PLN and Public Communications
Nat’s original post.

Hi Nat,

I totally agree with the risks you presented about the use of public communication. I also found the lack of control for information to be wide-spread a big problem especially when it is wrong and misleading. I also think that the social media platform that people post and spread the information on has the control over the information, and it makes the spreading of the information even riskier because if the power is used unethically, it could lead to serious results. So discussing the power and rights of the owners and “controllers” of social media platforms can be a very important topic.

The use of advertisements to control people’s action is a good aspect that I haven’t thought about when I wrote mine, but I really agree that it can be a big problem. As you mentioned, the apps track one’s likes and dislikes and recommend people to buy things based on their preferences. It is a violation to one’s privacy to some extend. I also want to add that the advertisements could be used to shape people’s idea, which could be mislead sometimes. It is also an aspect of advertisement being a problem to control or shape people’s mind. What do you think?

Qiaoyang

BTW here’s my site.