Mediaboss Marketing

Binky is an app that does everything an app is expected to do. Its got posts. Its got likes. Its got comments. Its got the infinitely scrolling timeline found in all social apps, from Facebook to Twitter, Instagram to Snapchat.

I open it and start scrolling. Images of people, foods, and objects appear on and then vanish off the screen. Solar cooker. B.F. Skinner. Shoes. Marmalade. Sports Bra. Michael Jackson. Ganesha. Aurora Borealis. These are binks, the name for posts on Binky.

I can like a bink by tapping a star, which unleashes an affirming explosion. I can re-bink binks, too. I can swipe left to judge them unsavory, Tinder-style, and I can swipe right to signal approval. I am a binker, and I am binking.

Theres just one catch: None of it is real. Binky is a ruse, a Potemkin-Village social network with no people, where the content is fake and feedback disappears into the void. And it might be exactly the thing that smartphone users wantand even need.

* * *

Its strange to think of content as optional. When Bill Gates declared that Content is King in 1996, he meant that digital content creators would make more money online than computer manufacturers. Gates cited television as a precursor: It was an invention that created many industries, but broadcastersthe content creatorswere the long-term winners on TV.

Gates was right and wrong. Content, from e-commerce to social media, did drive huge profits in the two decades since. But equipment also produced enormous wealthjust look at Apple. With the rise of Facebook, Google, Uber, Microsoft, Amazon, and others, content stopped being a name for ideas alone and started signifying a confluence of machines, services, media, and ideas. This is the phenomenon some nickname #content (as a hashtag), implying that the purpose of ideas is to fill every moment with computational engagement. Technologys effect on ordinary life is always more important than the ideas its content carries.

Marshall McLuhan was the best theorist of media as mechanisms for behavior rather than channels for ideas. His famous quip the medium is the message was meant to deemphasize content in favor of the media forms that make it possible. For McLuhan, the meaning of individual books, television programs, newspaper articles, movies, and software programs is just a distraction. More important: how those media change the way people think and behave in aggregate. The book, for example, creates a society for which knowledge is singular, certain, and authoritative thanks to the uniformity of print.

The smartphones effects have evolved and changed. When I wrote about the iPhone shortly after its launch, I called it the geeks Chihuahua: a glass-and-metal companion that people could hold, stroke, and peta toy dog for the tech set. Some years later, after games, apps, and social media made smartphone use compulsive, I dubbed the device the cigarette of this century: a source of obsessive attention that, like smoking, brings people together in a shared dependency whose indulgence also produces the calming relief of new data.

It doesnt make sense to talk about the meaning of cigarettes or Chihuahuas. Their meaning is the pattern of their use. Thats the thing about content: Its form and meaning matters less than how it changes peoples behavior. And when it comes to smartphones, seeing and touching them is far more important than processing the meaning they deliver.

* * *

Binky eviscerates meaning by design. Every bink on Binky is a labeled image, chosen randomly and generated endlessly. Liking a bink does nothing. Swiping or re-binking sends binks nowhere. The comments are my favorite: A keyboard appears on which to type them, but each key-tap reveals a whole word in a pre-generated comment. Words, tags, or emoji continue appending until I stop typing. This looks amazing! #harlemshake #wordsToLiveBy #rofl, or I dunno, I like this but its problematic .

Binky is a social network app with no network and no socializing. And yet, Binky is not just as satisfying as real social apps like Twitter or Instagram, but even more satisfying than those services. Its posts are innocuous: competent but aesthetically unambitious photos of ordinary things and people. Should binkers feel the urge to express disgust at Linus Paulding or Lederhosen, they can swipe left, and Binky accommodates without consequence. And the app doesnt court obsession by counting followers or likes or re-binks.

Dan Kurtz, the game developer and improv actor who created Binky, tells me that the idea for the app arose partly from his own feelings after reading through the current updates on Facebook or Twitter while waiting for a train. I dont even want that level of cognitive engagement with anything, he explains, but I feel like I ought to be looking at my phone, like its my default state of being. Kurtz wondered what it would look like to boil down those services into their purest, most content-free form. This is what people really want from their smartphones. Not content in the sense of quips, photos, and videos, but content as the repetitive action of touching and tapping a glass rectangle with purpose and seeing it nod in response.

