#digitalliteracy — Public Fediverse posts

We've done this before — computer, information, media, web, digital, data, algorithmic, now AI literacy. The bottle keeps changing. The questions underneath don't: who chooses, who benefits, what the system makes visible, who participates, what you need to understand before you can choose for yourself.

New post on when the bottle actually changes the wine, and when we're just teaching people where to click:

wiobyrne.com/the-bottle-keeps-changing/

#AILiteracy #DigitalLiteracy #EdTech #AI

True digital literacy isn't generated; it's understood. 💡

On this Literacy Day, step away from the opaque shortcuts of AI, dive into the clean NetBSD source code, and empower human curiosity from the bare metal up. Read the source, master the system, and keep human craftsmanship alive. 📖⚙️

RTFM (Read the Fantastic Manual)

#NetBSD #LiteracyDay #DigitalLiteracy #ReadTheSource #CodeLiteracy #HumanIntelligence #runBSD #Linux #Unix #RTFM #internationalliteracyday #noai #antiai #nollm #antillm

Let us fly… | This campaign bridges science & digital literacy. Open-access iBOOKs make Arctic research accessible, empowering global minds. Support evidence-based learning & action.

> https://donate-to.ikfoundation.org/fundraising/ibook-spitsbergen-science-expeditions

#OpenScience #DigitalLiteracy #Arctic #Spitsbergen #Europe #Books #whydonate

Education has repeatedly struggled with technologies that perform work students were previously expected to do unaided.

What if assessment placed more emphasis on whether students can verify, explain and defend their work rather than simply whether they produced it without assistance?

This article looks at the historical parallels.

https://www.alanbonnici.com/2026/08/the-ai-revolution-history-repeating.html

Hashtags:
#AI #Education #EdTech #AIinEducation #DigitalLiteracy #OpenSource #TTMO

Why do we trust chatbots and how can we use them more wisely? A psychologist explains
#Tech #AI #Chatbots #ChatGPT #Psychology #Misinformation #Truth #MediaLiteracy #Trust #Democracy #DigitalLiteracy #AIEthics #Search
https://the-14.com/why-do-we-trust-chatbots-and-how-can-we-use-them-more-wisely-a-psychologist-explains/

🎓 Back to school doesn’t have to mean back to subscriptions.
LibreOffice, GIMP, Inkscape, Zotero, VSCodium and Linux give students powerful tools to learn, create and explore without being locked into proprietary ecosystems.
Digital literacy should be more than learning how to use one company’s products. It should include understanding and controlling our technology.
Put a little more open into education. 🇨🇦🐧
📷 Antoni Shkraba / Pexels
#OpenSource #Linux #FOSS #Education #DigitalLiteracy

The Conversation: 41% of surveyed Australian teens now get their news from AI: new research. “Since 2017, we have been tracking young people’s media engagement, to understand how they get their news. This time, we found some young people are bypassing traditional outlets, reducing their use of social media sources and getting their news from artificial intelligence (AI) summaries using […]

Add this to the UK #postOfficeScandal & the Dutch child benefits scandal. No one committed suicide or got jailed, but German education was disrupted for DECADES, because an undiagnosed computer error contradicted direct evidence more teachers were needed.

#AIEthics #AIAct #devOps #digitalLiteracy

From the technology community ...

NPR: We tested how AI chatbots would handle foreign propaganda. They did surprisingly well. “Since AI chatbots exploded in popularity and Google started offering AI-generated answers, people who research foreign influence campaigns have expressed concern that some governments may poison AI-generated answers with false narratives. But an experiment NPR conducted with NewsGuard, a company that […]

A neighbor of our founder's, in his 70s, kept falling for scam sites and "miracle" ads, so we built Credibility Meter, a free, open-source Chrome extension that flags urgency, fake authority, and sales tricks on any page.

Opt-in, 100% local, no accounts, GPLv3.
https://tinyurl.com/3dmb6zkm

Read the code here: https://tinyurl.com/2t39wyts

Firefox port coming.

