New Media M.A. Research Blog | Media Studies, University of Amsterdam

Alternative for Who? Investigating Public Opinion on Alternative Platforms

By Tristan Bannerman, Amie Galbraith, and Natalie Kerby While monopoly power is growing in tech, so is the public consciousness of the inner workings of large platforms. A growing movement of alternative platforms could hold the potential answer to...

By Natalie Kerby on 10/29/21 Comments Off

How the Wall Street Journal made Facebook Inc. release an internal research

In the middle of September of 2021, the Wall Street Journal added an article to their ‘Facebook files’. This article surrounded Facebook’s internal research on Instagram and the negative effects it might be able to have on its users,...

By on 10/08/21 Comments Off

Putting the “face” in Facebook: Examining the role of digital media mediation through Facebook’s latest smart glasses

In Reality Check Digital Methods, Venturini et al make the claim that, though we upload our own content to our social media profiles, digital media itself “belong to the companies and institutions that have paid the huge cost necessary...

By on 10/07/21 Comments Off

Virtual Reality and the future of Big Data

Abstract As we sift through endless amounts of big data from social media, a new form of media is creeping up on us: virtual reality (VR). One of the biggest players in the industry is Oculus, who is owned...

By on 10/03/21 Comments Off

The Greedy Algorithm: An investigation into Facebook’s mismanagement of Big Data

In 2018, Facebook was issued a lawsuit by the developers of a now-defunct organisation called Six4Three. In this, they stated that Facebook had grossly mistreated access to users’ private data, while also collecting huge amounts of information on their...

By on 10/03/21 Comments Off

Infrastructuring Vision: An Examination of Automatic Alt Text on Facebook

In this commentary, I apply Susan Leigh Star and Geoffrey C. Bowker's concept of infrastructure to Facebook's automatic alt text tool. I discuss the tool in terms of its relational quality, the interplay between foreground and background, and the...

By Natalie Kerby on 10/02/21 Comments Off

The future in the eye of the beholder?: Facebook’s Ray-Ban Stories and their claim on our data

Since Baudrillard made his famous notion about a ‘hyperreality’ in his book ‘Simulacra and Simulation’ (1981), many people have been inspired by his differentiating views on reality. Big Tech companies are since their foundations influenced by the concept of...

By on 10/01/21 Comments Off

Censorship creates discourse: the implications of banning political advertising

Ayushi Arora (13237748, arora.ayushi@gmail.com) Thomas Ba (13286544, thomas.ba.7@outlook.it) Maurice Dharampal (10439250, maurice.dharampal@student.uva.nl) Alex Soete (13208918, alex.soete@gmail.com) Introduction Is free-speech under attack? Founder and CEO of Facebook Mark Zuckerberg has recently joined the head of Twitter, Jack Dorsey, in the...

By on 10/20/20 Comments Off

It’s a Small World – Oculus’ Quest 2 Redefine Distance

Oculus Quest 2, Facebook’s latest wireless Virtual Reality (VR) headset, was released in September 2020. Similar to its predecessor Oculus Quest, the gadget has been largely used for gaming, however this is not where the possibilities end. According to...

By on 09/28/20 Comments Off

What is VK and why could it be a social media platform of the future?

What is the best and most well-known social network of all times? Most of the people would say Facebook. But what if somewhere in the land of forests, snow, and, of course, bears exists a social media platform, which...

By on 09/27/20 Comments Off

Call to think: Twitter and Facebook urge users to fact-check information

Abstract:Aiming to nudge users in the right direction, Twitter introduced pop-up notifications if users want to (re-)post a news article that they have not opened yet, prompting them to be more aware of the content they are circulating to...

By Lara R. on 09/27/20 Comments Off

Will you find your next #1 Hit via Instagram? How the app’s new feature ‘Clips’ could make TikTok obsolete.

Funny clips, a lot of laughter, number-one hits and challenges with friends - That sounds very refreshing in times of self-presentation on social media platforms, such as Instagram. No wonder, TikTok became so popular and took over the music...

By Josephine Oettle on 09/23/19 Comments Off

Bluetooth and Its Mutation Into a Surveillance Tool

The almighty Facebook corporation has announced its entrance into the dating industry using bluetooth, facilitating the social network with yet another facet of user-generated data. In the past, this repurposing of the Bluetooth technology as an actor within the...

By on 09/22/19 Comments Off

Neurchi d’algorithmes

In 2017 Mark Zuckerberg decided that he wanted to help Nigerian women and reinvigorate Facebook’s business model. Somehow it triggered a renaissance in French memes.

By on 09/22/19 Comments Off

United States of Facebook: new methods of online governance

As of June 2019, Facebook boasts almost 2.5 billion monthly active users (Company Info | Facebook Newsroom). If it were a country, Facebook would be the biggest in the world by a large margin. However, everybody knows that it...

By robert baciu on 09/22/19 Comments Off

Would you let Mark Zuckerberg be your Cupid?

Introduction Facebook Dating, a relatively new platform recently released in the US, boasts to give you better matches than other rival dating apps using the already existing Facebook information it already possesses about you as (Perez, Tech Crunch and...

By Roisin Moloney on 09/22/19 Comments Off

AI Fact Checking: Artificial? Yes. Intelligent?

The phenomenon of ‘Fake news’ is now a household discussion, journalists and fact-checking platforms working solely to analyze and debunk these false pieces of information are now becoming increasingly visible. While it’s becoming harder than ever to tackle the...

By Sagar Hugar on 09/22/19 Comments Off

Facebook Gaming: Live Streaming the Perils of Data Privacy

The ability to record and live stream video games has completely reformed the gaming industry as it became the birthplace of popular online live streaming communities. Why do younger people today spend more time watching gaming content than playing...

By Boy Singmanee on 09/20/19 Comments Off

Matteo Salvini and the potentials of Facebook live-stream

Politicians are among the most affected by the breaking of live-stream services in social networks: this new communication has opened up uncharted ways to interact with supporters. Matteo Salvini, the most influential representative of European far-right populism, has developed...

By Giovanni Rossetti on 09/24/18 Comments Off

How Can Art Be Subversive in a Platform System? The Case of Benjamin Grosser

What would happen if one morning, a morning like many others, after you got up, you discovered that your Facebook home page is completely empty, without any type of content? I’m not talking about a crash or...

By Tommaso Campagna on 09/24/18 Comments Off

Facebook “M assistant”: a power of suggestion

It was never a secret that Facebook for a long time was trying to engage AI technology to expand the activity on their social media services. From their introduction of functions to identify people who are depressed and who...

By Katarzyna Wiercioch on 09/23/18 Comments Off

Facebook AI protects life from Live Streaming

In an era when everyone lives online, Facebook, the biggest social platform, adds constantly new tools for the user. One attractive feature is live streaming. Despite chatting and concerts that we are used to see, live video shows us...

By Anna Vallianatou on 09/23/18 Comments Off

Facebook’s ‘Rosetta’ System: A Form of Safety Implementation or Data Exploitation?

Facebook has announced its latest technological development, code-named Rosetta, which detects and recognizes texts in images, as well as videos. They claim that it’s for the benefit of the social network community because of the safety features it provides...

By Layal Boulos on 09/23/18 Comments Off

Facebook’s new “two more big steps”. A responsible resolution or a surge for more self-regulation?

Facebook has recently come under attack. Much can be written about the controversies that the social media platform is currently facing. Questionable subjects are, to name a few, tax evasion, live streaming of violence, the effects of social media...

By Aimee Dirkzwager on 05/02/18 Comments Off