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I think you’re making it more complicated that it actually is. I believe the case is specifically focusing on the promotion of the kits to underage children. A

I think you’re making it more complicated that it actually is. I believe the case is specifically focusing on the promotion of the kits to underage children. As a society we have already embraced censorship for children. If we can count how on Amazon to not offer up R rated movies to children via Amazon Prime (which they dutifully do), it seems reasonable that we should expect (and sadly now demand) that they not promote combinations of products to children that are designed to lead to their death.

giantg2 4y ago
The difference is that one is obviously categorized, and the other has no categorization. There's hundreds, if not thousands, of items on Amazon that can kill. Even if we start a lost of possible harmful items, would it solve the issue in this case? How are minors buying anything in the interent without supervision? Were they even using an account marked as a minor?
- nickelcitymario 4y ago
  Recommending a book that instructs you how to use these products in combination for the purpose of suicide is wrong. I’d argue selling and profiting from that kind of information is wrong, too. No one’s saying Amazon can’t sell these chemicals. But it’s dubious at best to defend selling the info, and it’s downright evil to recommend it. Yes, it’s their algorithm. But they tweak it all the time to catch issues like this. If they recommended Mein Kampf and white robes when you ordered rope, surely we’d all agree that would be wrong, even though those individual items are defendable. Recommending them in combination would be evil. Likewise, recommending guns and bullets alongside a book about mass shootings would be evil. I don’t see how this is a controversial position.
  - bryanrasmussen 4y ago
    I would think this information comes close to encouragement to suicide which is against the law in a lot of jurisdictions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_legislation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_legislation
    - giantg2 4y ago
      Close, maybe. Prosecutable, unlikely given the algorithm doesn't understand what is being recommended (products, not an idea) an would not meet mens rea.
  - giantg2 4y ago
    It can't be evil. The algorithm just recommends products without understanding their intent. The real question shouldn't be around the algorithm, but rather around the suicide book being banned. Or even around unauthorized account creation/access or payment.
  - Manu40 4y ago
    Except the algorithm is just working off the data it has available, and the data it has collected; and that data tells it that people who buy that list of ingredients have also bought that booklet in the past. So it suggests that booklet to others as well, since they have the same list of ingredients in their cart. The algorithm is not evil, and Amazon itself is not either, provided they do something to try to fix the problem. But the problem is in how algorithms themselves operate. It's just taking known info and applying it to current situation. The only actual, proper, and relatively easy by comparison solution to all of this is to just make it so people have no want or reason to commit suicide, or any other 'evil' acts that might be suggested by a foolish algorithm. Banning things has never worked. Just look at all those super successful wars on drugs, alcohol, etc. Never, worked. Ever. The true evil, in my opinion, is the attempt to kid-safe the world to the point where it removes all potential for joy and happiness. That leads to suicide by the first groups who commit it, which produces data for our A.I driven machines, which leads to algorithms happily suggesting the perfect thing for it. I would like to add finally, that just because you don't see how your or any one elses opinion is or is not controversial, does not make it so. Calling opinion controversial based upon opinion itself as well, is just argumentation. Which should be fine in a logical world. But we do not live in a logical world, which is why people are preferring to opt-out of it. And that's my opinion on the matter. Algorithms just happily oblige the user.
  - 31337Logic 4y ago
    It's "wrong" only if you believe that taking one's own life is wrong. This is a deep, long-standing issue that has valid points on both sides. Not so black and white. I can think of at least one good use case: where someone with a terminal disease (or otherwise poor quality of life, through no control of their own). Then, maybe, peacefully taking one's own life to reduce their own suffering, not to mention the suffering of their loved ones, might actually be the "right" choice. Hard to generalize this as a universal rule since context matters so much here.
    - CPLX 4y ago
      I believe teenagers killing themselves is bad and wrong and we should try to stop it. If your values diverge from that great for you I guess but I think my values on this are more consistent with a healthy society and approach to regulating corporate behavior.
- Lightbody 4y ago
  Just add a simple exception for THIS case. When Amazon has had to do this 1000+ unique times, then we can have the debate of whether their extra work is worth the lost lives of kids. Probably still a loser of an argument IMO but let’s just take a simple first step yeah?
  - giantg2 4y ago
    Why not ban the booklet? Then this whole discussion is moot.
    - Manu40 4y ago
