#filterbubble

[ptitolier]

Truth Social: Free Speech or Digital Secession?

In 2022, Donald Trump launched Truth Social, a platform designed as an alternative to traditional social networks accused of censoring conservative opinions. Behind this initiative lies a broader trend: the fragmentation of public discourse.

For a long time, the internet was seen as a space where ideas could circulate freely. But today, we are witnessing the rise of ideological social networks—digital bubbles where users choose the "truth" that suits them. Truth Social is not the only example: platforms like Gab, Parler, and others have emerged to attract specific communities, often in opposition to mainstream media.

Toward a Digital Secession?

This phenomenon raises a crucial question: Do social media platforms still foster democracy, or are they accelerating its decline?

Philosopher Jürgen Habermas described democracy as a space where citizens engage in rational debate, confronting different ideas. But if everyone isolates themselves within their own platform, there is no real debate—only parallel monologues. Truth Social does not create dialogue; it builds a media ecosystem where opinions are reinforced rather than challenged.

This aligns with Eli Pariser’s filter bubble theory: when we are only exposed to content that confirms our beliefs, our worldview becomes more rigid. Truth Social doesn’t just provide a space for discussion; it creates an alternative reality for its users.

Who Decides What Truth Is?

The choice of the name "Truth Social" is revealing. It implies that this platform holds authentic truth, standing against the so-called "lies of mainstream media." But is truth a fixed entity, or is it a social construct?

Philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche warned against the illusion of absolute truth. For him, truth is always an interpretation, shaped by power dynamics. Similarly, Truth Social does not reveal objective truth—it imposes a version of reality that serves a political agenda.

In a democracy, truth should be shaped through the confrontation of ideas. But in a space where contradictions are excluded, truth becomes an ideological product, rather than a democratic foundation.

A Model Bound to Collapse?

Truth Social claims to guarantee absolute free speech, but this promise is often an illusion. Unmoderated platforms quickly become flooded with extreme content, limiting their attractiveness and long-term viability.

Moreover, ideological bubbles cannot sustain themselves indefinitely. When everyone holds the same opinion, there is no debate, no stimulating exchange. This leads to radicalization, where only the most extreme narratives retain attention.

Philosopher Byung-Chul Han describes this phenomenon as "informational fatigue"—when users are overwhelmed by an overload of homogenous content, they eventually lose interest. Truth Social might collapse under its own weight, lacking intellectual renewal.

Has Democracy Become Impossible?

Truth Social reflects a deeper crisis: Can democracy still function if we no longer share the same public space?

If each group builds its own network, its own facts, and its own truth, then we are no longer in a democracy but in a fragmented archipelago of isolated communities.

I explore these issues further in my Medium series "Democracy VS Market." Truth Social is just one symptom among many of today’s democratic crisis. Read the full series here:

https://medium.com/@ptit.tolier/truth-social-free-speech-or-digital-secession-5f89ddfbebc7

💬 I’d love to hear your thoughts: Do you think social media is killing democracy, or does it still have the power to strengthen it?

P'tit Tôlier

Essayist & Popularizer. I analyze the world through accessible philosophical essays. Complex ideas, explained simply—to help us think about our times.

[itsnothingbutluck]

Verharmlosung des Klimawandels durch Politik, Wirtschaft, Angst, Filterbubble Also bei Galileo Galilei hat es gute vierhundert Jahre gedauert, bis die letzten großen Zweifel aus der Welt geschafft waren – und 1992 schließlich auch die Katholische Kirche offiziell eingestand, dass unser Planet eine Kugel ist und jahrein, jahraus um die Sonne kreist. Aber vielleicht ist die Erde ja bald wieder eine Scheibe. So, wie die Menschheit sie gerade plattmacht, wird’s nicht mehr lange dauern.

