A 26-page pdf academic paper examined efforts to study halfchan and assess their association with the Alt-Right. Of course, they took everything at face value and had no deep understanding of halfchan culture. Got upset about gore porn (apparently it was Funky Town). Turns out one of the workshop members was a regular user and, unbeknownst to the researchers, created a thread on halfchan about the workshop ( https://archive.4plebs.org/pol/thread/213257999/#q213257999 ). Hilarity ensued.

Then a couple threads appeared on pol today, analyzing the paper and the researchers. Top kek shitposts!

https://boards.4chan.org/pol/thread/279393888

https://boards.4chan.org/pol/thread/279412813

My conclusions: the researchers needed to lurk moar! As a anon posted, "The water is piss and the soft stuff on the bottom isn't mud." Cheers. Welcome to /pol/, you're here forever. Good thing they haven't found QResearch!

++++++++++++++++++++

Abstract (full paper behind paywall): https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1461444820948803

Full pdf of paper (free): https://sci-hub.st/10.1177/1461444820948803

https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444820948803

The challenges of studying 4chan and the Alt-Right: ‘Come on in the water’s fine’

Thomas Colley, Martin Moore

First Published September 20, 2020

Abstract

In 2019, the authors led a workshop at King’s College London examining how to study 4chan and assess their association with the Alt-Right. Unbeknownst to the authors, a participant was a 4chan user and started a mid-workshop thread on its notorious /pol/ (politically incorrect) board. It gained significant attention. Reviewing it later, the authors realised that this parallel thread illustrates perfectly the challenges researching 4chan – and similar – communities. We conducted discourse analysis on this unique dataset, providing an alternative perspective to predominant anthropological and informatic approaches. Our analysis enhances understanding of ‘free-extremist’ communities such as 4chan in several ways. It assesses how the /pol/ community responds to observation and provides new insights into roles influencers might have in radicalising others. It illustrates the value of discourse analysis in evaluating users’ associations with the Alt-Right. Finally, it proposes ways researchers can overcome the challenges faced when analysing such communities.

++++++++++++++++++++

The paper discussed the meaning of this story:

https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2019-03-06-watch–eff-says-white-boy-who-picked-up-rubbish-was-out-to-impress-white-cabal/

++++++++++++++++++++

There're also Twitter threads by the authors with very few replies:

https://twitter.com/ThomasColley/status/1308006160394575872

https://twitter.com/martinjemoore/status/1307960397803278337

You know what to do!