ASG 🌸

Among all the topics that we’ve learnt, week 11 topic which is “global social media: China” is one of the most interesting topics for me. Why? One of the reasons is because China’s technologies are one of the most powerful around the world.

Based on (China Population 2023 (Live), n.d.), China estimates population by the latest United Nations’ projections on 1st July 2023 are 1,425,671,352 citizens.

Ordinary Chinese citizens are enjoying access to information using methods that were unthinkable until a few years ago thanks to the Internet. China's Internet is surprisingly unrestricted, in contrast to a world where everything was pre-screened by editors at government-owned media. Social media are routinely utilised by Chinese Internet users, especially the domestically constructed social media connections. The social media platforms used in the nation aren't exactly the same as those in the western world.

Limitations on foreign websites and social networking sites have not eliminated social media; rather, they have developed a prospering local ecosystem that is permitted by the government and is favored by Chinese-owned properties. Although Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube have been banned in China, their Chinese counterparts are developing. Chinese social media users are among the world's largest numbers of users, by some measures. Chinese Internet users spend an average of 2.7 hours a day online, based on a Boston Consulting Group study (refer to Understand and Tap into China's Digital Generations). This is far greater than users in other developing countries.

Contrasting platforms on social media

Ogilvy's 360 Digital Influence group has created a series of social media "bulls-eyes" that show local synonyms on the inner circle and global platforms on an outer ring in order to demonstrate how social media has developed in Asia.

Although useful, this comparison might also be misleading. China's online behaviors and social media platforms different severely from those that could be categorized as the equivalents in other countries. Censorship is not a sole explanation for this variation. Similar to other Asian countries, different regions' strategies to Internet usage are shaped due to variables such as language, culture, economic growth, and the digital ecosystem which helps them. Digital ecosystems, or the platforms that people rely their online communications around, may differ greatly between nations as well as within one. Significant differences could occur between nations with akin economic development levels. Internet users in Japan and South Korea, for example, are prone to leaning toward locally developed social media platforms like GREE (www.gree.jp) and Cyworld (www.cyworld.co.kr), accordingly, rather than accessible worldwide ones, even in the absence of government blocks.

Variety social media usage behaviours reveal a lot regarding the world wide web and the nation in question. Chinese internet users, for instance, access online video platforms somewhat differently compared to do Americans when it relates to YouTube. Youku and Tudou are overflowing with more time shape content, as much as 70 percent of which is properly produced, compared to the brief clips of cute animals or entertaining household accidents that have become popular among YouTube audiences. The Chinese websites show more like digital video recorders or online television stations in the way they show content. Even though people in China produce and upload videos, longer-format professional videos make up an immense percentage of online video content. A large portion of this content is made up of foreign programs which have been uploaded, pirated, and with subtitles hours after they were aired in the US.

Like Facebook, but different

RenRen (www.renren.com), the Chinese version of Facebook, is trendy within university students who use it for interacting and connecting with one another. The website is organized according to the users' graduation class and school. A lot of users share videos as well as pictures of their activities.

The more niche social networking site Douban (www.douban.com) attracts avid readers, movie fans, art students, and music lovers. Users connect based on similar passions and regularly engage in non-Internet-based activities such as going to nearby art exhibits.

The Internet as social media

The reality that some Internet users solely utilize social media platforms to access the Internet is a broader consequence of China's wide-ranging utilization of social media. This is just because of the huge amounts of new users that are continually joining on the internet. By the first quarter of 2010, China had 420 million netizens, up 36 million to the end of 2009. This data is sourced from the China Internet Network Information Center. When a new user first enters in, their friend usually introduces them to one prominent service, like how to use Sina Weibo for free friend interaction or China's version of eBay, Taobao (www.taobao.com), for buying products. Therefore, the new user's concept of the Internet is defined by that one service. The examples provided illustrate how many Chinese internet users have no ability to differentiate between social media as well as the Internet itself. Social media is the worldwide web to them, and the opposite of that.

This might be my final post, haha. Who knows, if one day I get some inspiration, I’ll continue blogging. If.

References

China Population 2023 (Live). (n.d.). https://worldpopulationreview.com/countries/china-population

Thomas Crampton  –  Social Media in China: The Same, but Different. (n.d.). Thomas Crampton. https://www.thomascrampton.com/china/social-media-china-business-review/

What is game?

