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I feel like "open the recommendation algorithms!" is easy to _say_, and it's less easy (and maybe impossible) to do effectively. Should we have access (by law)

I feel like "open the recommendation algorithms!" is easy to _say_, and it's less easy (and maybe impossible) to do effectively. Should we have access (by law) to the code that makes recommendations on content? That seems like a governmental overreach. If that was the case, then we should have to have direct access to the brain of every editor/layout person of every newspaper. Why was one story above the fold vs below the fold vs on page 4? I don't see a whole lot of distinction between those two. Once we get access to that, how do we keep people from abusing these algorithms on the supply side? Thought SEO sites were bad before? Guess what happens when those sites know what they're _actually targeting_, as opposed to blindly guessing! As a question, how well do you understand the recommender system that you've created? For a given piece of content, would you be able to guess at the penetration into the platform? As an outsider, I sometimes feel like the recommender systems I interact with have grown out of the platform holder's control (see: Nazi/ISIS/ISIL propaganda on YouTube, etc.). I think these are the points the article is reacting to. So if the article is saying "I would really rather not see Nazi/ISIS/ISIL propaganda," then, ok, that's good. That's a good want. But we're going to need an algorithm to determine what that propaganda _is_, and then downrank that for that user. So, is the conclusion of the article... misguided? Sure! Is the desire of the author valid? I don't know. I don't have time to read these articles.

distortedsignal 4y ago
I hope the /s at the end of the last comment was loud enough to not be stated. But I read the article. Yeah, it was dumb. Specifically: > If recommendation algos aren’t shared then we need - by legislation, if necessary - a switch that turns the recommendation engine off. This is... baffling. On YouTube - the case-in-point of the article - you already have access to a non-algorithmic feed of videos: namely, your Subscriptions feed. And if you don't want a recommendation algorithm, good luck finding new content that you like. And if you "turn off" the recommendation algorithm, you want... what, exactly? The latest videos uploaded to the platform? Still a recommendation algorithm. Videos with words in titles similar to the last video you watched? Still a recommendation algorithm. Videos that the creators of your favorite channel watched? STILL A RECOMMENDATION ALGORITHM. I was wrong. The desire of the author is far dumber than I originally gave credit for.
- ad404b8a372f2b9 4y ago
  I don't see the problem with someone not wanting recommendations on their front page, having a chronological feed somewhere else is nice but it's not the same thing. Videos that get popular, and are therefore recommended, are those that prey on the basest components of our human nature (even if you curate your feed as best as possible), I don't see why we should put up with it. Your list of recommendation algorithms is inaccurate, a chronological feed is not a recommendation algorithm in any sense of the term, as for the rest you can't compare the deeply complicated and often abusive recommendation algorithms that are deployed on social media to the simple heuristics you listed.
  - distortedsignal 4y ago
    > ... I don't see why we should put up with it. I mean, you don't have to. Don't want to see YouTube's algorithmic feed? That's cool - just HTTP 3xx your youtube.com to the subscriptions page. There are some good browser addons to do just that[1][2]. Granted, that doesn't remove the recommendation algorithm from your YouTube experience. You would have to use some kind of content blocker to remove the algorithmic feeds from the video pages. I find that uBlockOrigin works well for that. [1] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/redirector/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/redirector/ [2] https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/redirector/ocgpenflpmgnfapjedencafcfakcekcd?hl=en https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/redirector/ocgpenf...
- alexvoda 4y ago
  This is a failure of imagination. On a federated network where you can have your own server/pod (think PeerTube or Diaspora) you absolutely can have a custom recommendation algorithm. And for news you can have custom filters in your RSS reader that trim the feeds you are subscribed to to only the desired articles and apply a custom order. And even in a Cloud/SaaS scenario like Youtube, one can imagine a settings page where you can configure each recommend view in some domain specific programming language using an API. Imagine something like IFTTT but for configuring your preffered recommendations views. Notice that something you do not want is beeing recommended to you? Just open settings and tweak the algo. This is just like feeding a custom comparator function to a built-in sorting function using dependency injection. Of course, this would not be in the platforms interest and will probably never happen. It really is not that hard to imagine if you have the mindset that you should be able to control your own computation instead of being at the whims of a corporation.
ad404b8a372f2b9 4y ago
The distinction is easy to make, a recommendation algorithm is personal, automated, scalable to a gigantic amount of content, entirely opaque for the average user. The social implications are much more dangerous than a newspaper editor and journalist following their paper's political bias.

distortedsignal 4y ago

I hope the /s at the end of the last comment was loud enough to not be stated. But I read the article. Yeah, it was dumb. Specifically: > If recommendation algos aren’t shared then we need - by legislation, if necessary - a switch that turns the recommendation engine off. This is... baffling. On YouTube - the case-in-point of the article - you already have access to a non-algorithmic feed of videos: namely, your Subscriptions feed. And if you don't want a recommendation algorithm, good luck finding new content that you like. And if you "turn off" the recommendation algorithm, you want... what, exactly? The latest videos uploaded to the platform? Still a recommendation algorithm. Videos with words in titles similar to the last video you watched? Still a recommendation algorithm. Videos that the creators of your favorite channel watched? STILL A RECOMMENDATION ALGORITHM. I was wrong. The desire of the author is far dumber than I originally gave credit for.

ad404b8a372f2b9 4y ago
I don't see the problem with someone not wanting recommendations on their front page, having a chronological feed somewhere else is nice but it's not the same thing. Videos that get popular, and are therefore recommended, are those that prey on the basest components of our human nature (even if you curate your feed as best as possible), I don't see why we should put up with it. Your list of recommendation algorithms is inaccurate, a chronological feed is not a recommendation algorithm in any sense of the term, as for the rest you can't compare the deeply complicated and often abusive recommendation algorithms that are deployed on social media to the simple heuristics you listed.
- distortedsignal 4y ago
  > ... I don't see why we should put up with it. I mean, you don't have to. Don't want to see YouTube's algorithmic feed? That's cool - just HTTP 3xx your youtube.com to the subscriptions page. There are some good browser addons to do just that[1][2]. Granted, that doesn't remove the recommendation algorithm from your YouTube experience. You would have to use some kind of content blocker to remove the algorithmic feeds from the video pages. I find that uBlockOrigin works well for that. [1] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/redirector/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/redirector/ [2] https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/redirector/ocgpenflpmgnfapjedencafcfakcekcd?hl=en https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/redirector/ocgpenf...
alexvoda 4y ago
This is a failure of imagination. On a federated network where you can have your own server/pod (think PeerTube or Diaspora) you absolutely can have a custom recommendation algorithm. And for news you can have custom filters in your RSS reader that trim the feeds you are subscribed to to only the desired articles and apply a custom order. And even in a Cloud/SaaS scenario like Youtube, one can imagine a settings page where you can configure each recommend view in some domain specific programming language using an API. Imagine something like IFTTT but for configuring your preffered recommendations views. Notice that something you do not want is beeing recommended to you? Just open settings and tweak the algo. This is just like feeding a custom comparator function to a built-in sorting function using dependency injection. Of course, this would not be in the platforms interest and will probably never happen. It really is not that hard to imagine if you have the mindset that you should be able to control your own computation instead of being at the whims of a corporation.

ad404b8a372f2b9 4y ago

The distinction is easy to make, a recommendation algorithm is personal, automated, scalable to a gigantic amount of content, entirely opaque for the average user. The social implications are much more dangerous than a newspaper editor and journalist following their paper's political bias.