Containing the spread of hatred and negativity on the ever-growing social media has become a constant challenge for nations and policy-makers, opined experts at the Social Media Summit & Awards 2017, Amaravati, hosted by AP Tourism.
The first of its kind summit in India was launched by Tourism Minister Bhuma Akhila Priya here on Saturday.
In a panel discussion as part of the summit, experts called for a proactive policy framework to deal with negativity in the virtual world.
Commissioner of Police D. Gautam Sawang said, “Dealing with infringement of rights of an individual on social media is a simple task but it becomes difficult when it comes to society.”
“We see that there is a lot of activism whether it is rightist or leftist. We need to keep contending with such kind of issues. It is really a challenge on a daily basis to see what is trending and its consequences on general law and order, conflict in society and creation of tensions among communities and sections of society,” Mr. Sawang said.
Thought Folks Digital founder and CEO Raghavendra Hunasgi, who does social threat management for international clients, said, “At the United Nations, the social media policy gets revised every quarter. Such is the pace of changes in social media. Social media is always reactive. One challenge all the countries are constantly facing is bringing in a policy or framework where being proactive than being reactive is possible,” he said.
“The government at some point would realise it should regulate social media. A lot of decisions are taken by the apex court than the government. There is also scope for misuse due to lack of regulation. Make a post and you get arrested but far more serious threats to director Sanjay Leela Bhansali and actor Deepika [for film Padmavati] could not have similar actions. The government should come forward and plan to regulate such things,” said Rajneil Kamath, CEO of R2D2 Tech and former public policy and government affairs analyst at Google India.
More regulation is done by the social media platform from its own perspective. Humorous content for one person can be offensive to another, according to Mr. Rajneil. “Such issues should be addressed across the world through combined regulation by the government and the platforms,” he added.
Earlier, in her inaugural speech Ms. Akhila Priya said, “Social media is extensively being used by the people at urban and rural areas of the State. In fact, rural folks are way ahead in using technology. The State government is largely using technology and social media in every department to connect with the public. Also, special campaigns are being planned to promote the Telugu language on social media.”
Prof. Mautusi Maity, Marketing Management, IIM Lucknow, gave a presentation on the relevance of social media while Satya Raghavan, Head, Entertainment Partnerships at YouTube, Ankur Mehra, Head, Regional Partnership, Facebook and Aneesh Madani, Head, Sports Partnerships, Twitter Asia Pacific spoke on their products and the impact on public. The event planned by Vibri Media is being supported by the State government.
