Connective life. Digital networks as sociotechnical mirrors of Ibero-America

Connective life has accelerated since 2020, when the covid-19 pandemic began, which contributed to intensify some digitization processes that have been underway for decades. This connective life also presents new challenges, such as surveillance capitalism, the attention economy, and contingent intellects, formed by powerful persuasive algorithms. In this context, the 147th edition of Chasqui is proposed as an Ibero-American transnational digital culture observatory. To do this, we have selected 10 articles that reveal significant networks, and in which user behaviors are studied;Ibero-American habits, uses and customs are mapped on social networks;Forms of organization in the consumption, production and circulation of content are described;techniques and content used to manipulate information and opinion are analyzed;describe and identify themselves in ways of spreading false news and hate speech;and new theoretical proposals are presented to understand Latin America through the analysis and reading of fields such as big data, machine learning, Artificial Intelligence, algorithms, or data analysis and visualization systems.

RESISTANCE TO INTERMEDIATION THROUGH CONNECTED SCREENS

This work will discuss the weight of the techno-economic logics that organize the socio-technical relations of digital social platforms. For that, theoretical references on attention economy, algorithms and platforms will be used. As case studies, results of semi-structured, non-probabilistic inquiries about information processes will be presented, intermediated by screens connected to the web, such as interest in emigrating, motivation to choose a vote, evaluation of press coverage of the movement Black Lives Matter and about the first wave / wave of covid-19. The period of such samples takes place between 2019 and 2021, and includes the so-called pandemic period of 2020, when the intermediation of life via communication and information equipment became more pronounced, given that a large part of the world population had to fulfill isolation and social isolation. As a result, it is perceived that there was resistance on the part of consumers of information in relation to news in the press, opinions of influencers or results of debate in groups of social networks.

NOT EVEN DEATH UNITES US: THE FUTURE OF HUMANITY IN POST-COVID-19

This text intends to shift the centrality of the debate about COVID-19 to the human condition post-pandemic. We use the concept of imitation as an axis (Tarde, 1978), in addition to other authors who contribute to the reflection on the "tragedies" generated by the new Coronavirus, based on the climate of insecurity and fear established in humanity and the economy. We propose a theoretical essay in which we use resources from the "sociological imagination", in the sense of prospecting the inversion of the established order and we present nine different and correlated arguments, as an analysis of the possible panorama that offers a hope in the context of use the direct and pronoun transitive verb "to hope", of political action, of longing, of seeking and contrary to the act of waiting.

Risks, dilemmas and opportunities: Journalistic activities during the covid-19

This work deals with the role of journalism during the SARS-COV.2 (Covid-19) pandemic, in 2020. In this unique context, in which journalists and the media in general had a leading role, we reflect on the journalistic field (Bourdieu, 1992) relating it to a constructivist notion of reality (Berger & Luckmann, 1999). However, we use the notions of post-truth and "fake news" to demonstrate two of the main lines of force that today involve the media in general, as well as to expose a case analysis about institutions such as the World Health Organization and the European Commission. The objective was to address the problems of disinformation and "infodemia" (Zarocostas, 2020), which occupy the information gaps on the internet. The method used was mixed. In the quantitative dimension, we resorted to the application of a survey with a sample of 365 people, among journalists in the press, in the media in general and in recurring news consumers, about production processes, work routines, information generated during quarantine and news consumption in confinement time. In the qualitative dimension, we resort to the description of cases that demonstrate the presence of the phenomenon of post-truth and "fake news" in times of pandemic and how it affected social behavior. The results of this analysis point to the need to review certain productive practices in the journalistic field, which accentuate information gaps, in addition to practices that encourage professional insecurity. We note that there is a lack of critical stance between the press and official institutions, whose speeches, when erratic, can make it difficult for the public to perceive the difference between "fake news" and provisional news truths during the coverage of the pandemic. It is also concluded that there is a constant need for self-assessment of the failures of the professional field. © 2020 Universidade da Beira Interior. All rights reserved.