Support our other products:
https://tinyurl.com/yzpzzt6j

#FOSS #Privacy #ScamAwareness #DigitalLiteracy

Older Australians losing independence as digital divide widens

Older Australians say they are struggling to maintain their independence as every…
#NewsBeep #News #Headlines #Agedcare #boltonclarke #Computers #COTA #counciloftheageingaustralia #councilontheageingaustralia #DigitalDivide #digitalexclusion #digitalinclusion #digitalliteracy #digtalnavigators #elderly #elderlyaustralians #myagedcare #onlinebanking #PatriciaSparrow #Technology #TopNews #TopStories
https://www.newsbeep.com/au/868503/

Older Australians losing independence as digital divide widens

Older Australians say they are struggling to maintain their independence as every…
#NewsBeep #News #Headlines #Agedcare #boltonclarke #Computers #COTA #counciloftheageingaustralia #councilontheageingaustralia #DigitalDivide #digitalexclusion #digitalinclusion #digitalliteracy #digtalnavigators #elderly #elderlyaustralians #myagedcare #onlinebanking #PatriciaSparrow #Technology #TopNews #TopStories
https://www.newsbeep.com/au/868503/

Offloading work tasks to AI comes with a cost – to our brains
#Technology #AI #Brain #CriticalThinking #AIAtWork #DigitalLiteracy #FutureOfWork #HumanIntelligence #WorkplaceAI #AIEthics #Cognition #Work
https://the-14.com/offloading-work-tasks-to-ai-comes-with-a-cost-to-our-brains/

The print edition of "Children and Adolescents in the Age of #GenerativeAI" by Isabell Baumann, Georg Mein & Johannes Pause is now available.

Commissioned by Luxembourg's Ministry of Education, this white paper analyses AI-related risks in young people's internet use, with six strategic recommendations including an assessment of BEE SECURE's #DigitalLiteracy work.

Digital edition free under CC BY-SA 4.0 (#OpenAccess).
https://doi.org/10.26298/1984-4142

#ChildOnlineSafety #Luxembourg

Understanding WCAG 2.2 as ePub and PDF

https://doeken.org/wcag-ebook

Comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49271442

#HackerNews #WCAG22 #ePub #PDF #Accessibility #DigitalLiteracy #WebStandards

Using AI
You can use AI when you are more intelligent than AI. But when AI is more intelligent, the opposite can happen.

#AI #digitalliteracy #philosophy

Cornell Chronicle: Cornell expands AI Critical Literacy Program for incoming students. “After a successful pilot launch in the spring, Cornell’s AI Critical Literacy Program will be offered in the fall to all incoming students as well as other interested students, faculty members and staff. The expanded program will feature four modules – ‘What is Generative AI?’; ‘Ethical Questions […]

Science Literacy Project: Disinformation that spreads during heat waves. “Extreme weather typically brings a storm of disinformation with it; this [summer 2026] heat wave is no different.”

NiemanLab: We analyzed 6,400 New York Times stories to find out how comments change when you give readers more information. “Data journalists have sometimes wondered whether loading a story with data can be overwhelming rather than clarifying. We found that giving readers more information changes who comments, and how.”

What are your favorite pieces of transformative journalism?

This one made me think of Nellie Bly's 'Ten Days in a Madhouse' - reincarnated as a comedic adventure to soften the blow of a hard truth about #ai

----
#journalism #writers #writing #literature #criticalcommentary #investigativejouralism #oss #selfhost #ytreview #solarpunkpraxis #genZ #digitalliteracy #comedy #journalism

A Philosopher’s One-Word Theory for Why the World Feels So Weird

https://www.nateshivar.com/37465/a-philosophers-one-word-theory-for-why-the-world-feels-so-weird/

Manchmal ist der Feed wie ein schlecht sortierter Dachboden: viel Zeug, wenig davon braucht man wirklich.

Das Problem ist nur: Wenn derselbe Mist oft genug zwischen brauchbaren Dingen liegt, wirkt er irgendwann normal. Ich sortiere inzwischen härter aus. Nicht weil ich nur noch sehen will, was mir gefällt. Sondern weil ich unterscheiden möchte zwischen „unangenehm, aber wichtig“ und schlichtem Lärm.

Das ist ein Unterschied.

#Mastodon #Tech #MediaLiteracy #DigitalLiteracy #MentalHealth

As AI becomes more sophisticated, learning how to identify AI-generated content is becoming an essential skill. Monash University is partnering with a cybersecurity company to help prepare the next generation with the knowledge to navigate an AI-driven world. Watch the story below. #AI #Cybersecurity #DigitalLiteracy #Education #ArtificialIntelligence

🔍 Digital literacy isn't just knowing how to use tech, it's interpreting what it produces, recommends and conceals. Join "Reading the Digital, Reading the Message" and discover the DIGI-ME 5-lens reading framework 👉 https://digital-skills-jobs.europa.eu/en/latest/events/reading-digital-reading-message-digital-literacy-media-literacy-digi-me #DigitalLiteracy #DIGIME

🔍 Digital literacy isn't just knowing how to use tech, it's interpreting what it produces, recommends and conceals.

Join "Reading the Digital, Reading the Message" and discover the DIGI-ME 5-lens reading framework 👉
digital-skills-jobs.europa.e…

#DigitalLiteracy #DIGIME
---
https://nitter.net/DigitalSkillsEU/status/2084928836567769578#m

The Conversation: How to do your own online health research like a scientist – a biostatistician’s step‑by‑step guide. “I am a biostatistician by training. In my work, I study how medical evidence is generated and interpreted. I have been on the other side of that process, trying to make sense of medical information that could affect my health or the health of my loved ones. Over time, […]

AI tools are useful only when people know how to evaluate them.

Join us and the Office of New York City Council Member Carmen De La Rosa for a free virtual AI 101 workshop on prompts, privacy, accuracy, and civic AI tools.

📅 Tuesday, August 4, at 12 pm ET
🔗 RSVP: https://www.beta.nyc/event/e260804

#AI #PublicInterestTech #DigitalLiteracy #NYC

So every website on the internet is saved on physical storage.

This physical storage is called servers.
These servers are far away from your house and only accessible through the internet.

Now let's get back to iCloud.

iCloud is space on Apple's servers, accessed over the internet. It's used for backups, syncing photos across devices, and storing files in iCloud Drive.

#Apple #iCloud #iPhone #technology #CloudComputing #TechExplained #TechTips #DigitalLiteracy #AppleTips

Vielleicht verlieren wir durch Technik nicht zuerst Fähigkeiten, sondern Geduld.

Wir lassen uns Texte zusammenfassen, bevor wir ihnen selbst begegnet sind. Das Ergebnis ist schneller da. Aber manchmal entsteht ein eigener Gedanke gerade dort, wo ein Text unbequem wird, abschweift oder uns kurz aufhält.

Wie viel Denken steckt eigentlich in den Minuten, die wir sparen?

#Mastodon #Tech #AI #DigitalLiteracy #HumanCentredTech

TechSpot: Meta is bragging about how its AI keeps people on Instagram, while facing lawsuits over addiction. “Social media addiction has been a subject of public debate for years, but time spent on apps like TikTok and Instagram keeps climbing. Meta has now confirmed it’s using AI to personalize the Instagram feed, and that shift is driving a sharp increase in the amount of time users spend on […]

The Conversation: Meta‑backed research finds exposure to ‘untrustworthy’ social media is rare. The fine print is less reassuring. “A new study published today in Science Advances offers the most rigorous answers yet. It comes from a collaboration between Meta and academic researchers who studied the 2020 United States election. It was run from inside the machine – on the live feeds of […]

Porting SafeText and analyzing digital content with Apache Tika

Last year I wrote about pitfalls in modern journalism, especially with regards to receiving documents and information from whistleblowers without offering them adequate protection.

The tl;dr is that you, as a whistleblower, need to protect yourself; and you, as an editor or journalist, need to protect your whistleblowers.

Steganographic fingerprints might be one method adopted to detect someone leaking information. Steganographic characters replace common textual characters with unusual but hard to detect variants, e.g. they look the same to the human eye, or are actually invisible. Using a tool called SafeText by David Jacobson we can identify these hidden fingerprints in the content that you share.

