Al-Noor Journal for Digital Media Studies

This article titled "Negative Effects of Western Media's Influence in Francophone Africa", discusses the cultural, political, and security repercussions of Western media domination on French-speaking African societies and communities. Based on postcolonialism and media imperialism theories, it argues that Western media continues to be a stealthy tool of neocolonial control, framing African realities using Eurocentric narratives and eroding indigenous languages, traditions, and cultural identities. As it is, this phenomenon generates a cultural dependency whereby Western values are adopted by local audiences as universal standards, thereby minimizing self-representation and fostering an alienation from the local heritage.Among the major issues of this report is structural dependence of Francophone African media organizations on Western wire agencies, including AFP and Reuters. Mainly due to chronic underfunding, infrastructural breakdown, and a lack of professional training, a vast majority of local media organizations opt to reproduce stories prepared by external sources rather than working up original stories about themselves and their communities. This kind of dependence reproduces information hierarchies, excludes African voices, and discourages the emergence of strong, pluralistic media spaces. Furthermore, it is also in line with that of long-standing "pluralist authoritarian" regimes, inasmuch as foreign media dominance and domestic political pressures both operate against the emergence of independent journalism.
This article also considers the security implications of such dependence. Sensationalized representations of extremism and violence, borrowed wholesale from Western media, can potentially enhance fear, provide terrorist agitators with discursive material, and obscure underlying socio-political grievances that drive radicalization. In this way, foreign media influence not only distorts global and local perceptions of terrorism in Africa but also potentially entrenches cycles of insecurity.
By intertwining these strands of neocolonial reproduction, structural dependency, security destabilization, and cultural erosion, the research underlines the necessity of strengthening African informational sovereignty. The research advocates for targeted policies to increase investment in local media production, expand journalistic training, and support Pan-African cooperation in news reporting. These are needed to reduce reliance on foreign agencies and to advance narratives rooted in African perspectives, nuance, and aspirations. Without such reforms, Francophone Africa remains vulnerable to the reaffirmation of neocolonial hierarchies and the recycling of instability through externally controlled media discourses.

In the context of information globalization, the short video industry is booming, which brings new opportunities and changes to the dissemination model of Chinese traditional culture. Short videos have effectively promoted cultural inheritance and innovation, presented traditional culture in a novel form, and enhanced people's cultural identity and cultural confidence.
However, Chinese traditional culture also faces many problems in the process of short video dissemination, such as serious content homogeneity and the prevalence of the wrong idea of "traffic is king", which has led some creators to excessively pursue traffic and ignore cultural connotations.
To solve these problems, it is necessary to innovate the dissemination path, improve the quality of short video content, create unique and culturally rich works, create key IPs and brands, and build a cultural database to provide solid support for the dissemination of traditional culture. This study aims to explore the value and innovative path of Chinese traditional culture dissemination in the era of short videos, promote the vitality and vitality of Chinese traditional culture in the era of short videos, provide valuable references for promoting the widespread dissemination of Chinese traditional culture, and enhance the country's cultural soft power and international influence.

This article discusses the phenomenon of interaction between the millennial generation in Indonesia and artificial intelligence (AI) in the context of confiding in or sharing stories. This research uses the Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) model to analyze the motivations, experiences and challenges faced by users when interacting with AI systems. The theory used includes the concept of "digital natives" from Prensky (2001) and the HCI evaluation criteria developed by Nielsen (2019), which include learnability, efficiency, memorability, errors, and satisfaction.
The research method applied is a qualitative descriptive approach, which aims to provide an in-depth picture of millennial preferences in using Al as a friend to confide in. The research results show that the millennial generation chooses to confide in Al because it offers anonymity, fast responses and comfort. However, challenges such as Al's limitations in understanding emotional context and concerns about data privacy were also identified. This research provides important insights into the role of AI in the social and emotional lives of the millennial generation in Indonesia. Keywords: Artificial Intelligence, Confide, Millennial Generation, Human-Computer Interaction, User Experience.

