eliothiggins.bsky.social
Founder and creative director of Bellingcat and director of Bellingcat Productions BV. Author of We Are Bellingcat. Democracy isn't dead, it just smells funny.
2,572 posts
115,272 followers
4,052 following
Regular Contributor
Active Commenter
comment in response to
post
“Special thanks to our sponsor Coinbase.”
*cuts to empty stage*
Has a national military force ever allowed themselves to be so debased and humiliated so quickly?
comment in response to
post
In this case they’re going to seize on any tiny piece of “evidence” to try to align these events with their frames — e.g. “the left did it.” Looks like the NY Post has already found some traction attempting to tie the suspect to Tim Walz.
comment in response to
post
The tools do exist. The challenge is political will, and rebuilding the institutional and epistemic scaffolding needed to make truth actionable again.
comment in response to
post
And once the information ecosystem fragments, it becomes impossible to build shared narratives about inequality, let alone address it collectively. That’s why I think the disinformation crisis and the inequality crisis aren’t parallel, they’re interdependent failures of the same broken system.
comment in response to
post
As you say, economics assumes perfect information, but in reality, information is filtered, framed, and withheld, often to reinforce existing hierarchies.
comment in response to
post
What I’ve been exploring is how the erosion of verification, deliberation, and accountability (what I frame as the VDA model) doesn’t just allow disinformation to spread, it allows power itself to become unaccountable, and inequality to appear natural, inevitable, or even invisible.
comment in response to
post
You're absolutely right to highlight how uneven access to knowledge and information underpins both inequality and systemic distortion.
comment in response to
post
So while the focus of my thread was on information systems, it’s not separate from inequality. It's about how those systems have failed to surface, address, or even agree on the reality of inequality, let alone respond to it. That’s a structural failure at the heart of modern democracies.
comment in response to
post
In fact, I’d argue that growing inequality requires a broken information ecosystem to persist in democracies. Without that distortion, without the manipulation of verification, deliberation, and accountability, it would be harder to justify or sustain the current political and economic status quo.
comment in response to
post
Thanks Matthew, and I agree inequality is a critical factor, but just to clarify, my thread wasn’t arguing that information alone is the root cause. It’s about how the information environment mediates and distorts how we perceive, respond to, or even recognise issues like inequality.
comment in response to
post
I think my NDAs would prevent me for saying, but there was and now there's not, but I'm hoping there will be again.
comment in response to
post
I had an initial meeting with them but decided to go with another production company, so we had no input.
comment in response to
post
They really want you to know they're mad, for some reason.
Anti-dril energy: "And another thing: print it in the newspaper that I'm mad. A1, above the fold. Just angry as fuck at Bellingcat -- buy an advertorial about it!"
comment in response to
post
and @dassakaye.bsky.social for nukes, Iran-Israel & regional political situation
comment in response to
post
What's also funny is I think they made it more obvious because we missed their last attempt at it bsky.app/profile/anti...
comment in response to
post
I just think it's to communicate there's 100 pieces.
comment in response to
post
That's the only part of it that annoys me.
comment in response to
post
They've massively misunderstood my sense of humour and enjoyment of jigsaw puzzles.
comment in response to
post
I hope they put in as much effort as possible, it would mean so much more to me.
comment in response to
post
If I get enough pieces I'm tempted to do a shirt like this for our supporters to buy. Would you buy it to support Bellingcat? I also promise if you come to one of my speaking events I'll take a photo with you if you wear it to sweeten the deal.
comment in response to
post
Yes. This is the reason for the many incompetent people in the administration. The competence doesnt matter as long as they are obedient.
comment in response to
post
These podcasts really helped with my process when developing these ideas.