TLDR 137

Too Long; Didn't Read Issue 137

Published: 2018-02-18 • 📧 Newsletter

Welcome to Issue #137. Algorithms, bots, & trolls...oh my...

Sorry this is a little late this week. Yesterday I spent the day with some colleagues and great teachers in a full-day workshop on STEAM integration in the K-8 classroom. This post contains all of our slide decks for the sessions.

This week I posted the following:

TLT Survey in French - As part of the Digitally Literate Research Project, we're surveying the globe to better understand the ways in which educators integrate digital technologies in instruction. Our french survey just went live...please considering taking it, or sharing it.
The four step process needed to write an annotated bibliography - After sharing my post about literature reviews last week, I realized I needed to first share a post on how to write up an annotated bib...so here you go.
Creating a strategic plan for your life - I'm starting up a mastermind group to help identify long & short term goals and keep ourselves all accountable. Send me a note if you're interested in joining us. This is the overview of where we're headed.
Developing a personal vision statement - Step one of developing a strategic plan involves creating a vision statement to guide all future work.
A Turning Point - This week in my Revolutionary Poets Society class, we focused on an obstacle that we overcame in our lives...and wrote some great poetry.

Please subscribe to make sure this comes to your inbox each week. You can review archives of the newsletter or on Medium.

Say hey with a note at hello@wiobyrne.com or on the socials at wiobyrne.

🔖 Key Takeaways

Lucas Spider Creator Makes Arachnophobia Adorable: Professional animator Joshua Slice saw spider in photo and wondered if he could create animated spider so cute that even arachnophobes could love it—his goal was making something super realistic and believable but presented in way that would endear viewers, with Lucas The Spider YouTube channel becoming beloved for world's cutest spider providing nice way to start off this week's issue before diving into darker topics.
Parkland Shooting Reveals Broken Systems: Gunman entered Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida killing 17 individuals as these critical incidents happen with increasing regularity in U.S. schools while it remains to be seen whether we choose to change situations leading to these events—something needs to change because we are broken, though positively youth survivors from incident are being vocal about demanding change while social media landscape fills with same posts from last shooting and shooting before that.
Russian Bots Hijack Parkland Conversation: Soon after Parkland shooting, pro-gun Russian bots and trolls immediately jumped on existing hashtags to take control of discussion and amplify their message—social media networks also broken while we need to counteract these negative messages and amplify positive voices of our youth, with Strategic Studies Quarterly article revealing how Russian bots stoked fear at University of Missouri in 2015 by creating false impressions about threats against black students and faculty contributing to negative university image that continues to be fought.
Trolls Exploit Local News Algorithm Weakness: Jonathan Albright research reveals brilliant algorithm exploitation where groups routing hyperpartisan and fake news content through fake local news agencies with local names in address (HoustonTopNews, DailySanFran, OnlineCleveland) knowing that Facebook, Twitter algorithms value local news more heavily and give more traction—this happens when you pay social media companies or ask for guidance as they show you keys to car and help your content go viral, ironically coinciding with Facebook's announcement about increasing reliance on local news in recent algorithm overhaul.
Information Apocalypse Threatens Credibility of Fact: Aviv Ovadya connects dots from AI tools putting people's faces on other people's bodies (discussed in TL;DR #134) pointing to scary future where our platformed and algorithmically optimized world is vulnerable to propaganda, misinformation, and dark targeted advertising from foreign governments—so much so that it threatens to undermine cornerstone of human discourse: the credibility of fact itself in coming information apocalypse.
DOJ Indictments Expose Coordinated Attack: U.S. Department of Justice indictments reveal coordinated well-funded informational attack conducted in social networks and online spaces originating from Internet Research Agency profiled by Adrian Chen in 2015 NY Times Magazine piece—seemingly random series of dots sowing discord appeared too organized to be random storm, with indictment documents requiring search for "Facebook" and "Twitter" to see how often platforms appear necessitating discussion about their role in these events as more fallout emerges from investigations.

📺 Watch

Lucas The Spider Creator Explains How He Makes People Fall In Love With Spiders

On the Lucas The Spider YouTube channel, viewers come to love the "cutest spider" ever. This video short interviews professional animator Joshua Slice to learn more about how and why he created Lucas.

Slice indicates that he saw a spider in a photo and wondered if he could create an animated spider so cute that even people that are afraid of spiders could love it. His goal was to make something that was super realistic and believable, but presented in a way that would endear viewers.

