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Say I go over to Fred, and ask him for a book recommendation. I've known Fred for a while, and he's given me good book recommendations in the past, so I usuall

Say I go over to Fred, and ask him for a book recommendation. I've known Fred for a while, and he's given me good book recommendations in the past, so I usually listen to what he says. Except this time, Fred says that the book I'm most likely to enjoy is Mein Kampf. I'm flabbergasted, because this doesn't sound like the Fred I know. Fred says that he has no idea what the book is about, but there's a small number of people who vigorously recommend it, and they're just so gosh-darned enthusiastic about it that now he's recommending it to anybody with even the slightest amount of interest in politics. He knows that I just read Elie Wiesel's Night, so it seemed right up my alley to Fred. Swap out "Youtube" for "Fred", and maybe that helps to show the issue. I'm not making an exaggeration here. Youtube has recommended that I watch Nazi propaganda, because I had just recently watched videos debunking those exact propaganda films. When "recommendations" become "recommendation engines", and the human steps out of the loop, the recommender still has a moral responsibility for the things they recommend. Without a human in the loop, it's a lot easier to close one's eyes to that responsibility. Maybe the solution is to go back to things that don't scale, and keep humans in the loop. Maybe the solution is to spend just as much effort on the quality of the recommendations as the addictiveness of the recommendations. But the current state is not sustainable.

root_axis 5y ago
I think your analogy supports the GP's point. The recommendation engine doesn't understand that the recommendation is a violation, it makes a heuristic error because there is an indomitable mountain of content to classify and it lacks the sophistication to accurately do so. It's certainly logical to hold YouTube accountable for the content it recommends, but it's also naive to expect it to achieve the impossible.
colejohnson66 5y ago
> Fred says that he has no idea what the book is about… And that’s the thing people don’t understand when they blame YouTube. If Fred is YouTube, and Fred doesn’t know that Mein Kampf is propaganda, how is YouTube supposed to remove it? You’re just reconfirming OP’s point: YouTube doesn’t know that a video violates its policies.
- MereInterest 5y ago
  Fred has neglected his duty to know what he is recommending, in the same way that YouTube has neglected their duty. The key part I was trying to get across with the analogy wasn't just that Fred didn't know what he was recommending, but that he didn't do his due diligence before giving a recommendation.
  - marzell 5y ago
    I feel everyone replying to my comment is missing the overall picture. YouTube has content guidelines... that doesn't mean they are obligated to enforce them, it only means they have easy reasons to moderate content where they feel like it. Their only real interest is profit, generally through showing you ads (by keeping you glued to the screen, sometimes by showing you controversial content) and by harvesting data. I'm not saying that's "right" in a moral or ethical way, it is simply the truth. If you recognize that, then it doesn't matter that they are recommending videos that ostensibly violate their own terms, and arguing otherwise seems to make you just willingly ignorant. YouTube has no incentive to incorporate "regrettability flags" into their algorithm, except to the degree that it serves them. I'd go further to say that YouTube probably could do a better, more thorough job of cleansing content on their platform, without any additional cost. But having a certain amount of content that is controversial, which panders to a vocal minority, etc actually serves their platform. They use the 1st amendment sometimes to justify this, but they actually don't care one bit about any of that. All they care about is money, and at this scale the dynamics get kinda interesting.
    - talaketu 5y ago
      So, your original post was a question, and I answered it. But maybe your question was rhetorical and masked an overall point you are now trying to clarify. But I still don't understand the point your making! Are you trying to absolve YouTube of any moral responsibility, while personifying with them with agency ("they have reasons", "they feel like it", "the degree that serves them", "they care") and granting them rights ("1st amendment")? As for what really motivates corporations - I believe survival, not profit, is the essential goal. Profit is just one strategy - but another is not poisoning it's own environment.
