3 ms·

I have no familiarity with David Icke, but I wonder how much of his "popularity" was fueled by the Youtube algorithm recommending his gullible viewers more and

I have no familiarity with David Icke, but I wonder how much of his "popularity" was fueled by the Youtube algorithm recommending his gullible viewers more and more of the same kind of conspiracy content. I remember speaking to a Flat-Earther once (yes, they actually exist), and it seemed he basically became a flat-earther because he watched one flat-earth video and Youtube kept recommending him more similar content until he became convinced. He also believed in basically every other conspiracy theory (eg. anti-vaxxing) due to spending a considerable amount of time in this Youtube rabbit-hole. Perhaps instead of simply blaming and deleting individual accounts, Youtube should accept responsibility for the dark side of its recommendation algorithms and stop feeding people the same kind of one-sided content espousing the same conspiracy theories.

Andrex 6y ago
They've already done this, and it's already been effective: https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/03/03/905565/youtube-halved-conspiracy-theory-videos-recommends/ https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/03/03/905565/youtube-h... Half is a good starting point, but obviously I think YouTube wants to push that higher. This article is from two months ago, also.
whywhywhywhy 6y ago
He was prolific in the conspiracy space and famous in the UK long before YouTube even existed. He doesn't need YouTube to get his opinions out there.
RobertKerans 6y ago
As sibling commenter said, was well known in UK, but anecdotally (from talking to other FB conspiracy theorists, also including a flat earther, and from having a few close acquaintances of that bent) this seems spot on. Literally all of them do the same thing, following YT recs, often sitting for hours. Specifically re Icke, I've talked to otherwise reasonable people who will watch him _despite knowing_ who he is because he comes across as reasonable (and much of what he says fits a certain worldview -- note this isn't left or right specific). He is a good speaker, which you would expect given he was a presenter before he decided to demonstrate he was absolutely batshit crazy live on TV. For people unaware of this, this demonstration was why he was well known in the UK - he went on the biggest talkshow on TV to proclaim that he was the son of god and that the world is controlled by a cabal of lizard people (and was going to be consumed by tidal waves etc etc). The lizard people cabal idea may seem at first glance to be a fairly obvious crude antisemitic trope, but he seems to be absolutely serious about everything, he literally means lizards.

Andrex 6y ago

They've already done this, and it's already been effective: https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/03/03/905565/youtube-halved-conspiracy-theory-videos-recommends/ https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/03/03/905565/youtube-h... Half is a good starting point, but obviously I think YouTube wants to push that higher. This article is from two months ago, also.

whywhywhywhy 6y ago

He was prolific in the conspiracy space and famous in the UK long before YouTube even existed. He doesn't need YouTube to get his opinions out there.

RobertKerans 6y ago

As sibling commenter said, was well known in UK, but anecdotally (from talking to other FB conspiracy theorists, also including a flat earther, and from having a few close acquaintances of that bent) this seems spot on. Literally all of them do the same thing, following YT recs, often sitting for hours. Specifically re Icke, I've talked to otherwise reasonable people who will watch him _despite knowing_ who he is because he comes across as reasonable (and much of what he says fits a certain worldview -- note this isn't left or right specific). He is a good speaker, which you would expect given he was a presenter before he decided to demonstrate he was absolutely batshit crazy live on TV. For people unaware of this, this demonstration was why he was well known in the UK - he went on the biggest talkshow on TV to proclaim that he was the son of god and that the world is controlled by a cabal of lizard people (and was going to be consumed by tidal waves etc etc). The lizard people cabal idea may seem at first glance to be a fairly obvious crude antisemitic trope, but he seems to be absolutely serious about everything, he literally means lizards.