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The technological age has blessed us with digital platforms that allow people to engage with one another virtually. With the advent of social media, information dissemination has fundamentally transformed.

Though people are more connected than ever before, at the same time, the privacy of users has been invaded and manipulated. The breach of privacy takes place when governments seek to control our opinions and manipulate us for their political benefit.

Across the world, this has resulted in political parties and government actors expanding their social-media footprints.

Since 2014, social media in India have witnessed a surge in online promotions, advertisements, SEO manipulation, politically motivated messages embedded with hate speech from political parties. This has transcended into a new type of competition for political parties, which have to engage tech-skilled young people to perform cyber operations for them.

Such operations include flooding social apps with misinformation, clickbait messages, developing new tools, looking for flaws in social-media apps to exploit them to spread propaganda and manipulate public opinion.

The Cambridge Analytica scandal in the US revealed that the company harvested user data before the 2016 election and used those data for social-media manipulation. Such incidents provide an understanding of how modern-day social-media apps can be manipulated to amplify a particular political discourse.

In India, social media have become a battlefield on which political parties manipulate public discourse, especially since 2014. Shortly after its victory in that years general election, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) extended its political campaigning on social networking platforms by glorifying its base ideology that calls for the creation of Hindu Rashtra.

The 2014 election is often referred to as the first social-media election because it was when the BJP used its workers to glorify the campaign on social networks in order to manufacture a new consensus.

People at that time had no idea that the apps they installed on their devices harvested data for political parties to use to manipulate public opinion.

Before 2014, India had different political discourses. Now, everything has changed. Researchers are examining the damage social media have done over the last few years. According toa survey by the University of Oxford in 2020, social media have been manipulated to change the political narrative in a range of countries. And India is no exception to this trend.

Although digital connectivity has expanded a lot, the space it provides has shrunk and the propagation of misinformation has affected many developments. An example would be when the BJP announced the Citizenship Amendment Bill, which the Muslim population resisted. During that time,the BJP cyber cellran several campaigns to link such protestss with pro-Pakistani groups.

During last years farmers protest in India, there was an attempt by the ruling partys sponsored IT cell through social campaigns to muzzle the voices of farmersz to delegitimize the protests. Pro-Khalistani accounts were cited to link the farmers agitation with the Khalistani movement.

Advances in social-media apps have deepened the gaps between Indias majority and minority populations. Incidents during the last few years indicate that the ruling party has mobilized special cyber operations like flooding apps with content that favors the Hindutva narrative.

The BJP has invested massively in these sophisticated tools. Such tools have been fruitful for the party. It mobilizes the online audience to issue threats, mock the ideology of people who criticize the BJP, and then delegitimize them.

This has succeeded in muzzling critics of the BJP, which has failed to consolidate the growing unemployment crisis, the economic crisis and the rising inflation rates. Whenever anyone questions the ruling party, the IT cell targets him or her for being a critic of the BJP.

Research has shown that the BJP has used disinformation to engage with the audience who usually discuss Hindutva, and engaged in misinformation and defend that philosophy with illogical premises. Such incidents have pushed social-media clients like WhatsApp to add a tag to forwarded messages and limit them to very few instances.

Political parties have invested in tools that are used to attack individuals privacy, and the modern-day trends that arise on social networks get manipulated when IT cells run different trending campaigns to change the discourse. Such attempts are designed to shape the perception of people to a certain political discourse.

Certainly, social-media trends have been fueled by the motive of changing the political discourse, with governments investing in companies that are developing tools to muzzle the voices of common people.

A recent investigation into this was done by The Wire. The Indian media outlet revealed that an app calledTek Fogthat is allegedly linked with the BJP IT cell harvests data and manipulate the ongoing trends that are against the ruling party.

Social media have indeed been manipulated for political purposes, which poses a growing threat for democratic countries. Over the last few years, social media have been manipulated and the political discourse has changed a lot.

India is heading for elections in five states soon. Social media are abuzz with hate speech that calls for genocide against minority communities. Some videos openly call for the creation of a Hindu state or Hindu Rashtra. Such videos seek to change the political discourse and obviously, people react to such manipulation and get involved in the new narrative.

These are instances that the BJP uses to make its election process easy as the party knows the audience who directly or indirectly supports the creation of Hindu Rashtra falls for disinformation easily.

Its time for social-media companies to look into this matter and work to stop misinformation. Social-media companies should look at their algorithms that propagate misinformation.

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Social media manipulation on the rise in India - Asia Times

BeReal takes casual posting to the next level.

