Troll clicks count, too – and this wisdom is not lost on Marianna Spring, the BBC’s Disinformation and Social Media Correspondent, who bid “welcome” to the haters delivering “misogynistic slurs” and other feedback to her launch video for BBC Verify.
“We’re a team of investigative journalists here at the BBC,” Spring said in a Monday video explaining the government-funded broadcaster’s new fact-checking venture. “But we’re also a new brand and we are a physical location above the newsroom in London. The point of the team is to verify video, to fact-check, to counter disinformation and to analyze really complex stories, so we can get to the truth of what’s going on.”
We will not amplify here the reactions that Spring flagged, but she described them thusly:
“The trolling in response to this – including misogynistic slurs, threatening and hateful messages – are just more proof of why investigating this is so important,” Spring tweeted. “Welcome trolls and stay tuned for my latest Radio 4 podcast, more upcoming investigations – and Undercover Voters.”
So what was it about BBC Verify’s otherwise bland, corporate presentation-style brand launch video could have possibly set off such a toxic response?
“At the moment I’m investigating the UK’s conspiracy theory movement,” Spring says in the video. “I’m trying to understand how it’s evolved and intensified since the pandemic … I’m looking at the alternative media that finds itself at the heart of this movement. I’m looking at the way that alternative media is funded … and I’m looking at its connection with far-right figures.”
It’s as if an occult hand moved to expose some sort of political motive.
