I notice a large number of ragebait-y political communities being spun up by new users with thousands of posts & ai profile header photos. I notice comment sections are more acrimonious, and foreign disinfo talking points are circulating a lot more prolifically than before the US election started ramping up.
Anyone else notice this? Any idea on how to combat it on this platform? Are there any communities built around creating block lists of obvious troll/ai/disinfo accounts & communities?
I haven’t noticed it but I rarely look at the all communities feed instead of just my subscriptions. I do notice that a lot of users seem to be simply in the tank instead of maintaining healthy skepticism towards politicians. I also keep hearing “foreign disinfo” but that makes me chuckle. Of course it exists but it’s not more potent than the domestic disinfo which is even more plentiful.
I’m not sure the distinction is easy to make, or all that meaningful.
I’m not who you replied to, but I think the implication is that the domestic disinfo is often just the plentiful pool of misinformed or so-called “low information voters” who may be pushing an agenda, but not one that goes beyond their own beliefs, whereas foreign actors are pushing a state agenda.
I mean, sure, but when a considerable number of the low information voters are uncritically spreading memes produced by domestic extremists inspired by narratives devised by state actors and pushed through state media, is it domestic or foreign? Does it even matter?
This is not a hypothetical. This is literally how major disinformation has spread since MH17, through Brexit, the 2016 election, Covid and beyond.
The Russians, the Iranians, the proud boys and uncle Jack in the family WhatsApp are all part of the same hydra of crap.
Hmm that’s a great point, I wasn’t really considering the interrelationships there. I see where you are coming from now.
I see what you mean, but I disagree. Bot accounts are categorically different in this space. It’s impossible to have a meaningful conversation with a bot. So when I see things like bot activity disguised to look like organic human activity, especially when it aligns with hostile foreign state interests, that’s something that I think is uniquely bad and worth pointing out and combating.
Oh yes, this is generally classified as coordinated inauthentic traffic and moderated away regardless of content.
That is, that was the norm before platforms decided they kind of like fascism if it gets them less regulations and more tax cuts.
Except that the foreign actors’ state agenda is domestic chaos for the US.