Founded in 2020 by French entrepreneur Alexis Barreyat, BeReal was made in response to the current social media landscape. It's not like Instagram, where users can curate their feeds and edit their images. BeReal doesn't allow you to curate. There are no filters. It simply gives users a random two-minute window each day to post one photo. When you post, the app uses both your front and rear-facing camera, giving your friends a full picture of what you're doing in the moment not unlike the now-defunct Frontback app. With BeReal, there is no way to lie about where you are or what you're doing.You can't project a picture-perfect image.

Once you receive the notification, you only have two minutes to post a photo on the app.Credit: Screenshot: BeReal

"BeReal won't make you famous," reads the description of BeReal in the App Store, "if you want to become an influencer you can stay on TikTok and Instagram."

Instagram's shift towards monetization and the accompanying changes to its algorithm have left its users wanting a feed filled with photos of their friends, rather than one riddled with ads, paid influencer content, and recommended posts. To combat inauthenticity on the app, there's been a move to "make Instagram casual" by posting photo dumps, or slice-of-life pics. But posting casually doesn't solve the problem either. Some say "casual Instagram" is an even greater performance. Is anything really candid on Instagram? Rather than posing for a cute photo at a party, you have to pretend like you're not posing for one at all to make your entire life fit a "vibe" or an aesthetic.

This is where BeReal comes in.

I only have a handful of close friends on the app, and they're all people who might follow my finsta or my close friends story on Instagram. A scroll through my BeReal feed today shows me sitting at my laptop at work, three other friends in front of their laptops, another thrift shopping, and a former classmate drinking coconut water. The appeal of BeReal is in its immediacy. When you get the alert on your phone, you only have two minutes to capture an image, and you never know when it will drop.

An example of one of my posts on BeReal, featuring some freshly baked bread. Credit: Elena Cavender

When BeReal occurs out of work hours, my feed is only slightly more interesting. You might instead catch me on my evening walk or reading The Custom of the Country. The appeal of the BeReal feed isn't the content it's that you like your friends and care about what they're doing.

"It's cute to see what your friends are up to," Juliette Decugis, a 21-year-old UC Berkeley student from Paris, tells Mashable. According to Decugis, the app is "huge in France," where it launched. She started using it in July, and like me, only shares her content with close friends. "I don't add people I'm not close with," Decugis says.

Isabel, a 22-year-old analyst in Boston, agrees. "I like BeReal because there's no need to add acquaintances or friends of friends. I only add the people I am fully comfortable with sharing random, unfiltered moments with. Because it's such a small community there's always a ton of good banter on the daily posts," she explains.

And investors are listening. By June 2021, the social media app had raised $30 million in Series A funding. From March to July the app grew from 10,000 to over 400,000 daily users. In November. The Hoya, Georgetowns student newspaper, reported "BeReal is the newest social media craze to take hold of Georgetown."

While BeReal is still in its infancy (as of July 2021, its numbers don't compare to its rivals), everyone I spoke to who uses the app loves it. "I only have four or five hometown friends on there," Kelly Young, a 22 year-old senior at Drexel University, tells Mashable. "[They] all live far away from me. BeReal is a really fun way for us to keep in touch, and it's the most realistic insight into what our lives are like now."

If you miss the notification, you are allowed to post late, but you are unable to see your friends' images until you post your own. By doing so, the app avoids the issue of lurking as well. You are forced to post content in order to see content. Additionally, the app has a more involved version of liking. You cannot just double tap to like a photo, in order to respond to a friends' content, you must take a reaction selfie or comment.

The posting-once-a-day model also means you only have to check the app once per day, and there's no anxiety over missing content because everyone you follow is only posting once a day, too. Therefore, it isn't a time suck the way that Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, and TikTok currently are.

Not only does BeReal build upon the photo sharing feed of Instagram, but it also incorporates the ephemeral nature of Snapchat by resetting your feed daily. Like Snapchat, the app holds your previous posts in "Memories" that only you have access to.

The app does pose some privacy concerns. It automatically posts your location with your photo unless you disable the feature in your settings, and it has its own version of Snapmaps. By having you post every day, the app can accumulate data that paints a picture of your habits, not unlike its competitors. The app promises not to sell your data to third parties, but its raised some concerns among its user base.

"It's strange because it shares your exact location, like your coordinates," Alisha Pandya, a 21-year-old UC Berkeley student, tells Mashable. "It's not just your city or general location, but it's your house on the map. So the app is kind of suspect."

But it hasn't stopped college students from downloading it. BeReal is already a hit in France, where it currently ranks in the top 10 of most-downloaded social networking apps in the App Store; in the U.S., its steadily rising through the ranks of the top 100. Last week, it was the 80th most-downloaded social networking app, and now it's ranked 61st. It's gained traction through savvy marketing and word of mouth, enlisting TikTok and college ambassadors to help popularize the app.

