This week brings forward a new hot topic of discussion for all of us. And I am so eager to discuss my thoughts on the topic: “Politics, Subversion of Democracy, News (Fake) and Digital Activism”. All of the material given on this topic is based on the news, reports and articles filled with the facts and news that how social media and the mass media is being used by the politicians and how they are taking advantage from these platforms.
Let’s get started with the article: “Can Facebook Fix Its Own Worst Bug?” in this article it has been discussed that how a small innovation like Facebook which has been started by Mark Zuckerberg and now has become a global political and cultural force that now not even Zuckerberg is able to stop what he has started years ago.
Nearly two billion people use Facebook about every month and 1.2 million on daily basis. The Company which Zuckerberg co-founded in his Harvard dorm room 13 years ago, has become the largest and most influential entity in the news business, commanding an audience greater than that of any American or European television news network, any newspaper or any magazine.
The author said that “It is also the most powerful mobilizing force in politics, and it is fast replacing television as the most consequential entertainment medium. Just five years after its initial public offering, Facebook is one of the 10 highest market capitalized public companies in the world.”
The next article “Longtime NBC Reporters Quits” has opened up a new fact door for all of us when a reporter from the NBC quit his career and said that the mass media has now become puppet in the hands of the President and the Trump free days are over for all of us. And on such basis he quits his career after reading this I felt it so much that I really thought is it really happening to that level now?
What do you think about this fact? Are the politicians are using the mass and social media for their own purposes?
Is it logically and ethically right to make mass and social media the puppets for politicians?
Coming towards the next article i.e. “The Next Big Focus in the Russia Investigation: Social Media” the author has stated that Facebook has acknowledged that it sold ads to some 500 fake Russia-linked accounts between 2015-2017 and what most alarming is that the ads addressed the socially divisive issues like gun control, immigration and race relations. It is also written in the statement that it may discover more.
On this issue the CEO of Facebook Mark Zuckerberg stated that “We are looking into foreign actors, including additional Russian groups and other former Soviet states, as well as organizations like the campaigns, to further our understanding of how they used our tools”.
What I figured out from all of the above discussion is that politicians are now using the mass and social media for their own sake and are now trying to get their agendas fulfil by the help of these global networks where it is easy to make false news and accounts and make the trends go viral in just seconds.
This week’s news article is based on the topic that we have discussed and I am sharing this article with you all to let you know more about what social media giants are doing in order to counter misinformation in this election.
SOCIAL MEDIA & SOCIETY 
Mark Zuckerberg created Facebook in order for people to be entertained and keep up with people but now the whole purpose of Facebook has changed to advertise. to answer your question “Are the politicians are using the mass and social media for their own purposes?” I would say yes to that question because it all a public relations front, they know that they can sway an audience by using social media because that where most people are every day. They want to be seen and heard and social media is the place to do it.
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Although I don’t think Trump is an effective leader for America, but I don’t think that he’s stupid either. I think that the media is falling right into his trap and that he uses all of the attention that the media gives him to his advantage. He knows exactly how to get the media’s attention and to start controversy, and whether we like it or not, I believe that’s one of the things that he has in his corner for this election and what propelled him forward in the last one.
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