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Waiting for Q: An Exploration of QAnon Users' Online Migration to Poal in the Wake of Voat's Demise

Antonis Papasavva, Enrico Mariconti

Many controversial and hateful online communities on mainstream social networks get banned due to moderation efforts. One of the platforms known to have taken such measures is Reddit, which banned various communities and users in recent years. Although banning these communities eliminates the problem on one platform, the participants of those communities often tend to regroup on other, laxer alternative social networks. One alternative to Reddit was Voat, a Reddit-like social network that allowed its users to share their controversial ideas freely. Voat bloomed and became more popular with every Reddit ban, and although it had a troubled history, it managed to stay afloat for four years before shutting down in December 2020. In this work, we investigate the Voat shutdown and how the users of the conspiracy theory QAnon organized their online migration. We find that many users proposed Poal as a Voat alternative, resulting in about half of the QAnon user base of Voat migrating there. In addition, we find that only a few Voat users lost hope close to the end of Voat, turning against Q, while others encouraged their fellow conspiracy adherents to "wait for Q" to tell them where to go. Lastly, we find evidence that shortly after the Voat shutdown, users on Poal (most of them Voat migrants) start discussing and planning the January 6th, 2021, attack on the US Capitol.

source: https://arxiv.org/abs/2302.01397

**Waiting for Q: An Exploration of QAnon Users' Online Migration to Poal in the Wake of Voat's Demise** *Antonis Papasavva, Enrico Mariconti* Many controversial and hateful online communities on mainstream social networks get banned due to moderation efforts. One of the platforms known to have taken such measures is Reddit, which banned various communities and users in recent years. Although banning these communities eliminates the problem on one platform, the participants of those communities often tend to regroup on other, laxer alternative social networks. One alternative to Reddit was Voat, a Reddit-like social network that allowed its users to share their controversial ideas freely. Voat bloomed and became more popular with every Reddit ban, and although it had a troubled history, it managed to stay afloat for four years before shutting down in December 2020. In this work, we investigate the Voat shutdown and how the users of the conspiracy theory QAnon organized their online migration. We find that many users proposed Poal as a Voat alternative, resulting in about half of the QAnon user base of Voat migrating there. In addition, we find that only a few Voat users lost hope close to the end of Voat, turning against Q, while others encouraged their fellow conspiracy adherents to "wait for Q" to tell them where to go. Lastly, we find evidence that shortly after the Voat shutdown, users on Poal (most of them Voat migrants) start discussing and planning the January 6th, 2021, attack on the US Capitol. source: https://arxiv.org/abs/2302.01397

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[–] • 1 pt

When trump won the primaries Q dropped by to say goodbye and thanks and that the campaign would restructure for the big leagues

This is where Steve bannon takes center stage, after being given complete/ sole control over Trumps digital online Election campaign - he appeared on an early side banner of a Trump running for Pres article (circa 2015 iirc) explaining how 'The Trump Campaign' have employed the data firm Cambridge Analytica and then mentioned something to the effect of '...the great thing about Data analytics is you are able to watch in real time how various themes propagate over social media and the effect it has on users and we're learning what we can do with that and how we can harness it' Pre-identified themes of God, Patriotism and fighting the deep State were used to influence, and at some point whether for plausible deniability to distancing Bannon and Cambridge, Defango (the cicada 3301 larp, illuminati treasure hunt hire, arizona spear of destiny nonsense) and his hand picked cohort of 'baker boys' began to seed Q drops - caught discussing on a livestream (circa 2018 iirc) 'changing trip codes- bc we can'. Q also completely splintered and co-opted the actual citizen led pizzagate investigations after a (((google Earth ))) image was seeded into pizzagate showing a Dept of Energy vehicle parked at or next door to a James Alefentis property - this eventually led to the idea of a Q security clearance insider .... working for Trump to take down the pedos.

TL;DR Q was a concoction of Steve Bannon and Cambridge Analytica to influence Trumps online election campaign after identifying social media/ chans from the earlier account used for the primaries.

[–] • 0 pt

This is pretty believable and I think it would explain the change in the format of qdrops, Q #1, probably eric, was straightforward, shared info, asked for feedback, gave thanks, Q #2 starts with bannon's team and is using massive data analytics to run something akin to an ARG among the most committed trump supporters in the online crowd, Q #3 is post election which gets co-opted by glowniggers or just poached by jim who runs 8chan, many theorized Jim Watkins was the donor floating voat while 8chan was closed.

This or something very similar explains the gaps in Qdrops and the change in the content and structure of the information given by Q.

[–] • 1 pt

Yep, the promise of good winning out over evil was a timely one people lapped it up and why wouldn't many (initially) ultimately though, those with any developed critical thought would see it for what it really was - kabuki theatre distraction - a modern day internet horoscoping - belief is in the eye of the beholder with bonus tard for 'confirming drops via discernment of arbitrary msm articles' - an endless loop for regurgitating mainstream media.