Frank A. Spring, founding partner at Altum Insight and managing partner of Undaunted Ventures, shares how qualitative methods can understand the stories voters tell themselves about politics. Frank discusses his work using AI-moderated interviews (AIMI) and digital ethnography to analyze citizens' understanding of democracy, and how these insights can be used to inform political storytelling.

In this episode, I share some initiatives to help in improving the teaching and learning of political communication. 1) Political Communication Teaching Database and the upload page. 2) Meta Oversight Board Game 3) Counterfactual Case Study

Professor Matthew Wall and Dr. Louis Bromfield, both at the Department of Politics, Philosophy, and International Relations at Swansea University, discuss election forecasting. We cover different types of political forecasting, such as polls and prediction models, and dive into prediction markets like Polymarket. We then discuss the concept of the 'wisdom of the crowd' and what attributes make a good forecaster, before turning to how betting market odds, forecasting platforms, and gamification can be used in research.

Thomas Hughes, CEO of Appeals Centre Europe, explains out-of-court dispute settlement bodies (ODS bodies) and the role they play in the Digital Services Act. We discuss Appeals Centre Europe's first Transparency Report, which provides an initial glimpse into how Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube are handling requests from ODS bodies. We cover some top line descriptives from the Centre's first year: how many disputes were submitted, from which platform, and what types of content they were about. We also talk about 'signposting' and how the platforms are communicating their digital rights to users.

Jakub Szymik, Founder of CEE Digital Democracy Watch, discusses the EU's ongoing initiatives to fight disinformation, regulate political advertising, and protect election integrity on social media. Jakub shares his insights on the Digital Services Act, the European Democracy Shield, and how these initiatives relate to digital political advertising on social media. We also discuss the latest Polish Presidential elections in terms of digital ad spending, Gen AI content, and political influencers.

Dan Brahmy, Co-Founder and CEO at Cyabra, discusses the cutting-edge in disinformation monitoring and the detection of coordinated inauthentic behavior. Dan shares some of Cyabra's work around the new pope, the tariff war, and narratives following the Trump assassination attempt. We discuss how disinformation detection works technically, what type of attributes are used to classify accounts as inauthentic, and how source attribution can be identified through patterns.

Dr. Neta Kligler-Vilenchik and Dr. Ioana Literat share research from their new book Not Your Parent's Politics: Understanding Young People's Political Expression on Social Media. We discuss how young people use social media such as TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube to experiment with their political identity, even if they are too young to vote. Examples from the 2016 US election, Black Lives Matter protests, and climate anxiety help illustrate the various ways that youth express their political opinions across social media platforms. We also discuss how to approach these expressions from a democratic and citizenship perspective.

Neil Brown, President of the Poytner Institute for Media Studies, discusses the challenges facing journalism. We discuss the concept of media trust, changing revenue models, and the challenges for journalism posed by digital fragmentation. Neil also shares his thoughts on fact-checking and Politifact.com, and we end with a discussion of AI's implications for journalism.

Dr. Michael D. Cohen, author of Modern Political Campaigns, shares how artificial intelligence is impacting political campaigns. We discuss how AI is like an automated staffer, and what types of human involvement is still needed to craft a winning strategy. We also examine AI's role in generating copy like social media posts and speeches, as well as how it can be used for qualitative data analysis such as focus groups. In addition, we consider how AI relates to trending concepts such as authenticity and political polarization.

Doug Kaplan, President of Kaplan Strategies, discusses the utility of political polling for local, state, and national races. We discuss the value of polls when partisanship is high, the changing political communication landscape, and Florida as a Republican stronghold (for now).

Dr. Johan Farkas and Dr. Marcus Maloney discuss how the language used to describe digital media frames our understanding and the actions of policymakers. We break down how terms like "toxic", "trolls", and "filter bubbles" are often used uncritically and limit how we understand the relationships between digital media and social problems like misogyny, racism, and harassment.

The 9th Annual Social Media and Politics Year in Review! This year, we cover the platforms’ year in review reports, election interference in Romania, the battle over text and the "eXodus", and social media bans for teenagers.

Ryan Davis, Co-founder and Chief Operating Officer at People First, guests for a debrief on content creators in the 2024 US election. We discuss content creator strategies between the two parties, how influencers have become professionalized, and what this means for elections going forward.

Professor Daniel C. Hallin, Distinguished Professor of Communication at UC San Diego, shares his thoughts on media systems and how digital media relates to the concept. We discuss the components of a 'system' and current debates around the concept of 'hybridity' in media studies. This leads to a broader discussion of conceptual stretching, media capture, and how single case studies can be made comparative through dialogue with existing scholarship. The recording took place while Prof. Hallin was a Visiting Professor at the Department of Communication and Media at Lund.

Kindred Motes, Founder and Managing Partner at KM Strategies Group (KMSG), shares his advocacy work to counter the online reach of Project 2025. Working with the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism, KMSG launched a paid campaign on Google Search before Project 2025 became mainstream. Kindred shares how TikTok played a role in catalyzing Project 2025 as a political issue, as well as some of the challenges that nonprofits face in running digital ad campaigns. We also discuss the benefits and trade-offs of social media for advocacy work, and end with some practical tips for how nonprofits can effectively communicate in today's fragmented media landscape.

Prof. Sebastian Stier, Scientific Director of Computational Social Science at GESIS and Professor of CSS at the University of Mannheim, discusses how web tracking data can inform social science questions. We discuss the data structure of web browsing data, how it is collected, and the types of incentives used to recruit participants. Prof. Stier also shares his insights and research integrating web browsing data with survey data, as well as how LLMs are opening up new methodological avenues in simulated data.

Ryan Davis, Co-Founder of People First, discusses how "micro-influencers" or "micro-creators" are being used in political campaigns. We discuss the benefits of using micro-influencers for engagement, as well as how they can be used to target specific blocks of voters. Ryan also shares how these creators can inform the political strategy of campaigns through panels and focus groups, and how the comments to creators' content can reveal themes and sentiments important for the campaign.

Dr. Eviane Leidig, Marie Curie postdoctoral fellow at Tilburg University, discusses her book "The Women of the Far Right: Social Media Influencers and Online Radicalization." We break down the role of social media for the alt-right movement, and how platforms like Instagram and YouTube work to mainstream extremist views. These insights come from Dr. Leidig's research conducting digital ethnography on women influencers prominent on the American Right.

Rhiannon Ruff, Wikipedia Expert and Founding Partner at Lumino, discusses how politicians and brands can effectively manage their Wikipedia presence. We discuss why Wikipedia is important for Google Search and AI like ChatGPT, and how the tone, norms, and editors of Wikipedia make editing your own page difficult. Rhi shares her tips on how to manage a Wikipedia page in the right way, and why that's crucial for politicians and political parties.

Dr. Rob Eschmann, Associate Professor of Social Work at Columbia University, discusses his latest book When the Hood Comes Off: Racism and Resistance in the Digital Age (University of California Press). We cover how social media works to unmask everyday experiences of racism, and how this affects student life at American universities. Dr. Eschmann also shares his research on social media, racial microaggressions, and Black Twitter; thoughts on TikTok and algorithmic bias; and how resisting racism starts with engaging in conversation.