This is a nice was to start off this week's issue.

📚 Read

Pro-gun Russian bots flood Twitter after Parkland attacks

This week a gunman entered Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, FL and killed 17 individuals. These critical incidents are happening with increasing regularity in our schools here in the U.S. It remains to be seen whether we choose to do anything to change the situations that lead to these events. I, for one, am done with having to once again come to terms with these active shooter events. The social media landscape fills with the same posts from the last shooting, and the shooting before that. Something needs to change. We are broken.

On a positive note, youth survivors from the incident are being vocal about how they want change as well.

The challenge is that our social media networks are also broken. More to the point, soon after the shooting, bots and trolls immediately jumped on existing hashtags to take control of the discussion and amplify their message.

We need to counteract these negative messages and amplify the positive voices of our youth.

How Russian bots spread fear at University in the U.S.

Continuing this look at the role of Russian bots and trolls, this piece from Inside Higher Ed looks at how they helped stoke fear at the University of Missouri in 2015. This insight comes from a journal article in Strategic Studies Quarterly examining the threats.

The article discusses in great detail how the bots created false impressions about some threats against black students and faculty members at the university, which resulted in some campus leaders calling for people to stay home and many students to say that they were terrified. The false reports also contributed to a negative image of the university -- particularly with regard to its support for minority students -- that the university continues to fight.

As I shared these stories about bots and trolls this week, one of the common responses I received was...."leave Facebook" or "leave Twitter." This may be great advice, but I also wonder what these forces are doing to the other millions of people that are being swayed by this content.

Trolls on Twitter: How mainstream and local news outlets were used to drive a polarized news agenda

We've discussed the work of Jonathan Albright quite a bit here in TL;DR as he has been researching social media trends to identify themes in propaganda, sources, and the role of algorithms. This latest piece of research digs in to the role of real news and fake news in these intersections.

Albright looked at open Bit.ly links for link sharing to look at viral social media feeds, and found some interesting elements. Some of this news comes from what you would consider to be "hyperpartisan" or "fake news" sites. There is also a large contingent of content coming from "credible" or "mainstream media" sources.

What is far more interesting is the path these links took to become viral. Many of the links originate from political donor or party addresses. But, they then take a turn toward local news agencies, or what looks like local news organizations. From here, the algorithms and feeds on our social networks pick up these sources and double/triple down on it and give you more in your feed. The algorithms give more value to what might be considered "local news" so this is spread more widely.

Think about that for a second. Whatever group was sending this content out and around, they knew that Facebook, Twitter, etc. would value it more heavily...and it would get more traction...if it was routed through fake/troll accounts with local names in the address (e.g., HoustonTopNews, DailySanFran, OnlineCleveland). This is brilliant. Of course, this is what happens when you pay social media companies, or ask for their guidance. They show you to the keys to the car, and help your content go viral.

As a reminder, one of the elements Facebook said they were changing in a recent overhaul was a reliance on "local news."

He predicted the 2016 fake news crisis. Now he's worried about an information apocalypse.

We've talked quite a bit about trolls, bots, algorithms, and their impact in social media in TL;DR over the past year...and especially in this issue.

Recently, in TL;DR #134 shared a piece about the AI tools being used to put people's faces on other people's bodies.

In this piece, Aviv Ovadya connects those dots and points to a scary future.

He notes: "Our platformed and algorithmically optimized world is vulnerable — to propaganda, to misinformation, to dark targeted advertising from foreign governments — so much so that it threatens to undermine a cornerstone of human discourse: the credibility of fact."

The Agency

So, where is all of this noise and propaganda coming from? Over the last year we've been studying this trend in TL;DR. We've been trying to connect the seemingly random series of dots that are sowing this discord. From my vantage point, it seemed a bit too organized to be a random storm of action.

Thanks to the indictments handed down from the U.S. Department of Justice, we now know that this is a coordinated, well-funded, informational attack conducted in our social networks and online spaces. This piece from Adrian Chen in the NY Times Magazine (in 2015!?!) profiles the Internet Research Agency, the focus of many of these indictments.

You can read the indictments here. I suggest that you take the time to read the documents. I'd also suggest doing a search for "Facebook" & "Twitter"...and your other social networks to see how often they appear. I think we need to have a discussion about their role in these events.