      Because banning things has never worked, for literally almost anything in human history. It just makes it more desirable since you can't have it. Humans are weird like that. But maybe it's fitting we are like that, because at the end of the day, who's right is it to be banning anything? Certainly not yours, or mine. Sure, protect the children... but against what? Themselves? Kids have been doing stupid things for a long time, and been mostly fine. It's only recently that society has decided to ban joy as well by happenstance via the many methods employed to reduce the spread of covid that things started to go overboard. How about we just stop making life shitty for people. That will be what makes this entire discussion moot.
      - giantg2 4y ago
        It's not that kids will stop doing it, but that Amazon would have taken action to prevent this on their platform (in the least invasive way), and there's no lawsuit at that point. Interesting that the article doesn't mention if the book is still available or not. "How about we just stop making life shitty for people." Easier said than done. Most of the child suicides are so well off families.
        Manu40 4y ago
        > Easier said than done. Sure, but nothing in life worth doing is easy. Sometimes you have to take the hard path to gain anything worthwhile. And quite frankly, there is no reason or excuse for society to continue to be made shittier and shittier just to suit the inadequate opinions of literally anyone.
- Manu40 4y ago
  That there is the real problem. You can't possibly kid-safe the entirety of the world, internet included; without running into practically Sisyphean challenges that don't even need to be approached. I mean, the solution is rather simple. Instead of trying to kid-safe the world, why not just make the world less shitty to live in? It's a 2 birds 1 stone trick, except this proverbial stone will be taking down many more than just 2 birds. Almost all of the current problems we deal with as a society, all stem from how shitty society has become for many people. But because some people are happy with the way things are going, since things are mostly fine for them; the rest of us have to put up with it? And people are surprised when kids, teens and adults are deciding to opt-out? And their best solution is to make it harder for people to find way to opt-out? Seriously, really? Is it really so surprising that people would want a fast ride out of hell at that point? Because that's what it must be like for them if they figure ending it all there and then, is better off than putting up with the rest of societies bullshit any longer. I have more to say on this, but am trying to follow HN's rules about flamewar stuff, and I realize that this comment thread is very easily turned into such a thing unless careful, so I am cutting my comment off here.
  - giantg2 4y ago
    "Almost all of the current problems we deal with as a society, all stem from how shitty society has become for many people." The interesting part is that many of the child suicides are in the well off families.
    - Manu40 4y ago
      Sure, well off... sure... by who's standards? 1. Are they well off because they have digital devices? 2. Are they well off because their parents can afford to have just 1 working member? 3. Are they well off because their parents make more than 100k a year? Or some other arbitrary number? I've met some families in the past that meet all 3 criteria and exceeded the 3rd; but they rent. Are they also well off? I do think it's interesting that the 'well off' kids are the ones offing themselves. But if that's the case, then we need to look very seriously at what's occurring at that point, because it just means I am more correct than previously stated. Someone who is well off by the standards of those who are potentially poorer than that person, may still have plenty of other reasons to be unhappy with life. Perhaps not valid to you or I, since they are 'well off', but our opinions on how well to do they are don't matter. The only thing that matters ultimately is that they don't feel like its worth it to continue living. That, needs to be solved. And that, is part of why I am right about how society has become shitty for many people. Even if they are well to do. Especially so. That should be the last group to be wanting to off itself. So that tells me that it's not money related, or object related. It's societally related somehow, in some fashion, which we need to find out, and fix.
PragmaticPulp 4y ago
> I believe the case is specifically focusing on the promotion of the kits to underage children. As a society we have already embraced censorship for children Underage children are already not allowed to have Amazon accounts (unless explicitly granted as a sub-account of their parents' account). How, exactly, would you propose that Amazon determine if the person viewing a page and entering credit card information and a mailing address is a minor? The only actual solution to this problem is to forbid selling of this specific product on Amazon, which I have no doubt is in process. Many chemicals and OTC medications have already disappeared from Amazon due to fears of abuse by minors. > t seems reasonable that we should expect (and sadly now demand) that they not promote combinations of products to children that are designed to lead to their death. There was no such intent in the recommendation algorithm. Did you know this combination of products could be used for suicide before it was blasted all over the internet by these news articles? I didn't, and I doubt anyone at Amazon was aware of it either (until now). Are you also holding the journalists to the same standard? These articles about "suicide kits" have been filling my social media feeds and news outlets for the past day. The number of minors being exposed to this information by news outlets has to be many orders of magnitude higher than the number of minors who ever saw this combination of "recommended items" on Amazon. Keep in mind that Amazon wasn't just showing this to random shoppers, you had to search for specific ingredients to begin with. Journalists, on the other hand, have been advertising this combination far and wide to everyone who just wants to read news.

