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Published Sep 24, 2024

1054: Renee DiResta | The Puppet Masters of Public Opinion

Renee DiResta discusses the manipulation of public opinion through disinformation tactics and the influence of algorithms on content creation, emphasizing the challenges of maintaining a shared reality in the social media era.
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  • Disinformation

    highlights how disinformation tactics have evolved with social media. Instead of persuading people, actors now create multiple conflicting explanations to obscure the truth. This was evident during the 2020 election, where false claims of voter fraud spread rapidly, often without later correction 1.

    They just have to create 30 different explanations, push them all out at the same time, and make it too hard to know what's actually true.

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    This tactic makes it difficult for the public to discern reality, contributing to widespread misinformation 2.

       

    Confusion

    Disinformation campaigns often use the tactic of 'flooding the zone' to create confusion. By releasing numerous conflicting narratives, they make it challenging for people to identify the truth. This strategy was used by Russia during the MH17 incident and is now common in various geopolitical conflicts 3.

    They just have to create 30 different explanations, push them all out at the same time, and make it too hard to know what's actually true.

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    The 'liar's dividend' further complicates matters by allowing real events to be dismissed as fake, leveraging advanced manipulation technologies 4.

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