Content Moderation Futures

This study examines the failures and possibilities of contemporary social media governance through the lived experiences of various content moderation professionals. Drawing on participatory design workshops with 33 practitioners in both the technology industry and broader civil society, this research identifies significant structural misalignments between corporate incentives and public interests. While experts agree that successful content moderation is principled, consistent, contextual, proactive, transparent, and accountable, current technology companies fail to achieve these goals, due in part to exploitative labor practices, chronic underinvestment in user safety, and pressures of global scale. I argue that successful governance is undermined by the pursuit of technological novelty and rapid growth, resulting in platforms that necessarily prioritize innovation and expansion over public trust and safety. To counter this dynamic, I revisit the computational history of care work, to motivate present-day solidarity amongst platform governance workers and inspire systemic change.