Van Huyssteen, Gerhard B., Puttkammer, Martin J., and Rabé, Monique. 2022. Do Afrikaans digital parents want content and age advisories for books? Digital Humanities in precarious times. Vanderbijlpark, South Africa: North-West University.
Van Huyssteen, Puttkammer & Rabé 2022
English: Afrikaans, advisory, censorship, content classification, digital parenting, parental control
Afrikaans: Afrikaans, advies, sensuur, inhoudklassifikasie, digitale ouerskap, ouerbeheer
English: For many decades now, automatic content classification stood at the centre of artificial intelligence design and machine learning systems. One of the most famous examples is probably the Netflix Prize, which was an open competition to find the best algorithm that could predict user ratings for films (e.g., Greene 2006; Kasula 2020). Content classifiers and predictors like these have a wide range of practical application, including among many others algorithms for online stores to suggest products to customers, music classification systems for online streaming services, and automatic text classification systems, like email classifiers (Bacchelli et al. 2012), applications for digital libraries (Finn et al. 2001), and classifiers of social media posts (Kumar et al. 2020). Another content classification application that emerged with the increase of so-called Web 2.0 content, is digital parental control (DPC), i.e., automatic algorithms and mechanisms that allow parents to manage (specifically restrict, and monitor) their children’s access to digital content. Digital parenting (Mascheroni et al. 2018) has been and still is a rich, multidisciplinary field of enquiry, ranging from legal studies and ethics, to developmental psychology and education, to computer science and engineering. However, as Mauk (2021) pointed out: “When considering the rights of children and the obligations corporations and regulators have to them in the algorithmic environment the role and needs of parents are often neglected”. In this paper, we report on empirical research investigating the needs and wants of Afrikaans digital parents (ADPs). Through online questionnaires, we investigated specifically whether ADPs want content and age advisories for books (e.g., thematic labels like “violence”, or “self-harm”, or age labels like “age 10-12”). We firstly clustered different opinions on the spectrum, before identifying demographic predictors for these opinions. Insights could be valuable to authors, publishers, educators, and most importantly, to developers of digital distribution platforms.
Afrikaans: Vir baie dekades lank het outomatiese inhoudklassifikasie in die middelpunt van kunsmatige intelligensie-ontwerp en masjienleerstelsels gestaan. Een van die bekendste voorbeelde is waarskynlik die Netflix-prys, wat ‘n oop kompetisie was om die beste algoritme te vind wat gebruikersgraderings vir films kan voorspel (bv. Greene 2006; Kasula 2020). Inhoudklassifiseerders en voorspellers soos hierdie het ‘n wye reeks praktiese toepassings, insluitend onder andere algoritmes vir aanlynwinkels om produkte aan kliënte voor te stel, musiekklassifikasiestelsels vir aanlynstroomdienste en outomatiese teksklassifikasiestelsels, soos e-posklassifiseerders (Bacchelli et al. 2012), toepassings vir digitale biblioteke (Finn et al. 2001) en klassifiseerders van sosialemediaplasings (Kumar et al. 2020). Nog ‘n inhoudklassifikasietoepassing wat ontluik het met die toename van sogenaamde Web 2.0-inhoud, is digitale ouerbeheer (DOB), dit wil sê outomatiese algoritmes en meganismes wat ouers toelaat om hul kinders se toegang tot digitale inhoud te bestuur (spesififiek beperk en monitor). Digitale ouerskap (Mascheroni et al. 2018) was en is steeds ‘n ryk, multidissiplinêre veld van ondersoek, wat wissel van regstudies en etiek, tot ontwikkelingsielkunde en onderwys, tot rekenaarwetenskap en ingenieurswese. Soos Mauk (2021) egter daarop gewys het: “When considering the rights of children and the obligations corporations and regulators have to them in the algorithmic environment the role and needs of parents are often neglected.” In hierdie referaat doen ons verslag oor empiriese navorsing wat die behoeftes en begeertes van Afrikaanse digitale ouers (ADO’s) ondersoek. Deur aanlyn vraelyste het ons spesifiek ondersoek of ADO’s inhoud- en ouderdomsadvies vir boeke wil hê (bv. tematiese etikette soos “geweld”, of “selfbesering”, of ouderdomsetikette soos “ouderdom 10-12”). Ons het eerstens verskillende menings oor die spektrum gegroepeer, voordat ons demografiese voorspellers vir hierdie menings geïdentifiseer het. Insigte kan waardevol wees vir skrywers, uitgewers, opvoeders, en die belangrikste, vir ontwikkelaars van digitale verspreidingsplatforms.
In: English
On: Afrikaans