Patrice Riemens on Sun, 25 Jun 2017 17:23:46 +0200 (CEST) |
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<nettime> How Tinder helped to beat May & could win the White House back (NYT) |
An upbeat story, yet for me at least, it has a feel of tech solutionism to it. How apps and bots, and long distance 'matches' are substituting for communities on the ground ... How Tinder Could Take Back the White House By YAara Rodrigues Fowler and Charlotte Goodman, NYT, June 22, 2017 original t: <https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/22/opinion/how-tinder-could-take-back-the-white-house.html> By now, you may have heard that young voters were critical in the election in the United Kingdom earlier this month, helping deliver embarrassing losses to the Conservative Party. As politically active progressives in our 20s, we were eager to help mobilize the youth vote before the election. But we also knew that reaching out to people in our mostly left-wing social bubble would change nothing. Yara’s matches on the dating app Tinder were surprisingly responsive when she suggested that they register to vote. So we decided to scale it up. With the help of two software engineers, Erika Pheby and Kyle Buttner, we designed a chatbot, a smart computer program that deployed an adaptable script. In the two days ahead of the election earlier this month, the chatbot struck up conversations with thousands of young people between 18 and 25 years old on Tinder. The chatbot talked about politics, with the aim of getting voters to help oust the Conservative government. The results were amazing. Over 30,000 messages reached young people in key constituencies. This is how it worked: People we recruited from Facebook and Twitter “lent” us their Tinder profiles, and the bot convinced Tinder that their profiles were in geographical locations where the vote was close. In these places, the proportion of 18-25-year-olds was high enough that they could swing the election — if they turned out at the national average. Using the photograph of the person who’d lent their profile, the program would automatically swipe “yes” on every user, and if someone swiped “yes” back, creating a “match,” the bot would ask about the user’s voting plans.If the user planned to vote for Labour (or whatever party best placed to beat the Conservatives), the bot sent a message with a link to the nearest polling station. If the user planned to vote for another progressive party, the bot asked if he or she would consider a tactical vote to beat the Tories, voting for the progressive party most likely to beat the Conservatives in their area. And if the user was voting for a right-wing party or was unsure, the bot sent a list of Labour policies, or a criticism of Tory policies. People who lent their profiles could jump in and chat at any time. And they did. We were amazed by the number of people saying that they’d spent hours convincing a match 300 miles away that high taxation for the rich would benefit them, because we all benefit from investment in the National Health Service. Others organized dates with people with whom they had compatible politics. The occasional match was disappointed to be talking to a bot instead of a human, but there was very little negative feedback: Tinder is too casual a platform for users to feel hoodwinked by some political conversation. By and large, users surprised us with their receptiveness. Some people who received bot messages asked how they could join us. Our inboxes were flooded. The number of profiles lent to us in just two evenings was incredible — we needed a 10-person team to process sign ups. We knew we were a part of something big. Continue reading the main story The fact is that until we saw the exit poll, which showed significant losses for the Conservative Party, we were pessimistic. When the election was announced, we prepared ourselves for a bloodbath. But like thousands of young people across the Britain, we got to work. This election campaign has been like no other. Voters have been more engaged online than ever before. People aren’t just posting “I voted” as a status update, they’re sharing information with each other on how to vote tactically in their area. Meme-friendly graphics have condensed 200-page manifestos into bullet points, helping people easily understand the parties’ policies. Social media has also made canvassing more inclusive. Several people who volunteered with us said our bot allowed them to canvass despite physical or mental health conditions that prevented them from handing out leaflets. Nathalie Wright, a disability activist and writer, said: “I could do it in my own time on my own terms, as much or as little as I wanted. This reflects a bigger shift this election, where politics has been made more accessible and relevant to people who are usually marginalized." What have we learned? At least two things.First, that in the weeks since this election was called, people on the left have come together. Every single person on our team wanted to beat the Tories, but we never discussed where exactly on the left we stood. This isn’t unusual: All over Britain, progressive alliances have been cropping up. These groups, made up of activists from Labour, the Green Party and Liberal Democrats, campaigned together locally for whichever candidate was best placed to defeat the Conservatives, something unprecedented in Britain’s highly partisan political culture. After years of the Conservatives’ austerity program, which included cuts to housing, domestic violence services, hospitals and schools, people became more willing to unite against something. In the United States, you might feel like all you do is talk and disagree. But when it comes it to beating Donald Trump in 2020, leftists will have a level of anger that just couldn’t be mustered after eight years of President Obama. Many voters had reservations about Hillary Clinton — many voters also weren’t sure about Jeremy Corbyn. But many on the left will agree that Mr. Trump has to go. If you get together and get organized, you can win. Secondly — and this is more speculative — Tinder is an intimate medium. When you’re on your way home from work and someone stops you in the street, you’re busy: You don’t want to listen. But on Tinder, people want to talk, and they talk candidly. It’s not unusual to disclose a taboo sexual preference in an opening message. And the political is personal. A £10 minimum wage is personal. So is universal healthcare. Talking politics on Tinder works because your matches are waiting for you to say something personal to them. And they are willing to listen. ------- Yara Rodrigues Fowler (@yazzarf) is a writer and campaigner. Charlotte Goodman (@charlgoodman) is a postgraduate law student. # distributed via <nettime>: no commercial use without permission # <nettime> is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: http://mx.kein.org/mailman/listinfo/nettime-l # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@kein.org # @nettime_bot tweets mail w/ sender unless #ANON is in Subject: