Prompt 1: Online Public Sphere

Online platform is one public sphere—can be the biggest size of public sphere, I believe. Thinking about our society without “online public sphere” today, I wonder how people express their opinions and views.  As I have seen on my Facebook page and other social media websites, people talk about not only politics but many different kinds of social issues, such as gender, racial or economic issues, that they want to let the world be aware of. Having online sphere, where people can state their thoughts on anything, has both positive and negative outcomes. In my view of online public sphere, outcomes depend on how people write and read others’ opinions.
I believe that positive outcomes of online public sphere include awareness, sense of inclusion and attention from the public. Because I do not follow political news personally, as I don’t truly believe in politics, I would not be aware of issues if I do not follow social media and read opinions of others. In fact, I also don’t read any types of newspaper, but I follow pages of news websites on social media. I feel that I’m not the only one who is aware of issues due to social media. In this case, online public sphere brings awareness in people who do not voluntarily follow social issues. By expressing opinions, people are participating in certain groups depending on what they are talking about. They can feel involved or included as they are allowed to express their opinions. The last benefit of online sphere is being able to get attention from others. The impact of reading random news articles and posts of random person can be significantly different. When reading articles on new websites is not as influential as reading opinions of people. The influence can gain more attention from the public.
Negative outcomes of online public sphere are misunderstanding with ‘freedom of speech,’ biased opinions, and emotional opinions. The best and worst part of social media is the fact that anybody can say everything from everywhere. Without telling names of writers, people can write whatever they want wherever they are. People are able to practice their freedom; however, they can take advantage of their freedom in wrong ways. Misunderstandings with freedom of speech not only can hurt people but also create conflicts between people. Another negative side of online platform is caused when people are biased by others. Being biased is easier online when certain people, including celebrities and politicians, express their opinions. Likewise, because people can say anything, there become online arguments and battles that are created emotionally.

I do believe that online platform is functioning as public sphere. Online public sphere is powerful; how we participate brings us different outcomes. 

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