blessmycottonsocks
Antediluvian
- Joined
- Dec 22, 2014
- Messages
- 9,423
- Location
- Wessex and Mercia
Reports seem to be escalating in UK mainstream media (just been discussed on the BBC 10:00 news) about the significant effect that fake news/rumours/misinformation spread via Facebook, Twitter and other uncontrolled social media, has on recent UK elections.
The EU referendum, Labour leadership campaign and the 2017 general election, all of which confounded the political pollsters, have been cited as examples where propaganda spread via social media has had a demonstrably stronger effect than mainstream news.
https://www.theguardian.com/technol...ry-data-misuse-deomcracy-at-risk-mps-conclude
https://gijn.org/2017/10/31/is-social-media-a-threat-to-democracy/
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-trending-40209711
There seems little doubt that the Leave campaign exploited social media far more effectively than Remain, just as Momentum did for Corbyn.
Do you see social media being used in this manner as a threat to democracy and, if so, should users on Facebook and Twitter etc. be denied their current anonymity and be subject to similar controls as articles published or broadcast on the mainstream media?
The EU referendum, Labour leadership campaign and the 2017 general election, all of which confounded the political pollsters, have been cited as examples where propaganda spread via social media has had a demonstrably stronger effect than mainstream news.
https://www.theguardian.com/technol...ry-data-misuse-deomcracy-at-risk-mps-conclude
https://gijn.org/2017/10/31/is-social-media-a-threat-to-democracy/
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-trending-40209711
There seems little doubt that the Leave campaign exploited social media far more effectively than Remain, just as Momentum did for Corbyn.
Do you see social media being used in this manner as a threat to democracy and, if so, should users on Facebook and Twitter etc. be denied their current anonymity and be subject to similar controls as articles published or broadcast on the mainstream media?