According to Cambridge Dictionary (Game, 2023), an enjoyable sport or activity, especially one which is played by kids, or the gear needed to engage in one such as:

Indoor/computer games

A board games

Game where the children played role as a polices or robbers

A game can be said having complete details if every player understands every rule, each decision, and every player before play history at any time during the game.

What is gaming and how popular it is?

Playing video games on an electronic device, such as a PC, smartphone, or were experts gaming console, is categorised as gaming. Gamers refer to individuals who play video games on every day. Globally, playing video games is a very popular leisure activity. More than 3 billion people are thought to be passionate gamers. Based to a few estimates, the value of the global gaming market in 2022 is expected to vary from $180 billion to $220 billion. This represents almost two times the market size of the internationally film industry. Individuals who play mobile games on their mobile devices account for almost all of the gaming market.

Short history of gaming

The term "gambling" came into existence in the fifteenth century to signify gambling with dice or cards. Up until the end of the fifteenth century, the term "gaming" was used to refer to gambling; shortly after that, it was used to define playing board games and role-playing games for entertaining with paper and pen. Since the 1970s, after video games first came out, the term "gaming" has become more closely related to its modern meaning.

Groups of gaming

CASUAL GAMER - a person who only plays one low-intensity game or who plays games on occasion. Someone who plays word or crossword puzzles on their mobile device while watching TV at their house or while using public transportation is an example of a casual gamer. As a result of its broad popularity and flexibility of access that smartphones offer, casual gaming makes up for almost all of the gaming market. It's regular for a casual player not to call themselves a gamer.

HARDCORE GAMER - Someone who enjoys a lot of time playing video games. They typically own game consoles or gaming PCs that have been optimized for playing video games. A hardcore gamer plays a lot of games, generally concentrating on a particular genre or collection of games that they really love. Hardcore gamers usually identify as gamers.

PROFESSIONAL GAMER - Someone who uses gaming for earning money or self-supporting purposes Some compete competently in video game tournaments as an e-sports athletes. They might take part in events which are televised and establish a team or clan. They could gain from commercial sponsorships and the prize cash gained from tournaments.

Future gaming trends

Cloud gaming is the situation where the player's device does not run the game software. The gaming application is instead executed on the cloud server. The user gets a stream of the game's video after the server receives the input coming from the player. Because more realistic games demand stronger and more expensive hardware to run, cloud gaming continues to rise in popularity. With cloud gaming, all the user wants is an appropriately low-power devices for playing the stream—they don't even need to purchase and upgrade all of their equipment.

Augmented reality (AR) is the space where actual objects from games are projected. You can use a mobile device's camera feed or a stereoscopic headset for this. VR gaming through a headset remains in its infancy, and the necessary equipment, like Microsoft's HoloLens, is hard to get by. Because they are so easily accessible and offer a fresh perspective in terms of fusing actual environments with game elements, augmented reality mobile games are starting to become nearly popular.

Virtual reality (VR) games are used to watch stereoscopic, three-dimensional (3D) games once the player puts on a headset. They provide the player the impression that they are actually there in the virtual environment. At the moment, advanced VR headsets are pricey and desire powerful hardware for them to work. Additionally, during VR gaming sessions, some players encounter motion sickness. A majority of developers cannot afford to develop VR games because of the lack of widespread user adoption.

Gaming impacts

Gaming has had a huge impact on society and perhaps will in the future. It's critical to comprehend the potential pros and cons of playing games and to conduct it in a sensible and balanced approach. While gaming can have a positive social impact, it's important to bear in mind that, like any other activity, it may also have drawbacks if not used responsibly and in a balanced manner. Some people might develop detrimental gaming habits, like playing for a long period of time or ignoring other responsibilities. People must play video games in a responsible and balanced manner. It's essential for parents and other grownups to keep an eye on their kids' gaming habits in order to make sure it's not affecting their health as a whole.

Gaming beneficials

Gaming can promote cognitive growth:

Puzzles and hurdles that players have to solve and surpass can be discovered in games. In order to get the best results, some games require the player to multitask and prioritize objectives. Gamers may quickly improve their ability to make choices skills. Certain video games have the ability of simulating historically significant, scientific, and economic systems. According to some research, those who enjoy video games perform better on tasks which require fast recall.

Playing games can promote spatial reasoning:

Gamers can boost their ability to visualize and navigate environments in three-dimensional space. boosted maneuvering in real life may result from this. Also, studies have demonstrated that specialists who playing video games prior to doing robotic or laparoscopic surgery have greater success than those who do not.

