The Algorithm

inspiration

Atlas of Copenhagen - Joost Grootens

The People’s Daily is a “news platform” that tracks published civic live-feeds on the most currently populated and debated articles before they might be censored or controlled, and thus, “detouring” censorship. It makes a statement about the current practices in Chinese journalism, a counter-brainwash against the ideological convergence and news propaganda.

The comments as news source, are presented in the format of newspaper and news site, in a simple black-and-white environment, so contrary to the usual “black-on-white”. The site takes a neutral stance with no editing. The popularity of the topic featured in the feeds deHines the hierarchy of presentation changing over time. People who comment are reporters, commentators and researchers of the platform.

The project is concerned about information democracy, and creates an ethical approach to respond to the politically manipulated and uneven spreading of information and opinion.

News without News - Xiaofeng Dai

Visualization

By searching for specific keywords, sources or channels and linking this to a location.
You get a more clear view of how certain areas experience the corona crisis

The algorithm visualises the amount of times a topic is mentioned and its occurrence in an area

Example

step 1: location
- Rotterdam-Noord

Step 2: search words
- stress, school

step 3: size
- if stress and school
are mentioned 500x
together create small
circle.

Step 4: Colour
- if stress and school
are mentioned daily
give darkest colour

The post-corona society

When thinking of the post-corona society, we tend to think in our own bubble.
And when looking at articles on the post-corona society they tend to be written and focused on a higher-educated target-audience, with most having a more political left undertone.

By linking keywords, sources and channels to a location the algorithm creates a more clear overview on how people from different socio-economic backgrounds experience the corona crisis, which helps us in breaking out of our own bubble.

I don't know what the post-corona society will look like, but I do know that realistic speculation of the post-corona society that it is important to include everyone and to not only think from our own experience, background, social circles and ideologies.