I firmly believe we can find clues about what is important to preserve, or learn to preserve, when we analyse the content of the digital record and not just the (file) format of the digital record.

A file can contain many different features and these are all challenges to their future interpretation, and thus preservation.

I wanted to use SafeText in some of my other non-Python tooling and so I decided to port the code to Golang as a composable module and binary.

By coincidence at the time I started writing this I had also just written about revisiting tikalinkextract and so I thought I would write this small explanation about how you might combine Tika and SafeText to perform some content analysis of your own.

Who knows, maybe we will find a conspiracy. Maybe we’ll find secret codes in our own digital records. Maybe we’ll learn something new about our records…

Lets have a look at putting Tika and SafeText together and see where it goes.

We are proponents of teaching critical thinking skills and digital literacy, so in honor of April Fool's Day we want to let you know that we have some great free teaching resources in our Media Literacy Collection.

These lessons cover social media literacy, surveillance, propaganda and disinformation, visual literacy and more. The lessons are based on award-winning films from around the world like And So It Begins (Philippines), Navalny (Russia), The Cup (Tibet/India).

Whether you want to boost your own media literacy skills or support your students in navigating their media world, we've got something for you. Check it out!

https://journeysinfilm.org/film/media-literacy-and-journalism-lessons/

#MediaLiteracy #DigitalLiteracy #CriticalThinking #Education #Homeschooling #GlobalEducation

Logged In, Tuned Out

https://web.brid.gy/r/https://www.educationnext.org/logged-in-tuned-out-fifteen-years-billions-of-dollars-later-what-has-learning-tech-accomplished/

The rising threat of disinformation in Canada’s municipal elections
#Canada #Politics #Elections #MunicipalElections #Disinformation #Misinformation #ElectionIntegrity #DigitalLiteracy #AIThreats #Democracy #Transparency #VoterAwareness #ElectionReform
https://the-14.com/the-rising-threat-of-disinformation-in-canadas-municipal-elections/

Linux Professional Institute (LPI) is excited to join Educ@tech Expo, a leading #EdTech event, in Paris, Nov 19–21!

Explore #AI, #digitalliteracy, & the future of #EdTech thru conferences, workshops, networking, & more!

Visit Booth B52 🐧 for insights on #LPI certifications to be future-ready!

Learn more: https://lpi.org/q8rh

#LPI #EducTechExpo2025 #DigitalTransformation #AI #LearnLinux #LinuxCertifications #LinuxEssentials #SecurityEssentials #FOSS #opensource #WeyouGroup

Hey y'all!

It is still October and a few days before I publish my #halloween short story with ghosts in Florence and all sorts of Halloweenish stuff... 🎃 so stay tuned in for that treat ( or trick? 👻 ) ... until then we can still talk about #cyberawarenessmonth or whatever #cybersecurity lead-gen rockstars and gurus (🙄) are spinning this excuse to market their product anyways....

A few days ago I published my conversation with Cybersecurity expert Jacqueline Jayne (JJ) where we spoke about her presentation at #cyberconmelbourne with the Australian Information Security Association (AISA) titled: Beyond Blame: Navigating the Digital World with Our #Kids.

It is about why #parenting in the digital age requires more than tech skills—and what really keeps #kidssafeonline.

🎯 As Australia prepares to ban social media for under 16s (December 10, 2025), JJ discusses why restriction isn't education and how parents can actually protect their children in a connected world.

KEY TOPICS COVERED:

The hidden language of emojis and what parents miss

Why cybersecurity professionals struggle to protect their own kids

Moving beyond blame in digital safety conversations

Practical conversation starters for different age groups

The impact of Netflix's "Adolescence" series on the debate

Australia's social media ban: what it means for families

How #gaming, #socialmedia, and #digitalliteracy intersect

ABOUT JACQUELINE JAYNE (JJ): Jacqueline Jayne specializes in the human element of cybersecurity with nearly a decade of experience. Her focus on digital safety for families addresses the gap between technical knowledge and real-world parenting challenges.

