Another Australian man charged over brutal Sharia law whipping - GlobalPost:
'via Blog this'
Friday 9 September 2011
Thursday 8 September 2011
What makes for good web design?
What makes for good wed design? How can a website deliver its clear message and purpose to users? The following video answers the questions that have been asked since the beginning of the Web.
Christopher Merrill is a prominent web designer who dedicated his work on designing webs since 1999. He specilises in web site design and is working closely with his client to provide high quality web site design. He’s designed over 200 web sites worldwide and he is a popular figure in social networking sites such as Youtube, giving advices on how to create a good web design.
In the video he argues that a web design should please the users and not the creator. He highlights that a common mistake that web developers make is that they try to “Wow the users” and put too much information on the front page of their screen. A good web design according to Mr Merrill is “Clearn, crisp and honest” delivering a clear message to users who visit their site. It is not the website you want to impress users with but rather the message it tries to convey.
References:
Social Media Marketing and Web 2.0
Social Media Marketing is a new, emerging concept, which started with the foundation of Web 2.0. Networking allowed millions of people to be connected and it allowed individuals to interact with one another, forming a new kind of relationships online. In present day, companies promote their products by joining these networks and/or forums and it has largely impacted the marketing industry and their strategy.
Google is one of the pioneer business corporations that successfully integrated their marketing scheme within the web. The design of the Google Search for example displays a mass number of advertisement by AdSense. AdSense is a marketing tool created by Google to give advertising opportunities to individuals and companies. It dedicates a space in Google Search to expose products to consumers to provoke purchase. Users of Google Search will most likely be affected even by a glimpse of ads thrown to their screens. In 2011 1st quarter, Google earned US $2.34 billion through AdSense, which is 28% of the company’s total revenue. The figures are growing and are proven to be effective in implementing social media as their marketing tool. It is regarded as one of the highly successful business model today. If a user types ‘Tah’ it automatically shows ‘5-star Tahiti Resorts’. Google fetches the ads from their AdSense program and promptly delivers it on the right side of their search site. The web design of Google is what triggers the users to be covertly brainwashed.
Social networking sites such as Facebook also implemented this model, only more engaging. As a social networking site, it allows products to further engage with users. Facebook not only has their integrated AdSense within the website, but also a Facebook page dedicated to brands and manufacturers displaying promotions of their products. Users can also ‘Like’ the page, similar to ‘Follow’ in Twitter, and get various update feeds about the company or product the user has chosen. Furthermore, by commenting or posting, all of the users’ ‘friends’ connections are able to view the message, thereby reaching more people. Social networking sites act as word of mouth, approaching more and more people by simply placing an advertisement or creating a page dedicated to their product. I believe Social media marketing has enabled companies to interact with individuals and it granted a feeling of loyalty to users that are connected to the their marketing.
Web 2.0 and Interactivity
Flew defines interactivity as “the capacity to easily connect interactions across different networks” (Flew 2008, p.29). Our web feature will encourage users to interact, engage, learn and discuss the content on the site and also through links to our social media pages. Interaction channels will allow users to write opinions and foster debate, similar to this “comments” section below. This will seek to drive more users to our feature. In Flew’s context of the ‘new’ media he believes that interactivity “stands for a more powerful sense of user engagement with media texts, a more independent relation to sources of knowledge, individualised media use, and greater user choice” (Flew 2008, p.28.) This definition is very much applicable to us as we are essentially designing our web feature within this context that is the ‘new’ media with competition against other journalistic and feature based sites that have already covered the Tahrir Sqaure protests. In this “greater user choice” context, we must make our web feature unique and different, taking a new investigative stance on the story.
Comments section from a existing documentary feature website “Go Back To Where You Came From”
http://www.sbs.com.au/shows/goback/
References:
Flew, T, 2008, “New media an introduction,” 3rd ed., Oxford University Press, Australia.
http://media.sbs.com.au/sbscorporate/documents/240104_online.pdf
Tuesday 6 September 2011
Who To Target?
