"Just about any social need is now met with an opportunity to "connect" through digital means. But this convenience is not free—it is purchased with vast amounts of personal data transferred through shadowy backchannels to corporations using it to generate profit. The Costs of Connection uncovers
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this process, this "data colonialism," and its designs for controlling our lives—our ways of knowing; our means of production; our political participation. Colonialism might seem like a thing of the past, but this book shows that the historic appropriation of land, bodies, and natural resources is mirrored today in this new era of pervasive datafication. Apps, platforms, and smart objects capture and translate our lives into data, and then extract information that is fed into capitalist enterprises and sold back to us. The authors argue that this development foreshadows the creation of a new social order emerging globally—and it must be challenged. Confronting the alarming degree of surveillance already tolerated, they offer a stirring call to decolonize the internet and emancipate our desire for connection." (Publisher description)
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"Die vorliegende Studie untersucht, mit welchen Mitteln der ursprüngliche emanzipatorische Anspruch der erhofften neuen Freiräume mit Hilfe digitaler Instrumente eingelöst werden kann. Es werden digitale Plattformen für Projekte der Auswärtigen Kultur- und Bildungspolitik (AKBP) analysiert sowi
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e neueste noch in der Entwicklung befindliche dezentrale Technologien aufgezeigt, die für negative Entwicklungen des Netzes neue Lösungen anbieten." (Seite 6)
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"The rise of social media in Zimbabwe has brought with it a greater variety of platforms which offer people a means to express themselves. However, the democratisation of information and the increase in digital spaces have also come with greater state restriction and polarisation among Zimbabweans.
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This policy brief intends to discuss the state’s attempts to act as the proctor of social media in order to explore the relations between users of online platforms in terms of political leanings and gender. To this end, it will also discuss the damaging effects of online targeting and how it can exacerbate already existing political divisions between people. The paper will also discuss how the state uses legal instruments to surveil and regulate online activity as a way of maintaining its iron grip on the people." (Abstract)
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"Technology plays an important role for news media distribution in Bulgaria: 88% of Bulgarians get their news online, first and foremost on the online platforms of popular television channels and their social network pages. Bulgarians are some of the most active social media users in the EU (ranked
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6th among all EU Member States), and use Facebook overwhelmingly more than all other platforms – among other purposes, for news consumption. Because of its astounding popularity, Facebook is the most popular online platform for news media, and the audiences of news outlets attract on their Facebook pages often surpass in numbers those of their own websites. For the same reasons, the platform is notable for its major role in promoting fake news in Bulgaria, which had a particularly strong impact on voters before the last parliamentary election in March 2017.
Google is another international technology company with a dominant position in the market for digital media distribution. Google occupies an overwhelming share of the search engine market across all platforms, and its YouTube is ranked as the second most popular social media platform in the country. On the other hand, Google is the sole international technology company that has contributed finances to the local journalism in Bulgaria: its Digital News Innovation (DNI) Fund has awarded €450,000 in funding to journalistic projects in Bulgaria since its launch in 2015. The fund’s overall influence in the Bulgarian media is insignificant for now, but it did help multiple innovative projects get off the ground.
