NDM #2

When fiction becomes fact: can we trust the internet?

A series of hoaxes have flown around the internet. But what happens when news sites report fiction as fact, delighting then disappointing their readers?

A story went viral of a man live-tweeting his interactions with a woman on the plane – was revealed to be fake. At the same time a Twitter conversation between a comedian and an American salsa brand – which appeared to result in employees being fired and had shot, sneeze-like across the internet – was confirmed as a hoax.

BuzzFeed is a lot of things. It's a gallery of grinning dogs. It's a thousand comedy lists about the 90s. It's a scrolling advert, a comic sports site, a politics blog, a moving newspaper, and its ad revenues this year are estimated to be $40m. As it stretches across our consciousness like clingfilm, its responsibilities are being called into question more and more. As a news organisation, profiting from the stories it shares, shouldn't it be verifying them before it publishes? And if this continues to happen – if it repeatedly reports on fictions as if they're fact – then won't it start to lose us, its fast-clicking readers? We don't expect every story posted by a stranger on Twitter to be true, but we do expect every story reported on by a huge media organisation to be, because that's what they're for. The point of them is to filter through the daily mess of culture and to repackage it for us in witty, bite-sized, trustworthy chunks. The more they mess up, the less we'll return.

That we see isn't always true, the internet can be edited. Television is an illusion - we believe what we see. This article talks about the issues about publishing newspaper articles, nobody verifies them before publishing, however they make profit, and a moving newspaper and it's ad revenue this year are estimated to be $40m. A story written by a reality TV producer then reported as fact by an international media company (BuzzFeed's post got almost 1.5m views) and shared frantically by those who think it's real.Also, on twitter we won't expect every story posted by a stranger to be true. However, we expect every story report by media to be true.  This is because of the authority they hold, and the power, they are able to engage audiences and can fool them into believing anything and everything is true, as audiences are fooled to believe the articles have been verified beforehand and are official, even though they may not be verified. Also, the internet is harmless, nobody gets hurt, but it affects how we engage online. We will be led to trust less and enjoy less. In the long-term it is said that our lives will become fractionally worse, but the issue lies not with the storyteller, it lies with the sites that share it. 

Pareto's Law

1) What is Pareto's Law? Sum it up in a paragraph.
Pareto's law is the 80/20 rule

2) What other industries or examples can you apply the 80/20 rule to?

• 80% of the media is owned by 20% of the institutions 
• 80% of a company's profits come from 20% of its customers
• 80% of a company's complaints come from 20% of its customers
• 80% of a company's profits come from 20% of the time its staff spend
• 80% of a company's sales come from 20% of its products
• 80% of a company's sales are made by 20% of its sales staff

3) List three arguments in FAVOUR of Pareto's Law applying to the internet:
Microsoft owns Hotmail and Skype
Google owns Gmail, Android, YouTube, Blogger
75% of users volume is from 5% of the top sites. 

4) List three arguments AGAINST Pareto's Law applying to the internet:
Wikipedia - user generated information - not reliable information
Twitter - don't own what is produced, there can be many rumours about a certain topic. 
Tumblr - we post images up, not always true can just copy it from somewhere else

Finally, answer the following question:
5) Even if Pareto's Law applies to internet ownership, does it still apply to the content we read online?

New and Digital Media #1

Rich kids of instagram - http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/dec/06/selfies-status-updates-digital-bragging-web

Launched in 2012, Rich Kids Of Instagram is a blog dedicated to the iPhone snapshots of teens and twentysomethings living opulent lifestyles around the world, like a two-dimensional MTV Cribs for people who aren't famous. If you live by the philosophy "money talks but wealth whispers", perhaps look away now, because this is high-pitched shouting. As the website tagline puts it: "They have more money than you and this is what they do." Much of it involves infinity pools, yachts and private jets, and bar tab receipts going into the tens of thousands. Many of the posts are accompanied by nauseating captions: a picture of a room featuring a giant Lichtenstein canvas bears the words "home is where the art is"; an image of a woman's head emerging from a sea of Chanel and Hermès bags is tagged as #goldrush; a young man's "reptile" shoe collection, meanwhile, is labelled #endangered. But even more likely to have you clamouring for revolution are the posts of mock humility: a #livingroom containing an old master and a chandelier, or "weekend at the farm" involving a young man in red trousers disembarking from a helicopter.

You may think looking at a 17-year-old's Ferrari ("This is how the pimps roll") might be an exercise in impoverished masochism, but the lack of self-awareness makes the whole experience strangely gratifying. It's that old schadenfreude working its magic again. These people may have "more money than you", but they're making complete tits of themselves in the process.

Instagram was launched in 2012, there is a blog post of instagram which is dedicated to the rich kids. This article talks about the glam of instagram and has quotes of what people do on instagram, such as '#' this is a way other people can search up the hashtag and then their picture will be there, so others are able to see it. It talks about different hash tags which are used on instagram and what they show i.e #livingroom it clearly says what the image contains, of an old master and chandelier.