Margarita Noriega | Vox Our world has too much noise and too little context. Vox helps you understand what matters. 2019-03-05T14:18:28+00:00 https://www.vox.com/authors/margarita-noriega/rss https://platform.vox.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2024/08/vox_logo_rss_light_mode.png?w=150&h=100&crop=1 Margarita Noriega <![CDATA[Terminally ill Redditors share an average day in their lives]]> https://www.vox.com/2015/10/13/9489867/terminally-ill-reddit 2019-03-05T08:58:21-05:00 2015-10-13T09:10:02-04:00 Dozens of people have shared responses to the question, “Redditors who know how much time they have left — what does your day look like?” Some respondents are teenagers; others only have a few months to live. But if you suspend for a moment the assumption that the posts are written by people who face death, many of the responses read like they could’ve been written by anyone. Take this comment by tofu_llama, for example:

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The stories are mostly about time: life, years, before, after, months, days

Many people wrote of future plans and memories they had of the past, especially regarding when they first learned of their illness. Not all the posters gave details about their diagnoses, but many who did shared details about stressful hospital visits and the effects of medication.

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Connections to people were a central focus: friends, siblings, spouses, and children

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Other stories described physical ordeals of illness: pain, cancer, disease, death

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But nearly all of the shared stories described varying moods, thoughts, and feelings triggered by illness

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Many of the accounts, of which you can read more on Reddit, articulate painful, challenging experiences. Among the most common phrases used by redditors replying to these harrowing stories? Hope.

Read more: 23 charts that explain how we die

]]> Margarita Noriega <![CDATA[Black man live-tweets being falsely accused of robbing an Airbnb]]> https://www.vox.com/2015/10/9/9488423/airbnb-false-robbery-accusation 2019-03-05T09:18:28-05:00 2015-10-09T14:35:01-04:00

Music producer STEF (@STEFisDOPE) was enjoying his Airbnb during a visit to the Atlanta Music Festival & Conference when two DeKalb County locals decided to make his stay a very unwelcome one — by calling the cops on him. STEF live-tweeted the incident, which has gone viral on social media, collecting hundreds of retweets and comments.

The "DOPE" in STEF's stage name refers to his motto: "driven on positive energy"

The two Atlanta residents who called the police and accused STEF of robbery could have turned his stay into a negative experience if it weren’t for just one thing: STEF’s life philosophy.

While it’s unclear how many black Airbnb renters report similar false accusations from neighbors, a Harvard Business School study conducted last year indicates that Airbnb has one specifically documented problem with racism — for hosts. While the company criticized the study for using data from two years prior, the researchers found that non-black hosts charged about 12 percent more for a similar Airbnb location than black hosts, indicating that there’s a problem of discrimination in online marketplaces.

STEF told Vox that one of the accusers and the Airbnb host apologized, but a second accuser did not. In the video above, STEF remarks on the event by saying, “Life is crazy, man.” He says he has continued his day by enjoying time with his friends until he leaves the Airbnb on Saturday. As of publishing, the group is cooking breakfast and listening to Jay Z.

]]> Margarita Noriega <![CDATA[The rise and fall of hip-hop’s greatest record labels since 1989, in one incredible GIF]]> https://www.vox.com/maps/2015/10/9/9487441/hip-hop-history-map 2019-03-05T09:02:16-05:00 2015-10-09T13:00:02-04:00
It wouldn't be a history of hip-hop without the rise of Young Money Entertainment. Drake, Nicki Minaj, and Lil Wayne in 2011. | Getty

Polygraph‘s latest digital interactive visualizes the historic rise and fall of more than 600 hip-hop record labels in the US since 1989.

Polygraph founder Matt Daniels worked with Rhymesayers, a Minneapolis-based hip-hop label, to create the project just for fun. The result is, in fact, fun. The GIF of the project’s map, below, shows the labels that garnered the most Billboard hits each year.

Southern labels kick in not long after LA labels drop off the map, literally

Polygraph’s “The Most Successful Labels in Hip-Hop” map indicates labels by bubbles, which change in size based on how many Billboard hits their artists collected for them.