Listen to the podcast and subscribe here: https://redefining-society-podcast.simplecast.com/episodes/beyond-blame-navigating-the-digital-world-with-our-kids-interview-with-jacqueline-jj-jayne-aisa-cybercon-melbourne-2025-coverage-on-location-with-sean-martin-and-marco-ciappelli

Check all my content on https://www.marcociappelli.com/

Or catch the video here: https://youtu.be/v-41rOVds-U

#OnlineSafety #ParentingInDigitalAge #Cybersecurity #SocialMediaSafety #DigitalLiteracy #AISACyberCon #CyberConMelbourne #ParentingTips #TeenSafety #InternetSafety

As you probably know by now, Sean Martin, CISSP and I are not going to be in Melbourne for #CyberCon with the Australian Information Security Association (AISA) this year... which really sucks as we had a great time there in 2024 - We met amazing people, created great content, and truly miss sharing quality time with the #cybersecurity community Down Under!

But this isn't stopping us from being virtually there by reconnecting with friends and meeting new ones while covering the event remotely.

So here's my conversation with the one and only Jacqueline Jayne (JJ) talking about her upcoming session: "Beyond Blame: Keeping Our Kids Safe Online" at CyberCon Melbourne (October 15-17, 2025).

There's something fundamentally broken in how we approach online safety for young people. We're quick to point fingers—at tech companies, at schools, at kids themselves—but JJ wants to change that conversation entirely.

Watch the teaser, then dive into the full episode:

🎬

Highlights: https://youtu.be/xeu1sZ3KiiM

🎬

Full episode: https://youtu.be/v-41rOVds-U

🎧 Audio: https://redefiningsocietyandtechnologypodcast.com/episodes/beyond-blame-navigating-the-digital-world-with-our-kids-interview-with-jacqueline-jj-jayne-aisa-cybercon-melbourne-2025-coverage-on-location-with-sean-martin-and-marco-ciappelli

What are your thoughts on this topic? Drop a comment!

#OnlineSafety #DigitalParenting #ParentingTips #KidsSafety #CyberConMelbourne #AISACyberCon #DigitalLiteracy #cybersecurity #infosec #technology #society

Megan Spielvogel CAE Ben Walkenhorst, GAICD ITSPmagazine

I am back!!!
And I brought Jacqueline Jayne with me. 🤘✨

Make some noise for an awesome episode 🎉

After taking a brief pause, I’m back at full speed with my shows: Redefining #Society & #Technology on ITSPmagazine Podcasts — ready to bring you bold conversations that challenge assumptions and question the role of technology in our lives.

This is the first episode published for the 2025 season, but trust me, many more are already recorded and coming your way soon.

And we’re kicking things off with a big one.

🚨 Australia recently banned social media for kids under 16.
A bold move? Sure. A solution? Well, that’s where the debate begins.

In this episode of Redefining Society & Technology, I sit down with my Australian friend Jacqueline Jayne to break it all down. JJ is a cybersecurity and human risk expert, and she’s got some strong thoughts about why prohibition never works.

Let’s face it—does banning something ever actually solve the problem?

We explore the unintended consequences:
⚠️ Will this really protect kids, or just push them to riskier online spaces?
⚠️ What about the communities that rely on #socialmedia for connection and support?
⚠️ Who’s actually responsible for educating kids (and adults) about online safety?

Technology moves fast, but knee-jerk policies don’t always keep up. Instead of banning, maybe it’s time we start educating.

📺 Start with the teaser video https://youtu.be/6wKbgTeNux8

📺 Then move on the full length video https://youtu.be/5ZehKjNsavc

🎙️ Or listen to the audio if it is your preferred media https://redefining-society-podcast.simplecast.com/episodes/the-great-australian-social-media-ban-fixing-a-broken-system-or-just-breaking-it-more-guest-jacqueline-jayne-jj-a-redefining-society-and-technology-podcast-episode-hosted-by-marco-ciappelli

The importnat thing is that you listen now and join the conversation -- comment below!

Let’s rethink, redefine, and challenge the way we approach technology in society.

Subscribe to the podcast for many more stories about our relationship with technology and what it means in our digital-analog hybrid society.