While the digital news distribution market overall is dominated by the international tech giants Facebook and Google, there are local digital media platforms in Bulgaria, too. The most notable one is Netinfo, the largest digital media company in the country, covering 85% of the users with a wide range of information, communication and entertainment services." (Page 4)
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"A number of recent legislative initiatives on ‘hate speech’, including most prominently the 2017 German NetzDG law on social media, make reference to some forms of self-regulation. Voluntary mechanisms between digital companies and various public bodies addressing ‘hate speech’ and other is
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sues, such as the EU Code of Conduct on hate speech, also make reference to self-regulatory models. However, our analysis of these mechanisms demonstrates that they fail to comply with the requirements of international human rights law. They rely on vague and overbroad terms to identify unlawful content, they delegate censorship responsibilities to social media companies with no real consideration of the lawfulness of content, and they fail to provide due process guarantees. ARTICLE 19 therefore suggests exploring a new model of effective self-regulation for social media. This model could take the form of a dedicated “social media council” – inspired by the effective self-regulation models created to support and promote journalistic ethics and high standards in print media. We believe that effective selfregulation could offer an appropriate framework through which to address the current problems with content moderation by social media companies, including ‘hate speech’ on their platforms, providing it also meets certain conditions of independence, openness to civil society participation, accountability and effectiveness." (Executive summary)
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"An MDIF analysis of the impact of Facebook’s Q4 2017 “Explore” News Feed test showed a steep decrease in traffic for test market publishers versus traffic changes for publishers in nearby regional markets. This report will explore the impact of the Explore changes in emerging markets, discuss
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the implications for the global News Feed change announced by Facebook in Q1 2018 and provide an action plan to deal with expected traffic losses. In October 2017 Facebook announced a test in six emerging markets to create a separate feed (the Explore Feed) for public posts from media, businesses and public figures, removing these posts from the main News Feed. The experience from news media in the emerging market tests suggest that Facebook page impressions and interactions could decline by 60% or more." (Executive summary)
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"Facebook commissioned BSR to undertake a human rights impact assessment (HRIA) of the company’s presence in Myanmar. BSR undertook this HRIA between May and September 2018, using a methodology based on the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs). This assessment identifies and
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prioritizes actual and potential human rights impacts, reaches conclusions about those impacts, and makes recommendations for their mitigation and management. This HRIA was funded by Facebook, though BSR retained editorial control over its contents." (About this report, page 1)
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"Future Politics confronts one of the most important questions of our time: how will digital technology transform politics and society? The great political debate of the last century was about how much of our collective life should be determined by the state and what should be left to the market and
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civil society. In the future, the question will be how far our lives should be directed and controlled by powerful digital systems - and on what terms? Jamie Susskind argues that rapid and relentless innovation in a range of technologies - from artificial intelligence to virtual reality - will transform the way we live together. Calling for a fundamental change in the way we think about politics, he describes a world in which certain technologies and platforms, and those who control them, come to hold great power over us. Some will gather data about our lives, causing us to avoid conduct perceived as shameful, sinful, or wrong. Others will filter our perception of the world, choosing what we know, shaping what we think, affecting how we feel, and guiding how we act. Still others will force us to behave certain ways, like self-driving cars that refuse to drive over the speed limit."
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According to the executive summary "Facebook’s Free Basics program aims to help bridge the digital divide through a mobile-based platform that allows users to connect to a handful of online services free of charge [...] This paper highlights the following findings: Language: Free Basics does not m
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eet the linguistic needs of target users [...] Content and usability: Free Basics features an imbalance of sites and services [...] Net neutrality: Free Basics violates net neutrality principles [...] Privacy: Facebook is accessing unique streams of user metadata from all user activities on Free Basics, not just the activities of users who are logged into Facebook." The Free Basics app was tested in six countries, with programs from five different operators: Colombia (Tigo), Ghana (Tigo), Kenya (Airtel), Mexico (Virgin Mobile), Pakistan (Telenor), and the Philippines (Globe).
