What information do you share online?

THE name Caterina Fake may not ring a bell to most readers but it is to this woman and her husband the world owes the technology of sharing pictures online. The name may have ‘fake’ in it but truth is there is nothing fake about what they came out with. The story as told to Michael Fitzgerald (2006) by the couple should be repeated for those who have no idea about the origin of what has now become common place.

“Stewart Butterfield asked Caterina Fake to start a company with him before he asked her to marry him. Butterfield and Fake, both Web design consultants who had been involved with start-ups, started their company in 2002, two weeks after they got back from their honeymoon. That company would morph into the photo-sharing site Flickr, which would quickly become one of the most popular sites on the Web, a cultural phenomenon, and — because of its design, technology, and user-generated content — a defining member of the new generation of Web 2.0 start-ups.

Last year, the then 37-year-old Fake (now 51), the 33-year-old Butterfield (now 47), and their seven employees all moved from Vancouver, British Columbia, to Silicon Valley after Yahoo (NASDAQ:YHOO) bought Flickr for a reported $30 million.”

Just three years after they sold their company the couple resigned. By 2019 Ms. Caterina Fake launched an “original audio series that aims to explore technology’s impact on humanity.”

THE above is to provide some context to the practice of sharing images, audios and texts online. To scholars who study what we do online, there is a pattern to our behavior especially our information seeking and sharing behaviors. What do the jokes we share online say about us? Are what we share online totally random and without rhyme and reason? To provide logical answers to these questions we must first understand how we form virtual communities or become members of different forums.

There are professional groups that friends and associates invite us into just like the cult and fraternities of old. The friends who extend the invitation(s) already have what is called a user profile of us. You may want to ask what a user profile is: “user profile is a collection of settings and information associated with a user. It can be defined as the explicit digital representation of the identity of the user with respect to the operating environment, which could be operating systems, software applications or websites. The user profile helps in associating characteristics with a user and helps in ascertaining the interactive behavior of the user along with preferences.”

Expressed in another way, the person who invites you to join a group of any kind, has an idea about your identity, personality and your preferences. Since your user profile in most cases is informally constructed, the friend inviting you may take your real person for your virtual persona. In cases where both converge it means you will be a perfect fit for any group you are invited to. What then happens if there is disconnect between your “real” user profile and your perceived user profile? Well, your guess is as good as ours. 

Apart from professional groups, there are semi-open groups on other social media platforms. To be a member of such a group, you must already be a friend of someone in the group. In effect “[v]irtual community is an online social network, constructed on the basis of social interactions for people with common interests, goals, share information and knowledge.

AS most people know, there is hardly anything transcendental about membership of social media groups. What remains unknown is why members share the kind of information they share. According to Dah-Kwei Liou and three other scholars (2016) “[d]esire to give information directly influences information sharing behaviour. The desire to give information plays important mediating roles between trust on websites/members and information sharing behaviour.”

Cheeseman Fisher Hassan Hitchen (2020) is of the view that the semi-public space created by WhatsApp is becoming a major socio-political concern in Africa. There are up to 40 countries “where WhatsApp is the most popular messaging app.” The reason he adduces is that this is “due to its low cost and the ability to easily share messages with both individuals and groups” without the interference of governmental authorities. It will surprise any reader when the list of members of different WhatsApp groups are revealed.

Since membership of WhatsApp groups is not public knowledge, I think the logical step is to go out on a limb by speculating.  A casual observation of the types of information shared may confirm that jokes top the list of information shared, followed by personal pictures taken at events, next will be musical videos that carry profound cultural messages or are shot in spectacular formats. 

Let us take a few samples of the jokes shared online:

“BLACK_AFRICAN_SOCIETY: You have two cows, you eat them all in one month, and you dream that donors or the international community give you more cows. When that doesn’t happen, you go to a church and hope for miracle cows. You fast 40 days and 40 nights without eating or drinking so that the cows will fall from Heaven. At last, You die in extreme poverty’

“This is how other races solve problems.

But among blacks, all we do is pray about it while sleeping in churches.

I can read the mind of God that HE will be pleased with these desert people that applied their Talents.

It is well with the desert people.

It is sad for us in Nigeria, as we struggle for pure water, despite the rains and rivers all around us.

It is sad for us.”

This year 2020, there were a thousand and one jokes about Donald Trump

One of the multitudes read, “Ha! Trump again?

Donald Trump is plotting to take the Supreme Court to court!

Someone asked “What is Alzheimer? It sounds like one of the breakaway countries from the former Soviet Union! Is it? Clap for me!”

The response was short and concise “It means you live in a “breakaway country” where you’re always reminded that your flap is “ajar”!

As with conversational jokes the first respondent had the last say on the matter; “Noooooo! Agbarha-Otor is an autonomous Kingdom and bigger than some countries in the UN! It is not a breakaway anything! Well done plenty plenty!”

Next to Donald Trump jokes are jokes about the Corona Virus

The person who shared the joke set the tone by including these lines as a preface; “Nigerians can joke for Africa. See a collection of Coronavirus jokes that will set you off while staying isolated:

1. First Name: CORONA

Surname: VIRUS

Nick-Name: COVID Age: 19.

