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"Facebook flipped a switch, favoring comments and reactions over shares, and suddenly a food blogger from Utah became the largest publisher in the country, if n

"Facebook flipped a switch, favoring comments and reactions over shares, and suddenly a food blogger from Utah became the largest publisher in the country, if not the world." While the firehose volume is disproportionate, the direction wasn't random. Whoever is copywriting these messages is an artist, drawing an outstanding number of responses. I felt the urge to react when I read them and bravely restrained myself. There's a lot of power in asking someone the right personal question.

seltzered_ 5y ago
not trying to make a conspiracy theory, but the Utah association is interesting considering how many lifestyle influencers are supposedly Mormon : https://twitter.com/Karnythia/status/1442840097032921088 https://twitter.com/Karnythia/status/1442840097032921088
oh_sigh 5y ago
Have you ever seen the posts? Some relatives comment on them so they show up on my feed, but the post will be something like "do you like dogs or cats better?" And my aunt and 10 million other people will make a post just saying "cat" or "dog"
- ethbr0 5y ago
  It's a series of gates too, right? To propagate (show up on more feeds), they need people to interact with it. So successful content will be that that best drives interaction, and I guess comments still weigh more heavily than likes? Consequently, Facebook itself is a brute force algorithm for discovering the more virulently memetic content and phrasing.
- Igelau 5y ago
  It's sort of weird to have watched the target demographic switch from college kids to everyone's older aunts and uncles. We went from "you should know better than to post that picture" to "you should know better than to engage with that order of operations question".
- wingerlang 5y ago
  Open LinkedIn today and you're almost guaranteed to see some engagement bait prompting you to react X or Y for different opinions.
- wiether 5y ago
  > And my aunt Facebook really ruined the opinion I had of my relatives because of that kind of stuff. Man, you taught me how to fish but look at you now, jumping on every bait thrown at you...
deathanatos 5y ago
> I felt the urge to react when I read them and bravely restrained myself. You feel an urge to react at bizarro twilight zone non-sequitur text posts? I'm sitting here trying to fathom why millions of people would even react to something like that. Like… what was "thumbs up" worthy in any of those?
- erulabs 5y ago
  I mean, you must see the primal appeal - essentially the posts are "haha, who else does {{COMMON_THING}}?!". Millions of people want other people to know they too are just like them. Facebook's algorithm is optimized for engagement - but people aren't desperate to engage - they are desperate to be engaged with.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - deathanatos 5y ago
    > I mean, you must see the primal appeal - essentially the posts are "haha, who else does {{COMMON_THING}}?!" No, and I feel like I'm explaining to the AI what human behavior looks like here. Yes, the sort of meme discussion you quote is fairly common, but it's not just "common thing", it's some sort of shared experience that's probably private; you're not sure if everyone else experiences it, but saying you experience it might sound weird to others, and the (usually unneeded) thoughts of potential embarrassment maybe prevents you from doing so. Until someone does, in such a post, and yeah, those take off as the day's lucky 10000 are all sighing a collective "I'm not weird!" sigh of relief. Eye floaters come to mind as an example. But … that's not the case here. "Who the heck sleeps with a Fan (sic) and AC on?". Heck, that odd capitalization just makes it even more uncanny valley. Like Zuckerberg really is a robot, and he's just tried a new social subroutine out on me. Who the heck eats Food?
    - raunak 5y ago
      Have you ever considered the fact that because clearly much of the world's population _does_ in fact comment on these posts, that _they_ have said normal "human behavior" and not you or I? We're the outlier on Facebook.
giarc 5y ago
I agree - The author hits at topics that are somewhat controversial but at the same time everyone has a story. I suspect, and I could be wrong, but majority of the comments on that DUI post are people over the age of 40 or 50. They all want to share their story of how drinking and driving wasn't a big issue when they grew up, that their dad always had a drink in hand. People love to talk about themselves and this topic, combined with that audience creates a lot of "nostalgia" for lack of a better term.
- DaiPlusPlus 5y ago
  > combined with that audience creates a lot of "nostalgia" for lack of a better term. Memberberries

seltzered_ 5y ago

not trying to make a conspiracy theory, but the Utah association is interesting considering how many lifestyle influencers are supposedly Mormon : https://twitter.com/Karnythia/status/1442840097032921088 https://twitter.com/Karnythia/status/1442840097032921088

oh_sigh 5y ago

Have you ever seen the posts? Some relatives comment on them so they show up on my feed, but the post will be something like "do you like dogs or cats better?" And my aunt and 10 million other people will make a post just saying "cat" or "dog"

ethbr0 5y ago
It's a series of gates too, right? To propagate (show up on more feeds), they need people to interact with it. So successful content will be that that best drives interaction, and I guess comments still weigh more heavily than likes? Consequently, Facebook itself is a brute force algorithm for discovering the more virulently memetic content and phrasing.
Igelau 5y ago
It's sort of weird to have watched the target demographic switch from college kids to everyone's older aunts and uncles. We went from "you should know better than to post that picture" to "you should know better than to engage with that order of operations question".
wingerlang 5y ago
Open LinkedIn today and you're almost guaranteed to see some engagement bait prompting you to react X or Y for different opinions.
wiether 5y ago
> And my aunt Facebook really ruined the opinion I had of my relatives because of that kind of stuff. Man, you taught me how to fish but look at you now, jumping on every bait thrown at you...

deathanatos 5y ago

> I felt the urge to react when I read them and bravely restrained myself. You feel an urge to react at bizarro twilight zone non-sequitur text posts? I'm sitting here trying to fathom why millions of people would even react to something like that. Like… what was "thumbs up" worthy in any of those?

erulabs 5y ago
I mean, you must see the primal appeal - essentially the posts are "haha, who else does {{COMMON_THING}}?!". Millions of people want other people to know they too are just like them. Facebook's algorithm is optimized for engagement - but people aren't desperate to engage - they are desperate to be engaged with.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- deathanatos 5y ago
  > I mean, you must see the primal appeal - essentially the posts are "haha, who else does {{COMMON_THING}}?!" No, and I feel like I'm explaining to the AI what human behavior looks like here. Yes, the sort of meme discussion you quote is fairly common, but it's not just "common thing", it's some sort of shared experience that's probably private; you're not sure if everyone else experiences it, but saying you experience it might sound weird to others, and the (usually unneeded) thoughts of potential embarrassment maybe prevents you from doing so. Until someone does, in such a post, and yeah, those take off as the day's lucky 10000 are all sighing a collective "I'm not weird!" sigh of relief. Eye floaters come to mind as an example. But … that's not the case here. "Who the heck sleeps with a Fan (sic) and AC on?". Heck, that odd capitalization just makes it even more uncanny valley. Like Zuckerberg really is a robot, and he's just tried a new social subroutine out on me. Who the heck eats Food?
  - raunak 5y ago
    Have you ever considered the fact that because clearly much of the world's population _does_ in fact comment on these posts, that _they_ have said normal "human behavior" and not you or I? We're the outlier on Facebook.

giarc 5y ago

I agree - The author hits at topics that are somewhat controversial but at the same time everyone has a story. I suspect, and I could be wrong, but majority of the comments on that DUI post are people over the age of 40 or 50. They all want to share their story of how drinking and driving wasn't a big issue when they grew up, that their dad always had a drink in hand. People love to talk about themselves and this topic, combined with that audience creates a lot of "nostalgia" for lack of a better term.

DaiPlusPlus 5y ago
> combined with that audience creates a lot of "nostalgia" for lack of a better term. Memberberries