The cohort of first time voters at this year’s Federal election have different ways of learning about the world than many of us. Generation Z’s media consumption habits are shaped by growing up with high-speed internet, smartphones and streaming media from an early age.

These digital natives consume primarily on mobile phones: TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram. They prefer short-form video as it’s fast and entertaining. What they see is driven by the platforms’ algorithmic feeds rather than by their conscious choices.

Generation Z do not watch broadcast TV or radio, do not buy newspapers, and are not used to reading long form articles - in fact they may have several screens going at a time.

While these new voters are at the extreme in terms of changes to media consumption, reaching Generation Y (Millennials born up to 1996) and earlier is also a challenge, not the least for supporters of the ABC who’s careers there revolved around a style of production is less appreciated than it once was.

During this election campaign, ABC Alumni have produced videos designed for distribution on social media. The videos are short, have vertical orientation and have “burned in” sub-titles (as many viewers watch with the sound off, we’re advised).

It seems like the power of the two major parties is diminishing and if there is a hung parliament, independents will be critical in legislating to support our valued public broadcaster. Many of the short videos produced have included statements from Independent candidates. Other videos are “vox pops” from people on the street who explain why they value Our ABC.

The videos have done quite well, particularly on Facebook, getting a wide viewing audience both through “organic” sharing and some paid “boosting”. The best videos have an engaging poster frame and the speaker gets right to the point. (Average viewing time is about six seconds). The videos have stimulated “engagement” with likes, or other reactions and often comments.

Some comments, however, are quite negative about the ABC. Some examples:

Pretty simple really.... shut it down! Australia doesn't need a media mouth piece for left wing ideology.

ABC needs to just go…

We need a referendum about giving ABC tax money ,, if asked ? There would be no abc

Defund the ABC.

The ABC is an absolute disgrace.

The ABC in the last four decades has evolved into a left wing political party teir funding has to be pulled back.

Defund the ABC now, what a waste of taxpayers money.

Lefty love in

We were a bit rocked to see these reactions but an examination of the accounts that made the comments reveals that almost all of them are “bots” or “sock puppet” accounts. 

There are clearly groups who pay money to have fake comments sprayed around social media and unsurprisingly the ABC is a target of this too. It is risky to assume that comments on social media are a real reflection of public opinion.

Looking at the accounts of negative commenters is interesting.

• Milton S. 100 friends. From Louisville, Kentucky. Only 2 posts, pictures of a dog.
• Mike S. 98 friends. No details. No posts. 
• Steve R. 8 friends. No posts. Follows 3 including 9 News.
• Robert M. 171 friends. Townsville. No posts. Looks fake.
• Lindsay B. 79 Friends. Red Cliffs, Victoria. Pictured on a tractor. Likes prospecting. One post with dog.
• Jim B. Locked profile. 147 friends.

A quick internet search finds that there are numerous services on-line that offer to get you social media followers for a fee and we suspect that many of these accounts have used them.

AI has made it cheap to automate inauthentic activity by “bots” on social media. Poor grammar and typos in the comments might seem to indicate emotion in the commenter but this is often a deliberate tactic.

Red flags in an account that indicate it might be fake include: no profile picture (or an AI generated one), unusual usernames, empty or vague bio and personal information. Lots of comments but little interaction by others. 

Bots, and the comments they create, do cost money and indicate that someone is funding a sophisticated campaign against a publicly funded ABC.

This election campaign is being fought on Social Media with massive spending by all parties. We have found that available ad inventory is so scarce that it’s been hard to spend our budget at times.

A great drawback of today’s election advertising that is highly targeted through Social Media advertising and that different groups get different messages - the leaders can be vague, as they have been about ABC funding - but can tell different audience segments what they want to hear without the risk of appearing contradictory. There is no unified message to all Australians.

ABC Friends and ABC Alumni are doing their best to campaign for more support for the ABC. Look for us on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, X, YouTube and LinkedIn.

One practical thing you can do to support the efforts of ABC Alumni (and ABC Friends) in arguing for the ABC is to follow our social accounts and like, share and comment on the posts you see from us. Don’t be alarmed by some of what you see under the posts - they may not even be by real people.

Peter Marks