Democrat Pramila Jayapal was ‘community noted’ over her false tweet about buying a gun. She compared it to buying tickets for a concert. The social media users on X quickly let her know the truth about her comparison. We can buy concert tickets in just a few minutes online, without having to do a background check. We can’t say the same about an assault weapon.
Pramila wrote: “It shouldn’t be easier to buy an assault weapon than concert tickets.” The community note said: “It is not. Purchasing concert tickets, is easy and simple. Legally purchasing a firearm in the United States requires an FBI background check.” The community note linked to the FBI.gov webpage.
Community Notes on Twitter (now known as X) is a feature where contributors can add context, such as fact-checks, to posts, images, or videos that might be misleading. It’s a community-driven content moderation program that aims to provide helpful and informative context based on a crowd-sourced system.
Here’s how it works:
Contributors add notes to potentially misleading content.
Users rate the helpfulness of these notes.
Notes that receive enough positive ratings from users with different viewpoints are shown publicly.
The goal is to counter misinformation and propaganda by providing accurate context. It was initially launched as Birdwatch in January 2021 and rebranded to Community Notes in November 2022
