Chequebook

The following is an appropriated exceprt from an essay I did last year. I’m not an academic (yet) but it was marked by one or a few, and I got a Distinction if that helps my credibility. Thought I’d share it with you all while Facebook is still timely and hasn’t been usurped by Twitter yet.

“Facebook helps you connect and share with the people in your life” (Facebook 2008), and then some. You may or may not have noticed the banner ads on the right hand side of your home page. But just how much you’ve been sucked into them might give us an indication of how well Facebook fulfils its purpose as a White Pages for third party businesses – a database of “sixty million active members” (Krivac 2008, p. 41).

From an economic perspective, the pitfalls of broadcast advertising, which saw the wasted energy of companies “pushing their message to consumers who would never buy their product” is alleviated by “niche communities [who] put the consumer at the beginning” (Digital Branding 2008). This is a major theme captured by Hirst and Harrison (2007) who argue that

the commercialisation of the internet in the past fifteen years has also led to a greater corporate reliance in personal data to refine advertising and marketing techniques at the heart of narrowcasting (p. 286).

Facebook achieves this “by collating ever more detailed subscriber profiles… to categorise users, charging premiums for the sale of these groups to advertisers seeking highly specific niche markets” (Murray 2005, p. 424 cited in Hirst and Harrison 2007, p. 69).

Facebook's Beacon records the “clickstream” (Hirst 2007, p. 285), or browsing patterns of its members through the use of cookies: “a small, unobtrusive piece of software… used to track preferences when visiting that website… [to construct] a profile of the computer user” (Hirst and Harrison 2007, p. 284). Facebook would then advertise similar searches on the ‘News Feed’ of the individual and their network of friends.

On the receiving end, members claim that their personal details were exploited for capitalist gain. For example, Chris Nash reveals that Facebook makes money by “extract[ing] information from people’s private to private communications” (2008, 3:30min)* and sell it to advertisers, as well as businesses for the purpose of screening potential employees. Yet, “the supporters of free-market data-mining argue that they are only trying to satisfy consumer demand” (Hirst and Harrison 2007, p. 326).

With legal policies slow to catch up, the government “must be careful that it does not appear to be too hastily doing the bidding of the major commercial players” (Hirst and Harrison 2007, p. 279). But when “personal data become the lawful property of Internet firms, and of their clients” (Castells 2001, p. 174) to ”monopol[ise] control over the information… so that it can tax advertisers wishing to reach these individuals at the highest possible rate” (New Era of Advertising Hinges on the Free Flow of Information 2007) - an ethico-legal paradox becomes apparent.

From personal experience, when I started posting status updates about the large amount of food I ate that day, I was bombarded with weight loss ads such as the ones below.




While posting comments to my friend about the PCD concert, I was quick to receive this.


Oh, and they also know that I love to write.




Don’t believe me? Let me introduce you to my best friend Jeremy. He’s Asian and he likes basketball. Keen to move out of home, he recently searched real estate online. “Bingo!” shouted Facebook.




As can be seen, socialisation within a virtual landscape brings with it issues of ownership, control, ethics, privacy; and the disclosure of consumer buying habits, preferences and personal details. But is the invasion of our privacy a fair price to pay for keeping up with our friends?

I wonder what ad I’ll get next. Anti-spyware software, perhaps? How close do your Facebook ads hit home? Tell us by clicking on the ‘comment’ link below.


SOURCES

2007, ‘New Era of Advertising Hinges on the Free Flow of Information’, Marketing Week, 15 November, p. 22.

2008, Digital Branding: Close friends, New Media Age, London.

Castells, M. 2002, The Internet Galaxy: Reflections on the Internet, Business and Society, Oxford, New York.

Hirst, M. and Harrison, J. 2007, Communication and New Media: From Broadcast to Narrowcast, Oxford, Victoria.

Price, J. 2008, Facebook: Making Friends or Making Sales?, Facebook Podcast Part 1: Jenna talks to Chris Nash, Communication and Information Environments, University of Technology, Sydney.

