Living Digitally: Loving Them is Red

LIVING DIGITALLY: LOVING THEM IS RED A Z IN E BY U T S AV I BAV ISK A R

i built that wall first!

Our love affair with social media started with a wall–The Facebook Wall. Connecting to people, comparing and competing with others, being seen and heard are human urges that can be traced back to as far as our evolutionary past (Veissière & Stendel, 2018, p. 2). As humans, we make meaning in relation to others. As a result, our self-worth is constructed depending upon other people's perceptions of ourselves (Veissière & Stendel, 2018, p. 3). Social media, particularly Facebook, then, intervened as a hyper-efficient platform for the satisfaction of these urges due to the sociability it encouraged (p. 2), all the while highlighting the importance we placed on how we want to be perceived and how we perceive others (p. 3).

These platforms were initially envisioned as a democratic medium that leveraged the value of free speech (Maddox & Malson, 2020, p. 3). However, the resultant association of social media with the metaphor, 'marketplace of ideas,' has since been rendered obsolete due to the increased polarisation of the platforms and the modern users' self-censored disclosure practices (Maddox & Malson, 2020, p. 4). With the permeation of surveillance culture, our growing' penchant for online performance' and our hedonistic obsession with social media likes, today's social media bears a more significant similarity to gladiator arenas (Lyon, 2018, pp. 15-16).

"We've been fighting even before we were born. The sperms compete to fertilize the egg. It's in our very nature! Social media has just made it easier for us to do so by presenting itself as an arena."

- Participant

For me, it’s like a clown!

You never know what will happen next!

WE’VE GOT SOMEONE FOR EVERY ONE. If it’s entertainment you seek, look no further!

Like a clown, we will entertain you with our juggling, different personas and memes.

Join the party and get social!

SOCIAL MEDIA

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Social media has long been touted as enabling democratised sharing of information that fosters diversity and free speech. In this way, social media platforms have connected us and helped us build networks at an unprecedented scale. Moreover, they have presented themselves as platforms fostering collective intelligence that people can access to make informed decisions (Sasahara et al., 2020, p. 382). But are we really exposed to the melting pot of opinions? Do we actively seek out disagreeable opinions?

Burke's (1969) identification theory states that we often identify with people similar to us or who possess similar beliefs (pp. 20-21). This tendency translates into homophily, our inclination to form ties with people similar to us (Cinelli et al., 2021, p. 1). Once paired with the concept of social influence and how we tend to alter our behaviour to match others, the shadow side of social interaction gets illuminated, and the bubble appears (Sasahara et al., 2020, p. 382).

We search for like-minded individuals and communities on social media platforms, engaging with them because we perceive them to be similar to us. With the availability of 'block' and 'unfriend' features, we create a bubble of sorts that disables people from accessing us and our lives at the click of a button (Maddox & Malson, 2020, p. 6).

Alternatively, we reduce our engagement with the opposing posts by either unsubscribing or paying them no heed. This creates a validating environment deeply rooted in confirmation bias that, although conducive for us, filters out the seemingly hostile and discordant worldviews–echo chambers (Cinelli et al., 2021, p. 1). As the name suggests, when we voice our opinions, our beliefs get reinforced and, in some cases, intensified, with the same ideas reverberating within our tiny bubbles.

So, riddle me this: For a generation besotted with personalisation, why would social media algorithms that account for users' preferences and attitudes while promoting content (Cinelli et al., 2021, p. 5) display anything that you've trained it to not encourage?

NOTIFICATION!!

1

WHO’S A GOOD boy???!

HERE’S A

TREAT!!!

COME & GET IT!!

DOG

Social media platforms' ability to display personalised content, paired with smartphones' ever-present connectivity, has introduced a new form of addiction in our lives. In the state of beeps and buzzes, notifications alert us of someone reacting to our social media activity. Studies discuss how social interaction possesses the power to activate 'dopaminergic reward circuits' (Veissière & Stendel, 2018, p. 4). Drugs also function analogously.