It doesn't take much to develop a gaming addiction. Players may ignore their own lives or escape from society as a consequence of this. This has forced laws to be issued in some countries that constrain how long kids can play games. Some games offer random incentives. These random prizes sometimes come with the option to be bought with real money through small transactions or for sale or purchase on a market. A few individuals compare this to gaming. To protect customers, a few different countries implemented rules prohibiting the habit of focusing on for random rewards.

References

game. (2023, November 22). https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/game

What is game theory and what are some of its applications? (2003, June 2). Scientific American. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-is-game-theory-and-w/

Wright, G. (2022, November 16). gaming. WhatIs.com. https://www.techtarget.com/whatis/definition/gaming

Gaming and its Impact on Society. (n.d.). https://www.tutorialspoint.com/gaming-and-its-impact-on-society

“Fandom, fandom, fandom. “Fan” and “dom”. Who createed this word of fandom? And what the relationship between “dom” and “fan”? Yeah, I know fan is admiring something or someone, but what is dom?” – yeah, this was me, stressing myself after attended our class during week 9. To be honest, fandom topic really brings me back to my childhood memory where I really love to watch KPOP.  Okay, enough with my story. Now let’s move with week 9 lecture topic, fandom.

What is fandom?

Fandom is the condition of being passionate supporter of someone or something (Fandom, 2023). Meanwhile, (Cooper, 2014) defines fandom is a greatly beneficial addition towards one’s own enjoyment as well as that of the community. For example, Harry Potter fandom or also recognized as Potterheads. What makes you a Potterhead? If you are already read all the books for multiple times, watched all the Harry Potter series multiple times and took quiz regarding Harry Potter, then you are already a Potterhead.

What is media function in fandom and fans?

As our technology nowadays is rapidly expand, so does the social media platforms. Social medias now are not just for people get the latest news, to keep in touch with friends or family or blogging. Social medias now have become one platform where people can create a community. The development and growth of fans and fandom has been greatly supported by the media. Fans of books, movies, music, video games and TV shows, are able to interact and share their interests freely by using the social media and internet.

By giving common interest and a forum for interaction and engagement, media are able to assist fans and fandom flourish. Fan now are able to communicate with fellow fans who share the same passions, emotions and express their views about the media they adore and involving in creative writing and fan art projects by using X, Facebook and other online platforms. By releasing fresh news and announcements that keep followers interested and engaged, media might additionally contribute to the to the expansion of fandom and fans. In particular, the reveal of an upcoming film in an ongoing series or the airing of new TV programme episodes can excite motivate audience engagement. However, a lot of the same mechanisms that organize the educational economy can also be found in fan culture, which can work against the involvement of people colour. Scholarly peer critism, research and analysis and fandom always exist in a dynamic and variable balance as components of any personals or team’s attitude towards a cultural work, as proved by decades of fan scholarship. Yet, gender-based authority and racially might causes these interests to split (De Kosnik & Carrington, 2019).

Psychological impacts

Media-facilitated fandoms may influence people and groups mentally in several of ways. Depending on the circumstances and the person, these consequences may be positive and bad. Considering positive impacts of fandoms encouraged by media are:

               Sense of belonging and community: Fans may provide people who might otherwise feel alone or disconnected a sense of belonging and connection. Engaging with fan might offer a feeling of direction and a way to meet people who share your interests.

               Increased self-esteem: Being a part of a supporters can provide someone with an overwhelming feeling of accomplishment and credit for their contributions, and this can increase their self-esteem.

               Escape and distraction: Fandoms can be a source of entertainment and distraction as well as a getaway from the stresses and struggles of everyday life.

As for negative impact, psychological consequences that fandoms can have, such as obsessive behaviours or prioritising fandom above other facets of life. In addition, unpleasant or toxic relationships can happen on occasion inside a fanbase, which can cause anxiety or worry.

In general, depending on the person and the scenario, fandoms generated by media can have various psychological impacts. Fandoms can be harmful if they grow into unhealthy obsessions or if bonds within the fandom are poisonous or bad. They may also have negative influences on a person's sense of belonging, while belonging, and self-worth.

References

fandom. (2023, November 22). https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/fandom

Cooper, B. L. (2014, April 10). Understanding Fandom: An Introduction to the Study of Media Fan Culture. Popular Music and Society, 38(1), 109–111. https://doi.org/10.1080/03007766.2014.908524

De Kosnik, A., & Carrington, A. (2019, March 15). Fans of color, fandoms of color. Transformative Works and Cultures, 29. https://doi.org/10.3983/twc.2019.1783

Fans and Fandom Facilitated by Media. (n.d.). https://www.tutorialspoint.com/fans-and-fandom-facilitated-by-media#:~:text=Media%20has%20played%20a%20significant,connect%20and%20share%20their%20passions.