Krivac, T. 2008, ‘Facebook 101: Ten Things You Need to Know About Facebook’, Information Today, Vol. 25 Issue 3, pp. 1-44.

The one thing I wish 14 years of schooling had taught me, but hadn't.

And that's that in the real world it's all about quantity, not quality.

I started my second job in a retail department store when I was 15. I was doing about two to three shifts a week, in perfect sync with my school hours.

I was recommended by a friend who already worked there. I did a maths test as part of my interview and scored 100%. I figured that all the extra-curricular activities listed on my resume impressed them. After all, school said they would, and school would never teach anything that wasn't true.

I felt appreciated. I went from someone arranging the racks to a cashier, to someone training the newbies, handling the cash flow and lay-by (sometimes the latter three at the same time). I had been at the company for two years, and my 18th birthday was coming round the mountain.

And that's exactly the point where my shifts were suddenly reduced to a single four hour shift every two weeks. It was like a plague that affected all of the almost 18 year olds. We soon noticed a bunch of newbies strutting their stuff into the staff room. While they were trying to be our friends, all we were thinking was "What the hell are you doing here?". We were fighting for shifts enough as it was.

Then we were informed of a new rule where you could only swap shifts with people your own age - or younger so as not to mess up the manager's budget on salaries.

You know those awkward situations with friends where you suddenly realise that they never really ever liked you, and it's humiliating because you thought so highly of them? Well, it was like that. The sudden influx of new, noticeably younger staff was the company's way of saying "Thanks for everything but we don't need you anymore. You're just too expensive. And it's because of your experience that we'll let you hang around just long enough to train the new people before wiping your name off our records." I guess it's kind of like how women feel when their husbands leave them for a young, ditsy slut with big boobs.

I immediately went for a Christmas casual job at another retail store. It was a relief to find a store that didn't think I was already due for retirement. I was getting about four shifts a week, more than the other Christmas casuals, two of whom were my friends. So I figured I must have been doing something right. That was, until I got the chicken pox. By the time I got better I didn't get any shifts. Sure it was a Christmas casual job, but was it so hard for them to tell me that I wasn't needed anymore than have me come in every week to check the roster? Walking out of the store empty handed was like the walk of shame when contestants are booted off a show, except this time you didn't know whether you were out or not.

I'm currently at another retail job that isn't age-ist. But we're sent home early during quiet days - which I guess is kind of understandable if you live 5 minutes away, and frustrating when you live 45 minutes away by train, up to 2 hours if there's track work - and that's not including the 45 minutes walk to and/or from the train station, or the 40 minute wait for the next bus that goes to your area.

A friend of mine works at a place where the staff are treated like walking dollar signs - and not like actual human beings with feelings. The manager will assign manual jobs that I doubt even superman could finish within the time the staff are given. The manager will say "Good job keep it up!" to my friend's face - and "Fuck he's slow, as if he hasn't had long enough to do those tasks" to another coworker. My friend's manager will also shave as much hours, commissions and bonuses off his employees' time sheets without it being noticeable, unless they closely scrutinised it. This same manager will also yell at casuals over the phone when they can't come into work. "Do you know what it means to be a casual?" he will scream. For him, being a casual means waiting next to the phone every minute of the day for the rest of your life and not having anything worth living for than going to a workplace that won't include you in the roster.

If you're reading this and have stories of your own, remember: sharing is caring.

Love, Noeline.
xox

One for you, Two for me

"Mine, mine, mine!" Have you ever noticed how much little kids love pointing out that something is theirs?

When we were young, my brother and I used to fight over the free tazos that come in packets of chips. When my other brother came along, I used to taunt that our mother was actually my mother, and my mother only. His response was to hug our mum in defense and cry. But some people never grow out of this possessiveness.

I have a quite a few friends who don’t tell their partner when they see or speak to a certain someone/s outside of their relationship. I ask them why. They say it’s because they know their partner will get angry. Or in other words, jealous.

But if lying includes the things you don’t say (and not just the things you do say that aren’t true), does it not then constitute, if not the slightest form of cheating? If the relationship was platonic, why would you go through all the effort of hiding it?

