Some Instagram meme pages are turning into “war pages” that repost unverified footage without context, often claiming to be run by journalists in Ukraine
Hours after the first explosions in Ukraine, massive IG meme pages began promoting an account claiming to be a journalist live-streaming from the ground. The page exploded in popularity I found the real man behind it, and he's not a journalist in Ukraine https://www.inputmag.com/…
Have you seen IG pages with hundreds of thousands of followers claiming to be on the ground journalists posting live updates from Ukraine? I wrote about the “war pages” exploding on IG this week for @inputmag https://www.inputmag.com/...
A tragic reminder of how social media can be an unstoppable force for good in times of crisis, and yet an outlet for opportunism and evil on an unimaginable scale in the same vein. #socialforgood https://twitter.com/...
Last night the man running these pages began threatening me saying there would be “consequences” for my story & he has “connections w/ Tucker Carlson & is “going to sue me for for writing abt this.” Since then I got texts trying to reset my IG password 2/ https://www.inputmag.com…
Clout chasing in wartime: Lying that you're a journalist, crowding out the real ones risking their lives, sharing unverified info that could get people hurt. “War is just another thing these meme accounts can monetize” https://twitter.com/...
The thing about a war in the age of social media is it's so hard to know what's real. In general, put more trust in the people and places whose job it is to be right. https://twitter.com/...
“I don't really know what's going on with all this political tension. I'm just trying to document what's going on. I can't really verify them myself.” some classic interneting right here @TaylorLorenz @inputmag https://www.inputmag.com/...
“war is just another thing these meme accounts can monetize” pretty awful but pretty predictable. worth a read from @TaylorLorenz ⤵️ https://www.inputmag.com/...
The PlantATreeCo fundraiser is back up and at $734,000. Once again the page is claiming that IG Likes, Follows, and Shares of their page is what will benefit Ukraine. https://t.co/jHT7fflNUD https://t.co/Km3DSLqcbs
A measure of just how polluted our information stream has become that a 21 year old from Kentucky is gatekeeping the Ukraine conflict for millions https://www.inputmag.com/...
A 21 y/o from Kentucky ran a war page called “liveinafghanistan” he renamed it “newstruths” and pivoted to posting vaguely conservative-leaning videos featuring people shoplifting then learns about war breaking out thru a hip-hop Instagram page so he creates “livefromukraine” htt…
Reporting on a war in real-time is a serious + harrowing job. These meme accounts on IG trying to fake it just to gain followers are playing a dangerous game — a variant of all the low-grade accounts dedicated to sharing violent content in Facebook when I worked on video. https:/…
Ppl have been flocking to these pages hoping to gain any morsel of info on what was happening in Ukraine. But the pages are not run by Ukrainian journalists, they're run by a young meme admin in the US who oversees a network of viral content across the web https://www.inputmag.co…