✨ https://redefiningsocietyandtechnologypodcast.com/

Enjoy!

#Technology, #CyberSecurity, #DigitalSafety, #SocialMedia, #OnlinePrivacy, #InternetRegulation, #TechEthics, #DigitalLiteracy, #CyberAwareness, #FutureOfTech, #HumanRisk, #ParentalControls, #OnlineSafety, #HybridSociety, #TechPolicy, #BanningSocialMedia, #DigitalCitizenship, #DataProtection, #CyberEducation, #TechForGood

The In-Betweeners

https://therealists.org/?p=8116

Capturing Gen Z’s attention

In early December I was invited to give a 30 minute presentation about The Realists for recent graduates of a prestigious business school in Paris. Their teacher told me that the students were already aware of many of the topics I typically write about – Big Tech, surveillance capitalism, behavioral manipulation – especially after watching the documentary The Social Dilemma. My task: to keep my presentation fresh and original to impress an audience that grew up online.

In the days leading up to the lecture, I was really intimidated. I had shown my documentary The Illusionists to auditoriums with over 300 spectators – but presenting to a class of 30 or so Gen Z students felt far more daunting. What could I possibly tell them that would grab and hold their attention?

Until I found an angle – that the audience eventually appreciated.

Meet a Geriatric Millennial

I am a geriatric millennial: I had an analog childhood in the 1980s; discovered the Web 1.0 in my teens, and the birth of social media once I was a university student.

I have this unique perspective of being in between worlds: I experienced socialization away from screens for most of my childhood and early adolescence; and the tidal wave of the internet and the monumental changes it brought to us as humans once I was already a young adult.

My dad worked in technology and would bring home early computer prototypes. Our first laptop, in the late 1980s, came in a heavy grey plastic suitcase that opened to reveal a keyboard on one side and a small orange, low resolution screen on the other. The availability of the internet would be a few years away… all I could do was play around with DOS commands and Paintbrush.

An IBM computer from the 1980s. Source: Wikimedia

At home, I would be engrossed in these new technological tools. At school, none of my classmates could relate to these experiences, as personal computers were still rare and prohibitively expensive in Italy at the time.

While preparing the presentation for the class of business graduates in December, I realized that I have always felt in between worlds. One foot in the digital world; one foot out in the real world. It’s been my normal my entire life. And being an in-betweener can offer a powerful perspective to what is happening to our world today.

An in-betweener doesn’t accept new things as normal; an in-betweener is reminded of what “normal” used to be like and questions every innovation. Maybe this is why I am so drawn to the writings of the late Neil Postman – especially his superb book Technopoly – as he held the same critical attitude towards technology.

The Last Generation

I belong to the last generation that grew up offline. The LAST one. Generations that came after me experienced the internet and social media from middle school… or even earlier. The only people who could relate to this are my late grandparents. They were born in a world without television… and then, in their adult years, they discovered this “magical” box that would bring the outside world in their living room.

As a geriatric millennial I distinctly remember what friendships used to be like – nurtured in the real world, away from screens. Sure, I would spend hours on the phone talking to friends in high school, once I got home from school. But there weren’t technological companies involved in mediating our communications, gamifying our interactions with hearts and likes and visible metrics. I am not saying one way is better than the other. Do not mistake this as nostalgia for a time now gone. Mine is just the testimony of someone who remembers what it was like to hang out for hours with friends in the afternoon, after school, in the absence of the internet, social media and the walled gardens of Big Tech.

I was an in-betweener as a child and adolescent, dipping in and out of two worlds. And I am still an in-betweener today, in 2024. How? You may wonder.

Half the day online; half the day offline

I wake up at around 6am every day. I immediately go online to read the news (bad habit, I know) or resume reading a book on my Kindle. Then I have coffee, get ready, and wake up my little one at around 8am. As soon as my child is with me, the phone goes in my back pocket… and stays there until I drop her off at daycare. I go home to work, power up my computer and tablet and dip back in the digital world for about 6 hours. When, at 3:30pm, it’s time to go pick her up from daycare, the computer and tablet shut off for the rest of the day and the phone returns in my back pocket… where it will stay for the next 5 hours, until my child is asleep.

