The 8th Annual Social Media and Politics Year in Review!
This year, we cover the platforms’ year in review reports, AI for political communication, the creator economy, and EU concerns around disinformation and cyberattacks.
Here are links to resources discussed in the episode, and see you in 2024!
Platform Reports:
Meta
Instagram
TikTok
Reddit
Pinterest
Snap
Twitch
Google
YouTube
Pornhub Insights
Russell Mindich, political consultant and author of the 2022 Political Tech Landscape Report, shares his insights on the role of social media in political campaigning. We discuss social media influencers and how campaigns are connecting to them on TikTok, the move towards politicla advertising on streaming services, and the potential uses of ChatGPT and other generative AI for politics.
The 7th Annual Social Media and Politics Podcast Year in Review! A Mega Episode with lots of knowledge bombs – you’ll simply have to listen to hear them all!
Here is a gift of all the platform year in review reports:
Facebook: Protecting People from Online Threats in 2022
Instagram: 2023 Instagram Trend Report
Google: Year in Search
TikTok: 1) Year on TikTok: 2022, truly #ForYou
TikTok: 2) What’s Next 2023 Trend Report
Pinterest: Pinterest Predicts 2022
Reddit: Reddit Recap 2022
Snapchat: Year End 2022
Pornhub: 2022 Year in Review
And the two clips played in the episode:
See you in January for new episodes!
Share your thoughts or questions @SMandPPodcast
Keep downloading, listening, and learning! <3
Joshua Tucker, Professor of Politics at NYU and Co-Director of the Center for Social Media and Politics, discusses social media’s impact on the invasion of Ukraine. We talk about ‘information theaters’ of operation and how they differ across the West, Ukraine, Russia, and China. Prof. Tucker also shares his thoughts on Volodymyr Zelensky’s teleconferencing, the Biden administration’s pre-bunking strategy towards disinformation, multinational corporations’ actions towards sanctions, and Vladimir Putin’s isolation. And more!
Here are links to prior episodes on Ukraine:
Volodymyr Zelensky’s Social Media Strategy in the 2019 Ukraine Elections
Here we go! A deep dive into the year’s latest trends in social media and politics, as well as predictions for the future. We cover various platforms’ year in review recaps, Telegram and Belarus, Facebook’s change to Meta and the Silicon Valley “Founder”, artificial intelligence and the virtual politician, Web 3 and Parler, and the enduring role of newsletters.
Here’s the platform year in review stats and bonus links for the episode:
Article with chart on social media’s impact on democracy
The greatest newsletter of all-time
See you in January for new episodes! <3
Professor Chris Bail, Professor of Sociology and Public Policy at Duke University, discusses his latest book Breaking the Social Media Prism: How to Make Our Platforms Less Polarizing. Professor Bail shares findings from three studies on political polarization covering field-experiments, qualitative interviews, and lab experiments. We discuss how social media contributes to a distorted reality in how extremists and moderates discuss politics online, and how this prism fosters a sense false polarization. We also chat about measures that individuals and social media platforms could take to reduce online political polarization.
Here are supplementary links to two studies discussed in the episode:
Exposure to Opposing Views on Social Media can Increase Political Polarization (2019)
Dr. Michael D. Cohen, CEO of Cohen Research Group and Lecturer at Johns Hopkins University, discusses his new book Modern Political Campaigns: How Professionalism, Technology, and Speed Have Revolutionized Elections.
We talk about how communication technologies have shifted political campaigns from being party-centered to candidate-centered. We also discuss various aspects of political campaigns covered in the book, such as: how political campaigns conduct opposition research, the role of data and analytics in the modern campaign, and the value social media can provide to a political campaign.
Buy Modern Political Campaigns here and use code RLFANDF30 for 30% off!
Tom Moylan, Communication Strategist at the Directorate-General for Communication at the European Commission, shares his personal reflections on EU digital communication. We discuss the value that social media can bring in communicating the European Union to citizens, as well as how EU institutions have evolved their communication strategy over time. Tom also shares his experiences as a speechwriter in EU trade policy, and how speech writing compares with social media communication. We also discuss current trends in EU institutional communication, and what lessons might be learned from coronavirus pandemic moving forward.
Be sure to subscribe to Tom’s newsletter: Speaking Moylanguage!
Ieva Česnulaitytė, Policy Analyst at the OECD, discusses her and her colleagues’ research on representative deliberative processes. We break down some of the key models of deliberative processes, when they tend to be used, and how their success can be measured.
We also discuss how the coronavirus pandemic has moved deliberative processes online. As social distancing limits the ability for citizens to attend in-person events, how are deliberative processes being carried out?
Here’s the report we discuss in the episode – Innovative Citizen Participation and New Democratic Institutions: Catching the Deliberative Wave.
And the op-ed in Nature discussing online deliberation during the pandemic.
Sinan Aral, David Austin Professor of Management at MIT and Director of MIT’s Initiative on the Digital Economy, discusses his new book “The Hype Machine: How Social Media Disrupts Our Elections, Our Economy, and Our Health—and How We Must Adapt.”
Prof. Aral breaks down key theoretical concepts from the book, which outlines some of the fundamental mechanisms for how social media platforms operate. We also discuss the science behind these concepts and they implications they have for elections, politics, and society.