The Current | Vol. 31 Issue 18

January 19, 2021 | nsucurrent.nova.edu 11 Opinions It’s time we get our facts straight — bias and all The GET mobile app needs to GET fixed Many students returned to live on campus for theWinter 2021 semester. As NSU experienced an influx of residential students, they sent out various emails during winter break, several of which outlined protocols for students who had to or planned on self isolating during the first two weeks of the semester. Several emails were sent about purchasing food from the GET mobile app, a food delivery app that NSU utilized during the previous semester that allowed students to order food from campus to be delivered right to their residence hall. Taking it a step further this semester, NSU mail couriering services were to deliver orders straight to students’ rooms for the first two weeks of the winter semester. This was an especially useful development for students who wished to self isolate. This service is available from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m., as advertised per the emails students received over winter break. Unfortunately, the GET app has a few bugs. Not only do many of the dining locations advertised simply not show up, but others show that they are ‘closed’ all day on days when they are most certainly open. Over the past two weeks, only four out of the eight supposedly available locations have appeared on the app and shown up as ‘open’at all. Not only do we have limited dining options, but we seem to have a limited window of availability to order. While GET mobile delivery is supposed to be available until 7p.m., every time I have attempted to order food past 5 p.m., I have not been able to. Whether it be that many students are all ordering at once or an error on the app’s part, an error message pops up after 5 p.m. stating that they have reached order capacity. Starting at 6 p.m., you cannot even try to order, as locations will show up as ‘closed’ or not taking any more orders, citing that there will not be enough time to prepare and deliver the order. While the app does disclose that it can take up to an hour to make and deliver your food, during the few times I have been able to successfully order it has only taken around 30 to 40 minutes for my order to be delivered. If you were planning on ordering dinner from the GET app, you’d better be ready to eat it early, because during the last two hours of operation, the app is essentially useless. While the GET mobile app could be a really good opportunity for students who wish to social distance or self isolate, it simply falls short of being truly useful. NSU needs to actively look into these bugs instead of just leaving the app as it is and leaving students hungry in a midst of confusion. Growing up, I read the “real facts” on the cap of my Snapple. I loved learning how bees have five eyelids, and I didn’t care where these facts came from. I just liked sharing knowledge. Clearly, nothing has changed. However, there has been one change in our world in the “real facts” we learn every day. It could be as simple as a street closure or as complex as the latest scandal by a politician or celebrity. These topics are brought up in casual conversations and around the dinner table just like anything else. There are rumors, speculation, hearsay and just flat-out lies; so how do we separate a By: Christina McLaughlin Co-Editor-in-Chief “real fact” from a factual piece of information? That is the million-dollar question. We’veallseentheFacebookaccountsriddled with reposts from sources like “my dear friend WilliamMichael,” “America’sPrideofLions” or “helthybodyslimfast.com .” Okay, I made those up, but you know what I mean. The memes might make you laugh and start a conversation, but it’s the “real facts” that are thrown that you have to worry about. Like it or not, President Trump highlighted this exact issue with his comments about “fake news.” Now, he wasn’t talking about those meme pages. He was talking about historically reputable news sources like The New York Times, CNN, NBC and The Washington Post. These outlets may make factual errors or misprints and aren’t perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but they don’t necessarily hide their bias or mistakes — hence the need for occasional corrections or retractions. Could your friend William Michael be accurate when he said Au is the symbol on the Periodic Table for gold or “helthybodyslimfast. com” when they say that not smoking can keep you healthy? Sure, but that doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t check those facts for yourself. In fact, you most certainly should because, at the end of the day, it’s all about the clicks and algorithm. According to tech experts in the Netflix documentary “The Social Dilemma ”—the ones involved in the creation of the apps we all know and love — our search results, posts we see and connections we make are all curated. So, what if you only saw a politically targeted meme because you live in a so-called “red state”or “blue area code?” Or only could easily find information from non-reputable news sources? Therein lies the problem with algorithms and how these apps (which most people rely on for their news nowadays) could cause such a huge uproar. That’s how we get situations like what we saw at the Capitol Building, whether we want to admit that or not. Essentially, we are being fed what we already want to believe. It’s not the app’s fault. All it wants is to get you to engage with it. It doesn’t realize that you watched 20 hours of propaganda last week, it sees that you stayed on the app for 20 hours and will recommend more of that content to gratify you. So, what does that mean for us? How do we avoid this bias from all directions? The short answer is we can’t, but we can work towards the middle ground. By using sites like allsides.com for news from each political leaning or by checking your news sources’ bias, we can find balance in our news cycle and some of the truth behind the “real facts” that we are presented with. By the way, bees do have five eyes, but no eyelids. Go figure. By: Sofia Gallus Arts & Entertainment Editor PRINTED WITH PERMISSION BY C. MCLAUGHLIN PRINTED WITH PERMISSION BY E. COWAN Constant error message