Creative uses of Snapchat helps company spread their advice

The Do Something organization always strives to empower young people through a variety of social causes. The nonprofit program’s main demographic falls in the 13 to 25-year-old age range, and it didn’t take much time for them to realize that the typical Snapchat user falls in the same window. In following this similarity, Do Something decided to have a little fun while still working towards helping others.

Sending out interactive Snapchat stories, the organization encouraged their followers to text in and vote on a cheap Valentine’s Day date idea for their “snapmaster” Bryce to go on to save some money. After this, the voters were encouraged to enroll in the group’s Would You Rather campaign. This campaign challenges users to make money-saving choices in return for personal finance tips, which many people in their target group do not tend to know. The organization is utilizing the social media in a creative manner in order to help others as best they can. It’s going to be interesting to see if and how other companies follow in their wake.

An example story sent by DoSomething.org

More about Do Something and the Would You Rather program:

http://www.dosomething.org/wyr

To read the Mashable article including a Q & A with the organization: http://mashable.com/2014/03/09/dosomething-snapchat/

Most Americans would choose Internet over TV or cellphones

This article poses the questions, “If you had to choose, would you rather give up Internet access or TV? Email or social media?” So, what were the results? A study conducted by Pew Research found that 46% of adults in America would not want to give up the Internet, followed by cellphones at 44%, then TV coming in at 35%. This is different from years past when people said that they would want to keep TV over the Internet. 

So what caused this change in people’s attitude towards the Internet? I think that it is the rise in social media and internet related activities. Facebook has recently celebrated its ten year anniversary, and is just now starting to show signs of waxing in popularity. I myself know a few very tech savvy people who have gotten rid of their cable service completely and replaced it with technology such as Chromecast and Netflix. This was very interesting to me to hear because, although I don’t typically watch live TV anymore, I still use a DVR to record my shows and watch them later. 

I have found that companies such as Netflix and other sites like Hulu don’t always have the episode that I want to watch the day or even the day after it has aired, and in order to see it, I would need to pay for the Hulu Plus service, which is not something that I want to do as a college student. Having said this, though, I really don’t think that I could choose to give up one over the other. They are both a big part of my life, not only as a college student, but also in my everyday life. I could see why people would choose the internet over TV, though, if you don’t mind paying for the services to be able to get instant access to pretty much any TV show you want, and watch it anywhere, it would probably be worth it. So, if given the choice, which would you choose?

Article posted on mashable.com on February 27, 2014

Twitter Predicting the Future

Social media is at it again! A few months ago Google was able to predict flu outbreaks and now mashable reports that Twitter can predict HIV outbreaks! Where does our privacy fit into these data collections?

UCLA researchers have harnessed the power of social media for detection and prevention efforts of HIV. Their work “suggests a link between geographic outbreaks in the U.S. and tweets with phrases that indicate drug-related and sexually risky behavior.” Words such as “sex” and “get high” were some of the phrases that the researchers’ algorithm used in order to predict outbreaks. They collected more than 550 million tweets that they ran through the algorithm and they then ran statistical models to assure if the locations matched places where HIV was reported.

There was a significant relationship between the tweets and locations, but they used outdated data from 2009 which is obviously a weakness in their study. The researches would require frequently updated HIV data in order to predict future outbreaks.

Sean Young, the co-director of the Center for Digital Behavior, stated, "This is the first [study] to suggest that Twitter can be used to predict people's health-related behaviors and as a method for monitoring HIV risk behaviors and drug use."

President Obama on YouTube?

Even the President of the United States wants to be YouTube famous.

An article posted Thursday on mashable.com stated that President Obama recently met with young celebrities in a kind of "who's who" of YouTube to discuss the current cultural issues that are plaguing our country. President Obama met with 15 of the creators of some of YouTube's most popular channels for about 45 minutes to discuss such weighty issues as health care, anti-bullying, and economic opportunities: and then the YouTubers created and uploaded videos about their experiences. Estimated to collectively have at least 35 million subscribers between the channels, that's a lot of lives reached by a fairly simple experiment.