Binky also offers a new take on the smartphones effects, McLuhan-style. Some of the toy-dog aspects of mobile computing remain, along with the compulsive ones, too. But the novelty of touching the smartphone has long since ended, and the angst of its compulsive use is universally acknowledged. Those habits are here to stay, like it or not.

Standard smartphone fare inspires users to create content whose publication accrues value for the tech titans that operate walled-garden services. Those businesses transform that aggregated attention into revenue and stock value in turn. Meanwhile, the pleasure and benefit of those services dwindles by the day, as conflict and exhaustion suffocate delight and utility.

Binky offers a way to see and tolerate that new normalcy. What if the problem with smartphones isnt the compulsion to keep up with the new ideas they deliver, but believing that the meaning of those ideas matters in the first place? Binky offers all the pleasure of tapping, scrolling, liking, and commenting without any of the burden of meaning.

The app frames its intervention with humor and mockery. Its name is a trademark for baby pacifiers, an image that also adorns the apps icon. Calling it Binky implies a global infancy among apps, but also a legitimate comfort thanks to Binkys succor. And Kurtz initially conceived of the app in a Comedy Hack Day mini-hackathon held by Cultivated Wit, a firm that produces, well, contentvideos and events and software and the like. Forged from games and comedy, Binky might look like an ironic joke to some.

Is a baby pacifier just a parody? Kurtz retorts when I press him on the matter. Its a good point; something that replaces another isnt always a joke. He reminds me of my own ironic app, which, to my delight, he cites as an inspiration: a game called Cow Clicker that boiled down Facebook games to their purest form like Binky does social apps. In both cases, irony offers an in-road for some but burns out fast. Deliberate use always wins.

On that front, Kurtz makes his faith in the apps earnest utility clear. Look, all we want from our apps is to see new stuff scroll up from the bottom of the screen, the Binky website reads. It doesnt matter what the stuff is. Thats no gag; its an incisive elucidation of why people want to handle their smartphones so often. By sparing the mental and emotional effort of taking in content and spitting back approval and commentary, Binky makes it possible to experience the smartphone as such, as a pure medium for its behavior rather than a delivery channel for social-media content.

Thats also where apps start, it turns out. Kurtz wanted to learn iOS programming, and he reasoned that the best approach would be to incorporate all the standard interface widgets. Binky was the result. Whats an app without content? Pure, unadulterated tapping and scrolling through the hollowed-out interfaces that all apps now share.

* * *

Theres a use of cigarettes beyond their chemical effects. Smoking gives people something to hold and something to do with their hands. McLuhan called it poise. And smartphones offer something similar. At the bus stop, in the elevator, in front of the television, on the toilet, the smartphone offers purpose to idle fingers. To use one is more like knitting or doodling than it is like work or play. It is an activity whose ends are irrelevant. One that is conducted solely to extract nervous attention and to process it into exhaust.

There have been attempts to cure the ills of smartphone compulsion. Fidget cubes and spinners offer a recent example, doodads that offer mechanical intrigue that might, some users hope, distract them from the draw of the smartphone. But these devices fail to cop to the smartphones victory in standardizing the mechanics of idle effort. The tapping, the scrolling, the liking, the #content, even. Those must be preserved. Binky offers an unexpected salve: a way to use a smartphone without using one to do anything in particular. Isnt that all anyone really wants?

More:
The App That Does Nothing - The Atlantic

The Weslaco Police Department recently teamed up with Nextdoor, a social networking company, to help connect the city and its residents increase safety and create a virtual neighborhood watch -- all for free.

Help and information for Weslaco residents is now next door--not physically next door, but in the form of a new social network.

The Weslaco Police Department recently teamed up with Nextdoor, a social networking company, to help connect the city and its residents increase safety and create a virtual neighborhood watch -- all for free.

We want to bring the community together with law enforcement, said Weslaco Public Information Officer Jose Rodriguez. Its not law enforcement against the community, or the community against law enforcement.

The social network company first began in 2010 and has grown to neighborhoods nationwide. The city of Weslaco has its own private neighborhood website, accessible only to residents who verify they live in the neighborhood.

Back in the day, we used to have neighborhood watches and people would have to make time to attend those watches, Rodriguez said.

The city and department wont be able to access contact information, or personal content from the social network, as the information shared on Nextdoor is password-protected and cannot be accessed by search engines.

Currently, 11 neighborhoods in Weslaco have signed up for the social network, while 13 other cities in the Rio Grande Valley are online as well.

It just brings everybody together at real time and you can communicate much quicker, said Rodriguez.

