Imagine this: US users, worried about a TikTok ban, are flocking to a Chinese app called Xiaohongshu, also known as RedNote. This app, started in 2013, is a big deal in China, but not so much outside it. Until now, that is. It's like Instagram, but with a twist – it's focused on user interests, not
Jennifer Rubin, a well-known columnist at The Washington Post, has decided to leave the newspaper. She's joining a new startup, but not without some harsh words for the paper's owner, Jeff Bezos. Rubin feels that big media owners like Bezos have let down their readers by trying to play nice with pol
Elon Musk isn't a fan favorite in Britain. Polls show he's unpopular, and his social media following has dipped since he took control last October. Yet, when he recently focused on a old child abuse scandal, everyone in Britain paid attention. Why? Well, Musk is super rich and has a friend in the U.
Ever wondered what happens when you watch or listen to content from people who speak differently than you? It turns out, this can actually lead to a more positive attitude. Previous research shows that people often connect with others by using a similar language style, like the same rate of articles
Imagine this: a social media giant suddenly decides to loosen its rules on hate speech and ditch its fact-checkers. This is what's happening at Meta, the company behind Facebook, Instagram, and Threads. Meta's CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, sees this as a return to the company's roots, promoting free speech.
A group of tech leaders and advocates has launched a campaign called Free Our Feeds to protect social media from being controlled by billionaires. They want to safeguard the technology behind Bluesky, known as the AT Protocol. Their goal is to create an open social media ecosystem that can't be cont
Last week, Meta announced plans to cut its US-based fact-checkers, just as wildfires raged in Los Angeles. Meanwhile, fact-checkers were busy debunking conspiracy theories about the fires. They faced a tough challenge: misinformation spread fast, and influential figures were pushing false claims. So
As the 2010s drew to a close, Sweden's traditional media outlets were talking more about climate change than ever before. This was especially true during the summer of 2018, when a severe drought and wildfires hit the country, and the Fridays for Future movement, led by Greta Thunberg, gained tracti
Social media has become a hotbed for spreading facts, false claims, and propaganda, especially since the Covid-19 pandemic. Graph Neural Networks (GNNs) are great at processing language, but detecting propaganda is tricky because of the complexity of text interactions and the need to understand cont
It's no secret that physical activity is great for our health. But why do some people do it regularly while others don't? Research often uses surveys and interviews to figure this out. However, these methods can have biases that make their results less reliable. This is where social media platforms
