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Launch of the Re-Boot Social Media Lab

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Friday, March 25, 2022 marked the launch of the Re-Boot Social Media Lab - the new initiative at the TUM Think Tank at the Munich School of Politics and Public Policy. 

The Re-Boot Social Media Lab is an innovative, public good-oriented project that takes a collaborative, problem-based, and impact-oriented approach. The Lab is dedicated to the grand challenge of improving the current state of social media and harnessing its potential for social impact such as human well-being, socio-political engagement, and sustainability.

At the launch event, 11 project teams from a variety of disciplines, including political science, sports and health science, education, and computer science, presented their ideas on how to address the social media crisis. The diverse project ideas approached this task from different angles and thrusts: What is the best way to promote skills for using and accessing social media for different social actors? How can we deal with some of the most negative effects of social media on the one hand and use social media as a tool for the common good on the other? How can and should we rethink the foundations and mechanisms of social media?

Several working groups are now being formed, which will (further) develop and test their projects together with various stakeholder groups within the Re-Boot Social Media Lab and then also work out concrete solutions for their respective problems. The Lab will be open to all TUM researchers as well as affiliated partners, with the explicit goal of bringing together different stakeholders from research, politics, society, and practice to jointly find promising solutions to some selected key challenges around social media.

If you would like to be part of the Re-Boot Social Media Lab, feel free to email us at thinktank@hfp.tum.de or contact Dr. Markus B. Siewert. You can also find some background information on the idea of the "Think and Do Tank" at the Munich School of Politics and Public Policy and the Re-Boot Social Media Lab in the interview with Prof. Dr. Urs Gasser, Rector of the HfP and Dean of the TUM School of Social Sciences, which was published on April 8, 2022 in the Tagesspiegel Background Digitalisierung & KI.

Contact details

Dr. Markus B. Siewert
Managing Director, TUM Think Tank
Munich School of Politics & Public Policy
TUM School of Social Sciences and Technology
Richard-Wagner-Str. 1 / 80333 Munich
E-Mail: markus.siewert@hfp.tum.de
Phone: +49 (0)89 907793 – 252