Every click, share, like, and post creates a connection, initiates a definition of yourself — — Your social-economic status, work ethic, criminal records and value towards others and society.
On-line and Off-line World
On-line and off-line is no longer separated. How we perform, share and interact online affects our off-line behavior. For example, people talk about the stories they posted online, the news they just read and latest product commercial they saw. Many of our off-line conversations are generated by our online interactions.
Taina Bucher argued that social media is no longer the discovery of the existing network, but the network networks.
“Being social in the context of social media means creating connections within the boundaries of adaptive algorithmic architectures. Every click, share, like, and post creates a connection, initiates a relation. The network dynamically grows, evolves, becomes, the network networks.” — Taina Bucher
However, the Black Mirror episode Nosedive goes beyond that. Every click, share, like, and post creates a connection, initiates a definition of yourself — — Your social-economic status, work ethic, criminal records and value towards others and society.
It’s important to think about what drives society to adopt these adaptive algorithmic architectures and what motivates people to embrace these technologies and tools.
Let’s take a look at the personal rating system depicted in Nosedive.
So if the citizen rating system in Nosedive is true, why would people use a rating system to review each other? What are the benefits of using this review system to standardize citizens, and what would be the potential drivers of these platforms?
Let’s take a step back and think about this first, what does review mean?
Online Review
According to Oxford Dictionary, “review” is defined as “A formal assessment of something with the intention of instituting change if necessary.” “Review” is a process of forming a social judgment or reconsidering existing evaluations.
People search for external information to reduce uncertainty and perceived risk when they are making purchase decisions (Olshavsky & Granbois, 1979). It’s an internal need and motive that drives people to seek second opinions to support their decision-making.
It’s very common for people to review products and services online. There’s a growing number of crowd-sourced business review sites such as Yelp, TripAdvisor and Google review which allow customers to read reviews and leave comments related to local businesses.
Take myself as an example, the most recent review I left was for a local car repair store on Google Review. My car battery was dead and I needed to find a repair store to replace my car battery. I went to google review and chose this car shop because they have a very high star rating (4.6/5.0) and is close to where I live. However, I was disappointed with the high price they charge for replacing my car battery. I wanted people to realize the potential overpricing of this car repair store, so I left a review.
Many studies have examined what motivates people to post and seek recommendations online. For example, researchers found that information-seeking and convenience are two of the top motivations for people seeking recommendations online.
People use these review sites for seeking information at a low cost. They can find a great volume and diverse information by simply spending a few minutes online, compared to off-line face-to-face communication which is restricted by space and time (Hicks et al., 2012).
People’s motivations for posting reviews can be broken into five main categories: 1) self-directed, 2) helping other vacationers, 3) social benefits, 4) consumer empowerment, and 5) helping companies (Bronner, Hoog, 2011).
A Rating System for People?
Yes, it’s very common for people to review goods and service, but what about reviewing people?
Well, some personal review platform/system already exist in our society. For example, RateMyProfessor, a public review site where people can rate the professors they have had.
By reviewing the rating on RateMyProfessor (RMP), students can avoid some “tough” professor and be in the classroom culture they prefer(e.g., relaxed, easy, etc).
However, RMP also receives criticisms for its validity and bias toward female professors (Legg & Wilson, 2012). Studies found a positive correlation between the easiness of the class and rating of the professor (Clayson, 2013). People also argue that the rating does not reflect the overall qualification of professors. Regardless, RMP is one of the most popular professor rating sites with 1.7 million professors’ profiles and over 19 million rating reviews.
Another example is the social credit system in China. The social credit system is a national reputation system developed by the Chinese government which is intended to standardize and monitor businesses’ and citizens’ social reputation. The system is based on big data analysis supported by the government and several major technology companies such as Alibaba Group and Tencent.
One of the main claims of the social credit system is that the system builds trust between citizens and allows them to interact with each more conveniently. People will know whether someone is a criminal if they can see their credit. The system keeps citizens’ past experience part of the record to restrict their social behavior and avoid crime.
These motivations seem to fall into the same pattern of the review sites mentioned before — — the purpose of reducing uncertainty and perceived risk in decision-making.
So how far are we from the citizen rating system in Nosedive? If citizens find the need to know the other person’s history before engaging in social interactions then yes there may be a big motivation to adopt the citizen review system. Also financially, if the company find it more convenient to distribute and manage resources based on the citizen rating system, then yes, a citizen rating system depicted in Nosedive may really come true in the future.
Other Sources
Bronner, F., & de Hoog, R. (2011). Vacationers and eWOM: Who Posts, and Why, Where, and What? Journal of Travel Research, 50(1), 15–26. doi:10.1177/0047287509355324
Clayson E, D. (2013). What does ratemyprofessors.com actually rate? Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 39(6), 678–698, doi: 10.1080/02602938.2013.861384
Hicks, A., Comp, S., Horovitz, J., Hovarter, M., Miki, M., & Bevan, J.L. (2012). Why people use Yelp.com: An exploration of uses and gratifications. Computers in Human Behavior, 28, 2274–2279.
Legg, A & Wilson, J. (2012). RateMyProfessors.com offers biased evaluations. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education,37,89–97. doi: 10.1080/02602938.2010.507299.
Olshavky, Richard W. and Donald H. Granbois (1979), “Consumer Decision Making: Fact or Fiction?” Journal of Consumer Research, Vol.6 (September), 93–100.