Polygraph shared data-driven insights, too, like the distribution of hits across labels. You can compare years to see how many labels collected top Billboard hits.

In 2004, more record labels enjoyed spending time on the top of the charts than in 2014

More labels reached the top of the Billboard charts in 2004 than in 2014.

In an email, Daniels provided insight into the trend by noting, “Tracks chart for longer. … This means that success is typically coming from a handful of labels, compared to the past.”

Related How pop songs are made

The top 10 labels based on how many weeks they led Billboard:

Def Jam wins the race for most weeks spend on the Billboard charts.

For hip-hop fans dying to listen to music and enjoy the research, the interactive is an audio experience, too — just click on any bubble on the map to hear a clip of a song from that label.

I’m more than happy to partake in any opportunity to enjoy the song “Can’t Nobody Hold Me Down,” which helped Bad Boy become one of the most popular labels in 1997. It would also be cool to see this research expanded to visualize the social graph of artists, since personal connections are an important part of hip-hop history. For example, Bad Boy’s founder, Sean Combs, began his career at Uptown Records, where he first signed Notorious B.I.G. before launching his own label. These bubbles, at the end of the day, represent history-making people as much as companies.

]]> Margarita Noriega <![CDATA[Facebook’s new Reaction feature builds popular emoji options into posts]]> https://www.vox.com/2015/10/8/9481469/facebook-reactions-emoji 2019-03-05T09:11:09-05:00 2015-10-08T16:40:03-04:00 In September, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced the company was working on a “dislike” button to let users show empathy. During a public Q&A, Zuckerberg replied to a question about the much-requested option, saying that the new feature would reflect a more nuanced expressivity than the social network’s famously positive “like”:

“What [users] really want to express is empathy. Not every moment is a good moment, right? And if you are sharing something that’s sad, like whether it’s something in current events like the refugee crisis that touches you or a family member passed away, then it may not be comfortable to ‘like’ that post.”

Facebook finally showed the world what those might look like on Wednesday: six well-known emoji called “Reactions.”

Most internet users will be very familiar with the new icons

The company studied data on user comments and reactions, chief product officer Chris Cox wrote in an official statement posted to Facebook. The platform will test the feature by offering it first to users in Spain and Ireland beginning later this week; it will only be viewable to users within those two countries.

Facebook Reactions

Facebook’s six new Reactions. (Facebook)

None of the reactions are new characters, although they are a new technical integration to Facebook’s platform.

Reactions help Facebook catch up to users and other platforms

Reactions hits a middle ground between the ever-popular emoji and Facebook stickers that — while I enjoy using them ironically — are mostly bizarre cartoon characters. What makes Reactions new to Facebook is that they are offered as a built-in feature in the same way stickers are now.

Emoji are popular across social media networks. For example, the messaging platform Slack offers reactions on user comments, though Slack has far more options since it’s based on a larger set of emoji (and also incorporates custom emoji). The feature is, coincidentally enough, called reactions. Here’s an example:

Slack lets you add emoji reactions to messages — and also lets you make custom emoji, something Facebook doesn’t currently do.

Facebook is playing a bit of catch-up with Reactions, but if you’re dying for a truly new expressive feature, why not make one using Vox’s Social Media Reaction Generator?

]]> Margarita Noriega <![CDATA[The most common faux pas of teenagers in love today? Binge texting.]]> https://www.vox.com/2015/10/3/9440953/teenager-cell-phone-study 2019-03-05T08:22:05-05:00 2015-10-08T11:23:00-04:00

According to Pew Research Center‘s survey of teenagers who have been or are in romantic relationships — about 35 percent — the most common annoying behavior is contacting a partner or ex too frequently in a short period of time, in text messages or online.

Teens who have dated prefer talking about funny stuff above all else…

Note that the third most common activity teens reported to Pew is “asking what you’re doing, seeing, eating,” and the fifth is “where you are.”