Perhaps the appeal of an entirely new social media platform is that it hasn't been overrun with nosy friends of friends, old coworkers, and celebrities. Your feed still feels intimate, and in today's social media landscape that seems radical. Because as soon as you start seeing unfiltered selfies from people you barely know, an app loses all of its charm and potential.

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Photo-sharing app BeReal offers an authentic alternative to Instagram - Mashable

There are plenty of reasons to exercise caution when posting content online, but more attention needs to be paid to the potential impact on employability, a new report suggests.

According to research conducted by cybersecurity company Kaspersky, a third of job seekers say social posts have harmed their employment prospects, a figure that rises to 47% among younger people applying for entry-level positions.

The survey also revealed that more than a third (38%) believe that the likelihood of receiving a job offer would fall if a potential employer had access to their posts, while 40% said they have previously looked up a new colleague on social media.

When social media platforms were first established in the mid-2000s, the novelty factor was enough to blind almost all of us to the dangers these kinds of services can present, from a reputational, addiction and data privacy standpoint.

Since the Cambridge Analytica scandal, many people have become more cautious about the social media content they interact with (particularly personality quizzes and the like) for privacy reasons, and awareness about the effects of screen time has encouraged some to establish healthier relationships with their devices. However, the same sense of caution does not necessarily extend to the content people choose to post online.

The report asserts that many people later come to regret the material they post on web platforms, with 45% of respondents saying they regret using social media as much as they did when they were younger.

Meanwhile, 42% of people say their social media profiles are not representative of their authentic selves, despite them becoming the most readily available resource for recruiters looking to learn more about a potential new hire.

However, on the other side of the coin, social platforms like LinkedIn have proven to be an invaluable resource for job hunters over the years. According to Kaspersky, 73% of millennials found their last position directly through a social media platform.

The question then becomes: how do we capture the benefits of social platforms, without exposing ourselves to the dangers? According to Tony Neate, CEO at advice portal Get Safe Online, people could benefit significantly by making a concerted effort to pause before firing off a post.

Social networking has been - and is still - one of the revolutions of the online age. When used correctly, it is an excellent way of keeping in touch with friends and family, sharing information and advertising and finding new work, said Tony Neate, CEO at advice portal Get Safe Online.

Our advice is simple. Enjoy the benefits of social media, but periodically take a step back and remind yourself why its important to think before you post. Use this time to edit and even delete recent posts that might position you detrimentally, minimising the risk of current and future employers seeing you in a negative light.

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Here's another reason you should be careful about what you post online - TechRadar

Virtual reality is also somewhat advanced in video games. In 2016, Sony released the $400 PlayStation VR, a virtual reality headset that plugged into its PlayStation 4 console to play virtual reality games. This month, Sony said a second-generation headset was coming for the PlayStation 5, though it did not share a release date.

But those were just steppingstones toward the complete metaverse, which is still taking shape. Technologists say that thanks to a number of things fast internet connections, powerful virtual reality headsets and a large audience of gamers it is now more possible to live in a richly animated, lifelike 3-D simulation.

The origins. The word metaverse describes a fully realized digital worldthat exists beyond the one in which we live. It was coined by Neal Stephenson in his 1992 novel Snow Crash, andthe concept was further explored byErnest Clinein hisnovel Ready Player One.

The future. Many people in tech believe the metaverse will herald an era in whichour virtual lives will play as important a role as our physical realities. Some experts warn that it could still turn out to be a fad or even dangerous.

Its only in the last few years that a critical mass of working pieces has come together, Mr. Ball said.

Truth be told, not too much.

Activision Blizzard is well known for making online games that have a metaverse component, where players spent hundreds of hours forming communities within the games. In its role-playing game World of Warcraft, released in 2004, gamers worked together online to complete quests in an effort to make their digital avatars stronger by collecting items like weapons and armors.

But the company has not dabbled in virtual reality. It has primarily made games for personal computers and game consoles but has yet to release a virtual reality game.

So far, Microsofts work on the metaverse has been nascent.

For several years, the software giant has developed the HoloLens, a $3,500 headset that shows digital holograms, with a focus on applications for businesses and government agencies. The device is related to augmented reality, which some technologists consider to be part of the future metaverse.

Microsoft is also the developer of the Xbox, the second most popular game console after the Sony PlayStation. But unlike the PlayStation, the Xbox has been conspicuously absent from the virtual reality gaming space.