Oder es gelingt auch den letzten Zweifelnden, sich modernen wissenschaftlichen Konsens anzunehmen. Denn vierhundert Jahre, wie zwischen den Schaffensjahren Galileis und dem Einlenken der Kirche, bleiben nun leider nicht, bis in Deutschland Durchschnittstemperaturen herrschen wie in Galileis toskanischer Heimat. Uneinsichtigkeit macht den Klimaschutz nicht gerade flotter. Die Zweifel am Klimawandel halten sich aber nach wie vor hartnäckig und um die Erwartungen gleich zu dämpfen: Wir werden in den nächsten Absätzen nicht abschließend klären können, warum Menschen den Klimawandel leugnen. Irgendwann will man ja auch mal Feierabend machen…

[alienpickle]

"People don’t make much of a distinction between the New York Times and some random blogger," the executive told me. There’s a big difference between "you are what you click" and "you are what you share." For example, software that helps companies sift through résumés for talent might "learn" by looking at which of its recommended employees are actually hired. If nine white candidates in a row are chosen, it might determine that the company isn’t interested in hiring black people and exclude them from future searches. "Right," he said. "We’re not evil. We try really hard not to be evil. But if we wanted to, man, could we ever." Google Search Engineer

Eli Parisier. The Filter Bubble

[omgwaulpaak]

#filterbubble https://www.instagram.com/p/B0S-jVZCAdo/?igshid=1bvbzl6cllwh8

[mathewlowry]

report reviews and summarises the recent available literature connecting polarisation and the news media...key findings...: little evidence that increased exposure to news featuring like-minded or opposing views leads to the widespread polarisation of attitudes... some studies found both can strengthen attitudes of minority who already hold strong views. Most studies failed to find evidence of echo chambers and/or 'filter bubbles'... Some studies even find evidence that it increases the likelihood of exposure to opposing views. self-select news sources based on political preferences... extent to which news outlets produce partisan coverage, still varies greatly by country. USA has much higher levels of partisan news production, consumption and polarisation, making it difficult to generalise from these findings. large gaps in understanding of relationship between news and polarisation, particularly outside Europe... and new, more partisan digital-born news sources. via: Diigo, IFTTT

[michaelbellu]

An echo chamber so loud it pops a filter bubble

Blog 2/16

If someone yells into an echo chamber, but no one hears it, does it still create polarization?

The article “Filter bubble,” by Axel Bruns, claims that echo chambers and filter bubbles are not as significant in creating polarization as people think. “The myth of the filter bubble,” above all, “is one thing: a big misunderstanding.” Misunderstanding continues to circulate in public debate, and scholars push back against it by pointing to studies that claim to debunk it.

New media and communication technologies have always undergone a process of individual adaptation and social construction; while not neutral, the technologies and their providers are neither inherently good nor evil in this but can be employed by their users to serve socially and societally beneficial as well as disruptive ends.

The article “The echo chamber is overstated: the moderating effect of political interest and diverse media,” by Elizabeth Duboisa and Grant Blank, also focuses on echo chambers with a more specific focus on politics. They also claim not to find significance in echo chambers when looking at the entire multi-media environment. The studies show that partisan echo chambers among politically interested could contribute to a growing gap in knowledge between those who are politically interested and those who are not. Greater interest in politics and more media diversity reduces the likelihood of being in an echo chamber. However, the high-choice environment also allows individuals, including those who are politically interested, to consume a wide variety of media, which could lead them to more diverse content and perspectives.

The article “When Birds of a Feather Instagram Together: Debating the Image of Islam in Echo Chambers and Through Trench Warfare on Social Media,” by Zeynep Aydin, Albrecht Fuess, Marcel Förster, and Thijl Sunier, shows that echo chambers do exist and how they can impact large groups of people. This study proves that not only do echo chambers exist within the #CharlieHebdo discussion online, but they can transcend multiple countries.

While echo chambers are built based on political views or personal interest, it is trigger events such as terror attacks that reinforce these filter bubbles. Tweets and likes by “cybermobs,” boost negative sentiments like anti-Muslim hostility and can finally lead to real-life targeting of Muslims.

While it could be argued that the “dank memes” modularity class is relatively low, considering that one user has posted most of the posts, this might not qualify as echo chamber behavior. However, the fact that there are many posts with these specific hashtags and because the individual posts are findable and offer a place for comments to be made qualify this hub as an echo chamber behavior and perhaps an echo chamber in itself.

