7 ms·

It's far easier online to find and follow people who have the same opinion as you, and block out people with views that you disagree with. And before you know i

It's far easier online to find and follow people who have the same opinion as you, and block out people with views that you disagree with. And before you know it, you're sucked into an echo chamber with only news that confirms your views.

Robotbeat 6y ago
I think it's worse than that. What Twitter especially does is make it easy to find people who are the worst possible version of those you disagree with. Every "nobody REALLY thinks that" is easy to disprove (although still generally accurate!)... You find ACTUAL neoNazis. ACTUAL tankies. ACTUAL fill in the blanks. That's what radicalizes people. That, and the easy ability to mob folks who don't toe the line on whatever issue. The most disgusting takes on both sides are amplified, not blocked. And even when blocked, still screen-capped. You see the most unreasonable perspectives amplified but the broad middle folk, or those who have legitimate points, either driven off the platform or who just aren't amplified. EDIT:I know this is usually frowned upon on HN, but I must ask: Why the downvotes?
- PaulKeeble 6y ago
  Both sides think they are arguing with the reasonable people on the other side of the debate,but in actuality the extremists are posting a lot more content than most users and they are get amplified as they get more "engagement". Engagement is a terrible measure for a single tweet in the nieve way because it amplifies really awful things that produce anger. What reddit, twitter even youtube get wrong is that mixed up and down votes might mean very engaging but it does not mean good wholesome healthy content, infact it definitely means the opposite. If you just amplify engagement as they do today it might bring more clicks but it hurts society and builds extremists.
- self_awareness 6y ago
  My take is that lots of extremists are on HN, and they dislike with what you wrote.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
- yodelshady 6y ago
  Don't know why, it's a very sensible post to me. I'm not sure echo chambers are bad - I like the "warrens and plazas" idea. If ideas really are a market - or more relevantly, policy is a market - we'd never buy anything if we only had half-baked prototypes to choose from. That said, twitter really makes me appreciate traditional politics. Party states in their manifesto they value x, y, z Party representative does something that is consistent, or not, with that (individuals get to decide this, even if the media get to present "an angle"). Some "undesirable group" (Neo-nazis, tankies, etc) may vote for that party, but they don't control the message. Or if they do, the party leader has failed. Twitter politics, by contrast, is built on the fundamental attribution error. If you don't take the most charitable interpretation of my side, and the worst interpretation of theirs, you're my enemy.
- mrec 6y ago
  "Nutpicking" is a very satisfying (and much easier to type) term for this phenomenon.
hhs 6y ago
> And before you know it, you're sucked into an echo chamber with only news that confirms your views. Indeed, this is how the infotainment ecosystem thrives.
- pythonslayer 6y ago
  just don’t blame this on capitalism.
anorakoverflow 6y ago
This echo chamber concept is cited time and time again in mainstream discussions, so much so that communication researchers argue that it has created “its own discursive reality”[1]. In fact, there is very little empirical support for the filter bubble and echo chamber concepts as a population-wide phenomenon. Social media users have been found to encounter more diverse news than non-users. And even when we think about people holding extremist views, findings suggest them to be even more engaged with the mainstream news compared to other news users—after all, they are interested to know what “the enemy” might be up to. If you’re interested, the article below gives a great overview on the origin of this concept and different disciplines’ view on the subject (it’s open-access as well). [1] Bruns, A. (2019). Filter bubble. Internet Policy Review, 8(4). https://www.doi.org/10.14763/2019.4.1426 https://www.doi.org/10.14763/2019.4.1426
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  This is amusingly visible in lots of discussion groups (including HN!), where you will find large numbers of participants arguing that the group itself is an echo chamber—but each of them arguing that it is an echo chamber with a very different viewpoint, usually diametrically opposed to the person making the argument.
- luckylion 6y ago
  > Social media users have been found to encounter more diverse news than non-users. And even when we think about people holding extremist views, findings suggest them to be even more engaged with the mainstream news compared to other news users—after all, they are interested to know what “the enemy” might be up to. But that's perfectly compatible with echo chambers. They will interact with the outside world, but their interpretation of things that happen comes from within the echo chamber. Anti-Vaxxers know that there are people believing in vaccinations, they read about them in the papers, but then they might just post a comment "it's what Bill Gates wants you to believe so he can sell more 5G towers to Huawei". The echo chamber does echo their world view and interpretation of events, and just exposing them to "diverse news" won't change that, or we really wouldn't have a large variety of fringe groups.
  - 6y ago