Read more from the original source:
Weslaco Police Department joins social network to increase neighborhood safety - KGBT-TV

INDORE: When most students his age are busy on social networking websites, JEE topper in Indore Arpit Prajapat did not even own a mobile phone.

From 8am till 9 pm, Arpit followed a tight schedule for more than two years to prepare for the JEE. "Whenever I felt tired and felt the need to relax, I just sat in a corner alone for a while without doing anything. Social networking was a big no for me," Arpit told TOI.

Arpit, who is the son of a gardener who couldn't even clear class VIII, feels that his hardwork has paid off. "My parents never expected this but it has happened. No one from my family has studied so much and attained any position in any competitive exam," added Prajapat.

An elated Harinam Prajapat, Arpit's father, said that his son will achieve what he has set out to.

See the article here:
Topper's success mantra: No social networking | Indore News ... - Times of India

The nature of independent media

Dr Gorg Mallia

According to Dr Mallia, there isnt any media which is totally independent. You are going to find that everybody has a sort of bias and this can be easily borne out through research. He explained that bias of media can be researched by, for example, analyzing the inclination of readership, or conducting a scientific analysis on language and the connotations of words used in relation to specific subjects, in order to find the favored inclination.

Bringing up how Trump tends to attack media who say things against him, he went on to explain that governments would much rather have all the media outlets support what they are saying. However, the reports which are against the government are not necessarily in favour of the Opposition. If they happen to attack government policies more than they attack, say, Opposition policies, it is because the government is currently on the spot, he explained, so that does not necessarily make the media non-independent just because they may be biased. They are just not dependent on the government or the Opposition for patronage; they are independent from all parties.

He went on to say that he is not a believer of, what he terms as artificial independence, for example when one page is assigned to news about one party then the next for the other party etc. That doesnt work, he says, its an artificial implementation of objectivity, you will be trapped in a narrow parameter where you cannot move.

If it just so happens that 70% is against the government, and 30% against to Opposition, or vice versa, then they are still independent, just at that point in time they are attacking the news as they see it. Providing there has been all the groundwork done that there is support for what journalists are saying, then thats the way it should be, trying to be independent by being equidistant, is betrayal of what a journalist should be, he said.

Dr Carmen Sammut

Dr Sammut believes that the word independent media is difficult to conceptualize. She explained that if you had to refer to independent media in the US, one would refer to it as media structures which are not commercial, which do not belong to co-operations. However, this concept may vary on a local level. In Malta, independent media is considered the media not owned by the parties, adding that, however, independent media also have quite clear editorial lines, she went on to say that we have a pluralistic media system, in terms of perspectives. Dr Sammut noted that she prefers the use of the term angle or perspective as opposed to the word bias. Bias is when there is a spin, she said.

In an age of media saturation, where traditional and new media (such as social media) live side by side, Dr Sammut believes it is sometimes difficult to remember from where information is obtained. Emphasizing that, whether it is considered as independent media or not, mainstream media can provide added value, she said that such media can be more careful about information that they pass along, as opposed to virtual clubs. I think when you read something you look at the source and people tend to read between the lines. Society is becoming increasingly media-competent, you can check information.

She mentioned that independent media houses might also want to satisfy their readership, which could be a possible cause of political affiliation. Highlighting the ownership when analyzing the media, is also a factor which should be taken into consideration, according to Dr Sammut. Ownership matters, she says, media houses are businesses at the end of the day.

Only of Maltese tend to trust the media. However, of Maltese trust what the government says

Dr Gorg Mallia

Dr Mallia said that he finds it unfortunate that people believe what the government says more than what the media says.

Both the government and the media have an agenda, but the media has more of an informative, independent agenda than the government, he said. I think the media should always be the informative voice for the people rather than the public blindly accepting what the government says. At the end of the day, the government is always run by a political party, that has a particular agenda.

We also need to see whether these seventy something percent of respondents (of those not trusting the media) are the general opinions? Are those people doting on patronage, are they are the solid support base of what is essentially a polarized society, are they getting something out of this, are they believing the party? If I support that party, I will say everything I can to support that party in surveys, he said.

Dr Carmen Sammut

Dr Sammut expressed her concern that it is unhealthy that the media has gained an untrustworthy reputation for itself.

The Eurobarometer year after year has been showing that trust in media is decreasing. People are sceptical, and are not so vulnerable to media onslaught.