I’ve been putting away my smartphone when I’m with my child ever since she was born: I never wanted to give her the impression that whatever appeared on this small black rectangle was more important than her. My number one priority has been – for 3 years now – to give her my undivided attention.

It’s fascinating to see how we model behaviors to our little ones and how much they learn by observing us.

Ever since my child’s toddlerhood, she has often yearned to imitate what mommy does. At home, we have had an unplugged, inactive cordless phone lying around in the living room. I explained to my child that that black object is a phone. Next time I caught her playing with it, she was trying to shove it in her back pocket – even if her pants that day didn’t have one. So she simply took the phone and sat on it. And then looked up at me and said “phone pocket.” It was hilarious. And incredibly endearing and powerful. When it happened my girl wasn’t even 2 yet… maybe she was 18 months old. And yet, she knew what I kept in my back pocket was a phone. And that it belonged there when we were together.

Takeaways from a tech-free, TV-free life

What happens when a 3 year old doesn’t have access to television, smartphones or tablets for “entertainment”? The entire world around them is an object of wonder, to be observed with the utmost curiosity and vigilance. A 360° interactive playground.

For example, on the way to daycare in the morning, she often screams “Mom! The moon!” The first time it happened I thought to myself: “what is she talking about it’s daytime” But then I looked up to the sky and saw a banana-shaped tiny sliver of light. Sure enough, there was a crescent moon barely visible behind some fluffy clouds.

It takes my girl less than 5 seconds to spot the moon on a clear morning, whenever we leave our apartment building. The moon… planes… cats perched on a windowsill… my offline, screen-free toddler spots interesting things all the time – an inspires me to be present, in the real world, and to notice interesting things too, so I can point them out to her.

Conversely, on the way to daycare, we often come across people walking while staring down at their phones, completely oblivious to the world around them. How many crashes have I averted! When I’m in a rush, pushing her stroller, I often feel like I’m playing a real life video game. Think: Frogger, but the obstacles and dangers are not cars and trucks… they are fast-walking humans whose eyes are hypnotized by cell phones and who do not notice incoming pedestrians.

It’s a bit awkward to be with my toddler and observe her observe these people who are completely engrossed in their screens. Whenever I get on public transportation with her, we are often the only people not staring down at a screen during the journey. She often tries to smile and establish eye contact with people – especially if someone is dressed in her favorite color – but it’s rare to have people look up and smile back. Fellow moms and dads, or people over the age of 70… but that’s about it. Luckily I always pack books, so we can read stories… and I can pull her attention away from this new normal of disconnection. My explanation to her “they’re probably writing to or reading a message from their mom.” Ha!

The Pursuit of Human Happiness

Seeing what makes my child tick, what she needs to be happy (attention! love! safety! her favorite stories!) is the biggest drive for me to make a documentary on technology and how it is changing us as humans.

Kids a decade older than my child are witnessing an epidemic of depression and anxiety – that has coincided with the introduction of smartphones and gamified social media platforms.

The idea that my child’s happiness will one day depend on social media metrics and online popularity – subject to an opaque algorithm – just about breaks my heart and infuriates me at the same time. I intend to fiercely protect her from this ugly digital world for as long as I can… and when she’s old enough, educate her about the mechanisms driving it and teach her to question everything and to follow the money.

My child may one day see me as an out of touch dinosaur, but I will be in the position to remind her that there used to be another way. And that there still is another way – if she chooses it. The Realists’ way. Informed, aware, and keen on using tech in a mindful way, instead of being used by it.

Thanks for being here.

Elena

#digitalLiteracy #GenX #GenZ #geriatricMillennial #millennials #NeilPostman #parenting #personalHistory #screenFree #socialMedia

My first #introduction: I teach #English at #MissouriStateUniversity. Mostly #EnglishEducation I’m interested in #communityliteracy and #digitalliteracy and #placeconsciousliteracy I’m also a huge fan of #yal and #graphicnovels and all things #starwars and #StarTrek I read, I write, I walk, I swim, I bake, I cook, I grandparent….just to name a few. #mastadonmigration