cross-posted from: https://sopuli.xyz/post/330836

Good article that criticizes Pew Research Center’s new report of reducing “alternative social media” just to sites like Parler, Gab, Truth Social and so on. It makes a good explanation of the Fediverse (referred as “citizens’ social media”) and sees it as an antidote to the propaganda and misinformation promoted on those platforms.

More nuance is needed here: the Pew report focuses solely on what mass media scholar Kristoffer Holt calls “right-wing alternative media.” And in doing so, it misses a more democratic form of alternative media, what communication scholar Clemencia Rodríguez refers to as “citizens’ social media.”

And for all of us tired of both big tech and online trolling, citizens’ social media is our way forward.