Whorkshop,Identity, Algorithmic Identity, and Representation

Record the learning and feedback on the Digital Practice course in the first semester.

2025-11-07

1. Analysis of Friends’ Posts on the Platform In the Week 6 workshop, I was asked to collect data on the topics of my friends’ social media posts and classify them into 13 predefined types. Since I use Rednote more frequently, I chose it as the platform for data collection. During the classification process, I encountered some overlap between categories. For example, one friend posted an outdoor selfie, which made it difficult to decide whether it should be classified as “Outdoor” or “Lifestyle.” Additionally, the fixed set of 13 categories could not accommodate all types of content. Posts such as my roommate’s requests for help were particularly challenging to categorize; eventually, I placed them under “Thought or Reflection.” Beyond classification issues, the diversity of platforms used by my friends posed another limitation. Since not all of my friends use Rednote, the pool of available posts was smaller than intended, and the total number of posts was below the target of fifteen. As a result, I collected data from 16 posters I follow to complete the task. These challenges suggest that the accuracy and representativeness of the data must be taken into account during analysis. 2. Summary of Findings In summary, the category “Lifestyle” dominated the sample with 203 posts. This was followed, in descending order, by “Thought or Reflection,” “Product or Advertising,” “Outdoors,” and “Music/Sport/Film.” Meanwhile, categories such as “Activism,” “Jokes/Memes,” “Work,” and “Family/Partner” received zero posts. This distribution indicates that among my friends, sharing lifestyle-related content is the most common practice on social media, while topics involving family or partners are seldom posted. These results may have been influenced by the demographic of my social circle. As an international student, I am connected mainly with other international students and workers, whose posts often revolve around cooking, shopping, and daily experiences—content I categorized under “Lifestyle.” This likely explains the dominance of that category. Furthermore, posts classified as “Outdoor” often overlapped thematically with “Lifestyle,” reflecting similar interests within this group.