Unveiling the Shadows: The Resurgence of QAnon in the OPEN Digital Sphere

If, at the speed of light or faster, information has rebounded off the walls echoed a hundred times over, the modern internet becomes a place before which a seemingly dead confluence of conspiracy theories can be reanimated, and indeed, can return with a voice promised to be ‘free’ again. As familiar as these stories are, it is still a complex portrait of the failures of the modern digital age, one we are just now attempting to sketch by examining the ‘great unmuting’ and QAnon’s return. This is a tiny part of our research and organisations, which lead the world in studying the connections between conspiracy theories and human rights abuses online. Here, we hope to convey some preliminary thoughts about a complex set of questions we have accepted as inherent to the design and use of the internet: How did QAnon get unmuted, and when? How does conspiracy function in the digital age? And what are some of its effects?

Breaking the Silence: QAnon's Digital Resurgence

Latest in a long saga of boundaries between digital words and worlds, on X emerged a symbol of a new morning for QAnon – literally, in this case, where a search for the phrase ‘QSentMe’ shows a 1,283 per-cent increase, the same surge for ‘TheGreatAwakening’ and ‘WWG1WGA’.

The Algorithms of Influence

All this goes to show that, as algorithms are sewing our sovereign digital realities, the surge of QAnon-branded content tells us something about the nature of these platforms’ involvement in the content they moderate. With more than 1 million mentions in the course of a year, the digital signature of QAnon is clear and vibrant, and our last frontier of freedom of speech is not at play here: public discourse is at stake.

Musk's Gambit: A Safe Harbor for QAnon?

With the takeover of X by the CEO Elon Musk, voices – such as those of the conspiracy theory QAnon – that might have been silenced before are being allowed to thrive and flourish. It showcases a ‘hands-on’ approach to politics by a social media mogul that goes back to the days of Mark Zuckerberg and the Cambridge Analytica scandal. Just like with that case, there’s an argument to be made about social media mogul’s responsibility towards the creation of political and social narratives.

The Ideological Battlefield

Stemming from core beliefs in far-Right conspiracy theories, QAnon exemplifies imbrications between the real and the made-up in today’s web. The fighting for and against X sheds further light on this battleground for free speech and online harms.

The Viral Nature of Conspiracy

@dom_lucre, the highest-reaching QAnon2 personality on X whose posts have been viewed more than a dozen million times, exemplifies that potent mix of social media and incendiary conspiracy content. Whether their controversial posts stand to sway public perception and behaviour at scale remains a serious preoccupation for those who would seek to regulate.

The Wave Ahead: Navigating the OPEN Seas of Information

Tempering the winds of freedom could cool the waves of disinformation ahead of the 2024 Presidential election. Will social media firms and their users push through these open seas again? Or will they generally learn to stay safe from one channel to the next? I doubt it, but I look to X with renewed hope.

Gazing into the Digital Horizon

QAnon’s future – and its continued existence in the digital realm – remains to be seen. We have a vague sense of which way powerful politicians like Musk want to take the platforms, with their narratives and policies attracting (and radicalising) users along certain paths. But the one certainty, that user behaviour seems to reveal, is that we are still seemingly many steps away from being over the worst of the brinkmanship.

Understanding "OPEN" in the Context of QAnon's Resurgence

The word ‘open’, in the language of social media discourse and the return of QAnon, captures these broader debates about open platforms versus regulated spaces, and as digital communities deal with the harms caused by unfettered speech, the idea of ‘open’ contains a double edge.

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And so, on this platform made of digital quotation marks, where realities collide and opinions overlap, X marks the re-emergence of QAnon. Out here on the open seas, freedom of speech carries the burden of responsibility and, with it, the inherent chaos of open ocean communication. Platforms must decide if they want to weigh anchor and set sail into the storm, or if they would rather close the port and let everyone walk out on their own terms.