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Bringing Ethics Back to Social Media : 3 Steps Toward an Improvement Plan

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I believe that social media, the ways in which it is used, and most specifically, the ways in which people behave, is a direct reflection of the society in which we live. And sadly, in a current present in which civility in America appears to be on the decline, it is hard to find any quick and easy solutions to making social media, broadly, a more ethical place. However, I do believe that there are some commonsense steps that can be taken to at least begin making some inroads in that arena: 1. J ournalists that work primarily on social media have long been ad a disadvantage when it comes to reporting, their work often viewed dismissively by people in the establishment -- in fact, distinctly recall a scene from one of my favorite shows, The West Wing, in which a major character questions the significance of bloggers and forum posters (LongMang4, undated). This has improved, but we need to do more. Elevating their stature to the same level as that of more traditional journalists has the ...
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Youtube, where everyone can be a star!

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  Back when I was younger, the idea of being on TV…”being famous” as I probably thought as a kid, was hard to imagine accomplishing. Indeed, barring some unusual access to someone at a local TV affiliate, your best, and really only, hope to using video to tell your story or share your content was to go through the laborious task of securing public cable access airtime and then producing content for it, only for it to air at 3am on a station no one ever watched. But that all changed when Youtube came around. From the moment that the first ever Youtube video appeared, it suddenly became possible for even the most mundane moments to be quickly and easily shared with the world. In fact, the very first video didn’t chronicle some big-time life event. Instead, it highlighted a trip…to the zoo (Jawed, 2005). Suddenly, not only could anyone at any time get their important messages out to the masses using video, they could also get their small moments in between. This has led to a massi...
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The rise and fall and rise again of streaming music

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When you heard a song on the radio that you really liked, and you wanted to hear it again, there used to be only one choice. Heading over the local music store, and buying the CD. Now, obviously, there were multiple factors to consider here. First, you needed to ensure you had transportation to the store. Then, you needed to ensure that the store actually had the album in stock (an advance phone call to ask was typically a smart thing to do before heading out). And of course, you needed to ensure that you had the money for the complete album, because while some individual songs were released as singles, most were not. However, Napster’s arrival in the early 2000’s changed everything. Suddenly, digital music was not only available, but it became easily attainable. Too much so in fact, as the site eventually was shut down as a result of multiple lawsuits from the RIAA. However, the cat was officially out of the bag and the world of digital music was officially ripe for exploration. Eve...
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Immediate gratification and the demise of Blockbuster

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I used to love the smell of Blockbuster Video. I know, it sounds crazy, but the smell of cheap fake popcorn butter and that synthetic carpet smell just immediately triggered thoughts of a fun weekend binging great movies. It was a physical tactile experience that triggered multiple senses at once and was somewhat of a payoff for the necessity of having to drive all the way over to the video store to actually fill your weekend hours with movie goodness. Unfortunately, excepting for the rare few who live in driving distance to Bend, Oregon, home of the last remaining Blockbuster Video store (Salisbury, 2022), this is a journey of yesterday, unknown to many south of their mid-teens. Indeed the world of streaming video ultimately killed the physical rental DVD (and really all physical movie media) because people eventually decided to choose the instant gratification of movie downloading with no late fees or out of stock titles over the traditional media we all used to know and love. And ...
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3...2...1...Podcast!

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Podcasting began as a novel way for people to connect with one another in an audio format. Initially it was relegated to discussions around niche topics such as technology, gaming, sports, and music, and initially could only heard using specialized software. However, more and more the technology has become mainstream enough that it now can readily be used on the phones that we all carry around with us all the time. This has led to more general consumer-based podcasts, and has also turned podcasts into a potentially financially-beneficial product for companies and organizations through subscriptions fees as well as ad-revenue. And projections indicate that podcasting as an industry is only expected to grow moving forward according to this Rumble Studio chart below (Rodnunsky, 2022).  News organizations have begun to tap into the technology as well, with more and more Americans getting their news from podcasts with each passing year. Indeed, Pew Research Center reports that nearly 15...
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Live event streaming - a great technology, but use with caution

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One of the most important technological advancements that came with the dawn of digital and social media is that of live streaming events to the web for the masses to see. it has allowed events to be not only viewed by the people who are in attendance, but also to scores more who are watching from some other place in the world. My department at AARP was one of the first in the organization to begin regularly live-streaming events, and it dramatically scaled up the number of people who were able to consume and engage with our content, and the practice has since been readily adopted by the balance of the organization (particularly critical during the pandemic). However, with the upside does come some considerations.  First of all, it's important to understand that by streaming live, regardless of where, there is the distinct possibility that you will be revealing your specific location to any viewers (Martin, 2018). Now, this could be the intent, or may be obvious, but if it is inadv...
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News orgs and social media - a new way to inform, and engage

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For decades, news was presented to audiences in much the same way. A reporter would gather information, and present it to his or her audience using a standard format, whether it be television, radio, or newspaper. The news would then be consumer at a standard time based on that format, whether it was during a regularly scheduled news broadcast. or perhaps in the newspaper the following morning. But that was effectively it. It was a one-way means of communicating information that, aside from the occasional letter to the editor, stayed exclusively unidirectional. Social media, however, has changed this for news organizations. Social media now allows news organizations to more readily and freely connect with their audiences in real time. This can range from simple interactions around a published story, all the way to highly choreographed offline encounters with the very reporters who presented a story so that he or she can garner feedback from the community (Nelson, 2021). The allows for ...
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