Flat Earth is some really crazy conspiracy theories, and anyone can easily tell that’s wrong.
YouTube in particular and the Internet in general contain a huge amount of knowledge, which anyone can access and learn in any field. In addition, however, YouTube and the Internet also have downsides.
When conspiracy theories are not true, misleading knowledge or fake news can easily be spread. And it is true that many people still believe that the Earth is an apartment just because of watching YouTube videos.
Asheley Landrum, assistant science professor at Texas Tech University, explored this strange phenomenon on YouTube. She found that the conspiracy theory videos claiming that Earth is an airplane not only attracted attention, but actually convinced viewers to believe in the distortion.
Asheley Landrum published her research at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She detailed her trip to North Carolina, attending a conference where “Flat Earth” believers gathered.
She said many of them thought the Earth was an airplane, not a sphere, after watching the explainer videos on YouTube. She interviewed 30 people, 29 of whom did not know what the shape of the Earth was until they watched the Flat Earth videos on YouTube.
One of the problems with YouTube is frequently recommending videos with similar content to any videos you’ve seen before, regardless of the content. So just watch a video of some conspiracy theories, similar videos will be suggested.
Maybe it’ll be videos with crazy conspiracy theories, maybe fanatic created videos, or other malicious content. Fortunately, the believers’ belief in the flat earth did not cause any damage.
