Page 102 - Mike Ratner CC - WISR Complete Dissertation - v6

• 2016 was the first year that an internet meme made its way into the Anti-Defamation

League’s database of hate symbols.

• Time magazine devoted a 2016 cover story to explaining “why we’re losing the internet to

the culture of hate.”

• Celebrity social media mobbing intensified. One example: “Ghostbusters” actor and

Saturday Night Live cast member Leslie Jones was publicly harassed on Twitter and had

her personal website hacked.

• Multiple news stories indicated that state actors and governments increased their efforts to

monitor users of instant messaging and social media

• Many experts documented the ways in which “fake news” and online harassment might be

more than social media “byproducts” because they help to drive revenue.

• #Pizzagate, a case study, revealed how disparate sets of rumors can combine to shape

public discourse and, at times, potentially lead to dangerous behavior.

• Scientific American carried a nine-author analysis of the influencing of discourse by

artificial intelligence (AI) tools, noting, “We are being remotely controlled ever more

successfully in this manner. … The trend goes from programming computers to

programming people … a sort of digital scepter that allows one to govern the masses

efficiently without having to involve citizens in democratic processes.”

• Google (with its Perspective API), Twitter and Facebook are experimenting with new ways

to filter out or label negative or misleading discourse.

• Researchers are exploring why people troll.

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