How Telegram fosters online extremism
The under-regulated platform lacks transparency. The Southport riots remind us why this matters.
BySocial Media
Find here all of the New Statesman’s comment and analysis about social media and the digital age.
We must break up the tech platforms that threaten our democracy
We are prisoners of a global online panopticon that knows more about us than we do.
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Social media has turned the riots into a spectacle
The former chief Crown prosecutor Nazir Afzal reveals how technology has both hurt and helped the state.
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The rise of playlist politics
How digital choice has deepened the crisis of democracy.
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The child entertainment reckoning
From family vlogging to kids TV, former child performers are speaking out about toxic workplaces, exploitation and abuse.
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The Policy Ask with Helen Milner: “Fixing the digital divide is essential to unite the country”
The CEO of the Good Things Foundation on social broadband tariffs, tackling e-waste and improving people’s online literacy.
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How Big Tech rewired childhood
Jonathan Haidt’s The Anxious Generation shows how smartphones have damaged the teenage mind – and urges us to fight back.
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The Parliament Brief: will the new schools “phone ban” keep children safe?
Rachel de Souza, the children’s commissioner for England, told MPs that most headteachers already restrict the use of devices.
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Social media companies can no longer leave children to their own devices
Big Tech must share user data so we can truly understand the risks of phone use for young people.
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The Policy Ask with Beeban Kidron: “Taking apart legal protections is straight out of a dictator’s playbook”
The children’s rights campaigner on online safety, how the world of work has changed for women, and the courage of…
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Sheryl Sandberg: “Ending hate on social media will cost billions”
The first woman on Facebook’s board – and the co-author of Lean In – on Hamas’s 7 October attack and…
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Stanley cups are not a feminist issue
Not all criticism of female-led trends is misogynistic.
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LinkedIn Britain keeps getting weirder
Its slightly melancholic hilarity is hypnotic.
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2023: the year fandom went feral
“Stan culture” has reached new heights of invasive obsession, delusion and misogyny.
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The Research Brief: Why harmful social media content needs stronger regulation
Your weekly dose of policy thinking.
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Wayne Barnes: How I deal with the death threats
As a top-flight rugby referee, the English lawyer has faced some of the worst abuse imaginable. Now he is lobbying…
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Everyone hates the critic
In the social media age, there is no room for negativity – or even insightful critique.
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Bluesky is a real alternative to Twitter
As far-right agitators Katie Hopkins and Tommy Robinson return to the platform, many users are seeking a new social media…
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The Online Safety Bill is finally law – it says a lot about our broken politics
Six years of debate have resulted in a job half done that fully tackles neither online harm nor invasion of…
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Are governments finally pushing back against Big Tech?
Lawsuits filed against Meta by more than 40 US states are the first of their kind against a social media…
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