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Ah no. Those 100 posts you see on your feed are not random. For your statement to be true, it would assume that social networks do not use algorithms to pick wh

Ah no. Those 100 posts you see on your feed are not random. For your statement to be true, it would assume that social networks do not use algorithms to pick what you see. The unfortunate truth is that fights creates audience engagement which drives up user retention and thus stock prices. Financial analyst look at how much time a user spents on each platform to issue a price forecast.

hugey010 4y ago
I believe that it not only increases engagement, but also increases likelihood to click ads and buy things. People seem to like to shop as a distraction / coping mechanism. I have no evidence of this but I have thought quite a bit about why social networks angering push content the way they do.
- nowherebeen 4y ago
  Yes, it's correlated. YouTube ads are a great example. The more you use the platform, the more likely you will see an ad. At the end of the day, these companies maximizes profits for shareholders. Users are a means to do so. Advertisers are the true customers.
filoleg 4y ago
How does any of this apply to WhatsApp? It isn't social media, it is a messaging app. And as far as anyone who actually uses it is concerned, it works just as well now as it did before the acquisition. If not better, given it finally has a migration story between devices, no matter how imperfect it is. I literally cannot think of a single thing, when it comes to WhatsApp specifically, that got worse.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- meowkit 4y ago
  > How does any of this apply to WhatsApp? The data gathered from WhatsApp is used to fuel backend algorithms and help Facebook sell your (and your networks) information and preferences to advertisers.
  - skinnymuch 4y ago
    How does any of that apply to Whatsapp the application though? The question was not answered.
    - nowherebeen 4y ago
      It didn't get worse because you can't see it. The value of Whatsapp is in the metadata. Not the UI/ UX. A bank used to keep your personal financial information as private. Now post-acquisition, the bank starts selling your personal financial information to insurance companies. To you, as an account holder, you don't know the difference because its all hidden away from you. Maybe you don't care because the bank hasn't increased your fees, but other people you don't know can now buy your data and target you. Here's how data brokers work: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqn3gR1WTcA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqn3gR1WTcA
      - wallfacer120 4y ago
        You seem to think that there's something really inherently evil in customer data. As if this hasn't been something that businesses have done since the dawn of business.
        nowherebeen 4y ago
        > As if this hasn't been something that businesses have done since the dawn of business. What!? Can you tell me an example of how businessmen sold customer data in the Victorian times? Unless, your definition of the 'dawn of business' is limited to this century or your lifetime? There is nothing inherently evil with data, it's what these today's businesses do with it and at this scale. There has never been a platform with over 1 billion users' data for sale. This has only happened in the last 20 years. You don't seem to have a very good understanding of the topic you are commenting on. In both your original and this comment, you make incorrect and face-value assumptions of how things work.
fshbbdssbbgdd 4y ago
There’s a popular narrative that social media companies use algorithms that intentionally favor divisive content. WhatsApp is a useful illustration of how that narrative might be wrong. The WhatsApp algorithm can be described as: “show the chat with the most recent reply at the top, then show the most recent reply at the bottom if the user clicks on that chat”. Suppose the Twitter algorithm was: “show the tweet with the highest count recent replies at the top of the feed, then show the most recent reply at the bottom if the user clicks on that tweet” That is a pretty natural way to design a social media service that wants to host the global discourse. And that algorithm would inherently promote tweets that provoke a lot of responses. It would take a strong thumb on the scale to make it not be full of divisive content (the major social media companies publicly claim to be attempting this). WhatsApp is a useful datapoint here because we know the feed is chronological, yet there are a ton of news stories about how the app is rife with divisive content and misinformation, just like Twitter and Facebook.
- ipaddr 4y ago
  Would you want the most recent reply or would you want to catch up and get the most popular in that order? The most recent is probably not what I would want to see. Close family, friends, social circles first than influencers after.
  - fshbbdssbbgdd 4y ago
    That’s a pretty reasonable ask, I believe both Facebook and Twitter give heavy boosts to content from friends. TikTok, on the other hand, doesn’t show you anything from your friends and just tries to show you what will keep you watching. It seems to work well for them.
- nowherebeen 4y ago
  That's not true. Whatsapp is a data harvesting platform for your social connections. They match it with their existing Facebook profiles/ shadow profiles to know what your political affiliations, race, gender, age are. With a big enough data set, they can infer a lot about you. How much you chat with your friend tells me how close you are and how similar your politics and shopping habits are. Add that with your location data from your IP address (contrary to popular belief, you don't need to turn on location permission to know). Whatsapp is the perfect power-up for platforms like Facebook. With your Whatsapp connections and Facebook profile combined, your data becomes even more valuable to advertisers. Why do you think Google and Facebook keeps on asking for your phone number?