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Whats All the Hype About the Metaverse? - The New York Times

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

The way we consume entertainment and news has shifted tremendously within the past decade. Whereas once we relied solely on TVs or news outlets to consume information, now we tune into our peers and listen.Its a movement that has changed the way we think, interactand relate to each other.Its the creator economy:the collection, creationand distribution of all content in our current digital world.

More than 50 million people worldwide consider themselves to be creators, with 41% of creators earning a living wage ($69,000 or more) per year. A new study from MBO Partners shows that the creator economy skews young, with 75% of creators identifying as Gen Z or millennial.

Its a rapidly booming economy, with social-media exposure influencing what kids want to be when they grow up.If youre an aspiring content creator just starting off, here are the top fourmediums to take your passion and skill sets to the next level.

With WordPress users producing about 70 million new postseach month, theres no doubt that blogging is an excellent medium for content expression.If youre a content creator whos passionate about the written word, taking your creative skills online and monetizing this lucrative platform is a great start to your content-creation journey. For example, platforms like Medium allow successful writers to generate money through community subscriptions, and writers use popular programs like Google AdSense and affiliate marketing to monetize their content on major publishing platforms like WordPress.

Consider leveraging contextually relevant content through affiliate-marketing platforms like Clickbank and Commision Junction. Additionally, a platform like Substack allows writers to send digital newsletters directly to their readers and monetize their content. The platform removes the institutional structure that allows media publishers to make a hefty profit off of a writer's work, and instead allows the writer to make money directly from subscriptions with newsletter publishing tools and all-in-one solutions to help writers get paid for their writing.

Creative veterans looking to stretch their successful blogging brand to new platforms and forms of monetization can partner with brands to create original content, sell ebooks, turn their skills into classesand conduct personal advising and coaching sessions.

If youre a content creator who uses other avenues of expression, consider branching to online blogging to market yourself or your business and increase exposure. After all, blogging is scalable and affordablefor individuals and businesses.

If time is of concern, an excellent way to break into the creator industry can look like purchasing an existing blog. With SEO, copywritingand content marketing skills, you can quickly grow your newly-acquired business as its already established and has some traction.

Related: How to Scale Your Blog Like a Startup

Because social media is at the core of most content creators businesses, they are active social-media users. According to MBO Partners creator economy study, 96% of content creators say social media is very important (71%) or somewhat important (25%) for building their online reputation and brand. Todays influencers on social media have the power to affect and shift consumer purchasing behavior through relationships with their online followers. Tailored niche accounts with loyal followings and sponsored influencers contributeto the creator economy, and according to Mediakix, are likely to be worth $15 million by 2022.

With consistent, effective social-media strategies, user engagement, networkingand brand consistency, its possible to grow a healthy following on social media and build a successful brand.

For the seasoned content creator, its always a great idea to experiment with A/B testing. For example, if you have a successful fanbase on social media that expands to your online blog, consider experimenting with elements like text placement and test running products.

Related: How to Make Money With Social Media

Whether youre a successful YouTuber or starting out in the content-creation industry, selling merch and products can be a great way to monetize your craft. There are over six million third-party sellers onAmazon, and that figure continues to climb as nearly 2,000 new sellers join the platform every day.

Branded merch and niche-curated products can be a great opportunity to monetize your brand, especially if you have an established, loyal fanbase.There are numerous pathways into the ecommerce industry. Sellers can use avenues like Shopify, Amazon FBA, dropshippingor Etsy.

Think of the ideal ecommerce model that you want. Do you want to hold and distribute the inventory yourself or use the Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) model, a service that Amazon offers to help business owners sell their products?As a rule of thumb, it is important to be mindful of supply-chain distribution.

Think about where youre sourcing your products. A reliable, efficient supplier will not only deliver your products at great prices, but will also do soin a timely manner.Have a long-term strategy in place in response to supply-chain disruptions due to labor, raw-materials sourcing, weatherand location-specific operating circumstances like power outages and local Covid restrictions.

Related: 9 Tips to Make Your Ecommerce Business Wildly Successful

Do you have invaluable skill sets or knowledge that others could benefit from? Consider expanding your market through SaaS (software as a service). SaaS is a way of delivering applications over the internet as a service. Perhaps youre a successful entrepreneur who wants to teach others how to thrive in the industry, or you have first-hand experience with optimizing your digital platform and gaining new followers. SaaS edtech will always be in demand. Leverage the connections, toolsand resources that you have as a creative entrepreneur and teach others how to do the same while making money.

Related: The Rise of SaaS: New Syllabus for Digital Gig Entrepreneurs

There are countless opportunities withinthe creative economy, and the good news is that there are endless different ways to break into it. Whats yours?

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How to Break Into the Creator Economy in a Digital Age - Entrepreneur