Despite what data has been shown in studies, I believe that echo chambers and filter bubbles are major reasons for increased polarization. I understand that people have to intentionally seek out information online and that algorithms are not responsible for what people put in them to how the end results. However, whether users intentionally try to see reflective content or not, applications will show them what they “like” to try to keep them on the platform longer.

Throughout the articles, the idea of people using social media and online technology to find differing opinions to learn new perspectives and see what people from the opposing side are saying is unrealistic. Most of the public does not want to see what the other side has to say unless it’s so they can criticize it and belittle it. Some people do that, especially highly educated technology and media-literate users. Outside of college classrooms and other scholarly uses, the majority of people use social media and the internet to confirm ideas they already have and give credibility to their opinions. These users mostly use the differing opinion’s media as ammunition for their arguments and talking points. This behavior promotes filter bubbles and creates echo chambers. In many cases, things may not rise to a full “echo chamber” but still trend in that direction enough to generate more polarization. The idea that the opposite happens and the public will use technology to understand and learn about opposing sides seems unrealistic and utopian.

[blogalimilne-blog]

Bursting filter bubbles

At the crux of social media is the ability to get in contact and relate to other people who, in real life, you might not get to meet. These would be people that you may have hugely similar or dissimilar interests with. What I have grown to understand is that social media, in many cases, has created a rift of factionalism around almost every area of society. I have literally seen showdowns online range from the heated political arguments between Trump supporters vs Clinton supporters to an arguably more aggressive (and more interesting) debate on whether cereal is in fact a soup. The link between these two intellectual duals are the fact that people have become stuck in filter bubbles. 

I find that filter bubbles are a threat to intellectual growth. I consider them to be a form of intellectual incest to be honest. Society these days is obsessed about being ‘offended’, I think that this is a direct cause of the filter bubbles sheltering people from truth that they do not want to listen to. These filter bubbles have been developed by online algorithms via Web 2.0 that engage with the user far more than the original form of the internet. This means that the internets soul purpose is to appease you for as long as it can, and social media platforms have now been developed with similar algorithms that aim to keep you online for as long as possible such as Facebook’s edge ranking system. 

SO, filter bubbles have not only taken away our ability to have reasonable arguments with people by associating us with people of similar interests, ideas, political views, financial status, but it is also drawing us further into the screen by feeding us things that we probably don’t need to see. 

[photographyandeducation]

https://www.wsj.com/articles/social-media-algorithms-rule-how-we-see-the-world-good-luck-trying-to-stop-them-11610884800?mc_cid=2102dd7f01&mc_eid=ebc92de8c3

[digitaldeliberations-blog]

Digital Citizenship #1: Political Engagement

There is nothing better on a Sunday morning than starting your day the lazy way: a slow roll out of bed without bothering to change into ‘day clothes’, a cup of coffee, and, for myself at least, a scroll through ‘my socials’ to begin building a picture of the day ahead. My Facebook feed is filled (if we pretend the relentless product advertising and viral posts don’t pop up) with sentimental birthday posts for family and friends, snapshots of holidays somewhere far sunnier than here, and comments that are only understood by those included in the inside joke.

Perhaps the politicians of Australia can provide a trustworthy resources for today’s topics of interest... and lo and behold, former Liberal politician Clive Palmer has delivered. A personal favourite of mine was the morning he shared a Star Wars meme, only the scene depicted was that of Greens party members screaming in fear at a self-help book ‘Economics for Dummies.’ As usual, this post was well received, with one social media user describing it as “another high-tier Palmer meme.” But Palmer’s social media activity poses the question of his level of genuine engagement with his audiences, and hence his interest in genuine connections. His position as former politician may cut him some slack, but the change in his social reputation, obvious by a quick Google search of his name and the resulting hundred of discussions of his hilarity, is sure to precede him. We know Palmer loves his memes, but do we know anything at all about Palmer on a personal level? Do we even have the right to expect this type of connection?

