“Game of Words” is a visual essay that examines narrative patterns in Russian state media during the war in Ukraine. Through careful analysis and the use of scrollytelling, the project highlights the manipulation techniques employed by authoritarian regimes to maintain power and control over people’s beliefs and opinions.
By bringing these techniques to light, “Game of Words” aims to increase awareness and push back against the efforts of those who seek to control information and shape public opinion. The project encourages individuals to think critically and make informed decisions that resist the influence of propaganda and misinformation.
The dataset of headlines for this project was compiled by scraping data from the largest Russian state media outlet, ‘1st channel,’ from February 24, 2022, to April 24, 2022. The scraping process was carried out using Selenium and Python, resulting in a dataset of 5,468 headlines. To extract unique words from the dataset, the Voyant tool was utilized. Contextual analysis was performed by querying the dataset of unique words using Pandas for Python.
The project’s final output is an HTML page that features scrollytelling, implemented using d3.js to reveal phrases. Hovering over these phrases allows users to view the complete headline and access the original source through a link. The project header utilizes p5.js to visualize keywords, and matter.js adds physics to the blocks containing the keywords, conveying the idea that words can be manipulated both physically and semantically.
The project was shortlisted by the Information is Beautiful Awards in 2022.
