Internet Privacy

Social accounts, like the masks I mentioned in my previous blog, can be used to cover up your unethical behavior on the Internet. In China, more and more social accounts are implementing online real-name systems. This is a very controversial topic in the United States because it involves privacy issues. In my opinion, creating accounts based on ID numbers can make users accountable for their actions. Buying a 17+ game in the United States is far easier than buying alcohol because you only need to click the "I'm 18 years old" button. The funny thing is that in China, the opposite is true, and almost no one will be checked for ID because of alcohol consumption (unless you really look too young). But I still remember that I tried to get my parents' ID number to get longer playing time (in China, if you have not been authenticated, your playing time will be limited). The Internet is no longer a cowboy's extraterrestrial place like the West. 

Although not many people are knocked at the door by the government for sensitive topics, people are often worried about such things happening. Over time, people will not discuss related topics by default, so the topic's tolerance is reduced. This may be the only thing I worry about online censorship. Just like the Hong Kong incident, the Fugitive Offenders Ordinance was originally owned by every country. Opponents are afraid of being sent to the mainland because of their words and deeds, just as people are afraid to take responsibility for their own words on the Internet. The topic of online privacy and censorship may be debated forever. Both East and West may be biased against each other's thinking, but as long as it is peaceful. 

EOTO from other team

Confirmation Bias 

Confirmatory bias refers to: once people form a prior belief, they will consciously look for various kinds of evidence that support or help confirm their belief, and sometimes even artificially distort new evidence. In this case, not only do people avoid the pain of regret, but their support for their beliefs adds to their "overconfidence." 

Example of Confirmation Bias 

• The world the dog knows is black and white. Most people can distinguish more than 30 colors, but some people's retinal nerves can distinguish thousands of colors. 

• When science and technology were underdeveloped, people thought that the "cubic place", after the development of navigation and astronomy, people gradually realized that the earth was a sphere. 

• In Aristotle's time, it was generally believed that the motion of an object was due to force. After Galileo, people recognized that "force is the reason for changing the motion of an object." After that, Newton, Einstein and others continued to "perfect".

News Deserts

Definition-

a community, either rural or urban, with limited access to the sort of credible and comprehensive news and information that feeds democracy at the grassroots level. 

News Desert

-- A comprehensive new study released today by the University of North Carolina’s School of Media and Journalism shows that far more U.S. communities have totally lost news coverage — more than 1,300.

-- Online news sites, as well as some TV newsrooms and cable access channels, are working hard to keep local reporting alive, but these are taking root far more slowly than newspapers are dying. Hence the 1,300 communities that have lost all local coverage.

-- About 20 percent of all metro and community newspapers in the United States — about 1,800 — have gone out of business or merged since 2004, when about 9,000 were being published.

Foot print on the Internet.

When you start using the Internet, you are like a prey that has fallen into a spider web, and you will never have the chance to escape again. Many people still think that simply sharing photos will not cause any problems, but as a little white who knows a little bit about the Internet, I know a simple photo can contain too much information. Therefore, I rarely use or share my photos when using social networks. Based on the advanced Google Image Search, anyone can find pictures about you from the Internet. When you share a photo with the school football team, people can scan the school logo from the database to determine your exact location.

You can even receive intimidation by email or text message. That's what we call Human flesh search (doxing) in China. Therefore, I personally think that private information should be kept on the Internet as little as possible, especially public.

Diffusion of Innovations

The theory of innovation diffusion is one of the classic theories of the study of communication effects. It is a proposal on persuading people to accept new ideas, new things and new products through the media in the 1960s. The theory focuses on the social and cultural impact of mass communication.

Have you seen this movie "The Social Network"? The film's story prototype comes from the founders of the website Facebook Zuckerberg and Eduardo Saverin. It mainly tells how Mark Zuckerberg and Eduardo Savarin established and developed Facebook. In the beginning, the founders just wanted to make a website dedicated to Harvard students viewing archives and personal information, and their competitors want to turn this site into a dating site. But after a short "latency period," Facebook quickly became popular among universities. Even though people were already using text messages to socialize at that time, Facebook caught the trend of young people (or was it a prestigious school effect?). As for the shortcomings of Facebook, there have been many news media discussing the privacy issues it brings. Facebook does bring convenience to people, but in some ways convenience and privacy conflict. As a user, we need to decide how much privacy we can sacrifice for convenience, but Facebook also has an obligation to clarify the terms (even not many people will read them).

Marketplace of Ideas

We discussed what Eight Values of Free Expression is in class, and me and my partner thought Marketplace of ideas is the most important and inspirational one. From the blog our professor posted, “this value was first suggested by Milton, who first said that when truth and falsehood are allowed to freely grapple, truth will win out. And the grappling makes the truth even stronger. His argument against requiring a license to print/publish.”

Marketplace of Ideas

When I first learned this statement, I tried to pick a mistake from it, that is, the truth will not always win in my opinion. When I learned that this passage should be interpreted based on freedom of the press, I could see what Milton wanted to convey. If the repressed speech is correct, not only is it obvious that the political rights of the oppressed are being trampled on, but the oppressor is also deprived of the opportunity to exchange error for truth; if the repressed speech or thought is wrong, this also means that everyone also loses the opportunity to make truth and error more visible in open contests. So the media should be able to make "wrong" statements, because the truth will become more meaningful. 