Author Greg Jericho suggests politicians and parties are “only able to overcome the... nature of social media when they forego the need to completely control the debate,” (2012, pp.302). That is, the risks involved in opening discussion in such a public arena are unavoidable if one wants to create real connections on social media platforms. Gone are the days of gatherings in the town square, where your comments may spread via hearsay and gossip for weeks to come. Now, our comments and opinions are forever embedded in data, to be analysed and picked apart by users irrespective of time and space. Whilst this social media data can serve as an invaluable resource for building a “profile of voters,” the flow of communication travels both ways, an affordance of social media that forces vulnerability on its users (Jericho, 2012, pp.308).

Social media is not only engaging as a means of direct communication, but also as a platform for news and current affairs dissemination. Activist Eli Pariser argues, however, that the effects of platform algorithms, such as the process by which a Google Search returns results to a user, can create what is known as a ‘filter bubble;’ an invisible internet bubble that shows users content it already knows the user is looking for or supports. The filter bubble theory rejects the idea of an unbiased Internet, however many users engage with social media as a tool for sourcing political information because of the perceived freedoms of platforms for information sharing.

Professor Gunn Enli uses data statistics to illustrate the influence of social media use when compared to traditional media use; during the 2016 presidential election campaign, Republican candidate Donald Trump (well known for his controversial tweets and posts) boasted 17.6 million Twitter followers, whilst The New York Times paled in comparison with their 1.2 million online subscribers (2017, pp.53). With Trump’s audience dominating that of the Times, it really is no surprise his campaign garnered a tremendous amount of both online support and loathing. I wonder if Clive Palmer will ever hit those kinds of numbers...

References

Enli, G 2017. ‘Twitter as an arena for the authentic outsider: Exploring the social media campaigns of Trump and Clinton in the 2016 presidential election,’ European Journal of Communication, 32:1.

Jericho, G 2012. ‘How many voters are there on Twitter?’ The rise of the Fifth Estate: Social media and blogging in Australian politics, Scribe Publications Pty Ltd, Australia.

[sgrobety]

Unpoppable Filter Bubbles

I used Google to better understand how to escape Google’s filter bubble. Wrap your head around that. I wanted to know if there was easily accessible information, provided by Google, about how to avoid falling prey to their algorithmic search tampering. 

The term “filter bubble” was first coined by Eli Pariser in his 2011 book The Filter Bubble: What the Internet Is Hiding from You. In his book and Ted Talk, Pariser uses the example of asking two different people Google searching the same word at the same time and getting completely different and diverging perspectives. In his Ted Talk, he told the story of how he had two friends both search the word “Egypt.” One of his friend’s feeds was almost completely news about protests and other relevant, world information. The other friend had no news, but simply tourism and fun fact information. 

So, who do companies like Google tailor information in such a way? The purpose of Google’s filter bubble is “providing and consuming content that is closely aligned to your preferences results in the creation of a bubble or chamber, restricting your view of the wider picture.” Using your personal data, including location, device, search and click history and other information, Google edits and tailors your search results to show you what they believe you should want to see most. Every Google user, logged in or out, experiences these algorithms. So how do we get around these? How do we avoid being exposed to this Google-tailored version of reality? 

So, as I would do with any other question I have, I Googled it. And I learned a lot.

Logging out and clearing your history and cookies will not protect you as well as I would have thought. Even doing both of those things and using an incognito or private browser will not completely hide your activity or keep you safe from the algorithm. Simply using your IP address and location, Google still subjects any and all searches to their own “internal bias.”

Unfortunately, Google is everywhere. Escaping their filter bubble is made even more impossible by the fact that Google is not the only website that employs these tactics. Facebook slowly edits out or hides posts from friends and pages you interact with that you are less likely to interact with. Yahoo! News curates their news results based on what they believe you are most likely to click on. 

Clicks are money, and these companies are trying to rake it in. By showing you a curated list of content you are likely to click on, these internet companies are simply trying to set themselves up for success. The continual improvement of algorithms and websites is important because it is how companies keep us coming back. Updating websites for stickiness and speed is exactly how users keep wanting to come back. 

