The Bits of Freedom case against Meta and the European Commission’s first big fine under the DSA for X: both are headline-producing cases revolving around the question of online influence and manipulation.
Marijn Sax just finished teaching a course on exactly these pressing regulatory questions.
In the course The Ethics and Regulation of Online Manipulation students of the Advanced Master’s in Technology Governance got to grapple with the technological, conceptual, normative, and legal dimensions of online influence.
This course worked with a collaborative ‘Digital Influence Journal’: a shared document where students and teacher would share a weekly critical reflection on an experience with digital influence online. Building on these examples provided by students themselves, the technological affordances of digital choice environments were explored. The examples also served as practical guidance when discussing key normative concepts such as autonomy, manipulation, vulnerability, and trust. The rich understanding of both the technology and key normative concepts allowed for an in-depth critical analysis of the applicability (and shortcomings) of the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive and the Digital Services Act to regulate online influence. Bits of Freedom’s case against Meta (led by IViR’s own Christiaan Alberdingk Thijm on BOF’s behalf) was timed perfectly as it took place during the course. This case proved a perfect case study of all the conceptual, technological, and legal questions discussed during the course.
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