5 ms·

Although TikTok should do better to demote these kinds of videos, I can't buy the conspiracy theory that this is done intentionally. Anyone who knows a bit abou

Although TikTok should do better to demote these kinds of videos, I can't buy the conspiracy theory that this is done intentionally. Anyone who knows a bit about recommendation systems can understand that watching depressing videos will get you more in your feed. Collaborative filtering with i.e watch time as a signal will lead someone who watches them to more.

CryptoBanker 4y ago
Why does it matter if it’s intentional? Negligence is still a crime
- mountainb 4y ago
  Proving causation is nearly insurmountable in suicide negligence cases even in fact patterns in which the person who killed themselves was heavily influenced by some person or someone who made the implements convenient to access. With a software application, causation is even more attenuated because the person's decision to kill themselves is almost always considered a superseding cause.
  - elecush 4y ago
    let's agree this is bad and hold them accountable
    - soganess 4y ago
      How? Using what laws? If there are no clearly relevant laws, perhaps you expect congress to pass one expediently? Let's suppose there is no law on the books that explicitly fleshes out liability if you train a model and it does not do as you expect, we'll need to figure out some nearest neighbor matching. So you will have to shoehorn this novel issue into some preexisting framework of precedent. Maybe something about negligence liability and a common public use item, like a bridge or something. But a bridge isn't as complicated as an ML model and a bridge failure is way more auditable. Bridges don't hallucinate. Also there are unintended consequences to doing this sort of legal massaging, before you know it, campaign finance = speech. "Hold them accountable" is so broad that verges on meaninglessness. Part of the whole living in a rapidly evolving tech landscape is living with laws that are always a few steps behind the times. Which bleeping sucks, but until we press for a better large scale solution, it is going to keep sucking.
- ilyt 4y ago
  "Give you more videos you wanted to watch in the first place" is hardly a negligence. In case of alcohol, sure I can see it but that is not exactly comparable. Enough alcohol will kill you 100% of the time, this aint even close. that being said some content warning or a bit of push to seek help wouldn't be a bad idea when someone gets stuck in some topic like that
icpmacdo 4y ago
I don't use TikTok but I have used the youtube shorts algorithm and it seems like its almost intentionally shit and trying to stir up people. I try and watch one linked short about something sports related on the home page and scroll feed automatically propagates with super low quality right wing, hustle and Jordan Peterson propaganda content. We can deflect saying "Anyone who knows a bit about recommendation systems", blame my use of the platform or play these off as a technical problem but imo it seems like Google and the other tech companies know exactly what they are doing in these use cases and are just cynically deploying this content with the culture war filter on because they know it makes the most money. I think when people ascribe political leanings to tech companies that maybe the mean belief of their employee's but as an org it is not the standard opined ultra left havens.
KaiserPro 4y ago
Allowing it on your platform, (and it applies to Everyone not just tiktok) Isn't right. Negligently letting it be pushed onto people is much worse. Imagine if facebook were doing the same thing now, there would me massive uproar.
- ilyt 4y ago
  Yeah random acts of censorship for "good of the people", what can go bad /s by all means put a content warning or maybe a suicide prevention hotline or other help but I'm tired of clowns trying to solve any problem with "bad content" with censorship. Like that didn't misfire enough times in history...
  - lazyeye 4y ago
    Like technology doesnt progress and we should just give up /s
  - chimpanzee 4y ago
    I’m tired of clowns conflating algorithm adjustments with “random acts of censorship”. If you have a problem with it, you should instead be demanding an open index of all content on these platforms so that you can be assured that all information submitted is available and free from real censorship.
    - nullsense 4y ago
      I'm more and more beginning 5o think tech companies need to face very aggressive regulations around transparency like this.
  - KaiserPro 4y ago
    > I'm tired of clowns trying to solve any problem with "bad content" with censorship. No not "random" but systematic, targeted and effective "censorship" When a news corp chooses to not run a news story for the third day in a row, is that censorship? When I am pissed off at a customer services agent, and instead of shouting "GET FUCKED YOU USELESS SHIT" is that censorship? When I am walking along the road and see a very sexy person, and I _don't_ shout out "HEY THERE SEXY, I'D LIKE TO FUCK/GET FUCKED BY YOU!" is that censorship? A well ordered society requires rules. Those rules need to be clear, and generated by consensus. When you negligently and repeatedly show footage to a vulnerable person designed to deliberately illicit harm, that is not what a well ordered and productive society allows. But then the US is not a well ordered society, so do what you want kid.
fdsaklvjalkj1 4y ago
Literally nobody's suggesting this is done intentionally. Not the article, and not in any comments here. So why even bring it up? It's completely disingenuous imho.
- BrianGragg 4y ago
  Maybe you skipped / filtered all the comments out blaming TikTok and that they should be punished for doing this?
  - timmytokyo 4y ago
    This is a nonsequitur. TikTok can be both negligent and responsible for the consequences of that negligence.
- lazyeye 4y ago
  Its this kind of gray area where dont appear to be doing anything intentional to stop it either. A bit like the production of fentanyl precursor chemicals and their export to Mexico...
tracker1 4y ago
Considering the Chinese version doesn't even allow the types of content that is most promoted on the US system, and is generally positive messaging.
- jacooper 4y ago
  Well duh, you can't recommend content that doesn't exist. And Chinese filters can't be applied to the world wide version because they won't be able to compete with other addictive social media.
BeefWellington 4y ago
> I can't buy the conspiracy theory that this is done intentionally. They have an algorithm that chooses what videos to show you based on types of videos you view. I'm not sure how that doesn't qualify as intentional.

