The Mediated Crowd: New Social Media and New Forms of Rioting by Stephanie Alice Baker - Article Example

The paper “The Mediated Crowd - New Social Media and New Forms of Rioting by Stephanie Alice Baker" is a spectacular variant of an article on sociology. The author talks about the mediated crowd as a group of people present in real as well as virtual environment, coordinating their actions together to achieve a certain goal. Nowadays this is an important part of social organization. The emotional climate - the complex set of values and opinions that are shared by the people and encourage them to act in a certain way.

It always existed, but today it is conveyed through media. It should be regarded as background for many social processes.ii. at the present moment, the people of the world are often engaged in various conflicts with the help of media which makes them the third observer who express their opinion or organize collective actions to articulate certain demands. What is even more important is that in the future technological development is likely to develop even further, allowing people to increase their level of involvement and effectiveness of group communication.

That is why it would not be a mistake to expect the mediated crowd to be responsible for many riots to come. All this raises a question of the necessity to censor the Internet and the amount of freedom that is granted to the people in the virtual environment.iii. advantages: the author was able to present the phenomenon from a rather unexpected point of view as well as highlight the aspect that is often overlooked by the researchers; she was able to put emphasis on the points that do not matter to other people, but are able to explain important relationship between the issues that are being analyzed.

  A close analysis of several key terms that are essential when it comes to analyzing the lives of the current people. The fact that the above-mentioned issues are witnessed in the modern age allows suggesting that they are characteristic to this age. Limitations: the author could have explained why she particularly chose the 2011 English riots. There have been so many different events that might have been used in the research as well, but she is not able to explain why particularly this case of civil unrest was so important.

It may be beneficial for the research to draw a connection to other similar events, compare and contrast them. If the author engages other events as well, she will be able to find some significant interconnections between the elements of the situation that are able to explain the deepest nature of the issue.iv. Should the government monitor the Internet activity of its citizen closely and prevent them from the organization of any collective activities that can possibly harm the society or would it be a violation of the rights of the citizens?

Should the developers of the social media and providers of Internet connection be held responsible for any damage that was caused by the riots which were organized by the people with the help of their products?Written summaryIn her article, Stephanie Alice Baker examined the peculiarities of modern social civil unrests. She dwells on two concepts. One of them is mediated crowd a group that exists simultaneously in actual and virtual reality. The next term is the emotional climate. This is the prerequisite for the development of the bond between people and engaging them into collective action.

The article holds important implications. On the one hand, it accurately reflects the connection between modern media consumers and the conflict that exist in the world. Secondly, the value of the research will increase as the technology advances and people will rely more on social media to coordinate their social life; so, riots that are organized by the mediated crowd will not be rare in the future.The study conducted by the author had strong and weak points. As for the former, she was able to grasp the peculiarity of the modern age as well as social life in it, something that is often overlooked by other researchers.

However, she fails to explain why English riots were chosen in particular.The questions to be asked after reading the article are the following: Should the government monitor the Internet activity of its citizen closely and prevent them from the organization of any collective activities that can possibly harm the society or would it be a violation of rights of the citizens? and Should the developers of the social media and providers of Internet connection be held responsible for any damage that was caused by the riots which were organized by the people with the help of their products?