Marc Owen Jones Profile picture
Nov 28, 2021 β€’ 13 tweets β€’ 12 min read β€’ Read on X
πŸ“’πŸ§΅[Thread] 1/ Here is a thread on the #DoNotComply hashtag, a Twitter trend that started yesterday in reaction to the UK's response to the new Covid19 variant #Omicron. Essentially it is people rejecting the mandatory wearing of masks in public. I will highlight some nuggets...
2/ First up, I analysed around 17,500 tweets, replies, & retweets on the #donotcomply hashtag. The sample range is the last 24 hours. I did a network analysis to determine a few things, most importantly, identifying the most influential proponents of the 'do not comply' hashtag
3/ There is clear evidence of polarisation. There are two distinct clusters. On the right there is a large group of accounts generally condoning the #donotcomply hashtag. The group on the left is disappointed at the group on the right (pun kind of intended...you'll see why)
4/ So who are the largest supporters of #donotcomply? Well the most influential by far is @LozzaFox , actor and @thereclaimparty leader. He does not wish to comply, and endorses mass civil disobedience. He also seems mad.
5/ Other top influencers on the do not comply hashtag include @jamesfwells @MattGubba @leehurstcomic . One of my favourites is @HumanRights4UK (the state of that account!) A lot of the influential accounts also are kind of anonymous, which is obviously suspicious. #Omicron
6/ Of those most influential accounts pushing back against the hashtag are @Femi_Sorry @JackSapsford @paul_baro - and a few others, including parody account @borisjohnson_mp #donotcomply
7/ Interestingly, and perhaps not surprisingly, the polarisation looks highly partisan. An analysis of the bios of those promoting #donotcomply reveals they are mostly right wing nationalists. The top words include indicators Trump, MAGA, conservative, god, country #omicron
8/ Conversely, most of those pushing back against #donotcomply appear to having indicators of being left/progressive/liberal. Among the most common words in the bios are BLM (black lives matter), FBPE (pro EU), socialist, johnsonout (UK PM). This correlates with studies that
9/ that also suggest republicans are more likely to embrace anti vaccine disinformation than democrats, for example. Not exactly the same but related. journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.117…
10/ So we can update the network graph to show how the polarisation is reflected on Twitter. This polarization shows in network analysis because the two communities (left and right) tend not to interact with each other and so form separate communities. #donotcomply #Omicron
11/ Some other high profile verified accounts endorsing undermining the public health message include UB40's @MattHoyOfficial debunked nutritionist @GillianMcKeith , GBNews Presenter @ToniaBuxton + many more . No eminent researchers or scientists of course. Go figure.
12/ The TLDR is those supporting the #donotcomply with mask wearing are not scientists, and generally right-wing/conservative types. There is push back from left/progressive types, but very little interaction between the two. The echo chamber is strong! Thanks for reading :)
13/ Small update
1) Some have asked about the orange blob on the map - this is George Gammon (😬). See screenshot
2) I used NodeXl and gephi for the visualisations
3) I didn't mean to imply those condemning the hashtag are scientists, merely that they're following the science!

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More from @marcowenjones

May 22
πŸ€– 1/ Ok this is pretty wild. I saw some sus pro-Israel astroturfing activity on a BBCNews Facebook post about aid arriving in Gaza. Lots of Hasbara comments like "Hamas will take the aid". The following 2 identical posts were side by side so I looked into it. #disinformation Image
2/ Specifically I looked at Dean O' Connor. Firstly up, there were two almost identical Dean O'connor pages, both created on consecutive days last week (15 + 16 May). The one that posted is the one on the right. Image
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3/ When I reverse image searched the picture I was inundated with dozens of pages from forums about romance scams asking about people using this same picture. A lot of people scammed out of thousands. Someone even asked on Quora about O'Connor! Image
Read 7 tweets
May 15
Macron Cocaine Thread/ - The first 10 hours of the @EmmanuelMacron @Keir_Starmer @ZelenskyyUa Cocaine disinformation.

Seemed to be promoted initially by a few dubious accounts like @Veritiste @SitgesFranck @99percentyouth @SilentlySirs @goddeketal

#disinformation Image
2/ Before being boosted by the right-wing ecosystem and conspiracy accounts e.g. @DineshDSouza @RealAlexJones @CollinRugg. No serious journalists reported this story (because it's absurd). Nonetheless, those tweeting in the first 10 hours generated over 103 million views on X! Image
3/ The boosting of the info by Putin's envoy Kirill Dmitriev was via Alex Jones, who as the above timeline shows - wasn't the first to put it out on X - but the most widely viewed. Image
Read 4 tweets
Apr 29
🚨1/ Fake News Alert: A number of accounts are spreading false information that a church in #Wales was burned down by two Pakistan migrants/muslims. There are other narratives, but this is the dominant one. It is false but has obtained millions of views. some data> #disinfo Image
2/ It is true that a church did burn down. It was set alight by two local teenagers. The South Wales police have tweeted that other rumours circulating are false - they are of course talking about the false info about the ethnicity of the attackers (right). Image
Image
3/ The most shared claim comes from 'RadioEuropes'. This is a 'Dysinfluencer' account - an account that repeatedly spreads false and malicious information - in this case xenophobic and anti-Muslim content. You can see its false tweet garnered over 3.6 million views Image
Read 12 tweets
Jan 8
1/ THREAD: On populist gaslighting and the war on truth-tellers 🧡 Image
2/ Something concerning is happening in our information ecosystem: populists aren't just spreading misinfo, they're systematically trying to undermine the very concept of verifiable truth
3/ When fact-checkers or experts present evidence contradicting false claims, they get labeled as "elitist manipulators" or 'censors' - effectively inverting reality
Read 8 tweets
Jan 7
🧡 THREAD: Meta's disturbing new "free speech" announcement is a masterclass in how platforms enable digital harm under the guise of freedom 1/9 theguardian.com/commentisfree/…
Meta announces it's getting rid of factcheckers & "restrictions" on gender/immigration content. This isn't about free speech - it's about platforming hate & disinformation under the guise of "mainstream discourse" 2/9
Key red flags: ❗️❗️❗️

Moving content teams to Texas "for less bias" (read: political motivation)

Replacing factcheckers with "community notes"

Framing basic content moderation as "censorship" 3/9
Read 10 tweets
Dec 21, 2024
1/ 🧡This graph shows X posts by impressions in the first six hours after the Magdeburg attack. Specifically these are posts falsely attributing the attack to an Islamist terror attack or a Syrian, or using it as an opportunity to attack immigration or muslims #disinformation Image
2/ The usual suspects are there - that is, the anti-Islam disinfluencers (routine spreaders of disinformation). As you can see, one of the most widely viewed is @visegrad24 - who shared at least 6 posts falsely claiming the attacker was an Islamist Image
3/ The posts falsely claiming that the attacker was a Muslim or Islamist gained at least 38,000,000 views. False claims that he was Syrian resulted in around 8.4million views (remember this is just an approx 6 hour period). Image
Read 8 tweets

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