https://www.wired.com/story/rumble-sends-viewers-tumbling-toward-misinformation/
“I'M NOT REALLY expecting things to ever be what they were,” says Sarah. “There's no going back.” Sarah’s mother is a QAnon believer who first came across the conspiracy theory on YouTube. Now that YouTube has taken steps toward regulating misinformation and conspiracy theories, a new site, Rumble, has risen to take its place. Sarah feels the platform has taken her mother away from her. Rumble is “just the worst possible things about YouTube amplified, like 100 percent,” says Sarah. (Her name has been changed to protect her identity.) Earlier this year, her mother asked for help accessing Rumble when her favorite conservative content creators (from Donald Trump Jr. to “Patriot Streetfighter”) flocked from YouTube to the site. Sarah soon became one of 150,000 members of the support group QAnon Casualties as her mother tumbled further down the dangerous conspiracy theory rabbit hole. Between September 2020 and January 2021, monthly site visits <https://www.similarweb.com/website/rumble.com/#overview> to Rumble rose from 5 million to 135 million; as of April, they were sitting at just over 81 million. Sarah’s mother is one of these new Rumble users, and, according to Sarah, is now refusing to get the Covid-19 vaccine. Explaining her decision, says Sarah, her mother cites the dangerous anti-vax disinformation found in many videos on Rumble. Rumble claims that it does not promote misinformation or conspiracy theories but simply has a free-speech approach to regulation. However, our research reveals that Rumble has not only allowed misinformation to thrive on its platform, it has also actively recommended it. If you search “vaccine” on Rumble, you are three times more likely to be recommended videos containing misinformation about the coronavirus than accurate information. One video by user TommyBX <https://rumble.com/vbq2z1-shocking-truth-covid-19-vaccine.scientists-warn-humanity.-msm-banned.html> featuring Carrie Madej—a popular voice in the anti-vax world—alleges, “This is not just a vaccine; we’re being connected to artificial intelligence.” Others unfoundedly state that the vaccine is deadly and has not been properly tested. Even if you search for an unrelated term, “law,” according to our research you are just as likely to be recommended Covid-19 misinformation than not—about half of the recommended content is misleading. If you search for “election” you are twice as likely to be recommended misinformation than factual content. On Thu, Sep 23, 2021 at 2:30 PM T. J. Garland <[email protected]> wrote: > Comments? > > https://rumble.com/vm8dkf-chlorine-dioxide-the-universal-remedy-that-drug-companies-hate.html > > > *Now we can use Ivermectin instead of regular flu shots. Anon* >
