberg: "Having two identities for yourself is an example of lack of integrity"
Without a traceable name advertisers can't target real people
People may have multiple identities and facets
Zuckerberg's pet dog "Beast" had its own FB page
Many other accounts with fictitious names
Effect on Activists
Wal Ghonim: administrator of
"We are all Khaled Said" FB page
Khaled Said, a young man who was brutally tortured to death by Egyptian police
Nov 2010 FB deactivated the page
due to "real names" policy as GHonim had used pseudonym
did not restore the page despite appeals across the world
finally an Egyptian woman from US allowed her real name to be used
She risked ire of Egyptian govt.
activists keep posts public
try to reach maximum audience
can be reported against or spammed by supporters of the government or powerful
FB uses community policing to keep costs down
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Reasons for such Policies
Business model
Driven by Profit
Open to pressure from government
Owned by Founders
individual ideology plays important role
underplays rule of law
Use of volunteer effort
Use of complex algorithms
Case Studies
. In September 2016, Facebook removed a post by a Norwegian journalist because it included a picture of a naked child. The picture was the Pulitzer Prize–winning 1972 photo showing a nine-year-old Vietnamese girl,
Phan Thi Kim Phuc
, running naked and screaming “Too hot, too hot,” having just been badly burned by a napalm attack.
Videos of Westerners murdered at the hands of ISIS were removed fairly quickly, while similar videos of executions of local Syrians, Iraqis, or Libyans often remained on YouTube.
for years Kurdish politicians were censored on Facebook. The Facebook page of the mayor of the biggest majority Kurdish city in the region was banned even though almost four hundred thousand people had “liked” his page before it was taken down.
The list of Kurds who were banned from Facebook ranged from prominent authors to elected deputies (parliamentary officials).
the same Kurdish officials appeared on traditional news media even as their Facebook pages were blocked and banned.
Facebook offered a terse statement about “violations of community guidelines.”
Facebook had adopted the U.S. State Department’s list of “terrorist organizations,” which included the Kurdish insurgent group, the PKK.
Facebook was failing to distinguish PKK propaganda from ordinary content that was merely about Kurds and their culture, or news about the group or the insurgency.
Algorithmic control
FB does not show everything to everyone
filters everyone's "News Feed"
according to companies priorities
filtered out "Black Lives Matter"
Does not depend on the ideology of the managers
but on the priorities algorithm
Once a story is buried a little bit -
it gets increasingly hidden
reinforces the
"
echo chamber
"/
"
confirmation bias
"/
"
Filter bubble
"
Visibility of a post enhanced by
Algorithm
Likes
Comments
Controversy