Our target publication is the SBS. The Egyptian protests – a social media revolution – fits the mould of a type of story that SBS would cover. Whether a television documentary or online feature; the story is solid. However, for the purpose of this assignment, we propose an investigative web feature.
SBS’s digital media unit allowed for the expansion of SBS news programs and documentaries online, which currently comprises of more than 150 individual websites. In 1997, SBS Online had seven websites and each month recorded an average of 35,000 page impressions (SBS). In today’s 150 websites, there is a monthly average of about 6 million page impressions (SBS). This growth online has been particularly rapid within the past five years.
The SBS “documentary” section (hyperlink from SBS homepage)
http://www.sbs.com.au/documentary/
With all this in mind, our web feature will serve as an extension of the SBS network, specifically from the “documentary” section of SBS. Our focus on social media as a powerful democratic tool in the Egyptian context, will be another website adding to the list which currently stands at approx 150. Noting the rise of online participation, particularly within the last five years, our web feature targeted for SBS users will seek to enhance their knowledge on the Tahrir Square Protest and give the story a new meaning. This in-depth focus on the use of social media as means for communication amongst citizens to collectively overthrow a corrupt government will give users a new side of the story to consider.
Furthermore, SBS websites act as an extension from aired television programs by the station. Research indicates that a total of 94% of website users watch the corresponding SBS television program. Interestingly, only a small percentage of users (5%) speak languages other than English. Whilst the SBS network does cater for various audience ethnicities, specifically Italian, Mandarin, Dutch, Croatian, Syrian, Arabic, Vietnamese, Greek and Cantonese, our web feature will simply focus on the international language of English. SBS websites aim to “both initiate and reinforce viewer/listener attachment to particular SBS programs and to the SBS brand” (SBS). Recent data reveals that SBS television’s largest demographic is people over the age of 40 (49%), however it is interesting to reveal that 74% of the users of the SBS websites are in fact under 40 years old. Clearly younger audience members are engaging in the online world, as according to Flew (2008) they represent “digital natives”. However, one cannot simply omit the older audience members when creating a web feature, who’s to say that are not or will not become technologically savvy?
References
http://media.sbs.com.au/sbscorporate/documents/240104_online.pdf
Monday 5 September 2011
Egyptian Online Timeline
Kefaya Movement, 2007Activists and bloggers begin to undertake early steps to change
April 6th2010 Youth Movement
Maximise use of blogs to counter state control of news
Arrested April 6th 2008 Ahmed Maher, co-founder of the April 6 Youth Movement, civil engineer and co-founderWaleedRashad, has a degree in commerce. Youth Movement protest in Alexandria where he and 14 members of the movement were arrested.
Tensions emerge too
January 18th Asmaa Mahfouz produces this rally video
January 18th Asmaa Mahfouz produces this rally video
January 22nd We are all Khaled Said page produced by Google Executive,Wael Ghonim http://www.facebook.com/elshaheeed.co.uk
February 2Twitter produces 'Speak to tweet' technology.
Protesters more efficiently post statements through this new Twitter technology
http://twitter.com/#!/speak2tweet
January 25th Egypt’s Day of Rage
Protest culminates in massive turnout, Tahrir Square, central Cairo
January 27thInternet is shut down
The Associated Press also confirms widespread Internet outages in Egypt..According to Resney’s, a US Internet monitoring company, Egypt's four main internet service providers cut off international access to their customers in a near simultaneous move at 2234 GMT on Thursday.
January 27th: Facebook, Twitter and Blackberry Messenger services are disrupted.
July-August 2011: Ongoing broadcast of Mubarak trials streamed on almasryalyoum.comand other sites
Tahrir Square
Tahrir, Castells and the emergence of a new, technology enabled 'Public Sphere'
Manuel Castell's 'The New Public Sphere: Global Civil Society, Communication Networks, and Global Governance
Castell's explains in this text, that
*Without an effective civil society capable of structuring and channelling citizen debates over diverse ideas and conflicting interests, the state drifts away from its subjects (Chapter 2, p 38)
*'Civil society’ is an organised expression of the views of this public sphere, and it is through the public sphere that diverse forms of civil society enact this public debate (Chapter 2, p37)
Friday 2 September 2011
More Social Media Strategies...
