Butterfly is a political media and civic engagement app, for reliable and divers information. The idea is to provide a news format, which would take the strengths of classic media, but offer it trustworthy and engaging. On the main feed, the user would watch short political clips, that function as “trailers”, while on the bottom of the video is a title header. When swiping down, a scroll based transition will lead to an article, that is written and designed by content creators or known publishers. After reading the article, the user answers short question polls and demonstrates his feelings on a slider. Had the user swiped the clip up, he would have got an analytics board, which has features like the author's credibility, political direction, rhetoric etc. Such engagement shapes the algorithm, while verification is done through community notes and verified volunteers for internal rewards. There are still classic elements, like the comment, or the repost function, which allow the user to repost in individual, topic-based sections. Additional elements, like discussion portfolios, or timelines for political developments should engage in fact-based discussions and provide transparency. Butterfly’s community should also get counter-opinions and unknown stories in their recommendations.

Political media sources are playing a big role in our society and are heavily criticised. Even though, there are a lot more problems to it, which Butterfly could solve, here are some relevant ones: 1.         Social media algorithms are toxic for consumption of political, or related content. Platforms like TikTok, Instagram, X etc. are pushing content based on its popularity, especially clicks and likes. This means, that mostly popular content will be very simple and emotional, which can easily lead to a spread of misinformation, conspiracy theories, or fake news. Things that happen on big platforms all the time. Political content does not have to be valid on social media, but it needs to be entertaining and format adjusted, which makes up modern populism, that is spread across all platforms. Butterfly solves this problem by introducing different ranking features, which are polls and sliders, instead of likes. This kind of feedback, combined with verification is making up the new algorithm, that pushes more qualitative and relevant content, based on the users overall activity and not simply his interests. The need to make more than a clip and short description to be relevant forces creators to offer better information. 2. Social media can and will push political agendas, which leads to polarization. This can happen unintentionally, due again to algorithms, but sometimes also intentionally, especially during elections or relevant political events. By pushing content with a certain political narrative, the platforms expose its users to this narrative on a daily basis, even if the user is not needing the platform for political information. A potential consequence of this is that users get trapped into certain political “bubbles” and engage only in these echo chambers. Butterfly offers a solution by making one of the suggested clips after finishing an article being from the opposite political spectrum. The discussion portfolio element should provide the opportunity to collect as many contents, coming from political directions, on a topic, as possible and discuss it. From time to time the user should get a recommendation for contrary political views, topics he is less interested in or underrepresented stories. 3. Traditional media sources (newspapers/TV channels) are well presented in their traditional fields, but are not always as good adapted to the usage on technical devices. Commonly and across different countries, their apps, but especially websites, looks very unorganized and overflown with content. Even though there are different sections for the large quantity of content, it does not specifically focus on things, the user might be interested in or should see. Especially negative are the ads, which make the source look unprofessional and are partly stretched over big parts of the site, which is distracting. Butterfly resolves this library-like structure. The swiping principle allows having a closer look at a potential article, so it is not invisible in the large amount of all the other articles, even if not attractive to the user. People using butterfly have not only a “for you”-thread but also other ones related to different topics, making them not just headliners, but organized content, that might be more appearing. Butterflies appearance allows trying a new type of ads. Users would get a product ad, between clips, like on Instagram. When scrolling down, the scroll based transition can present a landing page for a specific product, instead of directly taking the user to the website. It makes ads look better and be engaging.