Jess

I kind of agree with this yeah, because I do think that people find themselves looking at their phones when they have nothing to do.  But they are also used as a barrier to sort of maintain someone's positive face, I guess.  By looking at your phone when someone sits next to you on the train is just a way of letting them know that they don't have to talk to you.  They might not have had any intention of looking at it then.  It's just sort of the modern day book or newspaper which is easier to carry around.  And because the world is always moving and new things are always happening, people's phones are where they get a lot of their info in order to keep up with everything.  It's increasing communication- making it asynchronous, as well as also being a way of avoiding people. 

Character limits are quite clever as they make us more defined language users and help us to get a better understanding for language and ways that it can be manipulated to say the same thing but in fewer words. There are certain situations where I think Facebook statuses need to have the flexibility to be over 140 characters, such as when someone is sharing a story or a memory, but it all depends on the type of person and the ways that they choose to use Facebook - maybe it’s as a social platform or a place to express your opinions and political views. Or perhaps both?  

The character limit definitely does make you think more about what you want to say and how you can say it in the best way which will fit in the characters.  I'm not a huge fan of the limits because I feel that sometimes you need more than 140 characters to express what you want to say in the limited amount that you have.  So you end up writing it in more than one post or completely changing the way in which you word it to make it fit; which is kind of a hassle.  I think you have to write in a certain way on sites which have a character limit- it is a talent to write your story in so few characters

Yeah I think that people are naïve to think that they have any privacy online.  You should know that as soon as you put anything online it is no longer private.  I think that people have a right to keep some things private if they can, like phone numbers or something, because Facebook keeps asking me for that but that's not something I want out there.  So I choose not to put it anywhere online.  But if I found anything online that I wanted to keep private then I would not be happy.  I think that Privacy is key to keep you safe from hackers and fraud and things, but I also see your point.  For things like advertising then it's fine!  Sometimes really useful!   Basically, if you want to put anything about yourself online then don't expect it to be private and don't complain when you find out that it isn't. 

And here you are sharing it on yet another platform!I think it’s a good concept - I would never have seen this if it had not been shared across social media channels, as I never read The Independent. Therefore I guess it’s a great way for getting stories and advertisements out across to a broader range of viewers and thus increasing audiences. 

Yeah, I think it's quite funny that on Twitter and Facebook you have pages that are things like "Best of Tumblr" or something.  And on Facebook you have a link to share things to Instagram etc.  Not everyone has these different types of social media, so people share info across each one to reach more people.  I also like that there are all these different sites and they're all used for slightly different types of communication, yet they are all linked to each other.  Because the majority of people will have more than one of these accounts, does that mean that they are different types of people when they use each one?  If things get shared across all media sites anyway, why not have just one? I guess it's about what you want to say and how you want to say it as well as what info you get from each one. 

Yeah virality is an odd thing, because some people do things with the hope and intention that it will go viral; whereas others will do something with no intention of this at all.  Those who just have virality sort of thrust upon them I feel sorry for, because they could be remembered as that for the rest of their lives.  It's not like they asked to be defined by something that they once did.  At least with this girl she can get it removed and there have been wore things to go viral- but she still will probably be remembered as that girl that got that Ian Beale tattoo one time.  I think people need to think more about what they put online with the chance that they might go viral.  People are too caught up in what they think the positives of going viral are and forget that there is also going to be a downside

FIFA has always been one of those games that has baffled me anyway- why not just go outside and play real football?  But no I wouldn't say that smashing holes through things due to getting frustrated on a game is normal behaviour at all.  But maybe it is in the terms of the game?  People let go of anger in varying ways, and maybe they're all just caught up in the heat of the moment and it's just an impulse reaction that simply comes across as having all this anger towards a certain game. 

words have a standardised meaning that is commonly accepted but in my experience a lot of emojis have different semantic uses depending on the user 

Yeah, emojis are odd in the fact that they can stand for an actual word or a concept or just an emotion, which I guess is where they emerged from.  But yeah I think that they depend and rely very heavily on the context and the individual's perception.  I could have a go at guessing what that string of emojis stand for, but of course I won't know exactly what it means because I don't know the context behind it.

it’s not an “if”, it’s a “when”! there was a time books were new, now we are asking whether kindles have replaced them and how long it will be until e-books rule

That's very true!  So many things from our parents' era are now seen as old and there is a definite guarantee that things that are seen as new media in our generation will be seen as old in the next.  Things will always keep changing and technology will always be developing; so there is no doubt that this is the future for our new media.

Yeah I agree! It’s like its still hazardous to our perceptions on certain things, even if we don’t click on it!

I like that people do this and fill in what the post is about.  The interaction between people who don't even know each other is great sometimes because everyone knows that it's clickbait and so it's quite a nice little community.  But sometimes the comments people put on just entice me even more to want to know what the article is about.  For example if people comment "whoa!" or "wow, did not know that!" they just enhance the clickbait! 

🙋🙋🙋 guilty. ‘Sorry that was my friend’ what a classic line, reminds me of being in year 9 haha

that raises a good point… one of the affordances of IM is that you could tell the recipient of your message that it was sent by someone else from your laptop and they wouldn’t be 100% sure, as they cant see you! 

Unless they tried to make you go on webcam ofc haha!

I definitely am guilty of being that friend who would say all the embarrassing things to my friend's crushes.  So while it was good for my friend that they could blame me- the crushes very rarely believed them when they used the "that was my friend" line, because everyone knew that that was the classic lie.  There was a sort of known lingo that was used on that site.

I agree, I also believe that it really does depend on how people e use them and also I guess the way that they are used.  I know that psychologists have been debating this for a long time and it has been found that some psychopaths who have gone on murder shooting sprees have thought that they were part of a violent video game that they have been playing for a long time.  Clearly these guys were just very unbalanced, and so you can't say that all people who play that- or other violent video games will end up like this. So I do think that it really does depend on so many different possible factors, and you can never claim that video games are 100% good or bad for you until more research has been done in the area. 

Luckily, most of my friends know that I am awful when it comes to replying to things quickly; so I feel the pressure is off a little bit there.  But whenever I do get a message through I always feel the need to reply right away because otherwise I feel like they think I am ignoring them (I still am slow to reply though!) But I am always on the other end- wanting people to reply to me quickly, especially when I know that they are renowned for hasty replies.  It is annoying when you send a text wanting an immediate answer but they don't get back to you for ages, especially when you know that they've seen it.  I guess that's what's sometimes seen as good about social media- you're not face to face so it's a lot easier to ignore a message and pretend you haven't seen it yet  I think it is also partly to do with who you're texting though- I know that my brother deliberately ignores me sometimes.  But when his girlfriend messages him then of course he has to reply straight away!