Since avoidance seems impossible, awareness is the next best thing. As informed readers, we must take it upon ourselves to search for diverse information and points of view to escape our own filter bubbles. Interacting online with others who have differing viewpoints is important in making sure that we are challenging our own biases... and popping our Google filter bubbles as well. 

[marinaesmeraldo]

I illustrated #IsaacMarcet, founder of @playgroundmag for Folch Insights, a pioneering platform of ephemeral content by @folchstudio.⠀ .⠀ .⠀ .⠀ #illustration #marinaesmeraldo #portrait #GIF #FolchInsights #BrandActivism #EmotionalStorytelling #FilterBubble #NewMedia #Virality #PlayGround (em Poblenou)

[atgranger]

Things the people on tumblr have taught me, in no specific order:

1. Just because I could find something to criticize doesnt mean that I should. I am far happier if I let myself enjoy imperfect things and stopped looking for perfection in me and in others.

2. Go out of your way to show your support. I used to have the goal of being a social media ghost, just watching not interacting. Then I started making small steps, beginning to like posts, leave a nice comment on works that really moved me, smth like that. With time, these small steps didnt feel so daunting anymore.

3. It's okay to ask for help. I'm not broken for wanting support. There are always people willing to help.

4. Be kind and thoughtful but take no shit from anyone. The amount of people on my dash that seem like the sweetest, most supportive people, who turn into fierce and protective badasses, ready to punch anyone who dared to disrespect someone, is AMAZING.

5. People aren't as scary as I thought. Nothing like positive experiences to battle my social anxiety.

[char-rowlson-blog]

Walking around in our own bubble, how do we pop this?

Social media. Is it really ‘just an app’? I think not. Social media places us very specifically into our very own bubble. Whether that be big or small is up to you.

These so called ‘bubbles’ are well known as ‘filter bubbles’. According to Google, a filter bubble is “a situation in which an Internet user encounters only information and opinions that conform to and reinforce their own beliefs, caused by algorithms that personalize an individual’s online experience.”

On Instagram, for example, we follow whoever we want too. For me, this includes celebrities, models, fitness gurus and fashion lovers. This means, my filter bubble includes only these people and they are almost all I see on Instagram. But, it also means my filter bubble does not allow me to see anything other than that, unless I decide I want to search for something completely different to what I normally would.

When looking at the whole concept of filter bubbles, it enables us to think about what we are potentially missing out on. Advertisement's are specifically designed to you and your filter bubble, consequently filtering out the topics that are outside of your bubble. Personally, do not follow things like cartoons, or video games, therefore I do not see any advertisements to do with new releases of games, for example. However, I always see ads for independent clothes and jewelry shops and quite often, fitness programs, which I do tend to click on, but can never afford to purchase (I wish I could #studentlife). 

So are filter bubbles are good or bad thing? 

I would say a GREAT thing. 

For companies targeting a product at a certain audience, using Instagram to find the selected people within this audience, they are perfect. We put ourselves within this filter bubble, making it our own space. We have not been put inside it, forcefully. We can look at whatever we want too, and if we decide to venture outside of the usual, then we can, easily. I think that could be seen as the only con of a filter bubble, although we can change that. It is up to us (making it a weak con, I know, but still a potential con). Many people believe that filter bubbles have come around since the rise of social media. I would agree to disagree with these people. Granted, the official name for them may have been formed when social media arose, but when you think about it, filter bubbles have been around, more than likely, forever. A persons social bubble, for example, my Grandma, her bubble would include; baking, Church, knitting and art (she is a very cute woman). This bubble may not be on a device, but it is her bubble and what she likes to do. She has recently expanded her bubble, by joining ‘Grannie pilates’, something she wouldn’t normally do. 

Overall, I believe everyone is within a bubble and can expand it, but only if they want too. 

[azspot]

Increasingly, we become so secure in our bubbles that we accept only information, whether true or not, that fits our opinions, instead of basing our opinions on the evidence that’s out there.

Barack Obama