#structuralaffordances

Nick Adamson

Micah Nakamoto

Giang Nguyen

Background and History of Facebook:

Facebook was founded by Mark Zuckerberg with his roommates and a fellow Harvard University student Eduardo Saverin. The social network itself was really limited at first, then it was expanded to make it available for users.  Facebook predecessor is Facemash. It was created by Mark Zuckerberg and three of his classmates - Andrew McCollum, Christ Hughes and Dustin Moskovitz. It was just a type of “hot or not” game. In 2004, Zuckerberg wrote the code for a new website ‘theFacebook,’ he then realized "It is clear that the technology needed to create a centralized Website is readily available ... the benefits are many." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Facebook)

In February 2004, Zuckerberg launched ‘theFacebook’ and within 24 hours they had “somewhere between twelve hundred and fifteen hundred registrants”. He continued to develop the site even after dropping out of Harvard University his sophomore year. In June 2004, ‘theFacebook’ was renamed to ‘Facebook’ after purchasing the domain name facebook.com for $200,000.

From October 1st, 2005 the network then expanded to Ivy League Universities, then out of the U.S Universities, and eventually high schools and companies. In 2007, Facebook had 100,000 business pages. In 2010, the network invited users to become beta testers. As of February 2011, Facebook had become the largest online photo sharing website and expected to have 100 billion photos by summer 2011. By that time, over 350 million users accessed Facebook thru their mobile phones.

On March 12th, 2012 ‘Yahoo!’ filed a suit in a U.S. federal court against Facebook. On April 24th, 2014 Facebook and Storyful announced a new feature called FB Newswire. Facebook headquarters complex are located in Menlo Park, California and its former headquarters are in downtown Palo Alto California.  Facebook income was very positive as they hired Sheryl Sandberg as the Chief Operating Officer in March 2008. In 2014, Facebook revenue was 12,466 million U.S dollar and the net income was 2,940.

Features of Facebook:

‘Facebook’ is a social networking site that allows users to create their own individual profile and page.  A person can construct a profile for free on the facebook website by creating an account with a username and password.  You can chose to make your Facebook account private or public.  If you set your profile to private then only people you are friends with on Facebook will be able to see your profile and comments.  Whereas if you leave your profile on public then anybody can see your page/profile.  A major concern to privacy advocates is the ability of third party app developers to access your friendlist and other private information in your profile without even knowing.  People on facebook are given the freedom to follow any profile or page.  When you follow someone their posts and updates will show up on your news feed.  If the person choses to follow you back then they will see your posts and updates on their feed.  Facebook allows users to communicate with friends through messaging, posting pictures, liking or commenting on other people's pictures and putting information on your profile that you want people to know about you.  The news feed is composed of status updates, photos, links, and app activity from people you follow on Facebook.  Facebook can be accessed on the Internet, your smartphone and many other devices.

Performative Infrastructure:

Algorithms are used in Facebook by displaying the best list of content to its users’ on their newsfeed page. To make the best list Facebook uses a few criteria like your activity and interest, or what your friends liked/commented on and their interests. It also takes into account who is your best friend and how popular is the content that is currently being liked and commented on the most. Some of the things that Facebook uses algorithms for are their news feed, top friends, friend suggestions, graph search, sponsored posts/advertising, and year in review. Facebook uses information from its users’ interests and the content that they and their friends liked and commented on to give users the best list of news feed and help them with suggestions for friends or while searching.

Structural Affordances:

Information on Facebook such as pictures, status updates and comments can stay up for a long time. This is affordance is known as persistence and means that information or things people say can stay around.  A person can remove pictures and other information in their profile they have posted but some things can be saved by others who have seen it. Information such as pictures can be easily duplicated on facebook.  This affordance is called replicability.  Users can repost these duplicates and people wouldn’t be able to tell the difference from the original.  Scalability is very limited on facebook compared to other social networking sites because on facebook you must get approval to follow other users on Facebook.  Users can broadcast their content to other users to try attract more followers.  Profiles can be searched through search engines such as google and yahoo.  On Facebook users can search for other people and follow them or check their page out if it’s a public page.  The use of search engines to find other people’s profiles could lead to privacy issues since some people have personal thing in their profiles.