Apart from the fact that the government could be believable or not, it is unhealthy that the media have managed to become so mistrusted, she said.

How have we arrived at this level? she asked, adding that the situation overseas is the same. In our case, these figures should open our eyes. Why havent we managed to present journalism which is more professional and ethical? She went on to explain the strong link needed between ethics and journalism ethics strengthens the journalist, she said.

There is some recognition that if you dont have ethics you will not be trusted, she said. Adding that although ethical discussions have recently taken place, this discourse stopped because there was more polarization and polarization has never helped journalism. I hope there will be a revival in this discourse, to create self-regulating structures, she said.

Linked with the idea of ethical journalism, Dr Sammut went on to explain that journalists should be careful when it comes to language and the reputation of individuals. We have situations where peoples reputations are broken by the media, such as teachers who have been accused of pedophilia, and then wont be found guilty, and their reputation will not be restored.

Adding to what may be affecting trust, Dr Sammut listed that context should be given and competence in the issue is important. She said that trial by media sometimes decides who is guilty and not guilty. Presenting something as a fact when you dont have all the information. Trial by media can end up in losing trust, she said.

Social media as an echo chamber

Is social media minimizing discourse regarding specific views, due to its selective nature?

Dr Gorg Mallia

The problems remain the bubbles that we build around ourselves, said Dr Mallia. There is the bubble of social networking, which you can describe as an echo chamber, which echoes what you like, what you want and feel, but then we also tend to read within our comfort zone. It is only a few who will struggle outside of their comfort zone and this is also of fact that all media, newspaper, radio, television, have a bias, an editorial bias, and the readers will go for the bias.

The bubble we have on Facebook, where we have our Facebook friends and the algorithm which presents to us only things we like on your timeline, makes us see what we think as the correct way, as one that is endorsed by just about everybody we know.

We see the very negative and positive side amplified of humanity, and more than that we see the lack of understanding of what social media is through how people use it, lack of understanding also gives this echo-chamber effect. How many times have we seen people write that they want to block a person. Why? Because they are saying things we dont want to hear. Desensitization, our lack of want to hear the other side, and at the same time believing that that one side is being predominantly endorsed by just about everyone we know, that is why many were shocked with what happened also in the last general election also, as their newsfeed was painting a different picture.

Dr Carmen Sammut

When people oppose you and you do not agree with them, or they have a different lifestyle to you, you start eliminating and end up with a network that is very similar to your own perspective, she said, adding that this is what happened in the last general elections, for example, in polls.

In the echo chamber everyone has one perspective and this is worrying, she said. Not only on a political level, but also, for example, when it comes to things such as racism and sexism, you eliminate people who are racist or sexist, and end up in a bubble. You wont be grounded and seeing what other people in society will be seeing.

In the echo chamber there is also a lot of emotion, and maybe in order for politicians to get where they want to be, they are being passionate and emotional, hence populist in the way they deliver, Look at Trump on Twitter, she said as an example, adding that democracy also requires there to be a bit of a rational deliberation.

The way forward

Dr Gorg Mallia

The way forward is for professional journalists, who know what needs doing to verify something before they publish it, to keep plodding on. We are already edging on autocracy, when you have the government with the amount of advantage that this present government has, (and Im not point fingers at a specific party, it could be either has a large amount of votes in their favour, its just democracy playing out, but in the end, when there is a large seat majority), that party is more likely to do what it likes, he said.

So without the media as an observer of understanding and communicating after having done its job well, rather than hinting or implying at things, but stating facts (even if those facts will then be spun to be false facts), we are pretty much in an autocratic society, and that is something which cannot happen, he concluded.

Dr Carmen Sammut

Dr Sammut pointed to strengthening ethical journalism, and elaborated on the priority of eliminating fake news within the media stream.

To remove fake news, firstly, the media shouldnt publish fake news, fake news is something which is completely made up. When I had studied journalism I had studied the basics of verifying sources, it would have to be more than one source, the BBC model even pushed for three sources. If you dont find these sources, you dont publish it.

She gave the example of an incident last year where an article was published regarding the vandalism of a tower, which was made up on social media, and newsrooms which carried the story did not check the sources. Just because someone says something in social media you shouldnt take it as fact, she said.

She also stated the importance of looking at the source and agenda of the media before accepting the information.

