Think about the last time you opened your phone to check something quick—a message from a friend, a news headline, a video someone sent you. An hour later, you’re still there, scrolling through posts you never asked to see, watching videos you never searched for, feeling a strange mix of anger, anxiety, and fascination. You might tell yourself you chose to stay. But did you? Behind the screen, an algorithm is making choices for you. It decides which posts appear at the top of your feed, which videos autoplay next, which stories get buried. It decides what you see and,…

The quiet hum of a Canadian suburban evening is often punctuated by the soft glow of a smartphone screen. A resident, let’s call him Mark, scrolls through his social media feed, pausing on a headline from what appears to be his local news outlet. It reads, “City Council Votes to Hide Crime Statistics to Protect Newcomers.” His heart rate quickens. He feels a surge of anger, a sense of betrayal by his community leaders. He shares the article to his neighborhood group, igniting a firestorm of comments, half of which are equally enraged, the other half calling the story fake.…