Nationality: CHINA

Next of kin: HANTA VIRUS

Hobby: Traveling and spreading

Favorite Food: LUNGS

Favorite Country: America

Dislikes: Alcohol

Guarantor: HIV

Relative: EBOLA

Friend: Monkey pox

Ancestor: Bird flu

Great grandfather: Lassa fever

Cant help but laugh’… Naija, I hail una

2. While American Students are doing research on corona virus…

Nigeria students are busy sending secrets anonymous messages on WhatsApp.

3. Corona Virus is very respectful. The only disease that came into the country and went to greet the leaders first.

4. Na CHINA chop meat, but na we de Wash hand i don Wash hand Taya for meat wea i no chop. God Abeg o!

5. Hmmn! Politicians are testing Covid-19 positive, but their wives test negative. How manage? I think they are testing the wrong ‘spouses”. They should check the Side Chicks.

6. Women who order soup from big big restaurants and make their husbands believe they are good cooks – the hour of truth has come. The total lockdown will reveal everything.

7. For those weddings canceled because of this Corona virus, God is giving you a second chance to think about it.

8. The President of Nigeria Muhammadu Buhari still doesn’t know the name of the virus killing 24,000+ at such a rapid rate. Addressing the nation about it for the first time, he pronounced the virus as ‘CIVIK 1-9’. His friend, Imran Khan, thinks Japan and Germany share a border.

9. Anyone that offends me now…l won’t argue with you. I will just send your number to NCDC that you have symptoms of COVID-19 and you’ve refused to self-isolate.

10. Italy is LOCKDOWN China is LOCKDOWN, Metro Manila is LOCKDOWN, but Heaven is still OPEN For EVERYONE. God is faithful.

11. Judgment and Restoration: 20 Go into your houses, my people, and shut the door behind you. Hide yourselves for a little while until God’s anger is over. 21 The LORD is coming from his heavenly dwelling place to punish the people of the earth for their sins. The murders that were secretly committed on the earth will be revealed, and the ground will no longer hide those who have been killed. Isaiah 26:20-21.

12. This virus got people like “It maybe you, it maybe someone by your side, It can’t be me and it can’t be someone by my side. We don’t know who’s who. #Stay Safe

13. No be to buy things full house in the name of “stocking”, You Sabi cook?

14. How great is our God, government arranged lockdown from the 26 march 2020 and the Bible verse Isaiah 26:20 says Go home, my people an lock your doors ! Hide yourself for a little while until the Lord’s anger has passed isn’t that amazing?

15. Hehehe, Governors are waiting for [COVID] results and they cannot rig!

16. The Way corona virus is carefully picking its target one by one in Nigeria. It’s like it is fighting corruption more than EFCC.

17. Seriously if this money we hear people are donating can’t get to the poor masses, they should stop donating because nobody is benefitting. Na them them still dey benefit

18. You’re in isolation, you’ve read sixteen jokes and you are still looking for more, why don’t you add your own to keep fun moving.

19. If you are missing me call me or chat me, don’t come now, just stay safe in your house. Lol”

 The Indians too are not left out of the Corona jokes

“Did you notice that the alphabet “C” has shot to prominence in this Covid-19 era?

See the Sea of Change that the alphabet “C” has brought!

No one expected that the alphabet “C” would play a completely overwhelming role compared with any of the other alphabets…

Cough (C)

Cold (C)

Corona virus (C)

Covid-19 (C)

Case (C)

Confirmed (C)

Confinement (C) 

Contamination (C)

Containment (C)

Curfew (C)

Two most serious “C”s are,

Cemetery (C)

Cremation (C)

The possible remedial drug is, Chloroquine (C)

The beauty is, it started from China (C)

But at the same time,

GOD smiled, and said…

Cleanliness (is the remedy)

Courage (is the need of the hour)

Compliance to the expert advice…

Contention to overcome the crisis…

Clarity of thought…

Cooperation with the fellow beings…

Caring for the needy…

There are times the jokes come in the form of posters

This last set of jokes are from the wall of a Pastor.

1.The moment I knew Nigeria was in trouble was when someone stole his neighbor’s white goat and dyed it black, only for the neighbor to say he recognized the goat by it’s smile.

2. The best strategy to win arguments is to have serious mouth odour, they will just be nodding their head in agreement

3. I don’t like people who can’t let go of the past – especially people I owe money.

4. Hmmm… When NEPA takes light, a true Nigerian will stand up and check outside, to make sure their neighbors don’t have Light too! And you believe, you will make Heaven, abi.

(5). You will buy sachet water and finish it at once. But when you buy table water, you will be opening and closing it as if it’s doctor’s prescription.

(6). At home you can’t sleep without switching off your small radio but you can sleep in Church with eight Speakers blasting in your ear … it is called Demonic soft work.

(7). You broke up with a guy in your street then date another one in ‘ur street and you say you have moved on? My sister, you are just moving around.

(8). In Africa once your phone rings in the church, everybody will start looking at you as if Satan is the one calling.

Conclusion

“THERE is no escaping humor” says Arthur Berger (1993)  “and there is no subject, whether it be sex, marriage, politics, religion, education, work, sports-you name it-that has not been ridiculed, joked about, and used or abused one way or the other, as grist for someone’s militancy” The jokes shared on different social media platforms play other roles that are hidden. In essence, what is funny in one may not necessarily be laughed at in another. There is a growing body of work that focus on humor, jokes and satire. The jokes told in different societies tell something about them. If you look at the jokes I have selected it will not be too surprising that they also send subliminal messages that the receiver should be made aware.