In coming weeks, we'll learn more about these indictments and have more fallout from the investigations. For now, take some time to read the materials listed here. It's important that we understand the context before we think about what to do next.

🔨 Do

As you're sitting there reviewing all of the ways in which our online and offline social connections may be broken, perhaps you want to sit back and eat a $250 cookie. Makes sense to me.

The story of the $250 cookie is supposedly when a woman ordered a cookie at the Neiman Marcus cafe, the waitress said it would cost "two fifty". The woman assumed it was $2.50, paid for the cookie, and left.

When she saw her credit card bill, however, the charge was $250. She was so irate that she decided to distribute the recipe so that no one would ever pay $250 for the recipe again. The company has since debunked the rumor, but the recipe that accompanied that email became insanely popular.

🤔 Consider

"I am not an advocate for frequent changes in laws and constitutions, but laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths discovered and manners and opinions change, with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also to keep pace with the times." — Thomas Jefferson

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🌱 Connected Concepts:

Lucas Spider Joshua Slice — Lucas The Spider YouTube channel features world's cutest spider through video short interviewing professional animator Joshua Slice about how and why he created Lucas—Slice saw spider in photo and wondered if he could create animated spider so cute that even arachnophobes could love it, with goal of making something super realistic and believable but presented in way that would endear viewers, providing nice way to start off this week's issue about algorithms, bots, and trolls.
Russian Bots Parkland Shooting — Gunman entered Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida killing 17 individuals as these critical incidents happen with increasing regularity in U.S. schools while it remains to be seen whether we choose to change situations leading to these events—social media landscape fills with same posts from last shooting and shooting before that with something needing to change because we are broken, though positively youth survivors are being vocal about demanding change while challenge exists that social media networks are also broken with bots and trolls immediately jumping on existing hashtags after shooting to take control of discussion and amplify their message, requiring counteracting these negative messages and amplifying positive voices of youth.
Russian Bots University Missouri 2015 — Inside Higher Ed examines how Russian bots and trolls helped stoke fear at University of Missouri in 2015 based on Strategic Studies Quarterly journal article—bots created false impressions about threats against black students and faculty members resulting in campus leaders calling for people to stay home and many students saying they were terrified, with false reports also contributing to negative image of university particularly regarding its support for minority students that university continues to fight, raising questions about what these forces are doing to millions of people being swayed by this content beyond just advice to leave Facebook or Twitter.
Trolls Twitter Polarized News Albright — Jonathan Albright researching social media trends to identify themes in propaganda, sources, and role of algorithms digs into role of real news and fake news in these intersections—Albright looked at open Bit.ly links for link sharing in viral social media feeds finding content from hyperpartisan or fake news sites plus large contingent from credible or mainstream media sources, with far more interesting path being how links became viral by originating from political donor or party addresses then taking turn toward local news agencies or what looks like local news organizations, with algorithms on social networks picking up these sources and doubling or tripling down because algorithms give more value to local news for wider spread, revealing brilliant exploitation where groups knew Facebook, Twitter would value content more heavily and give more traction if routed through fake troll accounts with local names in address (HoustonTopNews, DailySanFran, OnlineCleveland) as this is what happens when you pay social media companies or ask for their guidance showing you keys to car to help content go viral, ironically as Facebook announced recent overhaul increasing reliance on local news.
Fake News Apocalypse Aviv Ovadya — Aviv Ovadya connects dots from TL;DR #134 piece about AI tools putting people's faces on other people's bodies pointing to scary future where our platformed and algorithmically optimized world is vulnerable to propaganda, misinformation, and dark targeted advertising from foreign governments—so much so that it threatens to undermine cornerstone of human discourse: the credibility of fact itself in coming information apocalypse.
Internet Research Agency NY Times — After year of studying trend in TL;DR trying to connect seemingly random series of dots sowing discord that seemed too organized to be random storm of action, U.S. Department of Justice indictments reveal coordinated well-funded informational attack conducted in social networks and online spaces—Adrian Chen's 2015 NY Times Magazine piece profiles Internet Research Agency as focus of many indictments, with documents requiring search for "Facebook" and "Twitter" to see how often platforms appear, necessitating discussion about their role in these events as coming weeks bring more fallout from investigations while it's important to understand context before thinking about what to do next.

Part of the 📧 Newsletter archive documenting digital literacy and technology.