…but the most common annoying behavior they report is sending too many texts to someone they're dating or used to date.

The struggles are real.

Pew left the exact definition of a “large number of texts” to the imagination of survey participants, but given that 72 percent of participants reported texting every day, and most teens have access to smartphones, it’s pleasantly surprising to see how well-behaved they all are. The center has conducted related surveys for dating adults, but they don’t include the same questions, so it’s difficult to compare them. A 2013 survey, though, indicates that at least one-third of adults visit social networks to passively “check up” on current and former partners, whatever that means (Facebook stalking, perhaps). Adults like to check in, too — we just don’t know how annoying they think it is.

Most teens do not report harassment from a current or former partner, but those who do describe a variety of behaviors

Curiously, the annoying behavior that most teens report doing the most — sending too many texts (36 percent) — sounds very similar to the most often reported behavior they receive (“checked up with you multiple times a day,” 31 percent).

Texting a romantic partner often in a short period of time is annoying for both parties. It’s also quite normal to check in with a love interest, but the pacing is key. The kids are all right — they just need to keep it chill.

Related The Rules, 20 years later: Why are men and women still following the same old dating script?
]]> Margarita Noriega <![CDATA[Nicki Minaj has a powerful message for women: Treat each other with respect]]> https://www.vox.com/2015/10/7/9473833/nicki-minaj-nyt-magazine 2019-03-05T08:50:30-05:00 2015-10-07T16:20:02-04:00
Nicki Minaj attends the Alexander Wang spring 2016 fashion show during New York Fashion Week on September 12, 2015, in New York City. | Craig Barritt/Getty Images

Nicki Minaj wants women to stop disrespecting other women, a call that came in response to New York Times Magazine‘s Vanessa Grigoriadis’s implication that Minaj “thrives on drama.”

The interview is full of interesting comments from Minaj regarding tension between labelmate Drake and boyfriend Meek Mill, and strife between Lil Wayne and Cash Money Records CEO Bryan “Birdman” Williams.

Toward the end of the interview, Grigoriadis got some clarification on a problem that’s far more widespread than the rumor mill of social media or record label problems: women who blame one another for the actions of men.

“Is there a part of you that thrives on drama, or is it no, just pain and unpleasantness—”

The room went quiet, but only for an instant.

“That’s disrespectful,’’ Minaj said, drawing herself up in the chair. ‘”Why would a grown-ass woman thrive off drama?”

You can almost hear the silence in that room. Minaj was getting ready to explain a deep conviction she holds and has raised before in interviews: that women aren’t treated with the same respect as their male peers. Minaj then explained that disrespecting someone is a choice, one she thinks women make too often with one another:

That’s the typical thing that women do. What did you putting me down right there do for you? Women blame women for things that have nothing to do with them. …

To put down a woman for something that men do, as if they’re children and I’m responsible, has nothing to do with you asking stupid questions, because you know that’s not just a stupid question. That’s a premeditated thing you just did.

It's not the first time Minaj turned an interview into an educational moment

“It’s like we don’t even value relationships anymore,” Minaj told the Breakfast Club‘s Angie Martinez about managing relationships while famous. “Fame is the strongest drug known to man.” Minaj just wants women to be treated with the respect they deserve, famous or not. “Is that wrong for wanting more for myself, wanting people to treat me with respect?” she asked the world during a famous 2010 MTV documentary clip that went viral.

“I’m a human being,” she sarcastically reminds us.

During an interview with ABC Nightline’s Juju Chang in 2012, Minaj said it was “irksome” and off the mark to be constantly compared by the media with another talented artist — Lady Gaga. When Grigoriadis asked the same question three years later, though, she declined to comment.

As for Grigoriadis herself? She respectfully admitted that Minaj reacted fairly to her leading question about “thriving” on drama, just before suggesting that Minaj’s reaction could have been a “convenient way of maintaining control” during the interview. So it looks like the famous rapper still has one person to convince that treating people with respect isn’t just a soundbite.

