Since September 2022, just before the U.S. midterm elections, Spring has maintained social media accounts that correspond to five different “voter profiles” she developed using Pew Research Center data:
- Larry, a “faith and flag” conservative, is a 71-year-old white retired insurance broker living in Oneonta, Alabama.
- Britney, a 50-year-old white school secretary living in Texas, is a Populist Right voter.
- Gabriela, a 44-year-old Hispanic nanny living in Florida, is a “stressed sideliner” who is not that interested in politics.
- Michael, a 61-year-old Black protestant and a teacher in Milwaukee, is a “Democratic mainstay.”
- Emma, a 25-year-old graphic designer who lives in New York City with her girlfriend, is a Progressive Left voter.
Each character’s accounts are confined to a single phone to avoid contaminating Spring’s findings. The reporter maintains accounts with computer-generated profile photos on a range of platforms — Facebook, Instagram, Twitter (now X), TikTok, and YouTube — and, essentially, lurks. She likes posts, but the accounts are all private and are not “messaging people or commenting on stuff,” she said. “They’re very much passive social media users to an extent — so all I have to do is feed the algorithm: watch content, like content, follow content. But they’re not deceiving people in any way.”