5 ms·

Its not social media. My parents barely use the internet but they live in the same bubble /w fox news and conservative talk radio. Its existed for a long time,

by taurath 10y ago

Its not social media. My parents barely use the internet but they live in the same bubble /w fox news and conservative talk radio. Its existed for a long time, but now there are so many sources and outlets you can stay completely and entirely within the bubble. One could argue about how much a bubble there is on the left... think for example the difference between CNN US and CNN international - one is relatively vapid lowest common denominator infotainment, and the other is hard news. I feel like infotainment/tabloidization and an uneducated populace is the biggest contributor to ignorance. Granted, its hard to know how much of a factor that's always been. I'd love to actually see tags on facebook posts. "Extremely conservative", "Mostly Neutral", "Mostly liked by liberals" etc etc. At least make people think about why they're seeing these sources.

maxerickson 10y ago
A fun thing to do is to watch the CNBC personnel that do Nightly Business Report on PBS. They are obviously incredibly talented people, switching their editorial focus and delivery for the different audience. Not just the hosts, everybody.
iamthepieman 10y ago
"I'd love to actually see tags on facebook posts. "Extremely conservative", "Mostly Neutral", "Mostly liked by liberals" etc etc. At least make people think about why they're seeing these sources" I'd love to see that and a lot more. "Read by your neighbor twenty minutes ago.", "Shared by 40 people within 1 mile of you", "Most liked by self-identified christian conservatives between 42-59 that make 70-90K in combined household income" But really, your suggestion will just allow people to self-filter even more. BreitBart readers aren't avoiding articles from Daily Kos because they think they are just copies of each other.
- taurath 10y ago
  Its the hidden nature of the self filtering that allows people to not be aware they are in a bubble. Just simply the awareness that this is an inherently biased source can make you think about other perspectives. You may go to brietbart because you agree with them, but if half the links are for infowars or other sites that you may not know the biases of it would be extremely helpful to know. Hell, even a browser extension giving you a bias bar with a sliding scale for each source would be super neat.
  - iamthepieman 10y ago
    Is it? That's not a question I know the answer to. I might agree with you but I don't take your point of view as a given. I try to read and listen to content from multiple perspectives but I avoid things that I "know" are wrong and/or ridiculous. It's not so much a judgment call on the validity of their viewpoint as it is the fact that I have limited time to read and ... oh wait, it is totally a judgement call on my part. My thoughts have just turned way too philosophical for a comment to a comment on HN but why the heck do I read anything. I don't know. I need to think now.
internaut 10y ago
> I'd love to actually see tags on facebook posts. "Extremely conservative", "Mostly Neutral", "Mostly liked by liberals" etc etc. This is the smartest suggestion I've seen so far. I think the only thing you can realistically do is encourage metacognition. Telling idealogues from either side 'Your Wrong' will almost certainly have the opposite effect to the one you intended.

by taurath 10y ago

maxerickson 10y ago

A fun thing to do is to watch the CNBC personnel that do Nightly Business Report on PBS. They are obviously incredibly talented people, switching their editorial focus and delivery for the different audience. Not just the hosts, everybody.

iamthepieman 10y ago

"I'd love to actually see tags on facebook posts. "Extremely conservative", "Mostly Neutral", "Mostly liked by liberals" etc etc. At least make people think about why they're seeing these sources" I'd love to see that and a lot more. "Read by your neighbor twenty minutes ago.", "Shared by 40 people within 1 mile of you", "Most liked by self-identified christian conservatives between 42-59 that make 70-90K in combined household income" But really, your suggestion will just allow people to self-filter even more. BreitBart readers aren't avoiding articles from Daily Kos because they think they are just copies of each other.

taurath 10y ago
Its the hidden nature of the self filtering that allows people to not be aware they are in a bubble. Just simply the awareness that this is an inherently biased source can make you think about other perspectives. You may go to brietbart because you agree with them, but if half the links are for infowars or other sites that you may not know the biases of it would be extremely helpful to know. Hell, even a browser extension giving you a bias bar with a sliding scale for each source would be super neat.
- iamthepieman 10y ago
  Is it? That's not a question I know the answer to. I might agree with you but I don't take your point of view as a given. I try to read and listen to content from multiple perspectives but I avoid things that I "know" are wrong and/or ridiculous. It's not so much a judgment call on the validity of their viewpoint as it is the fact that I have limited time to read and ... oh wait, it is totally a judgement call on my part. My thoughts have just turned way too philosophical for a comment to a comment on HN but why the heck do I read anything. I don't know. I need to think now.

internaut 10y ago

> I'd love to actually see tags on facebook posts. "Extremely conservative", "Mostly Neutral", "Mostly liked by liberals" etc etc. This is the smartest suggestion I've seen so far. I think the only thing you can realistically do is encourage metacognition. Telling idealogues from either side 'Your Wrong' will almost certainly have the opposite effect to the one you intended.