As I prepare a syllabus for a new class on media, I am fascinated by the ambivalence of so many who have moved transitioned from the analog to the digital age.

“On the one hand,” says MIT’s Sasha Costanza-Chock, an associate professor of civic media, “digital technology has been used by progressive social movements” to mobilize citizens to action. But on the other,   we have entered the era of digital media being used for surveillance, “well-funded disinformation campaigns” and extremists.

Newspapers and media organizations also wrestle with this conundrum, as this cartoon aptly captures.

From Editor & Publisher. editorandpublisher.com/cartoons