Joe is a researcher and PhD candidate assisting in long-form investigations into disinformation and the actors behind it. He is interested in virality and memetics, the “truthiness” of false narratives, and all things to do with digital text and what it can do (for good or ill). His PhD research explores on how social media blurs the boundaries between fact and fiction when used as a venue for storytelling.
A story claiming that popular e-commerce site, Wayfair, was using ‘overpriced’ cabinets recently set the Internet alight. The theory originated from a post by PrincessPeach1987 on Reddit’s conspiracy subreddit.
On Wednesday April 8th, Reddit user tobrown05 posted a link to a YouTube video with the title “Not news, but tbh if you have tiktok, just get rid of it.” The video has been removed by YouTube, but the contents can be at least partially inferred...
In the aftermath of Trump’s disastrously underattended rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and the flooding of racist or pro-police hashtags and communication channels on Twitter, the Internet was awash with proclamations that the “zoomers” (members of...
As demonstrations and protests were met with violence, erupting into civil disobedience across the globe, we can show how an effort to fracture solidarity in the Black Lives Matter online movement instead drew the ire of the online right, got...
The Epoch Times may not be a household name in the UK right now, but many will be waking up across the country today to find a free newspaper bundled in with their post bearing their name. The paper’s front page headline reads “How China’s...
Last week, Nick Backovic introduced Think Logically, our new fortnightly series designed to help facilitate media literacy and combat the prevalence of dis and misinformation at the level of our reception to the daily bombardment of conflicting...
London Real, the podcast/website/business guru course/YouTube channel responsible for reintroducing David Icke to the public eye and cultural discourse (reptilians and all), is currently in the midst of a PR crisis. Owner Brian Rose’s videos have...
After a flurry of uncertainty in the face of a global pandemic, scientists and researchers have worked tirelessly to understand how we have ended up where we are today. As a result of this, the current state of misinformation around the...
At the start of last week, Twitter lit up with outrage at a thread posted by John O’Connell – founder and editor of Far-Right Watch. In the thread, he purports to have found evidence that the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) had set up...