###### tags: `CDA`
# Reading Responses (Set 2)

## Reading responses 5 out of 5

### March 14 Fri - Finding Someone and Living Alone

People are becoming increasingly more alone, and that isn’t due to being unable to find a partner. In “Living alone in America” (Chamie, 2021), the societal shift of norms and the increased economic benefits in cities are just some of the motivations of certain generations choosing this lifestyle. For some, living alone is a milestone and often represents independence. We want to present to others that we are truly capable of success, as well as show that we are capable of living alone, but this is not possible for many others. As a student myself, living alone is a luxury that some of us don’t have, especially due to the cost of living all across the U.S.

Now, some of us don’t want to live alone, but as the world continues to grow exponentially, it has become increasingly harder to find a partner.. In “The Big Lies People Tell In Online Dating” (OkCupid, 2010), dating apps have expanded the playing field greatly, but also the ability to lie. Presenting ourselves in the best possible way is what many feel as though they need to do in order to find a partner, so lies such as height, income, and what we truly look like are very common. This performed and fabricated identity can heighten our chance at attaining a partner, but can lead to misinformation or miscommunication. This begs the questions of how often do we lie about these aspects in person? What is it about dating apps that lead to this, even if they end up meeting in real life?

### March 18 Tue - Ads and Social Graph Background

We are in a technological “tit for tat war”, or so the video “How Ads Follow You Around the Internet” (Vox, 2020), explains the battle between user privacy and business success. We see advertisements almost every day and in every place we go, with some being shockingly accurate to our preferences. Sometimes, like what is seen in “The Essential Guide to Marketing in a Digital World” (Stokes, 2014), when we think of a product we need, it pops up online in the form of floating adverts that appear over content, banners at the bottom of the screen, or even on social media sites. This often happens when you least expect it, as if your devices can somehow know what you are thinking.

So, how exactly does this happen? Well, it’s not some supernatural phenomenon, but is actually manifested through a Third party cookie by retaining information about you, your preferences, as well as serving you personalized advertisements based on this information. When you are simply browsing the internet or shopping on a brands website, you might see pop ups or banners trying to sell you products you most recently viewed or other similar ones, which many deem as a breach of privacy. To solve this common issue, many web browsers have allowed you to block third party cookies with just a click of a button. However, companies such as Facebook Pixel have found loopholes by giving sites a piece of code that looks like a first party cookie, begging the question of how far are these companies willing to go just to sell us products in an already saturated marketplace?

### March 15 Tue - Bemused
Commenting is a way to send our ideas, thoughts, and opinions in the void, all through a masked identity. How, though, does this capture our true feelings and intentions? In “”, comments have certain levels of depth and context, each viewed through colored glasses of our own perceptions. In a stark and serious example of this, there are instances where we say or post on social media phrases that are the opposite of our intentions, as a way to joke about an often serious situation. Jack Carter, an eighteen year old gamer, once said “Oh yeah, I’m real messed up in the head, I’m going to go shoot up a school full of kids and eat their still, beating hearts” (Reagle, 2019). Although he was being sarcastic, and simply said this in a fit of reactivity, quickness, and stupidity, humans simply don’t just transmit and receive messages, they “contribute to a constructed meaning that depends on various interpretive frames” (Reagle, 2019).

Online reviews highlight a different way to think about our colored glasses. Quite often, we see reviews of a product have differing messages. On one hand, the reviewer says that the product works well, but on the other, they rate it a 4/5, where the number system they use to represent this doesn’t match their message. Even if it worked well, why are humans so stingy about not rating a product to its full capacity? Would the same stinginess transfer over into real life, through word-of-mouth? Ratings can mean different things to different people, and I am no exception. When looking for restaurants, I tend to lean towards places that have no less than 4.2 stars, as I am often worried about the quality of the food. Of course, there are exceptions, but a place that has 4.2 stars can represent great quality to someone else. Overall, comments are subjective and users often lack context and information to make sense of it and the social network world.


## Apr 4 Fri - Algorithmic Bias

Standards have the power to shift societies behavior, opinions, and preferences. Like beauty standards and standards for education, these can be microscopic on an individual level or macroscopic on an environmental scale. In, “Weapons of Math Destruction” (O’Neil, 2016), systems of ranking that can change national standards got its start with college excellence rankings, which listed the top universities in the U.S.In the beginning, U.S. News and World Report based its scores on opinion surveys from University presidents, which had the potential to bring bias into the mix. With heavy backlash, reporters changed their ranking system and “...picked proxies that seemed to correlate with success. They looked at SAT scores, student-teacher ratios, and acceptance rates” (O’Neil, 2016). These scales shifted how society thought of schooling, which led to universities manipulating their way up the scale. This example reminds me of a Black Mirror episode where other people can rate you based on your personality and how you rate them. To make their rating increase and to make themselves more likable, some people would purposely act kind, manipulating those around them.

Rankings can also reflect the public's view of beauty standards and how we place others into specific boxes. In “This is why some people think Google’s results are racist” (Rutherford, 2016), many have noticed racial and ethnic stereotypes that can reflect societal norms: “The people in society are creating Google, in a way”... “It’s very easy to see stereotypes in Google. That tells us a lot about society” (Rutherford, 2016). Stereotypes about certain ethnicities and races are extremely clear, as searching specific terms, words, or phrases can vary in terms of who pops up. For example, if you search the word “beauty” on Google, hardly any people of color show up, which highlights how the world reinforces Eurocentric beauty standards. If society shapes how society thinks, how can we stand up to beauty standards, norms, and stereotypes?

## Apr 15 Fri - Pushback

Information overload is ever more common in an age where the digital landscape and technology is integrated with our daily lives. We are constantly consuming media, content, and information, to the point where it is not only affecting our personal lives, but how we interact with ourselves. In “Pushback: Expressions of resistance to the ‘evertime’ of constant online connectivity” (Morrison, Gomez, 2014), digital detoxing is a way to push back against this technology connectivity, with some, such as the Luddites, foregoing any at all. For many, the internet is a way for those to connect with their personal network, but some view it as a place of disconnection where, “...the way they ensnare young people, pushing them to create picture perfect online identities that have little to do with their authentic selves” (Vadukul, 2023), which fuels the Luddite lifestyle and the desire to have authentic, real connections.

In my opinion, trends play a major role in pushing back against media over-consumption. Throughout the article, the authors highlight multiple names of movements to categorize these movements, each through different mediums. With micro-trends coming into fashion every month, I often see similar content across all social media telling others how to detox from social media. Recently, I have seen content creators create videos that are titled “Things to consume instead of doom scrolling”, where they list other media, essays, videos, and information to replace the endless scroll. There is a push and pull between users wanting to keep up with daily news and those wanting to “digitally detox”, but is this over-consumption landscape truly our fault? In my opinion, it is not, and both sides can be overwhelming.