Judith presented the methodological background of the tracking data collection of our project at the German association of communication science method division.
And, on the question how to conceptualize such data as a network of news items and users, a second presentation of the Personalised Team, given by Damian:
Natali Helberger and Marijn Sax from Personalised Communication will enter into debate with the makers of a documentary about how Big Data, algorithms and persuasive strategies are used to influence our behavior as voters, consumers, readers and citizens. What are the implications of data-driven persuasion strategies on our autonomy, attention and even our political choices? What does it mean that major internet companies know more about us than we do? What goals do data-driven persuasion strategies serve? And what is the role of the law, regulation and governments? Do we need a code of algorithmic ethics? The debate is organized by the Dutch public broadcaster VPRO, and part of the successful Tegenlicht Meet Up series. It takes place on 28 September from 2000 onwards in Pakhuis de Zwijger in Amsterdam. The debate (in Dutch) can also be followed via life stream. Entrance is free, registration needed.
https://dezwijger.nl/programma/tegenlicht-78
How a strange new class of media outlet has arisen to take over our news feeds.
Frederik was interviewed by Deutschlandfunk about the Privacy Shield. The Privacy Shield is an agreement between the EU and the US that should enable companies to export personal data of Europeans to the US. The old Safe Harbor agreement was declared invalid by the Court of Justice of the European Union. The Court did not believe that European personal data were safe in the US, especially in the light of the Snowden revelations about data collection by the US intelligence services.
We organized an interdiciplinary panel at the ICA, the largest communication science conference, which was held in Fukuoka, Japan, in July. The panel focused on online behavioral advertising. From the panel description:
Online Behavioral Advertising, also referred to as behavioral targeting or online profiling, involves monitoring people’s online behavior, and using the collected information to show people individually targeted advertisements. This marketing technique involves tracking people’s online behavior, for instance with cookies, and uses this collected information to show people individually targeted advertisements. The use of OBA is rising. One website visit often leads to receiving tracking cookies of dozens of companies.
However, many people feel that OBA threatens privacy and fairness. Therefore, the development of using personal data to target advertising has received a lot of attention of regulators, lawmakers, consumer protection organizations, and scholars. Often, the debate revolves around privacy issues and transparency.
This panel aims to contribute to this debate, by bringing together experts in the field of OBA from all over the world (US, Europe and Japan), from different disciplines and fields (Law, Communication Science, and User Experience Research at Facebook). By providing views from different parties, disciplines, and regions, the panel stimulates a discussion about fairness and privacy in the context of OBA, and the implications for law and policy.
Speakers included: Sanne Kruikemeier, Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR), University of Amsterdam, Takahiro Nonaka, Privacy lawyer, Japan, Joeri Troost, Communication Science, Radboud University Nijmegen, dr. Jennifer Romano Bergstrom, User Experience Researcher at Facebook dr. Christian Sandvig, Communication Science, University of Michigan and dr. Young Mie Kim, Associate Professor, University of Wisconsin-Madison & Microsoft Visiting Professor, Princeton University.
Sanne Kruikemeier presenting a paper by Sophie Boerman, herself, and Frederik Zuiderveen Borgesius at our ICA panel
This week, Facebook announced a change in its news feed algorithm, which comes down to showing more content from friends and family, and less news from news organizations. Some have made a connection to the echo chamber or filter bubble thesis, fearing that news exposure would become too personalized and not diverse enough (read this article in WIRED magazine). In the context of this debate, Damian has been interviewed by VICE (link to the article).
One of the ways how news consumption gets more and more personalized is through the way people access the news: More and more, this happens through links on social media rather than through the news organization’s website. But what gets actually shared on social network sites? Together with two co-authors, Damian published an article on this:
From the abstract:
People increasingly visit online news sites not directly, but by following links on social network sites. Drawing on news value theory and integrating theories about online identities and self-representation, we develop a concept of shareworthiness, with which we seek to understand how the number of shares an article receives on such sites can be predicted. Findings suggest that traditional criteria of newsworthiness indeed play a role in predicting the number of shares, and that further development of a theory of shareworthiness based on the foundations of newsworthiness can offer fruitful insights in news dissemination processes.
Trilling, D., Tolochko, P., & Burscher, B. (2016). From newsworthiness to
shareworthiness: How to predict news sharing based on article characteristics. Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, online first. doi:10.1177/1077699016654682
On 30 June, Frederik is one of the speakers at an event organized by Dutch political party D66, in Amsterdam. The event concerns privacy in the 21st century.
We contributed again to the Facebook debate: Natali Helberger and Damian Trilling wrote a blog post for the LSE Media Policy Project blog, titled “Facebook is a news editor: the real issues to be concerned about“. They argue that the existance of human editors who edit Facebook’s news feed should not come as a surprise for anyone, because it is in fact inevitable from a technical point of view. Nevertheless, their existence raises a lot of interesting questions and has far-reaching juridical consequences.
This Thursday, 26 May, Frederik will be speaking at an event organised by the Dutch Section of the International Commission of Jurists: “Big Data, Big Responsibility”. Other speakers are Mr. Bart van der Sloot (IViR), Mr. Merel Koning (Pl.Lab), and Mr. Vincent Böhre (Privacy First).
The presentations and discussion will be in Dutch. More information here: http://njcm.nl/site/events/show/198