Social Media Strategy for Web FeatureImage: Karen Ng
Besides the four main outposts, there will be subscription and bookmarks devices such as delicious on our blog, which will encourage our target audience to visit our blog regularly by providing them with convenience.
Our blog will also provide interaction channels for the audience to voice their opinions about the issues and our posts. These interactions give the audience a sense of involvement and will act as a good guide to improve the quality of our blog. Moreover, our blog will perform as a resource by linking itself to other useful websites such as the Snapshorts A Camera® blog and The Lede. This will drive traffic to our blog because audience regards it as a helpful site.
Thursday 1 September 2011
Social Media Strategy
Social Media Strategy for our web feature
Image: Karen Ng
Image: Karen Ng
The social media strategy is based on the metaphor suggested by Chris Brogan, and is demonstrated by Darren Rowse in this video.
Brogan suggests that bloggers should treat their blogs as home bases and connect them to different outposts. Examples are social media such as Facebook, twitter and Flickr, depending on the nature of the blog and the target audience. This has inspired our social media strategy for the web feature blog and here are the social networking sites which we will be using to drive traffic to our blog:
1. Facebook: It is a popular social networking site which allows users to interact with each other using different applications on the site. Facebook has over 750 million active users and they spend over 700 billion minutes per month on the site. Our group has set up a Facebook page which will be connected to the web feature. The facebook page will introduce our web feature to the facebook users and attract them to visit our blog.
2. Twitter: Sometimes referred as SMS of the internet, Twitter is famous for its function of instant news sharing. An example is the first hand disclosure of Bin Laden’s death before the official announcement by President Barack Obama. Our group has set up a twitter account to follow important sources such as AJ English and Yalda Hakim. We will also disseminate our blog updates to our followers through twitter.
3. Youtube: Youtube is a video-sharing website which allows users to share and view varies of videos on the site. Ranging from music video to news segment, Youtube has become a great source of entertainment and information for viewers. Our group had created a YouTube channel which contains videos that are related to our web feature blog. It can visually present our ideas to the audience and give them an interesting way to look at the issue.
4. Google+: Google plus is a news social networking device created by Google. It is similar to facebook but places more focus on group sharing. Users can create their own ‘friends circle’ and share materials such as photos, links and even academic articles with the people in that particular circle. Our group will set up a Google+ account and connect it to our blog so interested audience can be informed with our updates and progress.
Wednesday 31 August 2011
The Social Media Boom
Use of Online Communication Technologies for people over 18Source: Australian Government Information Management (AGIMO)
''This is bigger than the dotcom boom. I have never seen anything like social media … There is a massive social shift going on here."
While social media can be used as a weapon to fight against the government, it can also be used in a peaceful way to drive traffic to our blog. The chat above shows that there is a significant increase in the use of online communication technologies among internet users (aged 18 years and over), Social networking sites in particular.
Its popularity had grown from 26% in 2008 to 36% in 2009. This indicates that people are increasingly using social media to absorb varies of information and communicate effectively with the world.
The report published by AGIMO also found that younger people were more likely to engage in social networking than those in older age groups. The average age of social networker and non-social networker were 35 and 53 respectively. In order to promote our web feature, our group will take advantage of this trend and use popular social networking sites to communicate with the target audience.
Sunday 28 August 2011
International scope, local audience
A screen capture of SBS' online asylum seeker campaign. Source: SBS
SBS online has a focus on international news, but it also launches campaigns now and then.
The most recent example is their asylum seeker campaign. SBS aired the series Go Back to Where You Came From on SBS television, and developed a (great) simulation, Asylum: Exit Australia. Along with this, their internet page has resources for schools and more general educational information such as fact sheets and FAQs.
This style of page and the way that it sits within SBS' main site while being separate at the same time would similarly work with our feature because it is not only relevant to SBS' educated and older audience but also explores the issue in an in-depth, interactive way which warrants its own dedicated section.
