The latest allegation indicates that Twitter bots were employed to vote for Oscars in favor of Zack Snyder‘s Justice League and his most recent Netflix flick, Army of the Dead.
The Oscars were broadcast on ABC earlier this year, and it was met with a deluge of criticism. That Will Smith slapping Chris Rock on Academy Awards stage due to making a crack about his wife, Jada Pinkett Smith, was the clearest proof. The results of a Twitter poll held by the Academy Awards in 2021 to determine the Cheer Worthy Moment and Fan Favorite Film of 2021 was another contentious topic, albeit receiving less attention than the first. In both instances, the award went to a film directed by Zack Snyder.
The online Twitter poll for the Cheer Worthy Moment was given to Zack Snyder‘s Justice League when The Flash joined The Speed Force. The 2021 Fan Favorite Picture was awarded to his Netflix film, Army of the Dead. Now, it seems that both of these Oscar voting processes were manipulated.
The majority of voters in the two Oscar categories were independent web applications. According to reports from Tweetbinder, a monitoring tool for hashtag analytics disclosed that the most active donors to both polls were made up of these programs, which weeded out thousands of false votes for Army of the Dead and Zack Snyder‘s Justice League. In addition, David Kirsch, a professor at the University of Maryland who has examined fanbots, concurred that the bulk of pro-Zack Snyder accounts did not seem to have been created by a human user but stopped short of labeling them bots.
Telescope, the company engaged to conduct the first Twitter Oscar polls, did not reply to demands for comment. Zack Snyder‘s spokesperson also refused to comment on the matter. However, the Academy is still sticking by its online poll and will not rule out doing another Oscar poll next year.
HBO Max currently offers both versions of Justice League for streaming.
