2020 was different than all the previous years in a lot of aspects.
A report from Mozilla Foundation which is a nonprofit organization who build a privacy focused Firefox browser said that this past year human health was tied to the internet health more than it has ever been. The president Mark Surman said the society and technology both are colliding head on with each other and it is impossible to ignore it. Head on Head collision between the society and internet basically means factors the people find wrong in the society and take it on the internet to raise awareness about it, or simply arguing against something they find discriminating on the web.
A report given out by Mozilla focused on three main topics that it believes were the factors for technology colliding with major societal issues. The factors are racial justice, labor rights, and social media companies' lack of transparency and accountability.
According to the Mozilla’s report, the internet is a white space and is usually centered around the US. The report also said that the web is a space made by white people who choose the people of their own skin as a first priority in employment. On the topic of Racial Inequality, a lot of cases came on board last year. The first was probably schools switching to online form of education and a lot of children especially Black and Lantinx students falling behind on their course work because of lack of the internet facility. Amazon’s workers who are white received increase payments and compensations as the e commerce business flourished during lock down while the people of color especially Hispanic and Black workers went through poor working conditions as well as low pays. George Floyds murder took the internet by storm with people chanting “Black Lives Matter” in honor of supporting the black community and a whole lot of other cases occurred.
The report argued that the internet can be a means to bring change, question powerful authorities, rethink how the systems work and bring stability and equality in the society.
On the topic of labor rights, the report stated that a lot of people in the US already used Lyft and Uber as a means of communication, but the lockdown brought about people using a lot of different online services like DoorDash, Grubhub, Instacart, Target-owned Shipt, and Amazon Flex to order their groceries and items of use as no one could go outside and everything was almost closed, but the report stated that these applications have gig workers for them. These are workers which do not receive basic benefits like healthcare, sick and parental leaves and labor protection and the bosses of these companies deny them any access to the data that is responsible for their livelihood.
The report stated that all this creates a power imbalance in the system that is what allows big companies to exploit people like gig workers.
According to the report by Mozilla, gig workers are now joining forces to fight for their potential rights for more control over their data and algorithmic bosses.
The topic lack of social media transparency discussed the ongoing issues with the elections and how all the socials are struggling between giving their users freedom of speech but also maintaining a line in what they should and should not say on the internet. The false misinformation has already caused a havoc when the capitol was attacked and also has left five people dead. To take the first initial step in maintaining a hate free space on the web all socials banned the former president of United States who played a vital role to promote false information but what will the socials do with all the other hate and negativity oozing people on the internet?
The social media will have to take greater steps to prevent such incidents or else they would be held accountable. The report on taking actions discussed how Facebook has automatically censored posts from anti police brutality in Nigeria.
The report further suggested some really good ideas about how to meaningfully hold companies accountable, from investigative journalism projects like The Markup that enlist everyday internet users to help them amass enough data to prove when companies aren't living up to their promises to the Facebook's quasi-independent oversight board.
Read next: Wikipedia’s parent company releases a new universal code of conduct related to abuse, profanity and misinformation of things on the site
A report from Mozilla Foundation which is a nonprofit organization who build a privacy focused Firefox browser said that this past year human health was tied to the internet health more than it has ever been. The president Mark Surman said the society and technology both are colliding head on with each other and it is impossible to ignore it. Head on Head collision between the society and internet basically means factors the people find wrong in the society and take it on the internet to raise awareness about it, or simply arguing against something they find discriminating on the web.
A report given out by Mozilla focused on three main topics that it believes were the factors for technology colliding with major societal issues. The factors are racial justice, labor rights, and social media companies' lack of transparency and accountability.
According to the Mozilla’s report, the internet is a white space and is usually centered around the US. The report also said that the web is a space made by white people who choose the people of their own skin as a first priority in employment. On the topic of Racial Inequality, a lot of cases came on board last year. The first was probably schools switching to online form of education and a lot of children especially Black and Lantinx students falling behind on their course work because of lack of the internet facility. Amazon’s workers who are white received increase payments and compensations as the e commerce business flourished during lock down while the people of color especially Hispanic and Black workers went through poor working conditions as well as low pays. George Floyds murder took the internet by storm with people chanting “Black Lives Matter” in honor of supporting the black community and a whole lot of other cases occurred.
The report argued that the internet can be a means to bring change, question powerful authorities, rethink how the systems work and bring stability and equality in the society.
On the topic of labor rights, the report stated that a lot of people in the US already used Lyft and Uber as a means of communication, but the lockdown brought about people using a lot of different online services like DoorDash, Grubhub, Instacart, Target-owned Shipt, and Amazon Flex to order their groceries and items of use as no one could go outside and everything was almost closed, but the report stated that these applications have gig workers for them. These are workers which do not receive basic benefits like healthcare, sick and parental leaves and labor protection and the bosses of these companies deny them any access to the data that is responsible for their livelihood.
The report stated that all this creates a power imbalance in the system that is what allows big companies to exploit people like gig workers.
According to the report by Mozilla, gig workers are now joining forces to fight for their potential rights for more control over their data and algorithmic bosses.
The topic lack of social media transparency discussed the ongoing issues with the elections and how all the socials are struggling between giving their users freedom of speech but also maintaining a line in what they should and should not say on the internet. The false misinformation has already caused a havoc when the capitol was attacked and also has left five people dead. To take the first initial step in maintaining a hate free space on the web all socials banned the former president of United States who played a vital role to promote false information but what will the socials do with all the other hate and negativity oozing people on the internet?
The social media will have to take greater steps to prevent such incidents or else they would be held accountable. The report on taking actions discussed how Facebook has automatically censored posts from anti police brutality in Nigeria.
The report further suggested some really good ideas about how to meaningfully hold companies accountable, from investigative journalism projects like The Markup that enlist everyday internet users to help them amass enough data to prove when companies aren't living up to their promises to the Facebook's quasi-independent oversight board.
Read next: Wikipedia’s parent company releases a new universal code of conduct related to abuse, profanity and misinformation of things on the site
