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Exclusive: Instagram Fights Animal Abuse With New Alert System

Natasha Daly

December 04, 2017 |

National Geographic |

Text |

800-1500 Words

Response Location: United States, Alabama

Responding to the rise in selfies taken with wild animals, Instagram now sends a user clicking on hashtags associated with these photos to information about animal welfare. Animal welfare joins suicide, self-harm, and eating disorders as topics where Instagram has put this mechanism into place.

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The chatbots taking over government: what jobs can they do?

Anoush Darabi

October 17, 2017 |

Apolitical |

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800-1500 Words

Response Location: United States, North Charleston, South Carolina

Chatbots don’t sleep. They can respond to citizen inquiries 24 hours a day. From North Charleston to Singapore, automated conversation platforms are improving the connection between governments and the people they serve by providing an easy channel for information exchange and public consultation.

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Why Are More American Teenagers Than Ever Suffering From Severe Anxiety?

Benoit Denizet-Lewis

October 11, 2017 |

The New York Times |

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Over 3000 Words

Response Location: United States

Anxiety is growing amongst adolescents, possibly due to the rise of the smartphone. Teachers and parents are struggling to find help for anxious teens, Mountain Valley is a treatment facility that involves group therapy, exposure therapy and more to help reduce their patient's anxiety.

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What Harvey and Irma Taught Us About Using Social Media in Emergency Response

A. Rochaun Meadows-Fernandez

September 15, 2017 |

Pacific Standard |

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Under 800 Words

Response Location: United States, Houston, Texas

Hurricanes Irma and Harvey showed the power of social media to share real-time alerts and information as well as get resources to people more quickly when official channels like crisis hotlines are clogged. Officials originally discouraged the use of social media fearing panic and misinformation, but those attitudes changed as they saw the immediate impact it had on getting people help. More local and national organizations shifted to using social platforms to guide their emergency response efforts.

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This Police Department Is A Smash Hit On Social Media

Chhavi Sachdev

August 25, 2017 |

NPR |

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800-1500 Words

Response Location: India, Bengaluru

Bangalore's police department had an image problem and their successes weren't reaching the public. Crowd Kart Media took over their social media making memes, popular shows, and humor in order to help the department's image, which sparked a huge rise in their facebook and twitter followings.

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Tweet Streams: How Social Media Can Help Keep Tabs on Ocean Health

Bela Stantic Rod Connolly Susanne Becken

August 18, 2017 |

News Deeply |

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Under 800 Words

Response Location: Australia, Queensland

In an effort to collect data about the environmental health of high traffic destinations, researchers are examining the text and images of geotagged social media posts. Tweets about the Great Barrier Reef were analyzed for relevant information about specifically where people visited, common activities, and common complaints. While people passively provided data by geotagging posts, researchers are also proposing creating hashtags that allow for people to actively communicate data to researchers through social media posts.

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Across the Arab world, a 'Women's Spring' comes into view

Taylor Luck

August 09, 2017 |

The Christian Science Monitor |

Multi-Media |

800-1500 Words

Response Location: Jordan, Amman

Women’s right activists are gaining traction in Jordan and Tunisia. Their efforts have led to the rejection of old laws that protected rapists, and more representation in parliament. The progress women activists are making is sustained through cross border collaborations, and is part of a larger movement happening in Arab countries.

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Taking Guns Off the Streets, $100 at a time

Claire Martin

July 10, 2017 |

The New York Times |

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800-1500 Words

Response Location: United States, Los Angeles, California

As professor of medicine and gun-violence researcher Dr. Garen Wintemute notes, gun buyback programs have "struggled against the perception" of ineffectiveness: attracting only older and non-violent gun owners, for instance, and in some cases leading people to use the cash to buy superior firearms. But after Gun by Gun—a gun violence prevention non-profit—successfully raised and invested prodigious sums through a customized online funding campaign, this perception has changed; partnering with several California cities, this national non-prof has used more than $100,000 of nationally-sourced individual donations to create demonstrably sustainable, more successful buyback programs across the state.

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Can "E-Responders" on Social Media Prevent Gang Violence?

Michael Friedrich

March 19, 2017 |

Bloomberg CityLab |

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800-1500 Words

Response Location: United States, New York, New York

A pilot project at New York University called "E-Responder" trained 26 anti-violence counselors at five sites across the city to interpret online posts threatening violence and intervene before virtual violence turns real. Nearly all their interventions ended peacefully. That is not conclusive proof that this prevented violence, but it's a strong correlation that inspired spreading the program to 18 more sites. Social media "cyberbanging" is the virtual equivalent of threatening gang graffiti that turns deadly. E-responders work with on-the-ground intervention teams and police to change risky behavior.

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Some single parents are turning to GoFundMe as a way to pay for college

Gail Cornwall

February 24, 2017 |

The Washington Post |

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800-1500 Words

Response Location: United States

Single parents are increasingly using GoFundMe to raise money for their own college costs. However, as GoFundMe has started to acknowledge, "crowdfunding is more difficult when one’s crowd doesn’t have extra funds." The platform is brainstorming ways to spread the word about individual campaigns and make donations to individual campaigners tax-deductible.

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