Social Media
Singer, Daniel Oyebanjo, popularly known as D’Banj has returned to social media, after several weeks of absence, following the death of his son, 13-month-old son Daniel Jr.
Recall that the music act trended on social media when his son drowned in a pool in his house.
On his Instagram page, D’Banj on Thursday shared a sombre photo of himself, revealing that the past few weeks have been a difficult one for his family.
He went on to thank his team and fans for their love.
See his post below:
Egypt’s parliament has passed a law giving the state powers to block social media accounts and penalise journalists held to be publishing fake news.
Under the law, social media accounts and blogs with more than 5,000 followers on sites such as Twitter and Facebook will be treated as media outlets, which makes them subject to prosecution for publishing false news or incitement to break the law.
The Supreme Council for the Administration of the Media, headed by an official appointed by President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi, will supervise the law and take action against violations.
The bill prohibits the establishment of websites without obtaining a license from the Supreme Council and allows it to suspend or block existing websites, or impose fines on editors.
The law, which takes effect after it is ratified by Sisi, also states that journalists can only film in places that are not prohibited, but does not explain further.
Supporters of Sisi say the law is intended to safeguard freedom of expression and it was approved after consultations with judicial experts and journalists.
But critics say it will give legal basis to measures the government has been taking to crack down on dissent and extend its control over social media.
Sherif Mansour, Middle East and North Africa programme coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, said the vague wording of the law allows authorities to interpret violations and control the media.
“That power of interpretation has been a constant powerful legal and executive tool that was used to justify excessive aggressive and exceptional measures to go after journalists,” he told Reuters.
Hundreds of news sites and blogs have been blocked in recent months and around a dozen people have been arrested this year and charged with publishing false news, many of them journalists or prominent government critics.
The Ugandan government on Tuesday said it will not scrap the recently introduced taxes on social media use and mobile money transfers in spite of public protest.
Frank Tumwebaze, Uganda’s minister of information, told newsmen that Cabinet on Monday decided that the daily rate of 200 shillings (0.05 U.S. dollars) charged on the usage of social media would stay.
He also said that the mobile money tax will be reduced from one per cent to 0.5 per cent.
The tax will only apply on withdrawals made.
The taxes triggered protests led by activists, media practitioners and parliamentarians resulting in further consultations between parliament and the government.
Tumwebaze clarified that those who use their mobile phones to pay utility bills and schools fees would not be charged any tax. He also said the Over The Top (OTT) tax, dubbed “social media” tax does not apply to other internet services such as sending emails.
David Bahati, minister of state for finance, planning and economic development who also attended the briefing, said the government is targeting to collect about 32 million U.S. dollars from the 10 million social users in the country annually.
“We want to get more options so that you can pay the social media tax quarterly or annually instead of the daily, weekly and monthly subscriptions,” Bahati said.
Telecommunication companies on July 1 started enforcing the excise duty charge on OTT and the levy on mobile money transactions.
Xinhua/NAN
Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed on Wednesday cautioned Nigerians on social media use.
The Minister admonished Nigerians not to share any information they cannot vouch for on Facebook, Twitter or WhatsApp as a measure to curtail fake news menace.
He made the admonition in Abuja at the launch of National Campaign against Fake News.
He urged social media users that before sharing any information on Facebook, Twitter or WhatsApp, they should ascertain how credible the source was.
Mohammed said the campaign against fake news was to sensitise Nigerians to the dangers it posed to peace, security and nation’s corporate existence.
He said though there were existing laws against fake news, the government did not intend to resort to coercion or censorship.
“There is an epidemic sweeping the world. If left unchecked, it could be worse than all the plagues that the world has recorded put together.
“It is a clear and present danger to global peace and security. It is a threat to democracy. It is the epidemic of Fake News. Mixed with hate speech, it is a disaster waiting to happen.
“For the media, the epidemic is even worse. This is because fake news, in most cases designed to misinform, undermines confidence in the media.
“And once the people lose confidence in the media, the society is in trouble,” he said.
The Minister noted that fake news is mainly distributed by social media, but periodically circulated through mainstream media.
He said fake news though not new it becane a issue of concern with the speed at which it spread around the world, and that means is the social media.
“Anyone with a phone and internet access can author and make fake news go viral in minutes.
“With the number of mobile phone users in the world expected to pass the 5 billion mark by 2019, you can see the kind of crisis we face,” he said.
He said fake news is already having far reaching repercussions across the world and Nigeria is no exception.
“In India, about a dozen people have been killed in the past six weeks just because of fake news or hoax messages.