hugey010 4y ago

I believe that it not only increases engagement, but also increases likelihood to click ads and buy things. People seem to like to shop as a distraction / coping mechanism. I have no evidence of this but I have thought quite a bit about why social networks angering push content the way they do.

nowherebeen 4y ago
Yes, it's correlated. YouTube ads are a great example. The more you use the platform, the more likely you will see an ad. At the end of the day, these companies maximizes profits for shareholders. Users are a means to do so. Advertisers are the true customers.

filoleg 4y ago

How does any of this apply to WhatsApp? It isn't social media, it is a messaging app. And as far as anyone who actually uses it is concerned, it works just as well now as it did before the acquisition. If not better, given it finally has a migration story between devices, no matter how imperfect it is. I literally cannot think of a single thing, when it comes to WhatsApp specifically, that got worse.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
meowkit 4y ago
> How does any of this apply to WhatsApp? The data gathered from WhatsApp is used to fuel backend algorithms and help Facebook sell your (and your networks) information and preferences to advertisers.
- skinnymuch 4y ago
  How does any of that apply to Whatsapp the application though? The question was not answered.
  - nowherebeen 4y ago
    It didn't get worse because you can't see it. The value of Whatsapp is in the metadata. Not the UI/ UX. A bank used to keep your personal financial information as private. Now post-acquisition, the bank starts selling your personal financial information to insurance companies. To you, as an account holder, you don't know the difference because its all hidden away from you. Maybe you don't care because the bank hasn't increased your fees, but other people you don't know can now buy your data and target you. Here's how data brokers work: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqn3gR1WTcA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqn3gR1WTcA
    - wallfacer120 4y ago
      You seem to think that there's something really inherently evil in customer data. As if this hasn't been something that businesses have done since the dawn of business.
      - nowherebeen 4y ago
        > As if this hasn't been something that businesses have done since the dawn of business. What!? Can you tell me an example of how businessmen sold customer data in the Victorian times? Unless, your definition of the 'dawn of business' is limited to this century or your lifetime? There is nothing inherently evil with data, it's what these today's businesses do with it and at this scale. There has never been a platform with over 1 billion users' data for sale. This has only happened in the last 20 years. You don't seem to have a very good understanding of the topic you are commenting on. In both your original and this comment, you make incorrect and face-value assumptions of how things work.

fshbbdssbbgdd 4y ago

There’s a popular narrative that social media companies use algorithms that intentionally favor divisive content. WhatsApp is a useful illustration of how that narrative might be wrong. The WhatsApp algorithm can be described as: “show the chat with the most recent reply at the top, then show the most recent reply at the bottom if the user clicks on that chat”. Suppose the Twitter algorithm was: “show the tweet with the highest count recent replies at the top of the feed, then show the most recent reply at the bottom if the user clicks on that tweet” That is a pretty natural way to design a social media service that wants to host the global discourse. And that algorithm would inherently promote tweets that provoke a lot of responses. It would take a strong thumb on the scale to make it not be full of divisive content (the major social media companies publicly claim to be attempting this). WhatsApp is a useful datapoint here because we know the feed is chronological, yet there are a ton of news stories about how the app is rife with divisive content and misinformation, just like Twitter and Facebook.

ipaddr 4y ago
Would you want the most recent reply or would you want to catch up and get the most popular in that order? The most recent is probably not what I would want to see. Close family, friends, social circles first than influencers after.
- fshbbdssbbgdd 4y ago
  That’s a pretty reasonable ask, I believe both Facebook and Twitter give heavy boosts to content from friends. TikTok, on the other hand, doesn’t show you anything from your friends and just tries to show you what will keep you watching. It seems to work well for them.
nowherebeen 4y ago
That's not true. Whatsapp is a data harvesting platform for your social connections. They match it with their existing Facebook profiles/ shadow profiles to know what your political affiliations, race, gender, age are. With a big enough data set, they can infer a lot about you. How much you chat with your friend tells me how close you are and how similar your politics and shopping habits are. Add that with your location data from your IP address (contrary to popular belief, you don't need to turn on location permission to know). Whatsapp is the perfect power-up for platforms like Facebook. With your Whatsapp connections and Facebook profile combined, your data becomes even more valuable to advertisers. Why do you think Google and Facebook keeps on asking for your phone number?