About the study
News grows like mold.
Mold doesn’t spread evenly. It finds a foothold, sends out threads, and each new branch makes the next one easier. Network effects grow the same way.
I’ve long been fascinated by how networks form. Cliff Lampe’s research at the University of Michigan on the ties that bond us and the ties that bridge us gave me a way to think about it. Nature gave me a way to see it.
Here, one story grows through the news like a living culture. The first outlet to publish is the seed, each article after grows from its likeliest source, and distance from the center is time.
The look owes a debt to Uncommon Creative Studio and Dasha Plesen’s mold-grown identity for OFFF Barcelona.
How to read it
Coverage is live from the GDELT Project. A colony’s rim is its outlet’s political lean, from AllSides and Media Bias/Fact Check. Its body is the headline’s tone: green negative, amber positive.
A study by Michael Barsky for Barsky LabsGDELT · AllSides · MBFC