VIDEO: How pop culture impacted popular belief

]]> Margarita Noriega <![CDATA[Here’s how the #BlackTwitter digest finds the most important news of the day]]> https://www.vox.com/2015/10/7/9469857/black-twitter-digest 2019-03-05T08:42:11-05:00 2015-10-07T11:30:03-04:00
A new digest collects the best of #BlackTwitter. | Mark Luckie

Author, journalist, and former Twitter employee Mark S. Luckie reverse-engineered Twitter’s trends to create a list of the best conversations in #BlackTwitter, a community that discusses issues that are important to black Americans but are often overlooked in mainstream media. It’s from this list of more than 150 accounts that Luckie finds content for a new daily, public digest, Today in #BlackTwitter.

The project is a refreshingly modern take on using social media for underreported news topics. The digest (and its Twitter account, @todayinblk) is a case study in how news can be both informative and relatable. You can create your own Twitter list for news, too, just by following the steps Luckie shared with me, below.

"Guns rights in America," "Wine train women sue for millions," "@TeenVogue's faux pas"

It’s impossible to describe in brevity the intersectionality of Black Twitter — it crosses race, gender, age, ethnicity, nationality — and Luckie flat-out refuses to water that down. He’s less interested in labeling individuals (a.k.a. who is or isn’t part of the #BlackTwitter discussion) and is instead focused on finding valuable conversations.

It’s impossible, too, to overstate the importance that #BlackTwitter provides to the news cycle. Those who discuss the news of the day are just as willing to talk about, say, celebrities who protest slut-shaming as they are shooting deaths in the US. And these discussions often bubble up beyond those involved in it. The conversation evolves offline in historically changing ways: As Dara Lind and Dylan Matthews wrote in August, Black Lives Matter (a movement that organized national protests using Twitter) is the “biggest grassroots force in the 2016 Democratic primary.”

Related Campaign Zero: Black Lives Matter activists’ policy platform, explained

Many of the conversations highlighted in the digest are the kind you might talk about with family or friends without knowing where the story goes next, or whether the media will even care to follow up. Did you know, for example, that the women’s book club members who were kicked off a wine tour train for being “too loud” are now suing for damages? Or that Black Lives Matter activist DeRay Mckesson was a recent guest lecturer at Yale University?

You can have a list of diverse sources on any topic and for any community, and what you’ll find is a universe of new ideas and information. Here’s how Mark created his list to find the stories for the Today in #BlackTwitter digest.

How to make an amazing list for news you want to follow

There are probably 10,000 published instructions for making lists based on topics. You don’t have to read any of them, but just know this:

1) Know a few hashtags and keywords. Know, broadly, the area you want to look into. The good news is that you probably already have a ton of ideas in mind. Luckie used several hashtags and keywords to find #BlackTwitter sources, but you can make a list just by starting with one or two keywords and expanding from there as you refine the list.

2) Use TweetDeck columns to sort top-shared content. By looking at tweets within a broad hashtag or keyword, and sorting by how many times it was retweeted by others, you can find users who said something important for the discussion at hand, no matter how many followers they have or whether they’re verified.

3) Check to see how many tweets a users has. This is a great way to figure out who might have joined the conversation a little too late. Luckie focuses on finding users who have at least 10,000 to 20,000 tweets under their belt. By analyzing tweet total counts, you can save yourself a bit of grief from untrusted tweeters.

4) To find new sources, see who users mutually follow. Let’s say you’ve found two brilliant Twitter users. See who they mutually follow with tools like Unfollowers.com and FollowerWonk.com, which can uncover new sources of mutual interest. Both services are paid, but you can’t go wrong with manually reviewing who people follow, too. This same idea also applies to outlets and brands: Many times a subject will be expertly covered by a source you may have never come across before.

5) Check your list against trending topics across the web. This is a good way to see what is not being covered by your list. Check on what’s being shared at Buzzsumo.com; type in a keyword or the URL of a news site to see top-shared links from the past week or 24 hours. You could use Twitter Moments or Facebook’s trending feed, for example, to see if Twitter is picking up new #BlackLivesMatter stories.

