Just a quick heads up. There's a little swearing in this episode.

Casey, how many conversations do you think you have had since the 2016 election about how

internet platforms and social media are hurting democracy?

I mean, it's sort of become the background chatter to every conversation I have about my beats.

Casey Newton writes the newsletter platformer, and he's been reporting on tech and the

internet for years. You know, when I started covering these issues, I don't think the sort of

intersection of tech and democracy had not been a particularly hot topic. And then in the wake

of the election, it was sort of all anyone wanted to talk about. And it sort of felt like we spent

the five years after the election just sort of reliving it every day. It's something we've

covered extensively on this show. The idea that social media algorithms are primed to amplify

content that is outrageous or offensive, just spread misinformation about COVID-19 or conspiracy

theories about the 2020 election or to be used to incite events like the Capitol riots.

I think it's pretty common now in the Twitter timeline to say to see people taking it as a given

that Facebook, Twitter, YouTube are all working together to destroy democracy. I have

long argued that it is more complicated that because for every, you know, 2016 election where you

have Russians interfering, you also have the Me Too movement. You have Black Lives Matter. You have

gay marriage, just like stuff that was playing out on social networks that was able to rally a lot

of people around those causes arguably to create a progressive effect. In Ukraine, Casey says,

we're watching a small country use the internet as a force multiplier.

And so now here you have this situation in Ukraine where once again, we're seeing how

people sort of on the margins write the underdog in this war against Russia are able to appeal directly

to a large global audience and rally the entire Western world to their side.

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