As I mentioned above, can crowdfunding build a community for creatives? What do you think? Alright, before we proceed, lets dive a little about what is crowdfunding, what is crowdsourcing and what is community for creatives meaning.

What is crowdfunding?

According to (Christensen, 2023), crowdfunding is a digital fundraising strategy, enabling individuals or businesses to raise money from people via online platforms, to support business, projects or causes.

Image from Arrow Electronics

What is crowdsourcing?

According to (Hargrave), crowdsourcing involves obtaining work, information or opinions from a large group of people who submit their data via the internet, social media and smartphones apps.

Image from Innovation Observer

What is community for creatives?

According to (Haslam et al., 2014), community of creatives is a sense of shared social identity provides the motivation for people to stick to a creative project and see it to completion.

What is community for creatives role in crowdfunding and crowdsourcing?

As the internet nowadays had become part of the daily routines with 4.95 billion users worldwide as of 2023 (McCain, 2023). With the exponential growth of the internet users, it will be easier for the certain individual do their crowdfunding through online communities as their new method to build the business. These are the example of what the community did to support crowdfunding such as, arranging mentor-mentee for the newbies, storing the sample project as references and giving an opinion or response for the newbies campaign presentation.

Crowdsourcing word was invented by Jeff Howe in 2006 in his article called “The Rise of Crowdsourcing”.  The origin word of crowdsourcing is crowds and outsourcing. To nail the targeted, social media platforms is a basic method to support this attempt. There are some examples of social media that have certain types of crowdsourcing, such as Mturks, Amazon and Mechanical Turk. Meantime, nonprofit organisations seeking to connect with the promoter after vendors provide crowdsourcing platforms for a suitable sale.

As I mentioned above, crowdfunding is a digital fundraising strategy to support business. Commonly, crowdfunding by certain individual or newbie companies to start or expand their organization. Its an ingenious approach for acquiring investment for fresh efforts, ideas and business plan. Furthermore, it could help to gain a community surrounding your offering. Plus, by the power of the internet community could help gain new clients as well as helpful knowledge from the industry.

Website that allows an interaction between funders and their supporters are recognised as crowdfunding platforms. Through crowdfunding platform, agreements of money can be submitted and received. There a few main kinds of crowdfunding,

Profit-sharing/revenue sharing

In return for current help, businesses could give the community a share of their possible future earnings or profits.

2. Donation-based crowdfunding

A little amount of fund from some individuals are made with the purpose to help a particular charity-related project’s larger supportive objective with zero expectation of financial or personal gain.

3. Peer-to-peer crowdfunding

With an expectation that the fund will gain profit, the community give loans or fund for business. The major distinction within it and borrowing from bank is the number of shareholders you gain from.

Now, back to our question just now. In my humble opinion, I would love to say yes, crowdfunding and crowdsourcing can build a community for creatives. Why? As we can see from the definitions given above, we can say that through this crowdsourcing we can develop a new connection with the communities by putting some ad on the social media platforms. For example, putting the fun run ad to raise a donation for the orphanage through Facebook or YouTube. Some people will participate this for fun and some will participate to donate for the orphanage. Other than that, indirectly crowdfunding will help newbie who just planned to startup their business to build a new connection with some expert or gain new clients.

References

Christensen, M. (2023) Crowdfunding: What it is, how it works, types & websites, P2PMarketData. Available at: https://p2pmarketdata.com/articles/crowdfunding/ (Accessed: 11 November 2023).

Hargrave, M. (no date) Crowdsourcing: Definition, how it works, types, and examples, Investopedia. Available at: https://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/crowdsourcing.asp (Accessed: 11 November 2023).

Haslam, S.A., Adarves-Yorno, I. and Postmes, T. (2014) Creative communities are key to innovation, Scientific American. Available at: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/creative-communities-are-key-to-innovation/ (Accessed: 11 November 2023).

Hui, J.S., Greenberg, M.D. and Gerber, E.M., 2014, February. Understanding the role of community in crowdfunding work. In Proceedings of the 17th ACM conference on Computer supported cooperative work & social computing (pp. 62-74).