The article examines the role of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in combating fake news, exploring its methods, successful applications, and key benefits. AI technologies, such as machine learning and natural language processing, enable the rapid detection of false information by analyzing patterns and inconsistencies in large datasets. Examples of successful AI implementation include social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter, which use algorithms to identify and flag misleading content. The advantages of AI lie in its speed, scalability, and ability to process information in real time, making it a critical tool in the fight against disinformation.
However, the article also highlights the technical, ethical, and social risks associated with AI. Technical challenges include algorithmic bias and the difficulty of detecting sophisticated deepfakes. Ethical concerns revolve around privacy, censorship, and the potential misuse of AI for propaganda. Social risks involve the erosion of trust in media and the exacerbation of polarization. To address these challenges, the article emphasizes the need for an interdisciplinary approach, combining expertise in technology, ethics, law, and social sciences to develop robust information verification systems.
The study concludes that while AI is a powerful tool for countering fake news, it also poses significant risks if not properly regulated. To maximize its benefits, strict control, transparency, and adherence to ethical standards are essential.
Recommendations include fostering collaboration between technologists, policymakers, and ethicists to create frameworks that ensure responsible AI use. Additionally, promoting media literacy among the public can help mitigate the impact of disinformation. The future of AI in this field depends on balancing innovation with accountability, ensuring that AI contributes positively to the information landscape.
In summary, AI has the potential to revolutionize the fight against fake news, but its application must be carefully managed to avoid unintended consequences. By addressing technical limitations, ethical concerns, and social risks, and by adopting an interdisciplinary approach, society can harness the power of AI to create a more informed and resilient information ecosystem.

The paper presents error analysis of AI mistakes during experiments with image generation using Shedevrum technology (YandexGPT) in the spring of 2025. The tasks included creating illustrations for little-known literary works, such as The Dark (T’ma) by Leonid Andreev and Her First Ball by Tatiana Shchepkina-Kupernik, in which echoed writers’ impressions of the political terror at a period of the Russian Revolution of 1905-1907. Thus, the AI task has become more difficult due to the ban on creating content related to religion and politics, mentioning specific individuals (here, character real prototypes), and generating content with elements of violence and brutality.
The dominance of the English language worldview (sprachliche Weltbild) in AI “consciousness” is noted: AI mistakes are similar to the mistakes of English-thinking students when learning Russian. In the process of generating the illustrations, some mistakes and clever tricks of Shedevrum coincide with the mistakes of children when they draw or try to avoid inconvenient decisions or solutions.
The paper suggests that the terms ‘aggression’, ‘sociopathy’, etc. are not fully applicable to the description of AI behavior, but arose based on erroneous interpretations (as it happened with the characters of Solaris by Lem). The pragmatic mode of those utterances cannot be unambiguously interpreted as aimed at harming people. This ambiguity hints at the manifestations of the emergent abilities of artificial intelligence.
These observations of the educator specialize in cross-cultural studies and teaching languages other than the student’s native language may probably be reasonably interesting for AI developers and machine learning engineers.

The article is dedicated to the complex comparative analysis of the use of the laugh track in situation comedies (sitcoms) of the USA and Russia, which is considered from historical, cultural, sociological and psychological perspectives. Particular attention is paid to the evolution of this film device: from its institutionalization within the American television industry in the mid-20th century to the adaptation and critical reception in the Russian media space. It is shown that, in American sitcoms, the laugh track traditionally performs the functions of emotional regulation, social validation, and the formation of a collective viewing effect.
In the Russian television tradition, the laugh track is used with less stability and is more often subjected to criticism as an intrusive and excessive device, disrupting the perception of humor, which is characteristic for a high-context culture and based on understatement and implicit forms of the comic. Based on the material from a number of domestic and foreign TV series, cultural attitudes, which determine the viewer`s attitude to laughter accompaniment, are analyzed, and psychological mechanisms of perception are also revealed.
The conclusion is made that the laugh track can be regarded as an indicator of profound differences between models of media consumption in various socio-cultural systems, which reflect the specifics of values, methods of communication, and forms of collective experience. The results allow us to refine the understanding of the transformation of the sitcom genre within the Russian context and indicate the significance of further interdisciplinary research of the phenomenon of laughter in mass culture.