Sebb767 5y ago
> Youtube has recommended that I watch Nazi propaganda, because I had just recently watched videos debunking those exact propaganda films. When you're interested in this field and watched documentaries about it, it is not too far off that you want to watch the source material. Now, it depends a bit on whether we're talking about "modern" Nazi propaganda or 1930's Nazi propaganda - the latter one can be pretty clearly categorized as historical interest, while the former might a bit more problematic. I don't want to say that showing countering view points is generally a bad thing, but in this case it's clearly crossing a line. It, however, also totally fits in your analogy: If someone is very interested in politics, it makes sense for them to possibly want to read works of dictators and the likes. Not to get radicalized, but to know what happened and be able to prevent history from repeating itself. I think the point you're trying to make is that the recommendation algorithm should check videos for violations, but then GPs point still stands: Would YT be able to determine the policy violation, the video would probably be already taken down long before it reaches recommendations.
- MereInterest 5y ago
  > Now, it depends a bit on whether we're talking about "modern" Nazi propaganda or 1930's Nazi propaganda - the latter one can be pretty clearly categorized as historical interest, while the former might a bit more problematic. I don't want to say that showing countering view points is generally a bad thing, but in this case it's clearly crossing a line. In this case, it was modern Nazi propaganda. This particular incident was a few years ago, but the title implied that it would be going through the history of a particular dogwhistle. I naively assumed that the history of that dogwhistle would be used as an example of the early steps for de-humanization of Jewish people, how to recognize those early signs of racial hatred, and what can be done to best combat that hatred. Instead, from the outline in the first 30 seconds of the video, the speaker was going through different atrocities committed, and lamenting how limited each atrocity was. It was pure Nazi propaganda, disguised as a lecture, and should not have been recommended to anyone. A human could have recognized it as such, had a human been within the decision-making loop for recommendations. > Would YT be able to determine the policy violation, the video would probably be already taken down long before it reaches recommendations. I think systems tend to proceed based on the incentives and rules that are set up within that system. Youtube's recommendations are designed to increase engagement, regardless of societal cost. I agree that if a human had seen the video, it would have been taken down. But that will rarely be the case, because there are minimal incentives for having good recommendations, as compared to the incentives for having engaging recommendations. Much of this is due to the push for automating everything, even if that automation results in poor results. I am of the opinion that if something cannot be done correctly at large scale, then it ought to be done only at small scale.
philwelch 5y ago
It seems like a reasonable assumption that, as of 2021, the majority of people who read Mein Kampf or watch Triumph des Willens are not Nazis, but rather people who are curious about the history of Nazi Germany for normal, good-faith reasons. If your personal attitude towards the Nazis is "never again", as it should be, you ought to be interested in how it happened the first time. Part of how it happened the first time is that a lot of Germans actually voted for them and many of the others just sort of went along with the program. Why would they do such a thing? How do I make sure I'm not fooled the same way they were? These are some haunting questions. I, myself, have watched this sort of primary source material on YouTube, e.g. subtitled videos of some of Hitler's speeches. You might assume that Hitler spent most of his speeches ranting and raving, but he spent a lot of time hiding behind the mask of a responsible politician promising to reduce unemployment. I think watching that stuff helps to answer those questions. And, as I recall, I don't think I actually went out of my way to search for it, either.

