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Published, Version of Record (VoR)Open Access (License Unspecified), Open
Journal article
Powerful Privacy Norms in Social Network Discourse
Proceedings of the ACM on human-computer interaction, v 5(CSCW2), pp 1-27
13 Oct 2021
Abstract
Social media companies wield power over their users through design, policy, and through their participation in public discourse. We set out to understand how companies leverage public relations to influence expectations of privacy and privacy-related norms. To interrogate the discourse productions of companies in relation to privacy, we examine the blogs associated with three major social media platforms: Facebook, Instagram (both owned by Facebook Inc.), and Snapchat. We analyze privacy-related posts using critical discourse analysis to demonstrate how these powerful entities construct narratives about users and their privacy expectations. We find that each of these platforms often make use of discourse about "vulnerable" identities to invoke relations of power, while at the same time, advancing interpretations and values that favor data capitalism. Finally, we discuss how these public narratives might influence the construction of users' own interpretations of appropriate privacy norms and conceptions of self. We contend that expectations of privacy and social norms are not simply artifacts of users' own needs and desires, but co-constructions that reflect the influence of social media companies themselves.
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17 citations in Scopus
Details
- Title
- Powerful Privacy Norms in Social Network Discourse
- Creators
- Nora McDonald - University of CincinnatiAndrea Forte - Drexel University
- Publication Details
- Proceedings of the ACM on human-computer interaction, v 5(CSCW2), pp 1-27
- Publisher
- Association for Computing Machinery
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- Information Science
- Scopus ID
- 2-s2.0-85117885227
- Other Identifier
- 991019173866504721