giantg2 4y ago

The difference is that one is obviously categorized, and the other has no categorization. There's hundreds, if not thousands, of items on Amazon that can kill. Even if we start a lost of possible harmful items, would it solve the issue in this case? How are minors buying anything in the interent without supervision? Were they even using an account marked as a minor?

nickelcitymario 4y ago
Recommending a book that instructs you how to use these products in combination for the purpose of suicide is wrong. I’d argue selling and profiting from that kind of information is wrong, too. No one’s saying Amazon can’t sell these chemicals. But it’s dubious at best to defend selling the info, and it’s downright evil to recommend it. Yes, it’s their algorithm. But they tweak it all the time to catch issues like this. If they recommended Mein Kampf and white robes when you ordered rope, surely we’d all agree that would be wrong, even though those individual items are defendable. Recommending them in combination would be evil. Likewise, recommending guns and bullets alongside a book about mass shootings would be evil. I don’t see how this is a controversial position.
- bryanrasmussen 4y ago
  I would think this information comes close to encouragement to suicide which is against the law in a lot of jurisdictions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_legislation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_legislation
  - giantg2 4y ago
    Close, maybe. Prosecutable, unlikely given the algorithm doesn't understand what is being recommended (products, not an idea) an would not meet mens rea.
- giantg2 4y ago
  It can't be evil. The algorithm just recommends products without understanding their intent. The real question shouldn't be around the algorithm, but rather around the suicide book being banned. Or even around unauthorized account creation/access or payment.
- Manu40 4y ago
  Except the algorithm is just working off the data it has available, and the data it has collected; and that data tells it that people who buy that list of ingredients have also bought that booklet in the past. So it suggests that booklet to others as well, since they have the same list of ingredients in their cart. The algorithm is not evil, and Amazon itself is not either, provided they do something to try to fix the problem. But the problem is in how algorithms themselves operate. It's just taking known info and applying it to current situation. The only actual, proper, and relatively easy by comparison solution to all of this is to just make it so people have no want or reason to commit suicide, or any other 'evil' acts that might be suggested by a foolish algorithm. Banning things has never worked. Just look at all those super successful wars on drugs, alcohol, etc. Never, worked. Ever. The true evil, in my opinion, is the attempt to kid-safe the world to the point where it removes all potential for joy and happiness. That leads to suicide by the first groups who commit it, which produces data for our A.I driven machines, which leads to algorithms happily suggesting the perfect thing for it. I would like to add finally, that just because you don't see how your or any one elses opinion is or is not controversial, does not make it so. Calling opinion controversial based upon opinion itself as well, is just argumentation. Which should be fine in a logical world. But we do not live in a logical world, which is why people are preferring to opt-out of it. And that's my opinion on the matter. Algorithms just happily oblige the user.
- 31337Logic 4y ago
  It's "wrong" only if you believe that taking one's own life is wrong. This is a deep, long-standing issue that has valid points on both sides. Not so black and white. I can think of at least one good use case: where someone with a terminal disease (or otherwise poor quality of life, through no control of their own). Then, maybe, peacefully taking one's own life to reduce their own suffering, not to mention the suffering of their loved ones, might actually be the "right" choice. Hard to generalize this as a universal rule since context matters so much here.
  - CPLX 4y ago
    I believe teenagers killing themselves is bad and wrong and we should try to stop it. If your values diverge from that great for you I guess but I think my values on this are more consistent with a healthy society and approach to regulating corporate behavior.
Lightbody 4y ago
Just add a simple exception for THIS case. When Amazon has had to do this 1000+ unique times, then we can have the debate of whether their extra work is worth the lost lives of kids. Probably still a loser of an argument IMO but let’s just take a simple first step yeah?
- giantg2 4y ago
  Why not ban the booklet? Then this whole discussion is moot.
  - Manu40 4y ago
    Because banning things has never worked, for literally almost anything in human history. It just makes it more desirable since you can't have it. Humans are weird like that. But maybe it's fitting we are like that, because at the end of the day, who's right is it to be banning anything? Certainly not yours, or mine. Sure, protect the children... but against what? Themselves? Kids have been doing stupid things for a long time, and been mostly fine. It's only recently that society has decided to ban joy as well by happenstance via the many methods employed to reduce the spread of covid that things started to go overboard. How about we just stop making life shitty for people. That will be what makes this entire discussion moot.
    - giantg2 4y ago
      It's not that kids will stop doing it, but that Amazon would have taken action to prevent this on their platform (in the least invasive way), and there's no lawsuit at that point. Interesting that the article doesn't mention if the book is still available or not. "How about we just stop making life shitty for people." Easier said than done. Most of the child suicides are so well off families.
      - Manu40 4y ago
        > Easier said than done. Sure, but nothing in life worth doing is easy. Sometimes you have to take the hard path to gain anything worthwhile. And quite frankly, there is no reason or excuse for society to continue to be made shittier and shittier just to suit the inadequate opinions of literally anyone.
Manu40 4y ago
That there is the real problem. You can't possibly kid-safe the entirety of the world, internet included; without running into practically Sisyphean challenges that don't even need to be approached. I mean, the solution is rather simple. Instead of trying to kid-safe the world, why not just make the world less shitty to live in? It's a 2 birds 1 stone trick, except this proverbial stone will be taking down many more than just 2 birds. Almost all of the current problems we deal with as a society, all stem from how shitty society has become for many people. But because some people are happy with the way things are going, since things are mostly fine for them; the rest of us have to put up with it? And people are surprised when kids, teens and adults are deciding to opt-out? And their best solution is to make it harder for people to find way to opt-out? Seriously, really? Is it really so surprising that people would want a fast ride out of hell at that point? Because that's what it must be like for them if they figure ending it all there and then, is better off than putting up with the rest of societies bullshit any longer. I have more to say on this, but am trying to follow HN's rules about flamewar stuff, and I realize that this comment thread is very easily turned into such a thing unless careful, so I am cutting my comment off here.
- giantg2 4y ago
  "Almost all of the current problems we deal with as a society, all stem from how shitty society has become for many people." The interesting part is that many of the child suicides are in the well off families.
  - Manu40 4y ago
    Sure, well off... sure... by who's standards? 1. Are they well off because they have digital devices? 2. Are they well off because their parents can afford to have just 1 working member? 3. Are they well off because their parents make more than 100k a year? Or some other arbitrary number? I've met some families in the past that meet all 3 criteria and exceeded the 3rd; but they rent. Are they also well off? I do think it's interesting that the 'well off' kids are the ones offing themselves. But if that's the case, then we need to look very seriously at what's occurring at that point, because it just means I am more correct than previously stated. Someone who is well off by the standards of those who are potentially poorer than that person, may still have plenty of other reasons to be unhappy with life. Perhaps not valid to you or I, since they are 'well off', but our opinions on how well to do they are don't matter. The only thing that matters ultimately is that they don't feel like its worth it to continue living. That, needs to be solved. And that, is part of why I am right about how society has become shitty for many people. Even if they are well to do. Especially so. That should be the last group to be wanting to off itself. So that tells me that it's not money related, or object related. It's societally related somehow, in some fashion, which we need to find out, and fix.