As a result, every notification alert builds anticipation and prompts the user to instantly gratify himself by seeking a reward–checking his phone. This arousal is at its peak just before the user checks his phone, after which it observes a gradual descent (Veissière & Stendel, 2018, p. 4).

Nevertheless, the possibility of exacting a reward guides the users' anticipation, making them highly attuned to every sound and vibration of their device. This behavioural phenomenon of intermittent reinforcement is evocative of the classical conditioning experiment of Ivan Pavlov. Yes, the same experiment that trained dogs to salivate every time the bell was sounded due to the co-relation the dogs inevitably drew between the bell and being rewarded with food. Now, substitute dogs with humans, food with our unquenchable desire to be validated and seen, and the bell with our social media notifications. The idea does not seem as outrageous, does it?

Maybe Facebook was onto this, hence the bell-shaped notification icon!

"My phone is the first thing I check in the morning and it’s the last thing I see before sleeping. When you get notifications, you kinda HAVE to check your phone!

Doesn’t everybody?"

- Participant

For me, it’s like a father!

You will always be guided and monitored.

WE’VE GOT SOMEONE FOR EVERY ONE. Sometimes, it’s best to have someone who can stop you from heading down a wrong path. We monitor your every move so that you behave in an obedient manner. We only want what’s best for you. And well, our family.

Get social the right way–ourway!

SOCIAL MEDIA

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SOCIAL MEDIA HELPS YOU FIND YOU. Since 'data' is an entry fee for accessing every social media site, no discussion about social media can be complete without examining privacy and surveillance (Akanbi, 2021, p. 12). As residents of the new global village, the pervasive digital affordances of the internet, social media platforms and smartphones have ushered in the dawn of surveillance culture, with people adopting the role of a prosumer, greasing the wheels of their own monitoring because of the data they produce (Lyon, 2018, p. 16).

Social media has presented us with an extraordinary opportunity to profile and observe one another without alerting the other. Geo-tagging and other location awareness tools have bolstered the voyeuristic tendencies of individuals, enabling them to track and surveil each other with scary accuracy (Ganascia, 2010, p. 489). Stalking, once a frowned upon act, is now a funny anecdote shared with peers as nothing out of the ordinary (Gangneux, 2021, p.

995). In a similar vein, all the participants in this study confessed to partaking in the occasional social media profile stalk.

"Oh, it's harmless!"

"Everybody does it!"

"It's so that I can know what the person likes, a form of ice breaker when we meet."

"It's not like I'm physically stalking the person! I'm just checking what he is up to!"

- Participants But what if someone like Joe Goldberg decides to "check what you're up to?"

'You' is a Netflix show that explains how social media can be used to uncover a myriad of users' secrets, right from one's home address to their preferences. It is also the show that will continue to haunt our consciousness every time we access a social media platform! It follows the story of an average Joe, not a genius hacker extraordinaire, mind you, who bumps into a woman he takes a shining towards. Thus begins their social media love story with your boy Joe harnessing the full potential of social media, Google, and just the name of his love interest, to locate and break into her apartment while she wasn't home, something he knew because of her latest geotagged Instagram post.

Social media platforms have thus, created an aura of anxiety and fear due to the potential widespread circulation of mindless damaging faux pas–drunken tweets, wild photographs or the good old Facebook rant (Duffy & Chan, 2019, p. 120). The surveillance culture has become so pervasive that people are now getting socialised against posting incriminating and controversial ideas on any social media sites, effectively training them to behave modestly against any potential gazes (Duffy & Chan, 2019, p. 120). The 'editing of the self' mantra is preached by future employers, universities and parents alike! (Duffy & Chan, 2019, p. 123).

Social media profiles have, in turn, become brands, and the users' have donned the role of public relations professionals scrambling to clean up their image. Now, managing one's impression and reputation is not a novel concept.

Everyone is doing it! After all, "watching others, surveillantly, is an ancient practice" (Lyon, 2018, p. 12).

