Post by Christian Pieter Hoffmann

Very happy to see our special issue of Studies in Communication and Media on "The age of synthetic media" out in OA 🎉 ⛓️‍ https://lnkd.in/dc6vgY7b Aside from our introduction, the issue contains five fabulous contributions: In "A new face of political advertising? Synthetic imagery in the 2025 German federal election campaigns on social media", Stephanie Geise, Anna Ricarda Luther, Dr. Sabine Reich and Michael Linke explore how different parties employ AI-generated visuals in their campaigns. ⛓️ https://lnkd.in/dPHXgPMR In "'The morass is just getting ... deeper and deeper and deeper': Synthetic media and news integrity", Michael Davis and Monica Attard examine the use of genAI in Australian newsrooms. ⛓️ https://lnkd.in/dYT79y9m In "Spotting fakes: How do non-experts approach deepfake video detection?", Mary Holmes, Klaire Somoray, Jonathan D. Connor, Darcy W. Goodall, Lynsey Beaumont, Jordan Bugeja, Isabelle E. Eljed, Sarah Sai Wan Ng, Ryan Ede & Dan Miller study which strategies lay users employ when attempting to detect deepfakes (supported and unsupported). ⛓️ https://lnkd.in/dTEt3eZG In "Support for deepfake regulation: The role of third-person perception, trust, and risk", Daniel Vogler, Adrian Rauchfleisch & Gabriele de Seta explore preferences for AI regulation, with a special focus on second- and third-person effects. ⛓️ https://lnkd.in/dWFk2kpE Finally, in "Synthetic disinformation detection among German information elites – Strategies in politics, administration, journalism, and business", Nils Vief, Marcus Bösch, Saïd Unger, Johanna Klapproth, Svenja Boberg, Thorsten Quandt, & Christian Stoecker highlight how those with professional expertise in the field of disinformation try to detect AI-generated disinformation. ⛓️ https://lnkd.in/d697M_QX In our introduction, Alexander Godulla and I summarize the contributions of these great studies and discuss the implications of synthetic media for epistemic institutions, such as media or universities. ⛓️ https://lnkd.in/d7mcsv_S Many thanks to our great authors for their valuable contributions, to the entire team at SCM, especially Ruth Kasdorf, our very helpful reviewers, and to my co-editor Alexander!