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> No targeted advertising. Strong disagree. Why the hell shouldn't I be able show ads to people who want to see them? > No algorithmic news feed. HN is an al

> No targeted advertising. Strong disagree. Why the hell shouldn't I be able show ads to people who want to see them? > No algorithmic news feed. HN is an algorithmic feed.

mullingitover 5y ago
> Why the hell shouldn't I be able show ads to people who want to see them? Nobody's stopping you. If you want to show ads to people interested in football, post ads on a football site. If you want to show ads to people interested in horses, show them on a horses site. If this type of non-invasive targeting to display ads doesn't make you as much profit, well that's a you problem. > HN is an algorithmic feed. You seem to be struggling with the idea of a 'bespoke' algorithm where everyone's algorithm is different, informed by an internet-wide surveillance system. This is the difference between HN and FB.
specialist 5y ago
Targeted ads. Targeted. As in specifically and exquisitely targeted to individual people based upon datum gathered from surveiling everyone. Still legitimate, and maybe even encouraged, are contextual ads, banners, sponsorships, branding, swag, paid placement, influencers, misc calls to action, etc. Please rest your concerns. Late stage capitalism will continue unimpeded after Facebook's wings are clipped. Social media will revert to less noxious enterprises, like metafilter and craigslist. > HN is an algorithmic feed. Opt-in. Transparent. What is FB's equivalent to HN's /newest? I'm not crazy about HN's ranking. It's pretty good, non-toxic, seems fair. But someone other than me is making judgement calls. I much prefer client side (user controlled) filtering and sorting, like with any generic RSS reader. Repeating myself: All HN visitors see the same feed. A crucial qualitative point you pointedly do not acknowledge. Nor do you answer any of my questions.
- quotemstr 5y ago
  Ad targeting is just a bugbear for a section of the tech activist crowd. There is nothing fundamentally wrong with a site like Twitter noticing that I tend to post a lot about cats and showing me cat ads as a result. No, it's not self-evident that targeting is bad, and no, behavioral targeting doesn't require "surveiling" everyone internet-wide. > Late stage capitalism I don't subscribe to the neo-Marxist worldview that uses this "late stage capitalism" frame all the time. Capitalism is the natural order of the universe, not some temporary aberration on the way to your Utopia. > Opt-in. Transparent. Not transparent, and hardly opt-in: HN feed ranking is the default. > I much prefer client side (user controlled) filtering and sorting, like with any generic RSS reader. Okay, so people seeing different feeds is good... > Repeating myself: All HN visitors see the same feed. A crucial qualitative point you pointedly do not acknowledge. ... and now people seeing different feeds is bad. Make up your mind. Different people should see different feeds because they're interested in different things. There's nothing sinister or nefarious about showing people stories about topics that interest them and not showing them stories about topics that don't. I think even you'd agree that someone should be able to opt into seeing stories about "cooking" and opt out of stories about "motorcycles". Okay, that's good, right? Now what's wrong with using ML to infer, based on what someone reads, that he's interested in "cooking" and not "motorcycles"? This interest inference is what FB is doing. There's nothing bad about it. I maintain that the criticism you and others are lobbying against algorithmic feeds is logically incoherent, emotionally rooted, and unworkable as public policy.
  - mullingitover 5y ago
    > This interest inference is what FB is doing. There's nothing bad about it. And circling back to the original article, there is in fact something bad about it. One guy started out with a site to rate the attractiveness of women at Harvard, and now my mother is probably going to die because his customized algorithm found that showing her lots of anti-vaccine misinformation would maximize his profits.
  - specialist 5y ago
    I wish you'd started with a reputiation of the body of research, and everyone's lived experience. As the scholarship advances, and both the predictive and explanatory powers they afford us, I'll update my views as best able. Meanwhile, if you can't entertain the premise that Facebook's profit model is a major net negative for humanity, we don't have much to discuss.
    - quotemstr 5y ago
      I can believe simultaneously that FB as currently structured is net negative and also that legal prohibitions on algorithmic feeds are net negative.