It's certainly a good idea for the President to reach out to the public - particularly the younger demographic, which YouTube specifically targets (defined in the article as ages 18-34). These are just the kinds of videos that I find myself watching on a day-to-day basis. It's definitely interesting that the President is choosing the middle of his second term as a starting point for what could have previously been a spectacular campaign tactic for young people; however, if the President wants to start publicly discussing the issues with America's youth, there is no better (or more trafficked) website than YouTube.

This makes me wonder about the future of our Presidential campaigns and what it will mean for our youth. Will YouTube soon be inundated with 2016 Presidential candidates vying for our attention with popular YouTube celebrities? Having political figures featured on young  influential YouTube channels could certainly be a game changer for those of us now old enough to vote in the elections. I'm not sure how I feel about having someone whose opinion I value on cultural topics as a sponsored spokesperson for a political candidate.

U.S. Couples Sharing Passwords

There a lot of couples have joint social media accounts, but now couples are going even further and sharing their passwords with each other.

According to a recent survey done by Pew Research Center, couples are more willing to share their their social media passwords with each other than ever before. They are more willing to share passwords than their calendars.

According to the survey 59% of users in a relationship five years or less share passwords and the number goes up to 79%, for couples in relationships ten years or more. Only 10% share online calendars with each other.

I wonder if this is because social media has been blamed by many for breakups and divorces. Many people use social media as a way to find out if their significant other is cheating. Maybe couples think that by sharing their passwords, they can avoid the questioning from their partners.

To view the story posted on February 18, 2013  http://mashable.com/2014/02/18/couples-share-passwords/

From Smartphones to smartwatches

Smartphones have been one of the biggest and best forms of technology in this generation. They have taken over as our daily source to use for just about everything! They have been around for quite some time now, and I'm sure that everyone has begun to wonder what would take over as the next big thing.
Well, for those who are wondering,   Samsung has something in store for you! At a recent conference Samsung unveiled 3 new products to the world.

The Samsung Gear 2, Gear 2 Neo, and Gear Fit, are wrist wearables that basically act as watches with many other features. The main focus of the article below by Mashable, is the Gear Fit, which has many of the Smartwatch functions, but seemingly is being used to target more of the fitness band users. The article explains, that the demand for fitness bands is slowing increasing and that this new creation might be big in the next few years. I personally am not a fan of watches but I have come to see that a lot of people have taken a liking to fitness apps of all sorts. This product seems to be a perfect fit for what.people are looking, for based off of the feedback people have about the fitness bands already out like the Nike Fuelband. I think this product by Samsung will be huge seeing as it takes the next step by allowing the band to work in sync with your phone. It will allow for you to receive calls, e-mails, and push notifications while being able to track all the important fitness uses.

http://tinyurl.com/mrjdtr3

Social media and the deceased, what's the protocol?

A decade ago, when someone passed away their online presence pretty much went away with them. Today, this is not the case at all. When someone dies, their tweets, Facebook posts, any photos they have posted online, and videos remain on their social media accounts like a living memorial to that person's life.

For the people who are closest to someone who has passed away, the question of who now owns, controls, and has access to all this information is brought up. Even in our local region, situations like this are making news.

In Wayne County, a man whose wife passed away on Valentines day left him videos on her Facebook account for him to view after her death. Facebook's policy on so-called "memorialized" accounts is that no one is allowed access to them when they receive a valid request that the person has died; they can only be deleted by a family member's request. This poses a problem for situations just like the one in Wayne County. Should it really up to different social media sites how a deceased person's information is dealt with? What if the person left a video will on Facebook, and their spouse needed to view it to fulfill their loves one's final wishes?

Death is a very serious and personal issue, and in my opinion, should really be left to that person's spouse, or a close family member to deal with the still-living memories of that person on social media, not a giant internet company. Whether they choose to keep the accounts open and viewable to friends to post farewell wishes, or view private videos and photos before deleting the account, it should be up to them. If a universal law or rights for this new situation is passed, many difficult situations of ownership of content on social media can be solved.

To view the story posted on February 23, 2014 visit:  http://bit.ly/1o48rU1