References
SBS (2011) “Go Back To Where You Came From,” SBS, June 2011 <http://www.sbs.com.au/shows/goback/> [Accessed: 20th August 2011]
Saturday 27 August 2011
Revolution 2.0? Are we getting ahead of ourselves?
The citizens of Egypt fight President Mubarak with social media.
Image: Bryant Arnold (Cartoon a day.com)
While some commentators like Phillip Howard deliver glowing reviews of social media's power as an effective revolutionary tool, Evgeny Morozov in this article tries to put things into perspective.
He says the Internet doesn't automatically equal democracy and "cyber utopians" have rose-coloured glasses on to shield themselves from the dormant threat of government regulation.
Morozov's discussion leads to some interesting questions I think we should explore in our feature:
- What is the dynamic and interdependent relationship between social media and on the ground revolution?
- Is the Internet really a new public sphere? Work by John Downey (2007) on 'radical democracy' argues that through its openness, connectedness and global nature, social media provides a newer and more effective platform for facilitating democracy. I will be interviewing Peter Chen who teaches media politics at the University of Sydney about this issue.
- To what degree can regulation and governmental control ultimately usurp citizenry power through their access to vital infrastructure that keeps the web running? I'm particularly referring to the US' 'master switch' idea and when Mubarak 'disconnected' the Internet for a few days during the revolution.
A graph showing internet traffic to and from Eqypt during the pivotal moments of the revolution.
Image: Arbor Networks (SMH)
Because the revolutions happened in Egypt months ago the 'newness' of feature will come from an in-depth exploration of social media, its use and its place within the democratic framework of governments and its people.
To keep the feature fresh with new news angles, we can also explore how to chart Egypt’s movement from political uprisings to actually forming a democratic government. I will be interviewing Samina Yasmeen from the Centre of Muslim States and Societies at the University of Western Australia for her perspective on this issue.
References
Bryson, Gary (2011) “Islam and the Arab Spring,” ABC Encounter, 12 June 2011 <http://www.abc.net.au/rn/encounter/stories/2011/3238008.htm> [Accessed: 20th August 2011]
Downey, John (2007) "Participant and/or deliberation? The Internet as a tool for achieving radical democratic aims", in Dahlberg and Siapera (eds) Radical Democracy and the Internet: Interrogating Theory and Practice, Palgrave Macmillan: Houndmils.
Howard, Phillip (2010) The Digital Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy, Oxford University Press, Oxford.
Howard, Phillip (2011) “Digital media and the Arab spring,” Reuters, 16 February 2011. <http://blogs.reuters.com/great-debate/2011/02/16/digital-media-and-the-arab-spring/> [Accessed: 20th August 2011]
Morozov, Evgeny (2011) The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom, Penguin Books, New York.
Morozov, Evgeny (2011) “How much did social media contribute to revolution in the Middle East?” Book Forum, Apr/May 2011 <http://www.bookforum.com/inprint/018_01/7222> [Accessed: 19th August 2011]
Friday 26 August 2011
Why social media and why now?
Egypt's literacy rates are on the rise. The chart below and more stats here that shows an upward trend in Egypt's Human Development Index.
Source: UN Human Development Indicators
This CNN interactive shows the proliferation of the Internet, Facebook and phone use in Egypt and surrounding countries. The stats are two years old so one would imagine these figures have only risen.
Two thirds of Egypt's population is below the age of 30.
This combination of a rising literacy, increased proliferation of the Internet, and a mostly young population within the context of a corrupt government and stale leadership by president Mubarak, in short, meant that the internet-savvy youth (or what Flew (2008: 1) terms 'digital natives') could see a problem and this time they proposed a new solution-- a digital revolution.
My first post noted some of the key benefits of social media (SM), and to draw on media theorists, here are a few more key points:
References
Cranny-Francis, Anne (2005) Multimedia: Texts and Contexts, Sage: London.
DiMaggio, Paul et al. (2001) 'Social Implications of the Internet,' Annual Review of Sociology, 27: 307-36.
Flew, Terry (2008) New Media: an Introduction (3rd ed), Oxford University Press: South Melbourne.
