POPULAR NEW MEDIA PLATFORMS
Focusing on 4 digital applications that I use frequently:
‘A picture is worth a thousand words’ — but there is always room for a caption and maybe a few hashtags. Instagram is an extremely popular social media application at the moment. Quick and simple to use and upload to, it is an easy way to document your best shiny, happy, Valencia-filtered, colour-saturation-increased life — and to show all your followers of course. You can edit, prep, shade, nip and tuck all your favourite pictures before displaying them to the friendly, welcoming, encouraging online public. What could possibly go wrong?
In a report published by Royal Society for Public Health, researchers studied the effects of Instagram on modern society. Amongst its findings, the report states that the social medium draws young women to “compare themselves against unrealistic, largely curated, filtered and Photoshopped versions of reality,” said Matt Keracher, author of the report. I must say I agree with this statement and despite being a fan and regular user of Instagram myself, I do notice how quickly and easily we come to accept that edited photographs are the norm and even more dangerously, come to accept those appearances as reality. Of course, this is not the case, therefore leading to poor self esteem and other adverse effects on mental health. This highly filtered, vain platform is resulting in young people comparing themselves to appearances which do not exist, their idea of reality and beauty standards is therefore warped, they begin to think lip fillers, botox, eyelash extensions and microblading — all seen in ‘no makeup selfies’ — are natural.
https://www.rsph.org.uk/uploads/assets/uploaded/62be270a-a55f-4719-ad668c2ec7a74c2a.pdf
YOUTUBE
One thing I’m very grateful for in this digital day and age is the advent of YouTube. You can learn anything you can think of on YouTube, somebody, somewhere in the world will have made a tutorial - for free! As education is becoming increasingly expensive in a lot of countries over the world, I feel that YouTube is an easily accessible platform for learning. With regards to quality of the education, you do need to take care with who you follow as not every vlogger is certified to teach their subject, some are just expressing their own opinions.
Jordan Catapano of www.teachhub.com/technology-classromm-using-youtube mentions that YouTube is:
- A visual and audible means of learning. Covering two main styles of learning.
- watchable any time and place. Convenient and accessible.
- Easily shared. Students can send amongst themselves or to teachers.
- Students can contribute. This is a vlogging platform after all!
- Videos are interesting and engaging. Usually down to being taught by peers.
- Wealth of knowledge from experts. Very cost effective way of learning from some of the brightest minds on the planet.
Jordan also says YouTube is:
- Classroom enhancer. It’s an excellent tool to be used in lessons.
- Self directed learning. A brilliant way for students to find the most interesting information for them.
SPOTIFY
Mark Sweeney from the Guardian says “since 2010, 840,000 young people have switched off for good” (radio). He believes this is down to extreme popularity of music streaming, which has dramatically affected the way the music industry measures popularity now and compiles its top 40 album and singles charts. Since its genesis, the music industry solely relied on sales of physical vinyls, CDs or cassette tapes to gauge its top 40 - a simple enough marking scale - this was completely disrupted with the advent of downloads and streaming, demanding their incorporation into the count. Mark Sweeney’s statement is backed by Gill Hind, an analyst at Enders Analysis who said “People are going to music streaming services and we are seeing young people turning off the radio.”
I must say I am guilty of this. Recent updates enable Spotify to make personalised ‘daily mixes’ tailored to your music taste and arrange them into genres, all adding to its sheer ease of use. Why put up with just a handful of songs you enjoy appearing sporadically on the radio station you’ve tuned into, when Spotify seems to be your own personal DJ, where every song is the one you want to listen to?
AMAZON
Amazon online shopping has truly revolutionised shopping today. It caters to the ever increasingly busy lives of its consumers, allowing them to purchase absolutely any item they require and then have it delivered to their own front door — or the shed, if you’re not in, that is.
Perhaps this new shopping culture is contributing to the crippling social anxiety epidemic — ‘if I don’t NEED to make contact with people, why force myself to?’ On the flip side though, this offers people who have physical disabilities and difficulty getting to the shops an independent option. Also, assisting those who are on the autism spectrum for example and are overwhelmed by busy shop environments, to be able to shop for themselves by “removing some of the anxiety-causing aspects of face-to-face interaction” and keep a level of independence not available to them in previous decades.
Cutting out mundane, regular trips to the shops for essentials — and not-so-essentials — is also probably one of the culprits as to why the nation is less active, less fit and ultimately less healthy. This tied in with our cultural lack of tolerance for anything less than ‘instant service’ — fast food, ready meals, next day delivery— is part of the increasing problem with diet and obesity. Of course, Amazon also improves the standard of living greatly: People who live quite a distance from shopping centres can easily browse and order items they need without having to commute a large distance and spend extra money on transportation. It is clear however, that high street stores are suffering greatly due to this modern day efficiency. Handfuls of well known brands are going out of business each year — especially after poor Christmas takings.
Psychology Today. 2019. Social Anxiety and Internet Use: What We Know | Psychology Today UK. [ONLINE] Available at: https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/your-online-secrets/201608/social-anxiety-and-internet-use-what-we-know. [Accessed 17 May 2019].
Jennifer Golbeck Ph.D.