Looking at the situation on a wider scale, Dr Sammut concluded that Malta only gained independence a few decades ago. Democracy does not happy often, it needs to evolve, sometimes there need to be setbacks, then there will be progress, you need to work hard at it. We need to make sure it evolves, media has a role in this and the Eurobarometer is worrying.

See original here:
Independent media, social networks, facts and fake news - A conversation with media academics - Malta Independent Online

The surrender of a militant who showed up at the funeral of Hizbul Mujahideen commander Sabzar Ahmad Bhat recently, in Tral, has revealed that an increasing number of youths in the Valley are being drawn towards militancy by joining social networking sites run from Pakistan.

A number of WhatsApp groups with administrators in Pakistan and social networking sites run from across the border are being used to draw youths towards militancy. A recent police report noted that the use of social networking sites by militants and locals remains a major challenge in Kashmir and that it had employed to aggravate the unrest in the Valley last year, after the killing of Hizbul militant commander Burhan Muzafar Wani.

Director General of Police, SP Vaid, said that there were a number of such WhatsApp groups and social media account pages. "We have detained many youths who were trying to foment trouble," he said.

Representational image. PTI

A top official said that at least 250 members can be added to such WhatsApp groups and that there were over 1,000 such groups with administrators in Pakistan.

Police are also investigating the role of local youth in hacking the website of National Institute of Technology (NIT) in Srinagar recently, on which amessage saying Kashmir should be "freed'' from Indian occupation was splashed.

A security official said that they had come across at least 15-20 complaints at the cyber cell in Srinagar about Facebook pages and personal accounts being used to aggravate the unrest in Kashmir. "Besides the cases registered at the cyber cell, there are people who have been booked under the IT act at different police stations. We are reporting the URLs to the officials at Facebook and other networking sites to get them blocked," a senior police official said.

Due to the increasing use of social networking sites propagating anti-India activities, security agencies recently suspended certain social networking sites after getting a nod from Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti at a security review meeting held in Srinagar.

Mobile internet services were snapped in parts of South Kashmir on Wednesday as well. The volatile region has erupted over the killing of a student and injuries sustained by several other youths who had thronged to an encounter site in Shopian, to help militants escape the security forces. Though people have reacted sharply,terming the suspension of mobile services as a gag, top security officials said that this was also done to prevent the sharing of videos posted by militants as well as to stop rumours from spreading.

"The internet is being suspended but we can't suspend WhatsApp groups that are run from Pakistan," a senior police official said.

Recently, when United Nations' Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Opinion and Expression, David Kaye, had sought feedback from Kashmiris over the impact of internet gag on them, his timeline was swamped with tweets on how the "gag was affecting students and businessmen". Several people also shared videos "highlighting the brutalities by the government forces on the students."

According to police, militant Danish Ahmad, son of Farooq Ahmad and a resident of Kulan Gam village in Handwara, had appeared at Bhat's funeral in his hometown Tral. Police said that he was drawn into militancy because of social networking sites.

Police officials said that Danish was studying BSc (third year) at Doon PG College of Agriculture Science and Technology, Dehradun, and had been previously involved in stone-pelting incidents at Handwara last year, during the protests triggered after Wani was killed.

Superintendent of Police, Handwara, Ghulam Geelani, said that Danish had been in touch with Hizbul militants via social networking sites before he joined militancy. "There are some other youths as well who are involved in this case... we will make more arrests shortly," he said.

"Once it was learnt that Danish has joined militancy, Handwara police and 21 RR Army got in touch with his parents and impressed upon them to counsel their son to surrender. His parents were convinced that if he surrenders, he would be dealt with fairly under thelaw. Efforts made by security forces yielded results and Danish surrendered," a police official said.

During the investigation, it was revealed that Danish was in touch with militants of South Kashmir region via social media sites "and it was at their instigation that he had decided to become a militant.

"According to police officials, Danish was tasked by Hizbul commanders to "activate" some local youth in North Kashmir and pull them into militant ranks.

The revelation of Danish's entry into militancy through the use of social networking sites comes days after Mufti was informed at a security review meeting that a number of WhatsApp groups, who have members in Kashmir, are being run from Pakistan.

Top security officials said that cases have also been registered against people using the networking sites to incite stone-pelting in Kashmir. A number of Facebook pages have also been blocked by the police after they postedmessages that "were perceived to be fanning the unrest in Kashmir." According to security officials, people were also eulogising militants on these networking sites.

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Kashmir unrest: Security forces at a loss as Pakistan-run social networks draw youth towards militancy - Firstpost