Miller, Paul (2004) 'The Rise of Network Campaigning,' in H. McCarthy, et al. (eds), Network Logic: Who Governs in an Interconnected World? DEMOS: London, pp. 207-17.
Nielson, Jakob (2000) Designing Web Usability, New Riders: Indianapolis.
Woolgar, Steve (2002), 'Five Rules of Virtuality', in S. Woolgar (ed.), Virtual Society? Technology, Cyberbole, Reality. Oxford University Press: Oxford, pp. 1-22.
Source: UN Human Development Indicators
This CNN interactive shows the proliferation of the Internet, Facebook and phone use in Egypt and surrounding countries. The stats are two years old so one would imagine these figures have only risen.
Two thirds of Egypt's population is below the age of 30.
This combination of a rising literacy, increased proliferation of the Internet, and a mostly young population within the context of a corrupt government and stale leadership by president Mubarak, in short, meant that the internet-savvy youth (or what Flew (2008: 1) terms 'digital natives') could see a problem and this time they proposed a new solution-- a digital revolution.
My first post noted some of the key benefits of social media (SM), and to draw on media theorists, here are a few more key points:
- Protesters can become both producers and consumers, and hence, take control of communication platforms and disseminate their messages to a wide audience (not just Egypt's two state-controlled TV stations) (DiMaggio et al. 2001: 307)
- SM is easy to use and start-up, with a simple design so there are limited barriers to engagement (Nielson 2000). It should be noted that there remains a significant digital divide that should also be addressed in our feature.
- You can act cheaply and quickly, with high media visibility due to the removal of physical restraints (Miller 2004: 208-13).
- virtual interactions supplement rather than substitute 'real' activities
- more scope for virtual interaction often leads to greater stimulus for more face-to-face interaction.
In our feature, a key part of understanding why SM played an important role in the Egyptian revolution is to firstly understand the cultural practices that enable users to engage in the technology to begin with (Cranny-Francis 2005: 120). Therefore, the questions why social media and why now provide important links, and would make for good 'pages' in the feature.
References
Cranny-Francis, Anne (2005) Multimedia: Texts and Contexts, Sage: London.
DiMaggio, Paul et al. (2001) 'Social Implications of the Internet,' Annual Review of Sociology, 27: 307-36.
Flew, Terry (2008) New Media: an Introduction (3rd ed), Oxford University Press: South Melbourne.
Miller, Paul (2004) 'The Rise of Network Campaigning,' in H. McCarthy, et al. (eds), Network Logic: Who Governs in an Interconnected World? DEMOS: London, pp. 207-17.
Nielson, Jakob (2000) Designing Web Usability, New Riders: Indianapolis.
Woolgar, Steve (2002), 'Five Rules of Virtuality', in S. Woolgar (ed.), Virtual Society? Technology, Cyberbole, Reality. Oxford University Press: Oxford, pp. 1-22.
Wednesday 24 August 2011
Faces of the revolution (warning: graphic image)
Khaled Said
Source: Arabist
This photo of this man, Khaled Said-- beaten to death at the hands of the Egyptian police for allegedly being in possession of a video showing police selling illegal drugs-- went viral online.
It lead to this Facebook page, We Are All Khaled Said, whose original page in Arabic has over 1,600,000 'likes' and is still updated hourly (there are almost 150,000 'likes' on its English page).
This Facebook page led to the coordination of this flash mob, a peaceful protest led by hundreds of Egyptians who were given these simple instructions on Facebook:
Stand 5 feet apart, so as not to break Egyptian laws against public demonstration; be absolutely silent; no signs; wear black, as determined in an online vote; stand on the banks of the river or sea for one hour only, then walk away.Cue video to 0:52:
This YouTube vlog by this woman, Asmaa Mahfouz, was shared with her friends on Facebook on January 18th.
These Egyptians led in a significant way to this:
Government security forces with water cannons and tear gas confronted protesters to the Mubarak government in a battle that lasted hours on January 28th.
Image: Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images
And then this:
Egyptian anti-government protesters celebrate under fireworks at Cairo's Tahrir Square after president Hosni Mubarak stepped down on February 11.
