Media Ethics

 Hi Everyone!

Today I watched four videos about media ethics that I found very interesting and would love to share with you all. I learnt that the word medium in the message "medium is the message" means that the change of the fundamental scale of those interactions, for example the phone has changed the idea for social gatherings now a days. 

Cambridge Analytica is a data marketing firm, it harvests online information to create microtargeted content. This company claimed that it "uses data to change audiences behaviour", But the data they used for "audience behaviour" was them harvesting data from the person using Facebook. They collected data not just from the person who used the app, but everyone that is linked to that one person, so all the data they get from one person branches out to multiple different peoples information. In February 2018, NIX faced a parliamentary inquiry on fake news, they said they didn't use other peoples data which was a lie and no one knew their profiles were being harvested. They rejected all allegations, which was later proven false. 

Dark patterns are features of interface design crafted to trick users into doing things they might not want to do, but which benefit the business in question. In my own words it's something that makes it difficult for you so you don't hurt Amazon or any other company, For example closing an account takes so many steps and is almost impossible to find, The company basically hopes you give up trying half way. 

Roach motel is a design that makes it easy to get into a situation but hard to get out, For example "two dots" the game offers green buttons for you to start levels, continue, etc. But once you lose it brings you to a purchase that is green and the x is extremely small. This shows how companies can use something as simple as a colour to trick you into doing something that they want you too. 

The video I found the most interesting was "How one main manipulated all of America". Due to industrialization supply was capable of being much higher than demand, The business owners increased demand of products. Many owners were willing to go to great lengths to manipulate the public into buying their products, Edward Bernays was one of them. Bernays believed that advertising could be much more effective if advertisers understood group psychology, if they knew the questions of the consumer, They could market their product fulfilling answer, This was a revolutionary thing Bernays helped popularise. 

Bernays was a big believer in symbolism, an idea or a product can become a movement when it represents something greater than itself. Getting women to smoke was his most noticeable action, He only used 4 simple steps for this. The first step was to create the symbol which was the cigarette that was then linked to female independence, cigarettes become more than a product it became a movement. The second step was that the cigarettes were advertised to women as an alternative to become thin, then an independence movement. The third step was normalising behaviour by reaching out to influencers and to make it seem as something normal. The last step is to get into their mental space, he tried to be in as many media outlets as possible, He wanted smoking to occupy a place in everyones head, By sparking conflict and debate. 

Bye everyone! Thats everything for today.

sources:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OseOb_wBsi4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q91nvbJSmS4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kxkrdLI6e6M

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nj_UWbifM2U

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