This pandemic has generated a surge in online community building, creating cautious optimism that our virtual efforts can offset some in-person losses
We've always hoped that our digital tools would create connections, not conflict. We have a chance to make it happen. Tweets: @cnalive , @nbcnews , @salilkallianpur , @ediplomat , @f_kaltheuner , @brianstelter , @kevinroose , @nikillinit , and @shiraovide Tweets: @cnalive : With public Masses cancelled in dioceses across the U.S. to help stop the spread of #coronavirus, many bishops have encouraged Catholics to watch live broadcasts of Mass and make an act of spiritual communion. https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/ ... @nbcnews : John Legend was joined by wife Chrissy Teigen for a live online concert on Instagram to raise awareness about how to slow the spread of coronavirus. https://www.nbcnews.com/... Salil Kallianpur / @salilkallianpur : If there is a silver lining in this crisis, it may be that the virus is forcing us to use the internet as it was always meant to be used—to connect with one another, share information and resources, and come up with collective solutions to urgent problems. https://www.nytimes.com/... E-diplomacy / @ediplomat : Necessity drives innovation. Today, online tools can push forward the effectiveness of diplomatic and global governance meetings. Read the summary, and watch the recording of ‘How to organise and run online meetings’ https://www.diplomacy.edu/... Frederike Kaltheuner / @f_kaltheuner : Bookmarking this to mark the end of the 2018-2019 tech-slash. I don't like this take though. Let's stop oscillating between “tech will save us” and “tech will tear us apart”. Tech is just tech, it has always been amazing, and it still has the same problems it had last year. https://twitter.com/... Brian Stelter / @brianstelter : “We've always hoped that our digital tools would create connections, not conflict. We have a chance to make it happen.” https://twitter.com/... Kevin Roose / @kevinroose : I wrote about how we're living online now. Between the Zoom classes, FaceTime parties, and Twitter fundraisers, it feels like after years of pushing us apart, the internet is finally helping us pull together. https://www.nytimes.com/... Nikhil Krishnan / @nikillinit : I've never felt better about what the internet can do to bring people together, and this week has shown that. A big part IMO is we're now using it for more synchronous functionality instead of asynchronous. Good article talking about different uses. https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/... Shira Ovide / @shiraovide : A week ago, I felt differently about the internet's ability to help us connect in a time of crisis. Now I agree with Kevin. https://twitter.com/...
Context & Ripple Effects
Kevin Roose's March 18 piece lands at the moment the pandemic forces American civic and religious life online overnight: US bishops cancel public Masses and urge Catholics toward live-streamed worship, while John Legend turns an Instagram live set with Chrissy Teigen into a public-health broadcast. The article's wager is that the same tools long blamed for division might, under lockdown, prove connective.
The stakes sit inside a running argument: Frederike Kaltheuner's critique of the oscillating 'tech will save us' versus 'tech will tear us apart' framing, and the pre-pandemic push for human-curated slow media as a corrective to algorithmic feeds. Roose's cautiously optimistic read is a test case for whether platform behavior changes when physical community disappears.
First-order effects
- Faith leaders and entertainers become emergency broadcasters within weeks — dioceses substitute streamed Masses for in-person worship, and performers like John Legend convert concerts into awareness-raising livestreams on Instagram.
Second-order effects
- Platforms face pressure to curate rather than merely host: Facebook's internal finding that US users are reading more COVID-19 content from 'higher-quality' publishers shows ranking choices now shaping what a locked-down public consumes, and the tech industry's rapid pivot to pandemic remedies doubles as a reputation play.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, behaviors once considered fringe go mainstream fast — the compression of years of digital transformation into months suggests congregations, artists, and organizers may not fully revert to in-person formats even after restrictions lift.
The trend: The pandemic is stress-testing whether social platforms can function as community infrastructure rather than conflict engines, with religious institutions and creators as the first large-scale adopters.