Image: Marco Longari/AFP
These are the people that sparked the 18-day revolution that toppled a government who had been in power for as long as some of them had been alive. These are the people who used social media as a tool to spread their message and voice their dissatisfaction. They didn't do it with guns and clubs, they did it with words, images and videos.
There are a large number of other contributing elements which helped in the uprising. For example:
- Facebook page, April 6 Youth movement
- The Facebook 'event' for January 25 called "The Day of the Revolution Against Torture, Poverty, Corruption and Unemployment"
- The #jan25 Twitter hashtag spearheaded by activist Wael Ghonim
Doing an online feature on the use of social media in the Egyptian revolution is complementary because we can link directly to web pages, embed videos, photos, and so on. In our feature we could document the revolution in a similar format to this one by Al Jazeera, but through images, videos and interactives. This is not only visually engaging for the audience but also makes full use of the online medium.
References
Adams, Richard, et al (2011) “Egypt protests – Wednesday 2 February Live Blog,” The Guardian, 2 February 2011. <http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/blog/2011/feb/02/egypt-protests-live-updates> [Accessed: 20th August 2011]
Al Jazeera (2011) "Timeline: Egypt's revolution," Al Jazeera, 14 February 2011. <http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2011/01/201112515334871490.html> [Accessed: 19th August 2011]
Beaumont, Peter (2011) “Can social networking overthrow a government?” Sydney Morning Herald (online), 25 February 2011 <http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/can-social-networking-overthrow-a-government-20110225-1b7u6.html#ixzz1XAC1qcA8> [Accessed: 19th August 2011]
Sutter, John (2011) “The faces of Egypt’s ‘revolution 2.0’,” CNN, 21 February 2011.
<http://edition.cnn.com/2011/TECH/innovation/02/21/egypt.internet.revolution/index.html> [Accessed: 20th August 2011]
Monday 22 August 2011
Carrying a club in our pockets around the world
Protesters gather at the statue of Alexander the Great in Cairo to demand the resignation of Hosni Mubarak. Source: SMH (AFP) 
We've never created a club that's half a billion people strong and growing faster than ever, a club with room in it for literally any point of view. And we've certainly never carried that club in our pockets, around the world.Taylor (CNN 2011)
In the above quote, Chris Taylor (a Mashable reporter) offers an interesting metaphor to describe the virtual power of Facebook, and more broadly, social media in the Egyptian revolution earlier this year. This club (be it a symbol of violence as a weapon of war or a casual reference to a community group) possesses powerful qualities that can be derived from Taylor's sentiments:
- it's popular and rapidly expanding
- it has a global reach
- it's non-discriminatory
- and it's incredibly portable.
With a list like this, social media and revolution seem to complement each other nicely. In fact, social media has been largely attributed as a crucial tool in the Arab Spring, which has seen the fall of dictators through a series of popular uprisings in the Middle East. Firstly Tunisia, then Egypt, Libya, and now Syria and Yemen.
Source: Dubai School of Governance
This graph shows that Egyptians relied predominantly on social media sources for their news during the revolution.
The events that led to the downfall of President Hosni Mubarak's 30 year-long dictatorship tell an interesting tale-- war, power, corruption. They also tell an important story about the power of social media and its connection with democracy.
In our feature, we hope to chart through the murky waters of the Egyptian revolution that took place in January and February this year and examine not only how social media was used as a primary tool for driving protests, but also to what extent social media can be a crucial tool for democracy.
Here's a clip from CNN to get started. It covers a range of social media usage during the Egyptian uprising:
References
Salem, Fadi, et al (2011) “Arab Social Media Report Issue 2”, Dubai School of Governance, June 2011 <http://www.dsg.ae/NEWSANDEVENTS/UpcomingEvents/ASMROverview2.aspx> [Accessed:18th August 2011]
Taylor, Chris (2011) “Why not call it a Facebook revolution?” CNN, 24 February 2011 <http://articles.cnn.com/2011-02-24/tech/facebook.revolution_1_facebook-wael-ghonim-social-media?_s=PM:TECH> [Accessed: 19th August 2011]
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