One important aspect of critical social media research is the study of not just ideolo-gies of the Internet but also ideologies on the Internet. Critical discourse analysis and ideology critique as research method have only been applied in a limited manner to social media data. Majid KhosraviNik (2013) argues in this context that ‘critical dis-course analysis appears to have shied away from new media research in the bulk of its research’ (p. 292). Critical social media discourse analysis is a critical digital method for the study of how ideologies are expressed on social media in light of society’s power structures and contradictions that form the texts’ contexts.

t has, for example, been common to study contemporary revolutions and protests (such as the 2011 Arab Spring) by collecting large amounts of tweets and analysing them. Such analyses can, however, tell us nothing about the degree to which activists use social and other media in protest communication, what their motivations are to use or not use social media, what their experiences have been, what problems they encounter in such uses and so on. If we only analyse big data, then the one-sided conclusion that con-temporary rebellions are Facebook and Twitter revolutions is often the logical conse-quence (see Aouragh, 2016; Gerbaudo, 2012). Digital methods do not outdate but require traditional methods in order to avoid the pitfall of digital positivism. Traditional socio-logical methods, such as semi-structured interviews, participant observation, surveys, content and critical discourse analysis, focus groups, experiments, creative methods, par-ticipatory action research, statistical analysis of secondary data and so on, have not lost importance. We do not just have to understand what people do on the Internet but also why they do it, what the broader implications are, and how power structures frame and shape online activities

Challenging big data analytics as the mainstream of digital media studies requires us to think about theoretical (ontological), methodological (epistemological) and ethical dimensions of an alternative paradigm

Who communicates what to whom on social media with what effects? It forgets users’ subjectivity, experiences, norms, values and interpre-tations, as well as the embeddedness of the media into society’s power structures and social struggles. We need a paradigm shift from administrative digital positivist big data analytics towards critical social media research. Critical social media research combines critical social media theory, critical digital methods and critical-realist social media research ethics.

de-emphasis of philosophy, theory, critique and qualitative analysis advances what Paul Lazarsfeld (2004 [1941]) termed administrative research, research that is predominantly concerned with how to make technologies and administration more efficient and effective.

Big data analytics’ trouble is that it often does not connect statistical and computational research results to a broader analysis of human meanings, interpretations, experiences, atti-tudes, moral values, ethical dilemmas, uses, contradictions and macro-sociological implica-tions of social media.

Such funding initiatives privilege quantitative, com-putational approaches over qualitative, interpretative ones.

The company's API for scoring toxicity in online discussions already behaves like a racist hand dryer.

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