Apliganda as a Form of Information Cascade
We’ve all been witness to the power of social media and influencers, how one celebrity wearing a coat could revive a company, or how one person’s post could call to action many others. But in addition, to the top-down spread of information from an individual or an institution, social media brought along a bottom-up spread of influence. We can observe these in the cases of hashtags on Twitter and Weibo posted by a user with a small influence that then continues to rise in popularity and trend and eventually comes to the attention of influencers and big accounts. These trending hashtags are not only a great marketing tool but have recently become a form of ampliganda, “the shaping of perception through amplification”. The article “It’s not the misinformation. It’s amplified propaganda” by Renee DiResta published on The Atlantic describes just this propaganda technique.
The article discussed how the author observed the growth of the hashtag #PelosiMustGo from its root in a private discord chat of Senator Bernie Sanders. This message was in support of Shahid Buttar against House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in the 202 congressional runoff. The author mentioned that she’s seen many attempts to push messages out by gaming the algorithm of Twitter but most were not successful. DiResta then observed several retweets, comments, and new tweets of the original tweet, another person’s tweet, and so on throughout the day. This amplification chain included some verified accounts with a substantial following but also thousands of smaller accounts that interacted, reacted, and added to the hashtag. Twitter’s algorithm then caught on to the high level of engagement which prompted it to recommend this to even more people.
Different from propaganda being information coming from a single source or a single group that is spread to influence a larger population, ampliganda starts from a smaller source and is propelled by just a few people before it has the potential to take a life of its own. This is a form of information cascade where one person decided to use the hashtag that then someone else also chose to use, where agents make decisions to use the hashtag sequentially by observing how many of the people they follow are using it or how many of their friends have used it. As soon as a person’s private signal, in this case, their agreement with the hashtag, is not enough to overcome the public signal then a cascade begins. In this case, #PelosiMustGo is supported by various claims of why she must go, so those Twitter users who may not hold a strong opinion towards either side could then be swayed by these arguments. After seeing the overwhelming support of the hashtag, instead of making an unbiased judgment of Nancy Pelosi, an observer would be more likely to follow the crowd and agree with #PelosiMustGo due to the information cascade. This is exactly what the ampliganda hashtag intended to achieve in the first place.
Another layer of complexity is added to this situation by Pelosi’s supporters also using the hashtag in support of her. Instead of using it as Pelosi must leave the house, their tweets reframe the hashtag: “#PelosiMustGo straight to the White House and take over the presidency!”. But these differing views not only added to the amplification of the hashtag on Twitter but are also quickly swamped by the original intention of the hashtag. A few users may use the hashtag as support for Pelosi but in this information cascade, their tweets are overcome by the other’s tweets and not enough to alter the information cascade.
Source:
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/10/disinformation-propaganda-amplification-ampliganda/620334/