 McCain, A. (2023) How fast is technology advancing? [2023]: Growing, evolving, and accelerating at exponential rates, Zippia. Available at: https://www.zippia.com/advice/how-fast-is-technology-advancing/#:~:text=There%20are%204.95%20billion%20internet,and%2050%20billion%20by%202030. (Accessed: 11 November 2023).

Pratt, M.K. and Gonsalves, C. (2023) What is crowdsourcing?: Definition from TechTarget, CIO. Available at: https://www.techtarget.com/searchcio/definition/crowdsourcing (Accessed: 11 November 2023).

Crowdfunding explained. (n.d.). Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship and SMEs. https://single-market-economy.ec.europa.eu/access-finance/guide-crowdfunding/what-crowdfunding/crowdfunding-explained_en#:~:text=Crowdfunding%20is%20a%20way%20of,way%20of%20accessing%20alternative%20funds.

Gif from giphy

Hi there! This week’s blog is about public health and we will dive a little about the coronavirus disease, also known as covid-19 and in days gone by, named 2019 novel coronavirus. Coronavirus was first spotted at one of open air “wet market” in Wuhan, China. Afterwards, during that time, there was an assumption that there might a coronavirus originated in one of lab in China as a biological weapon. However, the newest reports concur that the coronavirus is not an engineered virus being developed to become a biological weapon.

What is social media role during coronavirus issue?

According to (Abbas et al., 2021), people usage time on social media is higher than usual during COVID-19 pandemic period since social media is the only platform where people can search for health information for their own and their loved one’s benefits. Due to global crisis and health disaster during the pandemic, social medias have become the most welcome relief for people.

(Abbas et al., 2021) also stated, typically, users will create or share about health information that already available via local or international sources as their response to an international public health issue.

As social media platforms can bring impacts to people, people also need someone who can share their own life experience or their knowledge about health issue and shared their experience or knowledge about health information. This method called peer support. The peer support concept on social media is referring to health information that will help people to know more about Covid-19 pandemic issue. People will be searching for health-related news regarding to Covid-19 pandemic in their social media account, for example the most common one is Facebook. Since Covid-19 pandemic brought “culture shock” to the world, people will be searching for the detailed health-related update and stay keep in touch with family, friends and peers. Public communication and interaction searching for accurate information and opportunity of Covid-19 to create proper virus prevention on social media. Since social media provides the latest news and trustable information to the world, social media have become the central role in answering in global health crisis issue.

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Social media and electronic government (E-government) role during Covid-19 pandemic in Malaysia

Image from YouTube

First Covid-19 case detected in Malaysia after three individuals had a close contact with one individual in Singapore. They had their trip into Malaysia from Singapore on January 24th 2020 and tested positive on January 25th 2020. After that, on the February 4th 2020, the very first Malaysian was tested positive Covid-19 after he returned from Singapore and started to cough and had fever.

During the pandemic time, the Ministry of Health of Malaysia take advantages of social media to educate and spread the awareness to the public about the Covid-19 precautions. On 18th March 2020 until 18th April 2020, the Malaysia Government implemented Movement Control Order (MCO) to control the Covid-19 from widespread.

During the entire period of Covid-19, social media accounts for example like X (previously known as Twitter) and WeChat were used to share the updates about preventive measure and healthcare. After Tan Sri Muhyiddin implemented MCO, the media started to actively using the #stayhome hashtag to spread the awareness. The government of Malaysia come up with enough latest information to the public via the Official Portal of the Ministry of Health Malaysia, verified Facebook page named Kementerian Kesihatan Malaysia posted about the Crisis Preparedness and Response Center (CRPC) and Telegram channel named CPRC KKM.

The Malaysia government also launched one application that can only used on mobile named MySejahtera in April 20202 to help all the users to keep track of their health progress, helping the authorities to collect the latest information, check in location and come up with the most essential and fast reply.

Screenchot of CPRC KKM telegram page

Screenshot of KKM Facebook page

Now, if you ask me, i would definitely say yes. I do agree that social media is useful in spreading information on Covid-19 because through social media is the way that Ministry of Health Malaysia can reach out to the people since gathering is not allowed during the MCO period. People will depend on social media to stay connected with their family or friend and also to get the latest update regarding to health issues.

Image from Facebook

References

Brennan, D. (2022) Coronavirus history: How did coronavirus start?Dan, WebMD. Available at: https://www.webmd.com/covid/coronavirus-history (Accessed: 01 November 2023).