Other products like Lissted and Nuzzel collect Twitter content based on lists; I also recommend using these if you’re looking to expand sources. You’d be surprised to see all the stories and videos other people share across your social networks. As for Luckie, he says he’s already received a surprising amount of positive feedback since launching Today in #BlackTwitter, which will have its home on Medium.

]]> Margarita Noriega <![CDATA[Why the reasonable-sounding “40-hour workweek for Congress” idea would actually backfire]]> https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2015/10/7/9467243/busy-work-congress 2019-03-05T09:00:05-05:00 2015-10-07T10:20:01-04:00
Washington's political process is broken, but Congress shouldn't mindlessly pass legislation, either. Photo of Rep. David Jolly, 2014. | Getty

Congress would make a ton of progress just by spending every day voting on legislation, right? That’s the reasonable-sounding idea put forth by a Republican lawmaker’s latest bill (h/t the Hill’s Cristina Marcos).

Florida Rep. David Jolly has called on the “try-nothing” Congress to work at least eight hours a day, five days a week while it’s in session. Jolly wrote in a statement that “Americans are sick and tired of Washington inaction. They expect their leaders to govern. Look at all the bills gathering dust while Congress braces for the next self-made calamity.”

Despite this bold rhetoric, increasing voting activity isn’t the same thing as making informed policy — and the implication that members of Congress don’t currently work a lot of hours is untrue, anyway.

Members already work at least 40 hours a week

The bill presents misleading correlations between hours spent voting versus working, and between time spent voting versus making good policy. Let’s start with the fact that members put in far more than an average workweek — it’s just not all spent on the brief act of voting.

On average, members work about 70 hours a week, according to a survey conducted by the Congressional Management Foundation and the Society for Human Resource Management in 2013 (although this study hasn’t been conducted since then). And for the record, the workweek of the average American is closer to 60 hours.

The legislative process includes more than just voting

The legislation would encourage voting activity by increasing the hours that members spend in session, and Jolly’s characterization of Congress as a dysfunctional entity probably resonates deeply with many voters. One way to measure productivity is with legislative passage activity, which has decreased over time, as seen in this embedded chart. If you measured productivity by voting activity alone, you might come away very worried about how much work Congress actually does.

Is Congress less productive than it used to be?

Yes, increasing mandatory voting hours would likely result in more activity and passage of laws on paper. But there’s no reason to believe that the sole act of voting, or even legislative passage, makes the federal government more productive. No matter how many bills the House passes today, for example, the process still includes other checks and balances. The Senate and White House review legislation on their timing for every item the House passes.

If Congress really wants to increase its productivity in a valuable way, and not just on paper, it will need to find another yardstick than a simple count of yeas and nays.

]]> Margarita Noriega <![CDATA[The most frequently Instagrammed locations of every US state]]> https://www.vox.com/2015/10/6/9446725/most-popular-instagrams-state 2019-03-05T08:26:52-05:00 2015-10-06T10:10:02-04:00

Bus travel company Busbud tallied up every US state’s most popular place to tag an Instagram post based on hashtag and geolocated check-in data, and found that most of the favorite places are outdoors (h/t Business Insider). Local and state parks topped the list, followed by wineries and vineyards, historic sites, gardens, theaters, landmarks, nature and wildlife areas, zoos, and ski and snowboarding areas.

Theaters are the only places of the top Instagrammed locations where you’d spend more time indoors than outdoors.

And here are the most Instagrammed locations of every state:

Busbus State locations

Busbud’s list of Instagrammed place by US state. No surprise, the White House is Washington, DC’s most ‘grammed location.

Busbud also has a great interactive map, which you can check out here.

The top Instagram of the most popular location in the 10 most populous states

Just for fun, I checked out the most-liked posts in the 10 most populous US states (as of publishing) — collected by combining Busbud’s list with Instagram’s public data. Since you can’t search Instagram by likes alone, I picked the most-liked post of either the check-in or the hashtag for each location. Many of the locations have 50,000 or more public tags and check-ins.