Facebook does have all 3 dynamics Invisible audiences, Collapsed Contexts, The blurring of public and private (Danah Boyd (2010).”Social Networks sites as Networked Publics: Affordances, Dynamics and Implications.”In Networked Self: Identity, Community, and Culture on Social Network Sites(ed. Zizi Papacharissi)

Facebook can be used as an environment to meet new people, a place for individuals to express themselves to the others through means of communication; an advertise or commercial page, etc. it cannot be limited.

This social network has changed users’ participation. People can now access to unlimited contents just by looking up specific matters or using hashtags. A lot of pages about specific matters are created which will benefit people interested in it. It also gives suggestions as the users update their profiles. The more details people put online about themselves the more accurately Facebook will give suggestions (and predictions). With its algorithms Facebook has succeeded in connecting people who have same taste, habit and so on. This success has attracted more and more users and continue to ‘shape’ their participation.

Facebook makes itself a prime place for public communication because it allows users’ to freely message and view other peoples content. Facebook also has a feature to create specific pages which allows users’ to freely express their opinions with other people that share the same view or are able to comment on other pages that they disagree with. For more of a romantic type of communication facebook allows users’ to send private message to others.

Possibilities and functionality in a poly media environment, Facebook allow users to write posts, update status, upload videos and pictures, send messages with their customized privacy. Especially, their unique function is enable users to set up pages, groups to share ideas, communicate and to have their own community they want to build. Also, if some sources contain inappropriate information, media, they can be reported or banned.

The functionality of Facebook has unlimited possibilities that nowadays people can have multiple accounts, speak their own ideas, opinion anytime, discussing with the other about politics, society or privately discuss in closed group. Users can also commercially advertise or sell online products through facebook pages.  Although Facebook have such a great control but eventually, users can use the page with their intention with unlimited possibilities.

(http://www.statista.com/statistics/277229/facebooks-annual-revenue-and-net-income/)

Note: all the information was collected and quoted from Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Facebook)

By: Pamela Lee, Kiele Char, Taylor Pazcoguin

Background & History

Netflix, a participatory media site (PMS), is an on-demand media streaming site where members are able to instantly watch numerous amounts of different movies and TV shows, without commercials. In order to stream the most recent TV show episodes or movies, members must pay a subscription. They get the first month free, but then must pay a monthly subscription, for as little as $7.99.

According to Netflix Media Center, in 1997, Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph co-founded Netflix. At first, they only offered movie rentals until they offered unlimited movie rentals for a monthly subscription. In 2000, Netflix launched a new personalized system that uses their members’ ratings to predict movie and TV show choices for all Netflix members. In 2007, Netflix introduced streaming, allowing members to instantly watch TV shows and movies on their personal computers. Over the next three years, members were able to stream Netflix on their Xbox 360, PS3, Apple iPad, iPhone, and Nintendo Wii. Since 2011, Netflix has launched their services to other regions and countries outside of the United States, such as Latin America, Caribbean, Europe, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Nordic Countries, and Netherlands. As of today, Netflix has over 50 million members globally (pr.netflix.com).

Features of Netflix

Netflix contains profiles that are customized based on interests from shows, movies, documentaries, and cartoons previously watched. This participatory media site is relatively private, except with those that contain profiles within one account. The audience ranges from all ages. Within the Netflix site, users are allowed to add movies and TV shows to make their own personalized folder. You are able to manage your own profile by selecting the language, your profile picture, and maturity level. Movies and shows are categorized by genres and popularity. Netflix also lists shows that you have already started watching and will continue to watch. Netflix recommends shows based on previous movies/shows you have watched.

Performative Infrastructures

The algorithms that are associated with the internet media device, Netflix, include suggestions, recommendations, and content creation. Through this site, the suggestions given are based off of content that was previously watched, making the member’s profiles more individualized. The recommendations and content that are created for a specific member are shaped from other users that share the same interests as you. When a member searches a title, the database will suggest other films that are related or similar.

Structural Affordances

Based on structural affordances, persistence involves the idea that once something is done, it is hard to undo. Netflix includes persistence by preventing users from erasing their history of movies and TV shows watched. Netflix also offers a wide variety of movies and TV shows, which will not always appeal to the audience or users’ interests. This site contains a database of the digital media which can be easily accessed when searching for a specific title. Within the Netflix website, different films are organized and divided into different genres, allowing members to easily browse what they want to watch.