Abbas, J. et al. (2021) Social media technology during COVID-19: RMHP, Risk Management and Healthcare Policy. Available at: https://www.dovepress.com/the-role-of-social-media-in-the-advent-of-covid-19-pandemic-crisis-man-peer-reviewed-fulltext-article-

Elengoe, A. (2020, June). Covid-19 outbreak in Malaysia. Osong public health and research perspectives. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7258884/#:~:text=On%20the%2025th%20January,the%2024th%20January%202020.

Ahamd, N. S., Zulkifli Hussain, Abd Hamid, H. S., & Khairani, A. Z. (2021, July 10). Roles of social media and counselling support in reducing anxiety among Malaysian during COVID-19 pandemic. International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2212420921004179

Kahe. (2021, May 4). Important role of social media during pandemic disaster. Karpagam Academy of Higher Education. https://kahedu.edu.in/important-role-of-social-media-during-pandemic-disaster/

Md Shah, A. U., Azrie Safri, S. N., Thevadas, R., Noordin, N. K., Abd Rahman, A., Sekawi, Z., Ideris, A., Hameed Sultan, M. T., & h. (2020, June 2). Covid-19 outbreak in Malaysia: Actions taken by the Malaysian government. International Journal of Infectious Diseases. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1201971220304008#:~:text=The%20Government%20of%20Malaysia%20enforced,personal%20protective%20equipment%20for%20frontliners.

Mat Dawi, N., Namazi, H., Hwang, H. J., Ismail, S., Maresova, P., & Krejcar, O. (2021, January 27). Attitude toward protective behavior engagement during covid-19 pandemic in Malaysia: The role of E-government and Social Media. Frontiers. https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpubh.2021.609716/full#:~:text=Malaysia%20residents%20can%20get%20information,of%20CPRC%20KKM%20(24).

What is activism & protest? What is interesting about activism and protest?

Gif from Tenor

Before we proceed, lets understand what is activism and what is protest meaning. According to (Cambridge Dictionary, 2019), eye-catching activity and the use of direct to achieve an output, normally a political and social one. While, protest is a huge objection voicing opposition, disagreement and disapproval.

The most popular protests in United State history are in August 1963 called, March on Washington. This protest happened during Martin Luther King Jr. presented his famous speech, “I Have a Dream” and more than 200, 000 of people attended for a peaceful manifestation to call for racial equality and gathered outside the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C. Because of this protest, President John F. Kennedy felt pressure to move up civil right policies. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 also succeed because of this protest. (Famous Protests in US History and Their Impacts, 2022). Picture below was a photo they looking out on a sea of signs during the March on Washington, Aug 28, 1963.

Picture from Getty Images

How does social media affect protest?

Picture from Wellbeing Magazine

Obviously, social media does have a power to marshal people in protest. Through social media platforms, the wrongdoing evidence can be reported rapidly and in generally, the culprit will be responsible for their doings. For example, Black Lives Matter protests provoked worldwide when George Floyd’s murder news in May 2020 was filmed.

Picture from Gazeta Liberale

Sarah Everard’s murder case was used for education on gender inequality forcefully. This incident caused a protest called the Reclaim the Nights/Reclaim the Streets.

Picture from LBC

Even so, social media fast quick response to spread the news can lead to a good and bad situation. In other word, people will take social media’s ability to publish true lies and make situation become worse.  One of X user named Fawaz Rashed posted, “We use Facebook to schedule the protests, Twitter (known as X now) to coordinate, and YouTube to tell the world.” #egypt #jan25 (can check on https://twitter.com/FawazRashed/status/48882406010257408?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E48882406010257408%7Ctwgr%5E64f4b5ff2b4f1997c6017e30874fb0ce9d5ac1f7%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theguardian.com%2Fworld%2F2016%2Fjan%2F25%2Fegypt-5-years-on-was-it-ever-a-social-media-revolution for his post.)

On 2011, January 25, there was a protest happened in Egypt called “day of rage” where Egyptians wants their President Hosni Mubarak who had been hold the President position for 30 years to steps down from his position on the spot. Around 6, 500 peoples injured and leastways 840 were killed during that day, according to Amnesty International (2011). Picrture from Aljazeera

How can social media used for activism?

Picture from Scoop.it

Social media is where user post share their photo, share some random thoughts or share any facts or data. This thing is one of engagement with audiences by assist them to understand the situation. Social media help user to become aware with any issues around them.