> No targeted advertising. Strong disagree. Why the hell shouldn't I be able show ads to people who want to see them? > No algorithmic news feed. HN is an algorithmic feed.

mullingitover 5y ago

> Why the hell shouldn't I be able show ads to people who want to see them? Nobody's stopping you. If you want to show ads to people interested in football, post ads on a football site. If you want to show ads to people interested in horses, show them on a horses site. If this type of non-invasive targeting to display ads doesn't make you as much profit, well that's a you problem. > HN is an algorithmic feed. You seem to be struggling with the idea of a 'bespoke' algorithm where everyone's algorithm is different, informed by an internet-wide surveillance system. This is the difference between HN and FB.

specialist 5y ago

Targeted ads. Targeted. As in specifically and exquisitely targeted to individual people based upon datum gathered from surveiling everyone. Still legitimate, and maybe even encouraged, are contextual ads, banners, sponsorships, branding, swag, paid placement, influencers, misc calls to action, etc. Please rest your concerns. Late stage capitalism will continue unimpeded after Facebook's wings are clipped. Social media will revert to less noxious enterprises, like metafilter and craigslist. > HN is an algorithmic feed. Opt-in. Transparent. What is FB's equivalent to HN's /newest? I'm not crazy about HN's ranking. It's pretty good, non-toxic, seems fair. But someone other than me is making judgement calls. I much prefer client side (user controlled) filtering and sorting, like with any generic RSS reader. Repeating myself: All HN visitors see the same feed. A crucial qualitative point you pointedly do not acknowledge. Nor do you answer any of my questions.

quotemstr 5y ago
Ad targeting is just a bugbear for a section of the tech activist crowd. There is nothing fundamentally wrong with a site like Twitter noticing that I tend to post a lot about cats and showing me cat ads as a result. No, it's not self-evident that targeting is bad, and no, behavioral targeting doesn't require "surveiling" everyone internet-wide. > Late stage capitalism I don't subscribe to the neo-Marxist worldview that uses this "late stage capitalism" frame all the time. Capitalism is the natural order of the universe, not some temporary aberration on the way to your Utopia. > Opt-in. Transparent. Not transparent, and hardly opt-in: HN feed ranking is the default. > I much prefer client side (user controlled) filtering and sorting, like with any generic RSS reader. Okay, so people seeing different feeds is good... > Repeating myself: All HN visitors see the same feed. A crucial qualitative point you pointedly do not acknowledge. ... and now people seeing different feeds is bad. Make up your mind. Different people should see different feeds because they're interested in different things. There's nothing sinister or nefarious about showing people stories about topics that interest them and not showing them stories about topics that don't. I think even you'd agree that someone should be able to opt into seeing stories about "cooking" and opt out of stories about "motorcycles". Okay, that's good, right? Now what's wrong with using ML to infer, based on what someone reads, that he's interested in "cooking" and not "motorcycles"? This interest inference is what FB is doing. There's nothing bad about it. I maintain that the criticism you and others are lobbying against algorithmic feeds is logically incoherent, emotionally rooted, and unworkable as public policy.
- mullingitover 5y ago
  > This interest inference is what FB is doing. There's nothing bad about it. And circling back to the original article, there is in fact something bad about it. One guy started out with a site to rate the attractiveness of women at Harvard, and now my mother is probably going to die because his customized algorithm found that showing her lots of anti-vaccine misinformation would maximize his profits.
- specialist 5y ago
  I wish you'd started with a reputiation of the body of research, and everyone's lived experience. As the scholarship advances, and both the predictive and explanatory powers they afford us, I'll update my views as best able. Meanwhile, if you can't entertain the premise that Facebook's profit model is a major net negative for humanity, we don't have much to discuss.
  - quotemstr 5y ago
    I can believe simultaneously that FB as currently structured is net negative and also that legal prohibitions on algorithmic feeds are net negative.