root_axis 5y ago

I think your analogy supports the GP's point. The recommendation engine doesn't understand that the recommendation is a violation, it makes a heuristic error because there is an indomitable mountain of content to classify and it lacks the sophistication to accurately do so. It's certainly logical to hold YouTube accountable for the content it recommends, but it's also naive to expect it to achieve the impossible.

colejohnson66 5y ago

> Fred says that he has no idea what the book is about… And that’s the thing people don’t understand when they blame YouTube. If Fred is YouTube, and Fred doesn’t know that Mein Kampf is propaganda, how is YouTube supposed to remove it? You’re just reconfirming OP’s point: YouTube doesn’t know that a video violates its policies.

MereInterest 5y ago
Fred has neglected his duty to know what he is recommending, in the same way that YouTube has neglected their duty. The key part I was trying to get across with the analogy wasn't just that Fred didn't know what he was recommending, but that he didn't do his due diligence before giving a recommendation.
- marzell 5y ago
  I feel everyone replying to my comment is missing the overall picture. YouTube has content guidelines... that doesn't mean they are obligated to enforce them, it only means they have easy reasons to moderate content where they feel like it. Their only real interest is profit, generally through showing you ads (by keeping you glued to the screen, sometimes by showing you controversial content) and by harvesting data. I'm not saying that's "right" in a moral or ethical way, it is simply the truth. If you recognize that, then it doesn't matter that they are recommending videos that ostensibly violate their own terms, and arguing otherwise seems to make you just willingly ignorant. YouTube has no incentive to incorporate "regrettability flags" into their algorithm, except to the degree that it serves them. I'd go further to say that YouTube probably could do a better, more thorough job of cleansing content on their platform, without any additional cost. But having a certain amount of content that is controversial, which panders to a vocal minority, etc actually serves their platform. They use the 1st amendment sometimes to justify this, but they actually don't care one bit about any of that. All they care about is money, and at this scale the dynamics get kinda interesting.
  - talaketu 5y ago
    So, your original post was a question, and I answered it. But maybe your question was rhetorical and masked an overall point you are now trying to clarify. But I still don't understand the point your making! Are you trying to absolve YouTube of any moral responsibility, while personifying with them with agency ("they have reasons", "they feel like it", "the degree that serves them", "they care") and granting them rights ("1st amendment")? As for what really motivates corporations - I believe survival, not profit, is the essential goal. Profit is just one strategy - but another is not poisoning it's own environment.

Sebb767 5y ago

> Youtube has recommended that I watch Nazi propaganda, because I had just recently watched videos debunking those exact propaganda films. When you're interested in this field and watched documentaries about it, it is not too far off that you want to watch the source material. Now, it depends a bit on whether we're talking about "modern" Nazi propaganda or 1930's Nazi propaganda - the latter one can be pretty clearly categorized as historical interest, while the former might a bit more problematic. I don't want to say that showing countering view points is generally a bad thing, but in this case it's clearly crossing a line. It, however, also totally fits in your analogy: If someone is very interested in politics, it makes sense for them to possibly want to read works of dictators and the likes. Not to get radicalized, but to know what happened and be able to prevent history from repeating itself. I think the point you're trying to make is that the recommendation algorithm should check videos for violations, but then GPs point still stands: Would YT be able to determine the policy violation, the video would probably be already taken down long before it reaches recommendations.

MereInterest 5y ago
> Now, it depends a bit on whether we're talking about "modern" Nazi propaganda or 1930's Nazi propaganda - the latter one can be pretty clearly categorized as historical interest, while the former might a bit more problematic. I don't want to say that showing countering view points is generally a bad thing, but in this case it's clearly crossing a line. In this case, it was modern Nazi propaganda. This particular incident was a few years ago, but the title implied that it would be going through the history of a particular dogwhistle. I naively assumed that the history of that dogwhistle would be used as an example of the early steps for de-humanization of Jewish people, how to recognize those early signs of racial hatred, and what can be done to best combat that hatred. Instead, from the outline in the first 30 seconds of the video, the speaker was going through different atrocities committed, and lamenting how limited each atrocity was. It was pure Nazi propaganda, disguised as a lecture, and should not have been recommended to anyone. A human could have recognized it as such, had a human been within the decision-making loop for recommendations. > Would YT be able to determine the policy violation, the video would probably be already taken down long before it reaches recommendations. I think systems tend to proceed based on the incentives and rules that are set up within that system. Youtube's recommendations are designed to increase engagement, regardless of societal cost. I agree that if a human had seen the video, it would have been taken down. But that will rarely be the case, because there are minimal incentives for having good recommendations, as compared to the incentives for having engaging recommendations. Much of this is due to the push for automating everything, even if that automation results in poor results. I am of the opinion that if something cannot be done correctly at large scale, then it ought to be done only at small scale.

philwelch 5y ago

It seems like a reasonable assumption that, as of 2021, the majority of people who read Mein Kampf or watch Triumph des Willens are not Nazis, but rather people who are curious about the history of Nazi Germany for normal, good-faith reasons. If your personal attitude towards the Nazis is "never again", as it should be, you ought to be interested in how it happened the first time. Part of how it happened the first time is that a lot of Germans actually voted for them and many of the others just sort of went along with the program. Why would they do such a thing? How do I make sure I'm not fooled the same way they were? These are some haunting questions. I, myself, have watched this sort of primary source material on YouTube, e.g. subtitled videos of some of Hitler's speeches. You might assume that Hitler spent most of his speeches ranting and raving, but he spent a lot of time hiding behind the mask of a responsible politician promising to reduce unemployment. I think watching that stuff helps to answer those questions. And, as I recall, I don't think I actually went out of my way to search for it, either.