Hyperconnectivity, Not Isolation: Why Concerns about ‘Echo Chambers’ and ‘Filter Bubbles’ Address the Wrong Problem

Many contemporary dysfunctions in political communication and opinion formation have been blamed on the supposed fragmentation of the public sphere. This is perhaps expressed most forcefully in the claim that individuals and groups increasingly find themselves in ‘echo chambers’ or ‘filter bubbles’, as a result of their personal informational and interactional choices and/or of the algorithmic sorting performed by search engines and social media platforms. This chapter argues instead that the central mechanism in the emergence of contrarian and conspiracist groups, and of hyperpartisan communities more broadly, is not their isolation in information cocoons, but instead the hyperconnectivity of contemporary hybrid media systems. Hyperconnectivity both provides a bewildering multiplicity of media channels and information sources, and offers an opportunity for committed information seekers to ‘do their own research’ and construct personalised and collective alternative worldviews that are based on purposefully selected factoids and interpretations, and vigorously defended against outside criticism. If there is a fragmentation of the public sphere, then, it results not from the disconnection between distinct ideological publics that the ‘echo chamber’ and ‘filter bubble’ theses envisage, but rather from the constant, irresolvable communicative contest between these publics that animates our contemporary digital and social media environment.