On the bright side, at least people have control over who sees something and who doesn't! Thank the Silicon Valley Gods for helping you filter and censor yourself 24/7 in a way that seems like you've been doing this all your life! More power to all the versions of you!

Never mind the upward social comparison that one is forced to engage in due to the ubiquitous prevalence of only positive posts and pictures–a highlight reel of users' life (Yang, 2021, p. 8).

“I think certain people do try to create personas that really aren’t theirs, just to create content online. That’s saying that this is their real life when in reality, they are trying their best to show only their positives. These personas are not what they aspire to be but what people want them to be.”

- Participant

For me, it’s like Joey!

When it comes to data, it doesn’t like sharing.

JOEY DOESN’T SHARE FOOD!

WE’VE GOT SOMEONE FOR EVERY ONE. We usually celebrate sharing but since you’re special, your data is safely packed away for our eyes only. And also for some corporations that pay us. We gotta earn someway, right?!

BYOD (bring your own data) and get social!

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In this algorithmic age, how would you describe your relationship with your data?

Social media platforms can safely be deemed as a treasure trove of data, data that is generated by the users themselves. This poses serious threats to user privacy, especially if users are unaware of the various possibilities this data can be misused. Except for the two students studying digital cultures and an information system professional, the participants of this study lacked an understanding of how their data is being collected and to what extent this data can be used to accurately profile them.

However, once enlightened, one participant let out a tired sigh of submission and said, "Ignorance is bliss.

The less I knew about this, the happier I was!" Whereas the rest of the participants sang a similar tune of "It is what it is!" This normalisation of surveillance practices is evocative of digital resignation-learned helplessness developed in response to various social media practices, believing that online privacy is but a myth (Akanbi, 2021, p. 6).

The information system professional continued with, "Rallying for privacy on social media is stupid! If you want privacy, get off social media!," a commonplace sentiment mirrored in privacy paradox studies (Akanbi, 2021, p. 4).

“It is is “It what what it is!” is!” it

Someone said they left together Then I heard they slept together Oh my love, can't you see that you're on my mind Don't suppose we could convince your lover to change his mind Oh, the less I know the better

-”The Less I Know The Better” by Tame Impala

Due to the pervasiveness of digital technologies, people have been awarded convenience and efficiency at their very fingertips. Whether it is the possibility of connecting to people, sitting miles away, or the efficiency with which information has been made available to people, rendering bookshops and physical libraries deserted, digital technologies have granted us newer freedoms.

However, like the old adage, "nothing in this world comes free," these technologies have essentially brokered a deal to effectively monitor and 'modulate every aspect of our lives' in exchange for platforms that are free, pleasurable and convenient (Harold, 2004, p. 194).

Now, before you cancel me for only focusing on the shadow side of social media, this design intervention was created to ruminate on the true nature of our relationship with these platforms–a trade-off. We've successfully traded our privacy for convenience, our data for personalisation and our self-worth for huge, instantaneous bursts of doped up validation. Some have tried to escape this trade but, unfortunately, were only successful in becoming social pariahs or being seen suspiciously (Akanbi, 2021, pp. 6, 8). Like your average toxic relationship, social media has become deeply ingrained in our lives, so much so that despite privacy concerns, we repeatedly engage and interact with them, essentially undermining our own concerns (Akanbi, 2021, p. 3). This wicked problem is discussed to have two solutions–either alter your behaviour to match your attitude or change your attitude to match your behaviour (Akanbi, 2021, p. 14).

The apathy with which we, as users, are quick to announce the death of privacy shows the inclination towards the latter.

Perhaps it's time to reflect on our engagement with these platforms before we start pointing fingers. Perhaps it's time to better understand our reliance on these platforms before letting pleasure and distraction hinder the need to introspect and do better. In this arena, perhaps it's time to take a step back before we bleed ourselves dry.