Something I didn’t expect? First, many of these Instagrams are pretty recent. While the Explore tab is successfully connecting users to trending posts by users they may not know or follow, these may be replaced by new pictures or videos soon. I also didn’t expect to see so many check-ins at professional car racing events, but that’s probably because I’m not too into racing. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy these pictures as much as I did. The list is organized in descending order by total state population, according to the 2014 US Census.

Disneyland, Anaheim, California

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Circuit of the Americas, Austin, Texas

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South Beach, Miami, Florida

Is it any surprise that South Beach’s most popular post is of tanned, happy people on the beach? No.

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Empire State Building, New York

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Wrigley Field, Chicago, Illinois

The most-liked Instagram from Wrigley Field is a regram (a shared post of another’s Instagram post) of the picture below.

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Pittsburgh Zoo and PPG Aquarium, Pennsylvania

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Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Garden, Ohio

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Atlanta Motor Speedway, Georgia

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Charlotte Motor Speedway, North Carolina

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Silver Lake Sand Dunes, Mears, Michigan

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If you haven’t had your fill of gorgeous Instagram spots, there’s more to enjoy — Busbud also conducted the same survey for Canada.

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]]> Margarita Noriega <![CDATA[Women reporters denied access to NFL locker room — despite winning the right in 1978]]> https://www.vox.com/2015/10/5/9455361/sports-journalist-locker-room-access 2019-03-05T08:31:22-05:00 2015-10-05T16:30:02-04:00
Members of the Indianapolis Colts take the field before the game against the Jacksonville Jaguars at Lucas Oil Stadium on October 4, 2015, in Indianapolis, Indiana. | Michael Hickey/Getty Images

In 1978, Sports Illustrated reporter Melissa Ludtke won the right to practice journalism in the locker room of the New York Yankees, securing equal access to cover the same sports teams and interview athletes and coaches as her male counterparts. This Sunday, 37 years after that victory, three women reporters were mistakenly banned from an NFL locker room.

When a male usher at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis prevented Yahoo reporter Graham Watson from entering a locker room — a common area for journalists to interview players and coaches — during the Colts’ Sunday game against the Jacksonville Jaguars, she started to tweet about it.

Two other women reporters, Tuscaloosa News’s Joey Chandler and Tulsa World’s Katie McInerney, were also temporarily denied locker room access that day.

Ludtke believes women journalists still face discrimination online

The Colts apologized to the reporters for the usher’s error. Sunday’s sexist gaffe doesn’t happen often in the US anymore, thanks to Ludtke’s case, but the Colts mistake is a great reminder of how easy it is to forget specific legal rights in everyday circumstances when individuals depend on their social biases to make rules that end up superseding the hard-won civil rights of others.

In a recent interview, Ludtke told Huffington Post’s Maxwell Strachan that she thinks getting the work of journalism done is actually worse in some ways for today’s women reporters. Sexist and misogynist commenters can troll and harass reporters about opinions on social media under the protection of online anonymity:

[One thing that’s worse is] the social media environment, [which] is clearly something that we did not have back then. When people wanted to say something about me or about my lawsuit or about women in general doing this job, they actually had to put their byline on top of it. A lot of critics and a lot of sports columnists who went after me and this legal action and are really present in their profession, they did it with a restraint that I don’t see now, and this, of course, goes far wider than sports journalism.

To Ludtke’s point, women reporters should be able to work without being harassed, and protecting a woman’s right to do her job in locker rooms and chat rooms isn’t by any means a new proposal. In 2014, Vox’s Timothy Lee interviewed University of Maryland legal scholar Danielle Citron, who believes that online harassment is a civil rights issue for women because it harms their ability to express themselves and protect their privacy while pursuing careers. Sexual harassment online is a much more difficult problem to solve, however, because there’s no one global governance organization responsible for protecting civil rights online. The good news for women sports reporters is that their right to work in hundreds of locker rooms is protected. The bad news is that there’s an infinite number of social media networks and website comments sections where that’s not the case.

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