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"This article analyzes the 2015 campaign by net neutrality advocates against Facebook’s Free Basics service in India, and argues that their victory can be best understood by analyzing their privileged place in an India that imagines itself high tech and global. The advocates, predominantly tech wo
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rkers, loosely organized under the banner of Save the Internet (STI) echoing the net neutrality debate in the United States. The article assesses the competing claims and modes of contention of both Facebook and STI, and examines how STI’s appeals were able to mobilize public opinion in record numbers. I argue that STI formed a ‘recursive public’, which practiced a technopolitics that resonated within the broader narrative of technocultural nationalism championed by the current ruling party. I trace the historical origins of this dominant discourse that eventually led the regulator to ban all zero-ratings plans, including Free Basics." (Abstract)
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"Global Media Giants takes an in-depth look at how media corporate power works globally, regionally, and nationally, investigating the ways in which the largest and most powerful media corporations in the world wield power. Case studies examine not only some of the largest media corporations (News C
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orp, Microsoft) in terms of revenues, but also media corporations that hold considerable power within national, regional, or geolinguistic contexts (Televisa, Bertelsmann, Sony). Each chapter approaches a different corporation through the lens of economy, politics, and culture, giving students and scholars a thoughtful and data-driven guide with which to interrogate contemporary media industry power." (Publisher description)
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"Ausgehend von der Geschichte des Internets und einer Definition des »Social Webs« werden zunächst dessen Erscheinungsformen vorgestellt, verglichen und eingeordnet. Darauf folgt eine Beschreibung der technischen Grundlagen sowie der auftretenden Gruppenprozesse und der gesellschaftlichen Bedeutu
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ng des »Social Webs«." (Verlagsbeschreibung)
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"The debate on Facebook raises questions about the use and users of this information service. This collected volume gathers a broad spectrum of social science and information science articles about Facebook.Facebook has many facets, and we just look forward above all to the use and users. The facet
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of users has sub-facets, such as different age, sex, and culture. The facet of use consists of sub-facets of privacy behavior after the Snowden affair, dealing with friends, unfriending and becoming unfriended on Facebook, and possible Facebook addiction. We also consider Facebook as a source for local temporary history and respond to acceptance and quality perceptions of this social network service, as well. This book brings together all the contributions of research facets on Facebook." (Publisher description)
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"This article focuses on the case of Google, the newly emerged US Internet industry and global geographical market expansion. Google's struggles in China, where Chinese domestic Internet firm, Baidu, controls the market, have been commonly presented in the Western mainstream media in terms of a stru
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ggle over a strategic information infrastructure between two nation states - newly 'emerging' global power China countering the United States, the world's current hegemon and information empire. Is China really becoming an imperial rival to the United States? What is the nature of this opposition over this new industry? Given that the search engine industry in China is heavily backed by transnational capital - and in particular US capital - and is experiencing intense inter-capitalist competition, this perceived view of inter-state rivalry is incomplete and misleading. By looking at the tussle over the global search business, this article seeks to illuminate the changing dynamics of the US-led transnationalizing capitalism in the context of China's reintegration into the global capitalist market." (Abstract)
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"Zunehmend ist es nämlich nicht mehr die Frage „Was wird verbreitet?“, sondern die Frage „Was wird gefunden und kann verarbeitet werden?“, die über die Vielfalt der von uns wahrgenommenen Inhalte entscheidet. Vordergründig ist die Zahl der zur Verfügung stehenden Informationen ins Unerme
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ssliche gestiegen. Dort, wo früher teure und begrenzte Verbreitungswege zum Nadelöhr wurden und nach Spielregeln verlangten, dominiert heute die Grenzenlosigkeit des Netzes mit seinen letztlich unendlichen Ressourcen. Die Intermediäre, die hier den Nutzerinnen und Nutzern bei der Orientierung helfen, beurteilen Relevanz nicht mehr allein nach der gesellschaftlichen Bedeutung der Inhalte, sondern messen Relevanz primär an den spezifischen Interessen des einzelnen Nutzers bzw. der Nutzerin. Dennoch haben die Intermediäre mit ihren Leistungen auch einen mittelbaren Einfluss auf gesellschaftliche Kommunikationsprozesse. Wer über Algorithmen, Empfehlungen oder redaktionelle Kuratierung den Wahrnehmungshaushalt der Bürgerinnen und Bürger mitgestaltet, der trägt daher auch demokratische Verantwortung. Hier geht es nicht um düstere und netzkritische Verschwörungstheorien, sondern um Spielregeln für die strukturbildenden Angebote der öffentlichen Kommunikation, um die Stabilisierung von berechtigten Erwartungen, damit das nötige Vertrauen entstehen kann." (Vorwort, Seite 5-6)
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