Fighting with him was like trying to solve a crossword And realizing there's no right answer Regretting him was like wishing you never found out That love could be that strong Losing him was blue like I'd never known Missing him was dark gray, all alone Forgetting him was like tryna know somebody you never met But loving him was red - “Red” by Taylor Swift

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Cinelli, M., Morales, G. D. F., Galeazzi, A., Quattrociocchi, W., & Starnini, M. (2021). The echo cham ber effect on social media. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 118(9), 1-8. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2023301118 Duffy, B. E., & Cha n, N. K. (2019). “You never really know who’s looking”: Imagined surveillance across social media platforms. New Media & Society, 21(1), 119-138. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444818791318 Frechette, J., Bitzas, V., Aubry, M., Kilpatrick, K., & Lavoie-Tremblay, M. (2020). Capturing Lived Experience: Methodological Considerations for Interpretive Phenomenological Inquiry. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 19, 1-12. https://doi.org/10.1177/1609406920907254 French, J., & Curd , E. (2021). Zining as artful method: Facilitating zines as participatory action research within art museums. Action Research. https://doi.org/10.1177/14767503211037104 Ganascia, J.G. (2010). The generalized sousveillance society. Social Science Information, 49(3), 489–507. http s://doi.org/10.1177/0539018410371027 Gangneux, J. (2021). ‘It is an attitude’: the normalisation of social screening via profile checking on social media. Information, Communication & Society, 24(7), 994-1008. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2019.1668460 Harold, C. (2004). Pranking rhetoric: “culture jamming” as media activism. Critical Studies in Media Communication, 21(3), 189-211. https://doi.org/10.1080/0739318042000212693 Lyon, D. (2018). The Culture of Surveillance: Watching as a Way of Life. Cambridge: Polity Press Maddox, J., & Malson, J. (2020). Guidelines Without Lines, Communities Without Borders: The Marketplace of Ideas and Digital Manifest Destiny in Social Med ia Platform Policies. Social Media + Society, 1-10. https://doi.org/10.1177/2056305120926622 Newton, K. M. (1997) Victor Shklovsky: ‘Art as Technique.’ In K. M. Newton (Eds.), Twentieth-Century Literary Theory (pp. 3-5). Palgrave: London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-25934-2_1 Sasahara, K., Che n, W., Peng, H., Ciampaglia, G. L., Flammini, A. & Menczer, F. (2020).

Social influence and unfollowing accelerate the emergence of echo chambers.

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Applied Developmental Science. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888691.2021.1894149

LIVING DIGITALLY: LOVING THEM IS RED Victor Skhlovsky's theory of 'defamiliarization' opines that when something becomes habitual or ubiquitous, we tend to be aware of it, but we cannot truly 'see it' (Newton, 1997, p. 4). With the internet and social media occupying a significant role in our everyday lives, to critically investigate them, we must make sense of them by making them 'unfamiliar.'

'Living Digitally' is a culture jamming zine that leverages the power of visual illustrations to showcase people's perceptions and lived experiences of living in the digital era. In this sense, it positions itself as a phenomenological study devised to unearth the subjective interpretations of seven participants as they experience being surrounded and guided by digital technologies in their everyday lives (Frechette et al., 2020, p. 1).

'Zines' are a free-flowing expression of ideas and reflections that enable the creator to explore their ideas and imaginations creatively. Often characterised as 'individualised booklets,' these publications circumvent the traditional rules of writing and storytelling, presenting a myriad of short stories instead (French & Curd, p. 8). Alternatively, 'Culture Jamming' interrogates the dominant popular culture narratives by introducing noise into the communication process (Harold, 2004, p. 192). In a way, it is a form of guerrilla communication that challenges the status quo through satirical imagery by questioning dominant producers' values, norms, and actions.

Consequently, by incorporating visual metaphors, this intervention aims to showcase subversive understandings of commonplace social media affordances to "engender a qualitative change" by producing an emotional reaction of awe and wonder within the user (Harold, 2004, p. 192). In its arsenal, this zine equips the weapons of memes, satirical visual illustrations, popular culture references and interviewee responses, which are then analysed against the existing academic scholarship of social media participation, privacy and surveillance in the digital era.

A Z IN E BY U T S AV I BAV ISK A R