References

Activism. Cambridge Dictionary. (n.d.). https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/activism

Stacker.com. (2022, January 24). Famous protests in US history and their impacts. WNCT. https://www.wnct.com/news/national/famous-protests-in-us-history-and-their-impacts/#:~:text=1963%3A%20March%20on%20Washington

The role of social media in protests: Mobilising or polarising? - 89 initiative: The first European think-do tank. 89 Initiative | The first European think-do tank. (2021, April 6). https://89initiative.com/the-role-of-social-media-in-protests-mobilising-or-polarising/#:~:text=Social%20media

‌ Egypt rises: Killings, detentions and torture in the “25 january revolution.” Amnesty International. (2011, May 19). https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/mde12/027/2011/en/

Social media as activism and Social Justice. Maryville Online. (2020, June 11). https://online.maryville.edu/blog/a-guide-to-social-media-activism/#:~:text=Spreading%20Awareness&text=Social%20media%20can%20create%20a

Have you ever wondered about what is politic and political engagement is? If yes, lets take a minutes to get to know what is politic and what did they do.

gift from Tenor

What is politic? As we know, politic is one of the most popular topics in the world. Why?? The British Academy, Professor Christina Boswell FBA stated that politics is something that is necessary about sorting out the argument over the giving out the things (Boswell, 2020). In a general way, politics is a communication between communities, organisations or even individuals that look forward to achieve the option about doing a collaborative choice or find a solution for some collaborative problem. As political are involve in governments, these communications become their primary focus in political science (Rom et al.).

Gif from Gifer

Now what is political engagement? According to Carole Jean, political engagement is a voluntary activities handle by a bunch of public to give impact public policy, either directly or by affecting the selection of persons who make policies (Uhlaner, 2015).

Meanwhile, world bank define political engagement as the involvement of communities in voting and allows the leader who have power in government, as well as become part of competitor for leadership (n.d.).

Who is the main user of social media?

Image from Oberlo

Based on the global demographics above, we can say that aged 20-29 are the most users of social media. The previously mentioned group is about 31.8% worldwide amount of social media users. Most of these users are male which is about 17.5% compare to female, only 14.3%. Second higher group is users aged 30-29, with 21.9%. Same as the previous group, the majority users are male with 12.1% and just 9.8% are female. The third higher group is aged 13-19 with 12.7% and 10% for users aged 50-59 in social media. The lowest users is aged 60 and above with 8.6%. From this demographics research, we can tell that the older that person, the lesser their spent time on social media. This might because young-adults is likely social media as a source of all the information. On the other hand, the senior citizens is doubtful and still prefer old method such as television (Oberlo, 2023).

How social media affects politics?

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According to (Satterfield, 2020), as internet became more useful these days, same goes to the politics. To be specific, social media is now a become major factor in political movements and in the way people think about issues.

Participants and their followers frequently share their thought on social media such as X (previously was known as Twitter) and Facebook account. Every politic parties will requests for donations and spread propaganda through their own pages. Lets take a look on how social media can give impact politics nowadays.

Demographics and targeting

To make sure that messages and ads grasp the right audience, objective is used all over the advertising the advertising corporation. For example, if a participant aims for a group of voters, women's concerns, college students or elderly people, they can now create their messages. Participants and politicians are able to use their targeted advertising and analytics just like some ads on Facebook. Therefore, it is not a coincidence if you aware that political message seem to be speak to you directly.

2. News around the clock

Poll results, shared rumor and news haste on social media is one of the way that caused the politics transformed. While during the previous days, to get the latest news, citizens waited for TV news show or the next newspaper. Meanwhile via online, we can get the latest news 24/7. Most citizen spend extra time on X and Facebook compare to how they do on political sites or serious news. In the words, whenever you logon your social media account, you will automatically get all of the people's thoughts or the latest viral news on social media.

3. The impact of polls

The internet really gave a huge impact by increasing the amount of poll results to the political news. Social media play their part to accelerated this very well. Polls results also give a huge impact on elections. Such as, if people think one participant is already far ahead in the contest, they may conclude the other participants will be pointless voting for the loser. It will a big deal of tension on participants to move forward of their competitor when netizen start to post the latest poll results.

List of references

FBA, P.C.B. (2020) ‘What is politics?’, The British Academy, 14 January. Available at: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/blog/what-is-politics/ (Accessed: 08 October 2023).

Rom, M.C., Hidaka, M. and Walker, R.B. (no date) 1.1 defining politics: Who gets what, when, where, how, and why? - introduction to political science, OpenStax. Available at: https://openstax.org/books/introduction-political-science/pages/1-1-defining-politics-who-gets-what-when-where-how-and-why (Accessed: 08 October 2023).