Dynamics and Social Practices

Participation is enabled by a monthly subscription. However, in a way, participation is also constrained in that there is no social or public interaction. Netflix is strictly another form of watching movies and shows. Netflix filters digital media based off of a user’s genre preference. The function that this platform fulfills is entertainment for its audience. Netflix makes it easier to access the different films and shows that it provides.

Polymedia Environment

There are no sorts of communication or interactions. Netflix constrains people from communicating with each over the Internet. For example, Facebook allows people to connect with one another, whereas Netflix does not. It is used as a form of entertainment. A possibility that lies in its functionality is watching it in one’s spare time.

Bibliography

Anon. 2016. “Netflix.” Wikipedia. Retrieved January 24, 2016 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/netflix).

The Platform of Spotify

Authors:

Kendra Bailey

Cassie Apple

Emily Peters

   Spotify is a participatory media site that provides a commercial music, podcast, and video streaming service. Music can be browsed or searched by artist, album, genre, playlist, or record label. Spotify was founded in April of 2006 in Sweden by Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon. The site was officially launched October 7, 2008. Spotify can be accessed either through a free or premium subscription depending on the amount of access to the site that the user prefers.

   To construct a profile the user must create an account either through facebook or by using their personal email account. The information that is made public or semi-public through the site is the user profile’s overview, recently played artists, public playlists, followers, and who they follow. Another feature that is semi-public is the ability to see what and when other users that you follow are listening to when they are or were last active. On spotify users can connect with anybody else on the site and if they are connected to the site through Facebook it allows for finding mutual friends easier and more accessible. The audience of the user is specifically who follows them or those who browse their mutual music and come upon their playlists. Users primarily interact by seeing their activity, messaging, and creating own content  from who they follow by being Facebook friends or others who follow them but their is a lack of commenting, liking, and reblogging. When streaming Spotify the site allows for public browsing based upon playlists found under overview, charts, genres & moods, new releases and discover. A user can access their own music, activity, radio, and local files as well as search particular songs, artists, or albums. The site provides suggested genres and playlists through algorithms and displays popular playlists that suit the user and their preferences.

Although spotify is said to be mostly human generated and altered; however, it uses a set a system only available to employees called truffle pig which suggests songs to them based upon a certain theme so they can make a playlist they think others would enjoy. -wired.com. It also uses a set of ‘complex algorithms’ to put music types that you personally enjoy listening to together into what they call clusters. For example if you listen to a few hip hop songs and right after you listen to a pop song it will put your music into a cluster of hip hop and pop songs together and recommend the grouped music types to you as a playlist. Spotify also uses a program called EcoNest which breaks down the music into thousands of categories based on the type of music it is. -techinsider.io

Structural Affordances:

   Persistence: Spotify is shaped by all different by different structural affordances, one being persistence. Persistence refers to the idea that when one publishes or uses said SNS it tends to stay lingering on the web. When someone listens to music on spotify, people who they are friends with are able to see what music they listen to and at what time they listened to said music or songs.

   Replicability:Replicability is the idea that information can easily be copied or replicated. On spotify the user is able to take files from their own personal computer and copy it onto spotify making it easier to listen to music that you like that may not be available on the app itself.

   Scalability: Scalability enables one to reach a broader audience; however, it does not ensure one. Spotify allows one to share their personalized playlists with the public and others have to option to follow said playlist if they enjoy the music. If the playlist one created gets a certain amount of follows then it can be featured as popular.

   Searchability: Searchability is the idea that information can be searched and can leave traces. On spotify you are able to search for music or songs that you like, which leaves a trace of the type of music your prefer and spotify will then suggest songs and playlist that it thinks you will like based upon your searches.

   Spotify enables its users (through the use of Facebook or personal email) to find and follow friends, artists, and other public profiles. The purpose of following others on Spotify is to view the genres of music they listen to and see when they listen to specific songs. The features of Spotify allows the user to not only search and follow friends, but also allows them to find music ranging from genres, to the mood one is in, an artist, or even specific song titles. The style of music one listens to often gives others an insight to who they are as a person; music is used to help us define who we are as individuals and gives individuals a unique way to describe how they feel.