PragmaticPulp 4y ago

> I believe the case is specifically focusing on the promotion of the kits to underage children. As a society we have already embraced censorship for children Underage children are already not allowed to have Amazon accounts (unless explicitly granted as a sub-account of their parents' account). How, exactly, would you propose that Amazon determine if the person viewing a page and entering credit card information and a mailing address is a minor? The only actual solution to this problem is to forbid selling of this specific product on Amazon, which I have no doubt is in process. Many chemicals and OTC medications have already disappeared from Amazon due to fears of abuse by minors. > t seems reasonable that we should expect (and sadly now demand) that they not promote combinations of products to children that are designed to lead to their death. There was no such intent in the recommendation algorithm. Did you know this combination of products could be used for suicide before it was blasted all over the internet by these news articles? I didn't, and I doubt anyone at Amazon was aware of it either (until now). Are you also holding the journalists to the same standard? These articles about "suicide kits" have been filling my social media feeds and news outlets for the past day. The number of minors being exposed to this information by news outlets has to be many orders of magnitude higher than the number of minors who ever saw this combination of "recommended items" on Amazon. Keep in mind that Amazon wasn't just showing this to random shoppers, you had to search for specific ingredients to begin with. Journalists, on the other hand, have been advertising this combination far and wide to everyone who just wants to read news.