Social media and internet public events

From Digital Culture & Society

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Revision as of 11:46, 19 March 2019

Article Title: Social media and internet public events

Find article online: https://journals.scholarsportal.info/details/07365853/v34i0003/726_smaipe.xml

doi: 10.1016/j.tele.2016.05.024

Contents 1 Context 2 Overview 3 Strengths and Weaknesses 4 Assessment

Context

Social media and social change have been proven to be directly correlated. More than ever, China has been experiencing deeper reform and social transformation; and it is all being promoted and talked about through social media. Dong, Liang, and He claim what is just as important as using the internet for locating information and mobilizing people, is having an open and free space to discuss these public events. The traditional means of communicating information through television and news sources are no longer reliable and have opened doors for the public to take matters into their own hands.

Overview

This article by Dong et al. (2017) delves into China’s relationship with social media and how society participates in internet’s public events. 97 articles covering 57 cases that fall under 15 concepts have been studied to be able to write this paper. There are three different types of media that trigger public opinions; traditional media, network media, and social media. With how China’s media is structured, traditional media is used as an extension of the governments voice. Network media is not an extension of the governments voice, but they do follow certain regulations and constraints placed on them by the government. Social media is the only space where Chinese citizens attain truthful information. The reason this happens on social media is because Traditional and Network media do not report and also hide information regarding political events and stories that take place. Dong et al. concludes that all 57 cases they have studied have been only sourced from social media. Cases like “My Dad is Li Gang”, “Guo Meimei Scandal”, South China Tiger Photos Scandal”, “Drag Racing Case in Hangzhou” cause heated discussions on the internet and remained unreported on traditional network media. This means that in China, people resort to social media for truthful information and no other source. They have created a system of mobilizing each other to transfer their online connections offline to extend the power of the internet into social reality and to further strengthen public opinion. The content of their discussions raise important questions that affect the Chinese people as a whole. Questions of social justice, law enforcement, governments integrity are raised and they turn transform beyond online forums to governmental pressures to investigate officials involved in cases being discussed. What is being demanded by the people in China through these actions is maintaining justice; and more than half of the cases studied, they manage to attract the attention of the government which later lead to changes of government policies and introducing new government policies.

Strengths and Weaknesses

The article starts conducts an important task of clarifying different arguments

The weaknesses worth noting with this article is *types of social media?

Assessment

In conclusion,

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--Am16yp 11:46, 19 March 2019 (EDT)