Bias, Skew, and Search Engines Are Sufficient to Explain Online Toxicity

Anatomy of an internet argument

Social media isn't toxic, most people just haven't figured out the game (yet)

Bias, Skew, and Search Engines Are Sufficient to Explain Online Toxicity

U.S. political discourse seems to have fissioned into discrete bubbles, each reflecting its own distorted image of the world. Many blame machine-learning algorithms that purportedly maximize “engagement”—serving up content that keeps YouTube or Facebook users watching videos or scrolling through their feeds—for radicalizing users or strengthening their partisanship. Sociologist Shoshana Zuboff15 even argues that “surveillance capitalism” uses optimized algorithmic feedback for “automated behavioral modification” at scale, writing the “music” that users then “dance” to.

Bias, Skew, and Search Engines Are Sufficient to Explain Online Toxicity

U.S. political discourse seems to have fissioned into discrete bubbles, each reflecting its own distorted image of the world. Many blame machine-learning algorithms that purportedly maximize “engagement”—serving up content that keeps YouTube or Facebook users watching videos or scrolling through their feeds—for radicalizing users or strengthening their partisanship. Sociologist Shoshana Zuboff15 even argues that “surveillance capitalism” uses optimized algorithmic feedback for “automated behavioral modification” at scale, writing the “music” that users then “dance” to.

Play nice! How the internet is trying to design out toxic behaviour

Online abuse can be cruel – but for some tech companies it is an existential threat. Can giants such as Facebook use behavioural psychology and persuasive design to tame the trolls?

RIP social media. What comes next is messy.

As social media splinters, how can we keep the new online spaces from devolving into toxic pits of despair?

People Across the Globe Increasingly Say Social Media Is Harming Democracy

Most think social media leads to manipulation and division, but they also say it informs people and gives them a voice in politics.

Introducing a network for thoughtful conversations

The quality of conversations on the Internet is terrible. Most platforms like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Reddit, etc. optimize for engagement as their key metric. This spawns and rewards behavior that leads to bragging of gameable metrics such as likes and followers, self-feeding thought bubbles, knee-jerk reactions, “if you’re not on our side, you’re on their side” mentality, and thought policing even by people who think they’re fighting for a good cause. Today’s Internet doesn’t incentiviz

Digital Social Norm Enforcement: Online Firestorms in Social Media

Actors of public interest today have to fear the adverse impact that stems from social media platforms. Any controversial behavior may promptly trigger temporal, but potentially devastating storms of emotional and aggressive outrage, so called online firestorms. Popular targets of online firestorms are companies, politicians, celebrities, media, academics and many more. This article introduces social norm theory to understand online aggression in a social-political online setting, challenging the popular assumption that online anonymity is one of the principle factors that promotes aggression. We underpin this social norm view by analyzing a major social media platform concerned with public affairs over a period of three years entailing 532,197 comments on 1,612 online petitions. Results show that in the context of online firestorms, non-anonymous individuals are more aggressive compared to anonymous individuals. This effect is reinforced if selective incentives are present and if aggressors are intrinsically motivated.

Digital Social Norm Enforcement: Online Firestorms in Social Media

Actors of public interest today have to fear the adverse impact that stems from social media platforms. Any controversial behavior may promptly trigger temporal, but potentially devastating storms of emotional and aggressive outrage, so called online firestorms. Popular targets of online firestorms are companies, politicians, celebrities, media, academics and many more. This article introduces social norm theory to understand online aggression in a social-political online setting, challenging the popular assumption that online anonymity is one of the principle factors that promotes aggression. We underpin this social norm view by analyzing a major social media platform concerned with public affairs over a period of three years entailing 532,197 comments on 1,612 online petitions. Results show that in the context of online firestorms, non-anonymous individuals are more aggressive compared to anonymous individuals. This effect is reinforced if selective incentives are present and if aggressors are intrinsically motivated.

How Social Media Brings Out the Worst in Us

A new book argues that social media does more harm than good and we might be happier and healthier using it less.

The challenge of identifying subtle forms of toxicity online

The reality is that most forms of toxicity are subtle and often ambiguous, rather than obvious or extreme.

Social Media Effects: Hijacking Democracy and Civility in Civic Engagement

Perceived as an equalizing force for disenfranchised individuals without a voice, the importance of social networks as agents of change cannot be ignored. However, in some societies, social networks have evolved into a platform for fake news and propaganda, empowering disruptive voices, ideologies, and messages. Social networks such as Twitter, Facebook, and Google hold the potential to alter civic engagement, thus essentially hijacking democracy, by influencing individuals toward a particular way of thinking.

The Noisy Room

Only 3% of social media users post toxic content — but Americans estimate 43%. An interactive essay.

Can a video game company tame toxic behaviour?

Scientists are helping to stop antisocial behaviour in the world's most popular online game. The next stop could be a kinder Internet.

Do social media threaten democracy?

Facebook, Google and Twitter were supposed to save politics as good information drove out prejudice and falsehood. Something has gone very wrong