points

Americans who seek political insight and information on Twitter should know how much of what they are seeing is the result of automated propaganda campaigns. Nearly four years after my collaborators and I revealed how automated Twitter accounts were distorting online election discussions in 2016, the situation appears to be no better. That’s despite the efforts of policymakers, technology companies and even the public to root out disinformation campaigns on social media. In our latest study, we collected 240 million election-related tweets mentioning presidential candidates and election-related keywords, posted between June 20 and Sept. 9, 2020. We looked for activity from automated (or bot) accounts, and the spread of distorted or conspiracy theory narratives. We learned that on Twitte...

Before making “Ready Player One,” Steven Spielberg had directed 30 feature films. There were ticket-selling triumphs (“Jaws”) and box office bombs (“The BFG”). There were somber studies of social issues (“The Color Purple”), haunting historical dramas (“Schindler’s List”), and science fiction flights of fancy (“A.I. Artificial Intelligence”). But it’s been a long time since Spielberg successfully latched on to the little kid inside of him and made a film that’s simply a bunch of fun, I’d say since “1941.” From its opening salvo of music — Van Halen’s “Jump” — to its last — “You Make My Dreams” by Hall & Oates — “Ready Player One” is a whirlwind celebration of fantasy versus reality and good versus evil, a salute to competitive spirit, youthful idealism, and pop culture. It’s also the ...

Tag: points

Spielberg scores a lot of points with ‘Ready Player One’