Freedom of Speech

I know there been a lot of things happened between the two biggest countries in the world. Therefore I would post some view which is not trying to convince anybody, but to provide a different point of view, to help us to observe things more objectively.

In this News, Digital Activists Take Aim at Video Game Companies Over China Censorship, a famous gaming company, Activation Blizzard, has banned an e-sport gamer because he announced some speech in a public game which is offensive to Chinese government and Chinese people. First of all, as a gamer I personally believe that there should be no politics in the sport game (e-sport is considering as a sport :), but many Americans would support the argument that the News made the "freedom of speech", and the "evil" side is China, so we are just gonna hate, hate, hate.

I have learned a lot about the "freedom of speech" in this class, and we have to assume that there is no absolute freedom. You must be responsible for the consequences of every word you've said. In addition, some arguments you might never want to made since you might get in trouble. Thus, how to value the boundary of the freedom of speech is really important. For example, racial argument is literally sensitive in the United States. A "C" or "N' word that speaks out from a white people would result in losing a job, homeless and maybe gone. We can see that racial argument is red zone to American since there are too much history and people fight for it. However, you can made racial argument in a Chinese forum and just few people would care about it. Territorial issue is the red zone of speech in China which is same as the racial issue in the United States. People use their own world view to judge, and they apparently ignore the cultural differences. 

If the right of the freedom of speech is correct, I hope my blog won't result in any problem. Love and Peace!❤

What is Anti-Mask Law？

Hong Kong Announces Ban on Masks and Face Paint That Helps Protesters Evade Facial Recognition, which we can see the Hong Kong Chief Executive was lazy and uncreative. Because the Anti-Mask law was not a new thing, and it has implemented in many area.

According to the Wikipedia, "Anti-mask or anti-masking laws are legislative or penal initiatives that seek to stop individuals from concealing their faces, who do so often to not be identified or out of religious practice". This law seems like really go against the human basic right, but many democratic countries got this law, and here is part of the list: Canada, France, Germany and Italy etc.

Additionally, a number of states in the US had this law, and some of them are still practicing today. I don't know why people are afraid of revealing identity if they believe they are peacefully doing the right thing. Mask is same as the internet in some way since we can just be keyboard warriors under this cover. 

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-mask_law  

The Joker Film

The latest DC film Joker has released, and it's glad to see they made some change.

If you haven't seen yet, Spoiler Warning!!! 

It's not a superhero movie at all, but a crime movie featuring ordinary citizens at the bottom. Film has a wonderful atmosphere build on Gotham, damp road, streets of rubbish, hair-trigger riots. A miserable life, a bad day, is enough to put an honest poor people into the abyss, and each step change is believable.

Joker tried to turn the government to anarchy which is completely chaos. Some people might learn and act like Joker but I don't get it. The theme of this film is how to avoid to become the next Joker; even though there is a Joker in the heart of each of us. Paying attention to the people you know nothing about them can really save someone. 

The Power of Media

"The media should be unbiased and real" probably only existed in my daydream of childhood or a small brochure of reporter which has forgotten in a corner. Come on, as a young, mindless and rebellious people, who cares about the media standard. Thanks for the internet, everybody can be a media and just try to grab more and more attention to make more money. One of the great thing the President Trump has done is he pointed out truth of media. Many people just read what media give to them and abandon to think individually. 

As we all know, some bad things has happened in Hong Kong, which is extremely violent. Viral Video Shows Hong Kong Police Shooting Teen Protester in the Chest. I am really sorry to hear about that,and I wish the protester would be recovered soon. However, if we read this news carefully, you would buy any of it because it directly hit your mind. "A brutal police shot an innocent teenager by following the order of a dictatorship government". But things is getting interesting if you watch the full footage https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4xmxW0RAqT8. I am not sure about that I would still alive if I gathering a group of people and then using metal pipes or gasoline bomb to go strike police officer in the United States. No matter what weapon they were using, it might cost a live if they keep practicing violence.  

We need to oppose all violence, no matter which side. Nevertheless, some protesters were committing crimes and they pretended to be innocent when police arrested them. Actually, most word, picture and video from the media can be edited and we cannot the truth if we stop thinking. 

How Dare You?!.

Recently, A Swedish girl Greta Thunberg became known because her speech of global warming. She is a environmental activist who is only 16 years old, and let me have a sense of being eld. She accused the leader of every country because they've "betrayed" the young generation. The climate of earth is getting worse and people choose to do nothing. Her behavior is praiseworthy, but also is kind of unrealistic.

  On the other hand, Vladimir Putin criticises Greta Thunberg's UN speech on climate change - BBC News. The Russian President pointed out there are still many countries in Asia and Africa want to live like Western countries, and the environmental protection would limit their progress. As we can see, we need to think critically since too much chains are behind this propaganda.

Many Chinese netizens criticize her speech is not practical. They believe actions speak louder than words. One-third of world’s new vegetation in China and India, satellite data shows. For instance, Every time when you use the Alibaba in China, you would gain the green energy, and when you got certain amount of green energy, the Alibaba will plant a tree in the desert of Xinjiang. My roommate has planted 30 trees and he can really see these trees grow up.