Is it not logically easier to have a fight, and get the compromising over and done with – than spend the rest of your life manoeuvring around particular friends without your partner’s knowledge? And even if the compromise meant a break up, then you’d leave… right? Bros before hoes? Chicks before dicks? BFF’s?

Well, apparently this is easier said than done when you’re in, or have been in this situation. I had a friend who practically disappeared off the face of the planet when she started going out with her on-again-off-again boyfriend. He made her delete every single contact number off her phone, save for him and her family. “But he’s good to me,” she says, trying to justify the situation. So almost any form of outside communication, including her conversation with me, was secretly devoured like a binge eating anorexic.

According to marriage and family therapist Joan Lachkar, such behaviour is actually a degenerate, more dangerous form of jealousy: envy. “ENVY… is destructive, possessive, controlling, and does not allow outside intruders in.” Bevan agrees. According to him, "Jealousy is… a protective reaction to a perceived threat to a valued relationship, arising from a situation in which the partner's involvement with an activity and/or another person is contrary to the jealous person's definition of their relationship.”

Another friend of mine said he was jealous upon finding out that a girl he used to like was now seeing someone else, even though he already had a girlfriend. I asked him if this jealousy meant that he would rather be with the other girl over his current girlfriend. “No, I’m jealous of the fact that another guy pulled the exact same moves I did, and that it worked out successfully for him, but not for me. That’s all.”

This resembles the politically correct definition of jealousy. Joan Lachkar explains that “Jealousy, unlike envy, is… whereby one desires the object, but does not seek to destroy it or the… rival.”

Sibling rivalry is also a common example. Take for example an anonymous contributor; let’s call him William. When he was young, William’s parents bought him a toy sword. A few days later, his brother was treated with an even bigger, better light-up sword. Not because it was his birthday, but because he got jealous of William. Now in their teens, William toiled for hours at a part time job in order to save for a laptop. His same brother got one for free, from their parents. Knowing that William would get jealous, they bought him an iPod.

Yet, another contributor admits that she has double standards when it comes to her boyfriend. She spends hours assuring her boyfriend that her boy friends seek her purely platonic company. But when it comes to her boyfriend spending time with his girl friends, she feels a littlelest, tiniest, teeniest pang of jealousy. “It reassures me that I still care for him. So a little jealousy is healthy,” she says.

If there’s one thing I’m jealous of, it’s of people who can drive. I’d have to work over two hours for a one hour driving lesson. And driving lessons would mean giving up my university degree, which requires me to study overseas for a year. I’m jealous that people can drive to work located nowhere near public transport. I’m jealous of people who don’t have to ask their friends’ parents to drive them around. I’m jealous of people who have parent/s who are confident enough to teach them how to drive, or have a parent who does live within the same proximity.

Coming from a broken family, I’m jealous that girls from a nuclear family are more likely to trust men than I am. As thankful as I am for the lessons my parent’s divorce has taught me, I’m jealous that for other girls, their template of a happy marriage is their parents’.

But since my mum says likens having a car to having a baby (the finance, the upkeep), and since I probably wouldn’t be as strong-willed and independent as I am had it not been for my parent’s divorce, then maybe it’s true that

“Jealousy is all the fun you think they had”
- Erica Jong (American writer and feminist, 1942).

So... what are you jealous of? Let it all out in the comments section. Adios amigos!

Love, Noeline.
xox

SOURCE
Bevan, J.L. 2004, ‘General partner and relational uncertainty as consequences of another person's jealousy expression’ in Western Journal of Communication, Vol. 68, pp. 195-218.

Welcome to my new home!

You've probably heard that we're currently in a global financial crisis. But if time is money, then I'm low on that too.

I'm not sure if you guys noticed, but I so got tired of waiting for my old blogdrive to load that I decided to make a new one with blogger. So far, its proved faster and easier to use.

I've also decided to mix the usual content with shorter snaps of whatever might be on my mind at the time.

So stay tuned, and remember the drill. Comment! I'm only one person. I can't think of everyone's thoughts. Kindly share your views with me and everyone else who reads this blog.

Love, Noeline.
xox