Robotbeat 6y ago

I think it's worse than that. What Twitter especially does is make it easy to find people who are the worst possible version of those you disagree with. Every "nobody REALLY thinks that" is easy to disprove (although still generally accurate!)... You find ACTUAL neoNazis. ACTUAL tankies. ACTUAL fill in the blanks. That's what radicalizes people. That, and the easy ability to mob folks who don't toe the line on whatever issue. The most disgusting takes on both sides are amplified, not blocked. And even when blocked, still screen-capped. You see the most unreasonable perspectives amplified but the broad middle folk, or those who have legitimate points, either driven off the platform or who just aren't amplified. EDIT:I know this is usually frowned upon on HN, but I must ask: Why the downvotes?

PaulKeeble 6y ago
Both sides think they are arguing with the reasonable people on the other side of the debate,but in actuality the extremists are posting a lot more content than most users and they are get amplified as they get more "engagement". Engagement is a terrible measure for a single tweet in the nieve way because it amplifies really awful things that produce anger. What reddit, twitter even youtube get wrong is that mixed up and down votes might mean very engaging but it does not mean good wholesome healthy content, infact it definitely means the opposite. If you just amplify engagement as they do today it might bring more clicks but it hurts society and builds extremists.
self_awareness 6y ago
My take is that lots of extremists are on HN, and they dislike with what you wrote.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
yodelshady 6y ago
Don't know why, it's a very sensible post to me. I'm not sure echo chambers are bad - I like the "warrens and plazas" idea. If ideas really are a market - or more relevantly, policy is a market - we'd never buy anything if we only had half-baked prototypes to choose from. That said, twitter really makes me appreciate traditional politics. Party states in their manifesto they value x, y, z Party representative does something that is consistent, or not, with that (individuals get to decide this, even if the media get to present "an angle"). Some "undesirable group" (Neo-nazis, tankies, etc) may vote for that party, but they don't control the message. Or if they do, the party leader has failed. Twitter politics, by contrast, is built on the fundamental attribution error. If you don't take the most charitable interpretation of my side, and the worst interpretation of theirs, you're my enemy.
mrec 6y ago
"Nutpicking" is a very satisfying (and much easier to type) term for this phenomenon.

hhs 6y ago

> And before you know it, you're sucked into an echo chamber with only news that confirms your views. Indeed, this is how the infotainment ecosystem thrives.

pythonslayer 6y ago
just don’t blame this on capitalism.

anorakoverflow 6y ago

This echo chamber concept is cited time and time again in mainstream discussions, so much so that communication researchers argue that it has created “its own discursive reality”[1]. In fact, there is very little empirical support for the filter bubble and echo chamber concepts as a population-wide phenomenon. Social media users have been found to encounter more diverse news than non-users. And even when we think about people holding extremist views, findings suggest them to be even more engaged with the mainstream news compared to other news users—after all, they are interested to know what “the enemy” might be up to. If you’re interested, the article below gives a great overview on the origin of this concept and different disciplines’ view on the subject (it’s open-access as well). [1] Bruns, A. (2019). Filter bubble. Internet Policy Review, 8(4). https://www.doi.org/10.14763/2019.4.1426 https://www.doi.org/10.14763/2019.4.1426

dragonwriter 6y ago
This is amusingly visible in lots of discussion groups (including HN!), where you will find large numbers of participants arguing that the group itself is an echo chamber—but each of them arguing that it is an echo chamber with a very different viewpoint, usually diametrically opposed to the person making the argument.
luckylion 6y ago
> Social media users have been found to encounter more diverse news than non-users. And even when we think about people holding extremist views, findings suggest them to be even more engaged with the mainstream news compared to other news users—after all, they are interested to know what “the enemy” might be up to. But that's perfectly compatible with echo chambers. They will interact with the outside world, but their interpretation of things that happen comes from within the echo chamber. Anti-Vaxxers know that there are people believing in vaccinations, they read about them in the papers, but then they might just post a comment "it's what Bill Gates wants you to believe so he can sell more 5G towers to Huawei". The echo chamber does echo their world view and interpretation of events, and just exposing them to "diverse news" won't change that, or we really wouldn't have a large variety of fringe groups.
- 6y ago