The Laborers Who Keep Dick Pics and Beheadings Out of Your Facebook Feed

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In the article “The Laborers Who Keep Dick Pics and Beheadings Out of Your Facebook Feed”, Adrian Chen explains the job of social media mediators and the parts of social media that we don't think about. There are many people whose job is to spend their day looking through photos and videos that are posted to social media to deem them appropriate or not. Meaning they are sifting through lots of content that is most likely stuff most humans don't want to see. They do this to make sure that our social media experience is not full of pornography and graphic violence. The article also discusses some of the impacts this has on the people who work these jobs and how it deteriorates their mental health. Some of these jobs provide access to therapy although often employees don't know how to get it. The repercussions of this work can be a lifelong struggle.

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While I am grateful that I can use Facebook or Instagram for the most part, without coming across something that is offensive or disturbing I do feel sad for those who work this type of job. There have been times where I have come across something on social media that was disturbing to me. It made me sick to my stomach to see that kind of violence. I can't even fathom what it would be like to look at that kind of content hour after hour and day after day. They would eventually be desensitized to it and feel more numb to it but that can't be healthy. I'm just having a hard time grasping the idea that my good experience comes at the cost of another human being's mental health. 

Where the Cloud Rises from the Sea

 Where the Cloud Rises from the Sea

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In the article where the cloud rises from the sea, it tells the story of the small town called Point Arena. Point Arena is a location where undersea internet cable comes out of the ocean and connects to land. Being a small town Point Arena has limited access to the internet despite being the location of a cable landing. Big companies have come in and torn up roads to lay cable through their town to supply other locations but have not supplied this town with the infrastructure to be able to have access saying it would be too expensive to do so. Although some smaller businesses are trying to help remedy the lack of connectivity here there is still a struggle because the large comp[anies are restricting their access.

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While I think being able to have good access to the internet could help this town in many ways there's also the side of the big companies. AT&T is first and foremost a business. So to completely fault them for considering the costs of supplying this town with the infrastructure is not completely fair. Is this small town going to pay to have it installed? It's completely natural for any business to consider costs for certain projects and decide to move forward with it or not depending on those costs and whether that investment will have a good return. So while it would be a nice thing for AT&T to do, it's not their responsibility to do so. Just because a Large company is successful and has the means to do something doesn’t necessarily mean they should, making these kinds of choices is what allowed them to get to where they are in the first place. If they make an exception here and provide without return they will also be expected to do it again. 

Remediating Social Media

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In the article Remediating Social Media by Annemarie Bridy, she discusses the history of internet regulation and regulation of free speech on social media. She talks about the threat that large internet-based companies impose on the internet community and the amount of control they have over the internet. She touches on net neutrality and the effects of paid prioritization. She also discusses the issue of censorship on social media. Social internet platforms have mediation for content posted to their site but the quality of this mediation varies from site to site. The differences in interpreting rules regarding censorship are an issue that needs to be resolved. While there have been improvements in the quality of mediation on social media it's still an issue.


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I do think there could be better rules and regulations for censorship on social media. While there have been improvements in the rules and regulations there's still more to be done. I think equal regulation across all platforms could be helpful because there would be clear and concise rules that would help protect users and providers alike. I think we do need to do more research on the issues of the current forms of mediation on social media to find the main issues in what is censored and what isn't. We always need more understanding of the issues to make a better-informed decision of how to resolve the issues at hand, especially since the online world is changing at such a fast rate.