This paper investigates the symbolic politics behind the renaming of public infrastructure during President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s administration, with a focus on how Nigerian media frame these acts of political memorialization. Anchored in Agenda-Setting Theory, the study conducts a content analysis of 12 news articles published between 2024 and 2025 across four prominent Nigerian news platforms; Daily Trust, Punch, This Day, and Daily Post. The selected reportage covers the renaming of major national landmarks, including the International Conference Centre in Abuja, the Minna Airport, and the inauguration of the Bola Ahmed Tinubu Barracks. By quantitatively examining word frequency through content analysis, the study explores how news media either reinforce or contest the symbolic capital embedded in infrastructural renaming.
The findings suggest that the media act not only as channels of information but as active players in legitimizing or challenging presidential legacy-building. Varying coverage styles; ranging from celebratory framing to subtle critique, reveal underlying editorial ideologies and political alignments. This paper argues that infrastructural renaming serves as a discursive strategy of power inscription, while media reportage functions as a key arena for shaping national memory and contesting historical narrative ownership. Ultimately, the paper contributes to discussions on media framing, postcolonial leadership symbolism, and the instrumentalization of public memory in Nigerian democracy.

The article examines current trends in product promotion on social media in 2025, with a special focus on the specifics of SMM communications for so-called “low-emotional” or “non-creative” product categories. Using the case of the flooring retail chain “Upravdom”, it explores the principles of building an effective SMM strategy aimed at engaging audiences and fostering sustained interest in visually unattractive and weakly viral products.
Particular attention is given to the use of modern digital tools such as content personalization algorithms, AI-driven recommendations, visual storytelling, interactive formats, and shorts videos. The article analyzes key approaches to creating valuable content that highlights the practical and aesthetic significance of the product in the consumer’s everyday life.
The role of emotional context and local positioning in shaping communication with the target audience is also considered.
The case presented in the article demonstrates how products considered “non-creative” from the perspective of classical SMM can be effectively integrated into social media, becoming part of the digital consumer experience.
The findings may be useful for digital marketing professionals, retail brands operating in the durable goods segment, and researchers in the field of communication technologies.

Human trafficking crimes are one of the most dangerous criminal phenomena that affect modern societies, and digital media emerges as a dual tool used in both the spread and detection of these crimes, as it allows the introduction of methods of electronic extortion and sexual exploitation of children, and exposes smuggling networks and illegal immigration, as digital media has worked in exposing brokers and violations against servants through this, digital media enhances community awareness, and supports judicial and legislative efforts to protect victims and limit the spread of these Phenomena.
The problem of the study lies in the prevalence of human trafficking crimes and the exploitation of digital media in the dissemination of these crimes, in contrast to the need to enhance its role in exposing violations, raising community awareness, and supporting judicial and legislative efforts to limit the spread of the phenomenon.
The study aims to clarify the role of digital media in detecting human trafficking crimes, increasing community awareness of them, and supporting judicial and legislative efforts to reduce the spread of these crimes.

This research will examine one of the most pressing issues in the media industry in 2025. Emotional overload is one that has become key to psychological impact in today's media space. The article looks at this problem from two sides: the overabundance of information resources and news, and the impact of artificial intelligence on content creation - and then connects the two parts of these problems into one whole. The article analyzes how the overabundance of digital content: video, news, audio and textual information - affects the human psyche, behavior in life and in the media space. It also considers the impact of AI on content generation, its authenticity and distribution, as well as about personalized recommendation feeds.
Current statistics and data from psychology and media communications are discussed, such as analyzing interviews and statistics that confirm the growing symptoms of emotional exhaustion among Internet users.
The article talks about the concept of “clipthinking”: its dangers and benefits. The article explains the terms “info noise”, “infodemic”, “doomscrolling” and others. Possible solutions to the problem are given, and the conclusion talks about the development of media literacy, emotional self-control.