Making Politics Work for Development (no date) World Bank. Available at: https://thedocs.worldbank.org/en/doc/612211464199873818-0050022016/original/Chapter2PoliticalEngagement.pdf (Accessed: 08 October 2023).

Uhlaner, C. J. (2015). Political Participation - an overview | ScienceDirect Topics. Sciencedirect.com. https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/social-sciences/political-participation

(n.d.). Making Politics Work for Development [Review of Making Politics Work for Development]. In World Bank (p. 1). Retrieved October 17, 2023, from https://thedocs.worldbank.org/en/doc/612211464199873818-0050022016/original/Chapter2PoliticalEngagement.pdf

Oberlo. (2023). What Age Group Uses Social Media the Most? Www.oberlo.com. https://www.oberlo.com/statistics/what-age-group-uses-social-media-the-most#:~:text=According%20to%20recent%20research%2C%20global

‌Satterfield, H. (2020, March 11). How Social Media Affects Politics. Meltwater. https://www.meltwater.com/en/blog/social-media-affects-politics

Satterfield, H. (2020, March 11). How Social Media Affects Politics. Meltwater. https://www.meltwater.com/en/blog/social-media-affects-politics

‌

Before we get started, lets explore what blogging is about.

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According to Artem Minaev, blogging is an online journal or informational information on internet.  (Minaev, 2019) Blog was created in 1994 by Justin Hall during his time in Swarthmore University. Blog also known as community formation where people talking about food, music, fashion, health, "mummy", entertainment and many more. Putting in a nut shell, we can say that blogging is a public diaries on the social media.

What is tiktok and why is it so popular? According to Deborah D'Souza, TikTok is a social media platform where people can create, watch and share their creativity in 15 second duration videos shot. (D'Souza, 2023)

Image by Reddit

In TikTok, people also can create their own filter and anyone can use it, stitching other people video in a different country as a content.

In 2016, TikTok was launched by the Chinese technology company named ByteDance and its previous name was Douyin. At that time, TikTok wasn't really popular as now. TikTok started popular during the movement control order (MCO) due to COVID19 virus.

‌Why TikTok is so popular? According to Courtney Cooper, built-in features in TikTok make easy for people to quickly editing, recording and posting it on their account and the video will gone viral in a minutes when they put #fyp in their caption.(MuteSix et al., 2023)

What is Instagram?

Image by Digital Information World

According to Brian Holak and Emily McLaughlin, Instagram is an online photo sharing application and socila network platform where allowed people to comment and like people image and also can be viewed by public if their using hastag and is their account is in public mode. (Holak & McLaughlin, 2017)

Instagram was created by Kevin Systrom and his partner Mike Krieger in San Francisco. At first, they was trying to create one application that akin to one app called Foursquare but they turned their idea to create an app where people can share their photo. Instagram is a simple short form of telegram and instant camera.

People also can send private message to each other on Instagram and mention people in their posting or their Instagram stories. Photos also can be share on other social media platform such as Facebook.

Other than that, Instagram social media platform also use to to business branding.

Now back to the question. In my opinion, yes. Blogging is still relevant in the age of TikTok and Instagram. People will still continue to blog since blogging is also part of people's life since blog is introduced and as I mentioned above, blogging is an online diaries for certain group of people who love to share their thought with public.

References

Minaev, A. (2023) What is a blog? - definition of blog, Blogging & Blogger, FirstSiteGuide. Available at: https://firstsiteguide.com/what-is-blog/ (Accessed: 02 October 2023).

D’Souza, D. (2023) Tiktok: What it is, how it works, and why it’s popular, Investopedia. Available at: https://www.investopedia.com/what-is-tiktok-4588933 (Accessed: 02 October 2023).

MuteSix, Ma, J. and Cooper, C. (2023) Why is TikTok so popular? 10 reasons for its success, Mutesix. Available at: https://mutesix.com/why-is-tiktok-so-popular-10-reasons-for-its-success/#:~:text=TikTok%20Is%20Fun%20and%20Creative,making%20their%20content%20go%20viral. (Accessed: 02 October 2023).

‌Holak, B. and McLaughlin, E. (2017) What is Instagram?: Definition from TechTarget, CIO. Available at: https://www.techtarget.com/searchcio/definition/Instagram (Accessed: 02 October 2023).