A simple girl

Unicorn Riot’s protest coverage recalls long history of grassroots video production

A Unicorn Riot videographer films an interview on the streets of Minneapolis on May 29, 2020. Stephen Maturen/Getty Images

On-the-ground views of the protests sweeping the country are vital for understanding who is protesting and why. Mainstream news media coverage and individuals’ social media posts only go so far – and can focus on violence and disruption.

There’s a grassroots media tradition in…

“Wokewashing”— the latest questionable PR strategy  

Ben & Jerry’s opened Art for Justice, which highlights the need for criminal justice reform and features art by formerly incarcerated artists. AP Images/Andy Duback

More consumers want companies to address societal problems, including climate change and crumbling infrastructure.

Additionally, more than half want to buy from brands that take stands on social issues.

At the same time, consumers are

Detecting deepfakes by looking closely reveals a way to protect against them

Are any of these faces real? meyer_solutions/Shutterstock.com

Deepfake videos are hard for untrained eyes to detect because they can be quite realistic. Whether used as personal weapons of revenge, to manipulate financial markets or to destabilize international relations, videos depicting people doing and saying things they never did or said are a fundamental threat to the longstanding idea that…

Will Netflix eventually monetize its user data?

Netflix currently spends much more cash than it brings in, leading to consistent negative cash flow and a mountain of debt. sakhorn/Shutterstock.com

Even in the wake of a recent mixed earning report and volatile stock prices, Netflix remains the media success story of the decade. The company, whose user base has grown rapidly, now boasts almost 150 million global subscribers.

But as someone who…

Study shows the paw-sitive effects of watching cat videos

Come watch me play! Paul Reynolds/flickr, CC BY

According to ReelSEO.com, a website about video marketing, there are more than two million cat videos on YouTube. People have watched these videos more than 25 billion times, which equates to an average of 12,000 views per cat video.

The statistics speak for themselves, but they don’t tell the whole story.

Perhaps it’s because I’m a dog lover with a…

It’s time to get ready for augmented reality

WayRay’s holographic AR device displays information tailored to drivers and passengers. WayRay

The world’s largest annual consumer technology show — CES 2018 in Las Vegas — took place in January 2018 and some of the most exciting gadgets this year were on display in the augmented reality (AR) marketplace.

This follows the news, announced in December, that 2018 will be the year the previously…

How artificial intelligence can detect – and create – fake news

Is that clickbait true? Crystal Eye Studio/Shutterstock.com

When Mark Zuckerberg told Congress Facebook would use artificial intelligence to detect fake news posted on the social media site, he wasn’t particularly specific about what that meant. Given my own work using image and video analytics, I suggest the company should be careful. Despite some basic potential flaws, AI can be a useful…

Don’t quit Facebook, but don’t trust it, either

What is this man doing with your data? AP Photo/Jeff Roberson

Is it time to give up on social media? Many people are thinking about that in the wake of revelations regarding Cambridge Analytica’s questionable use of personal data from over 50 million Facebook users to support the Trump campaign. Not to mention the troubles with data theft, trolling, harassment, the proliferation of fake news, cons…

Government regulation of social media would not be a ‘cure’

NextNewMedia

[dropcap style=”font-size: 60px; color: #c4322d;”]I[/dropcap]n recent weeks, Congress has grilled Twitter, Facebook and Google about their role in allowing foreign interests to place ads and articles intended to divide the electorate and spread false information during the 2016 election.

Now a number of people in and out of government are calling for federal regulationof social media.

Is the new iPhone designed for cybersafety?

How safe is it to use an iPhone? Mesk Photography/Shutterstock.com

[dropcap style=”font-size: 60px; color: #c4322d;”]A[/dropcap]s eager customers meet the new iPhone, they’ll explore the latest installment in Apple’s decade-long drive to make sleeker and sexier phones. But to me as a scholar of cybersecurity, these revolutionary innovations have not come without compromises.

Early iPhones…

What if someone posts an unflattering photo of you on social media?

How could they post that of me? Woman image via www.shutterstock.com.

[dropcap style=”font-size: 60px; color: #c4322d;”]O[/dropcap]pen your Twitter or Instagram account and chances are good somewhere in there you may see an unflattering photo of a stranger. It’s become increasingly common to share pictures of people we don’t know online.

And it could happen to you. Imagine, for…

Why are there so few women critics?

epa04937265 Spanish director Alejandro Amenabar (2-R) and executive producers Paolo Vasile (R), Fernando Bovaira (2-L) and Axel Kuschevatzky (L) attend the press conference for ‘Regression’ at the 63rd annual San Sebastian International Film Festival, in San Sebastian, Spain, 18 September 2015. The movie presented in the Official Selection opens the festival running from 18 to 26 September.…

What to say to clients who want to write their own copy

[dropcap style=”font-size: 60px; color: #c4322d;”]I[/dropcap] recently had an international nonprofit contact me about a brochure to attract more sponsors. “We’ll provide the content,” they said.

Clients who want to write their own copy can pose a problem. Obviously, any designer can design with copy that’s provided by a client.

Yet client copy almost always has the following issues:

there’s too…

What Facebook Live means for journalism

Facebook Live streaming after the police shooting death of Philando Castile. Tony Webster, CC BY-SA

[dropcap style=”font-size: 60px; color: #c4322d;”]E[/dropcap]very week seems to bring another devastating Facebook Live video posted online. A Florida teenager killed herself live on the internet in January. A woman in Sweden was reportedly raped while her three attackers broadcast itfor hundreds to…

The sound and the furious rewriting

William Faulkner was a high school dropout and never formally trained as a writer, which may seem to disprove my entire point, but I’m sticking with it anyway.

I wish someone had taught me to write in college. Really write.

All we were instructed to do was to write papers. Most of us thought if we wrote terribly long, convoluted sentences that we’d sound smarter than the actual words and meaning…

The key to writing a Pulitzer Prize-winning story? Get emotional

A bust of newspaper magnate Joseph Pulitzer looks on as reporters look through a box containing the announcements of the 1996 Pulitzer Prizes at Columbia University. AP Photo/Wally Santana

The 2017 Pulitzer Prizes have just been announced, and this year’s winners of the prestigious award include Charleston Gazette-Mail reporter Eric Eyre for his investigative reporton the drug companies that…

Explainer: the exciting new genre of the audio-visual film essay

Explainer: the exciting new genre of the audio-visual film essay

A still from Mirrors of Bergman, a profoundly moving audio-visual essay. Vimeo.

During March, the renowned film scholar Adrian Martin and the film critic Cristina Álvarez López are conducting a series of public workshops and lectures on a new and exciting phenomenon of digital film culture: the audio-visual essay.

Barely ten years…