Exposing Chaos and Repression in Wuhan with User-Generated Content

Ahmed Albasheer is an Iraqi journalist who uses a combination of humor and grassroots organizing to teach youth in Iraq and across the world about their government's corruption with his show, "The Albasheer Show.” He has been compared to Jon Stewart in how his weekly series airing on YouTube and satellite television engages young people through his comedic timing and straight-forward manner of speaking. As a result, protests have erupted, and the government has killed protesters in response, but Albasheer continues to boost morale and amplify their voices in solidarity.

Independent journalists and upstart news organizations in Mexico have banded together to counter potentially deadly or disruptive fake news with a highly organized fact-checking campaign calling itself Verificado. Besides debunking hundreds of false political rumors in the 2018 elections, the coalition has fact-checked the sort of fake news that has prompted mobs to carry out hundreds of lynchings. One WhatsApp fact-verifying account enabling anyone to submit requests for debunking stories has been used extensively by mostly young readers.

The UDEME Monitor program trains student journalists to track and report on transparency and accountability around publicly-funded projects. The team has produced roughly 1,000 stories exposing corruption and gaps in implementation and has worked directly with community residents to raise awareness around procurement processes.

Although Taiwan and Canada saw the beginning of coronavirus outbreaks within days of each other, Taiwan has been able to better contain the spread. Using tactics such as integrating "its health insurance database with its immigration database" and using the military to help produce protective masks for medical workers, the Taiwanese government's aggressive approach offers lessons in how to use big data and regulations to stem the spread of infectious diseases.

The stock photo community is taking steps to offer more diverse options with a partnership by Getty Images, Dove, and GirlGaze to produce 5,000 newly available photographs of 179 women from 39 countries. The photos are their own collection on Getty's website and has customizable tags written by the subjects in the photo (recent ones include “blackgirlmagic,” “confident,” and “bosslady.” Already searches for terms like “strong women” and “women leaders” are up 187% and 202% respectively, and Getty plans to donate 10% of each licensing fee to promote further work in this area.

Human-based fact checking offers a more dynamic and thorough way to determine the credibility of news outlets than the use of machine learning software. Although humans are still prone to implicit biases, NewsGuard’s model of employing a team of human fact-checkers to rate news websites pushes back against the tendency of algorithms to disseminate false or misleading content. A user-installed plug-in offers details about the credibility and transparency of over 2,000 websites.

Where rental stores couldn’t compete, non-profits step in to preserve physical media in the digital age. Despite promises of unlimited access to media, online streaming services have actually reduced the variety of films available to their subscribers. In contrast to the vagaries of digital streaming business models, Beyond Video in Baltimore looks to members, donors, and volunteers to grow and maintain a lending library—already larger than the Netflix catalog—invested in promoting film culture and history.

In order to counter the spread of harmful propaganda, journalism and information can be treated like an national "asset" to be cultivated akin to energy. The Latvian government takes this approach by comprehensively understanding the Russian media, regulating the ownership of Latvian media, and cultivating a relationship with the Latvian news industry.

Identifying and combating propaganda is imperative for an informed public to have a sense of identity and make political decisions. In Finland, a “public diplomacy” program is countering Russian propaganda by better understanding how false information spreads.

In India, videos made about the many social problems are secretly broadcasted in different villages to make people aware of the real problem and also aware of what they can do to fix it. Video Volunteers, an organization that coordinates these video productions, catalyzes community change through transparency and accountability.