“The victims were lynched after they were falsely accused of child abduction based on fake messages circulated via the social media platform, WhatsApp!
“Right here in Nigeria, the situation is not better. And it is not restricted to the social media.
“Last Thursday, the front page headline of a national newspaper was: Court orders National Assembly to begin impeachment of Buhari.
“The problem with that news item is that it is fake news.
He said the judgment was manipulated to read that the court has given the go-ahead for the National Assembly to commence impeachment proceedings against the President.
The minister recalled a recent report by the BBC, that fake news circulating in the social media is fuelling the farmers-herders crises in Nigeria.
“Gory pictures from other lands are circulated freely via Facebook, WhatsApp and Twitter, purportedly being from the killings in Jos or Benue.
“In 2017, a fake report circulated on the social media claimed that five students of the College of Education, Gidan Waya, were ambushed and killed by
Fulani herdsmen in southern Kaduna.
“That report turned out to be false. No student was killed. I can go on and on,” he said.
The minister stressed that in a multi-ethnic and multi-religious country like Nigeria, fake news is a time bomb.
He said that government would consider engaging big technology companies like Google, Facebook and Twitter in addressing the menace.
Twitter will on Thursday run a major operation to delete accounts of fake followers, its president in charge of trust and safety has announced.
Vijaya Gadde said in a statement that the clean-up will affect accounts that were frozen over the years for suspicious behavior.
“This week, we’ll be removing these locked accounts from follower counts across profiles globally. As a result, the number of followers displayed on many profiles may go down,” she wrote.
The New York Times newspaper said Twitter planned to begin deleting tens of millions of accounts starting Thursday, slashing the total followship by six per cent.
The measure is reportedly aimed at users who have inflated their followships by paying for automated accounts to fake social media influence.
Nigerian actress, filmmaker and entrepreneur is one rising entertainer who continues to evolve and expand her brand.
The role interpreter popular in the Yoruba movie sector has shared what a sexy woman means to her.
In an encounter with TheNewsGuru, she said: ”I am not comfortable with the word ‘Sexy’. I think it’s mostly used to describe a lady lustfully and to say she is ‘Hot’. I prefer to use the word’ Strong’. A lady that is beautiful, confident and believes in herself so much is a sexy woman”.
Speaking further she condemned entertainers who put their personal lives in the public glare.
Hear her: ”I don’t support celebrities who put their private lives on social media.I don’t support this if it is dating or courtship level.But if it’s marriage, It’s still cool.There is nothing bad when you appreciate your partner publicly, Or you just choose to be happy by putting it in the public glare. But it is totally bad when you abuse it! For instance turning your Instagram page to your love album is wrong. What if social media doesn’t exist? Social media does a lot of damages to relationships”, she concluded.
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The number of posts on Facebook showing graphic violence rose in the first three months of the year from a quarter earlier, possibly driven by the war in Syria, the social network said on Tuesday, in its first public release of such data.
Facebook said in a written report that of every 10,000 pieces of content viewed in the first quarter, an estimated 22 to 27 pieces contained graphic violence, up from an estimate of 16 to 19 late 2017.
According to a report, the company removed or put a warning screen for graphic violence in front of 3.4 million pieces of content in the first quarter, nearly triple the 1.2 million a quarter earlier.
Facebook does not fully know why people are posting more graphic violence but believes continued fighting in Syria may have been one reason, said Alex Schultz, Facebook’s vice president of data analytics.
“Whenever a war starts, there’s a big spike in graphic violence,” Schultz told reporters at Facebook’s headquarters.
Syria’s civil war erupted in 2011. It continued this year with fighting between rebels and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s army.
This May, Israel attacked Iran’s military infrastructure in Syria.
Facebook, the world’s largest social media firm, has never previously released detailed data about the kinds of posts it takes down for violating its rules.
Facebook only recently developed the metrics as a way to measure its progress, and would probably change them over time, said Guy Rosen, its vice president of product management.
“These kinds of metrics can help our teams understand what’s actually happening to two-plus billion people,” he said.
The company has a policy of removing content that glorifies the suffering of others. In general it leaves up graphic violence with a warning screen if it was posted for another purpose.
Facebook also prohibits hate speech and said it took action against 2.5 million pieces of content in the first quarter, up 56 percent a quarter earlier. It said the rise was due to improvements in detection.
The company said in the first quarter it took action on 837 million pieces of content for spam, 21 million pieces of content for adult nudity or sexual activity and 1.9 million for promoting terrorism.
It said it disabled 583 million fake accounts.