CryptoBanker 4y ago

Why does it matter if it’s intentional? Negligence is still a crime

mountainb 4y ago
Proving causation is nearly insurmountable in suicide negligence cases even in fact patterns in which the person who killed themselves was heavily influenced by some person or someone who made the implements convenient to access. With a software application, causation is even more attenuated because the person's decision to kill themselves is almost always considered a superseding cause.
- elecush 4y ago
  let's agree this is bad and hold them accountable
  - soganess 4y ago
    How? Using what laws? If there are no clearly relevant laws, perhaps you expect congress to pass one expediently? Let's suppose there is no law on the books that explicitly fleshes out liability if you train a model and it does not do as you expect, we'll need to figure out some nearest neighbor matching. So you will have to shoehorn this novel issue into some preexisting framework of precedent. Maybe something about negligence liability and a common public use item, like a bridge or something. But a bridge isn't as complicated as an ML model and a bridge failure is way more auditable. Bridges don't hallucinate. Also there are unintended consequences to doing this sort of legal massaging, before you know it, campaign finance = speech. "Hold them accountable" is so broad that verges on meaninglessness. Part of the whole living in a rapidly evolving tech landscape is living with laws that are always a few steps behind the times. Which bleeping sucks, but until we press for a better large scale solution, it is going to keep sucking.
ilyt 4y ago
"Give you more videos you wanted to watch in the first place" is hardly a negligence. In case of alcohol, sure I can see it but that is not exactly comparable. Enough alcohol will kill you 100% of the time, this aint even close. that being said some content warning or a bit of push to seek help wouldn't be a bad idea when someone gets stuck in some topic like that

icpmacdo 4y ago

I don't use TikTok but I have used the youtube shorts algorithm and it seems like its almost intentionally shit and trying to stir up people. I try and watch one linked short about something sports related on the home page and scroll feed automatically propagates with super low quality right wing, hustle and Jordan Peterson propaganda content. We can deflect saying "Anyone who knows a bit about recommendation systems", blame my use of the platform or play these off as a technical problem but imo it seems like Google and the other tech companies know exactly what they are doing in these use cases and are just cynically deploying this content with the culture war filter on because they know it makes the most money. I think when people ascribe political leanings to tech companies that maybe the mean belief of their employee's but as an org it is not the standard opined ultra left havens.

KaiserPro 4y ago

Allowing it on your platform, (and it applies to Everyone not just tiktok) Isn't right. Negligently letting it be pushed onto people is much worse. Imagine if facebook were doing the same thing now, there would me massive uproar.

ilyt 4y ago
Yeah random acts of censorship for "good of the people", what can go bad /s by all means put a content warning or maybe a suicide prevention hotline or other help but I'm tired of clowns trying to solve any problem with "bad content" with censorship. Like that didn't misfire enough times in history...
- lazyeye 4y ago
  Like technology doesnt progress and we should just give up /s
- chimpanzee 4y ago
  I’m tired of clowns conflating algorithm adjustments with “random acts of censorship”. If you have a problem with it, you should instead be demanding an open index of all content on these platforms so that you can be assured that all information submitted is available and free from real censorship.
  - nullsense 4y ago
    I'm more and more beginning 5o think tech companies need to face very aggressive regulations around transparency like this.
- KaiserPro 4y ago
  > I'm tired of clowns trying to solve any problem with "bad content" with censorship. No not "random" but systematic, targeted and effective "censorship" When a news corp chooses to not run a news story for the third day in a row, is that censorship? When I am pissed off at a customer services agent, and instead of shouting "GET FUCKED YOU USELESS SHIT" is that censorship? When I am walking along the road and see a very sexy person, and I _don't_ shout out "HEY THERE SEXY, I'D LIKE TO FUCK/GET FUCKED BY YOU!" is that censorship? A well ordered society requires rules. Those rules need to be clear, and generated by consensus. When you negligently and repeatedly show footage to a vulnerable person designed to deliberately illicit harm, that is not what a well ordered and productive society allows. But then the US is not a well ordered society, so do what you want kid.

fdsaklvjalkj1 4y ago

Literally nobody's suggesting this is done intentionally. Not the article, and not in any comments here. So why even bring it up? It's completely disingenuous imho.

BrianGragg 4y ago
Maybe you skipped / filtered all the comments out blaming TikTok and that they should be punished for doing this?
- timmytokyo 4y ago
  This is a nonsequitur. TikTok can be both negligent and responsible for the consequences of that negligence.
lazyeye 4y ago
Its this kind of gray area where dont appear to be doing anything intentional to stop it either. A bit like the production of fentanyl precursor chemicals and their export to Mexico...

tracker1 4y ago

Considering the Chinese version doesn't even allow the types of content that is most promoted on the US system, and is generally positive messaging.

jacooper 4y ago
Well duh, you can't recommend content that doesn't exist. And Chinese filters can't be applied to the world wide version because they won't be able to compete with other addictive social media.

BeefWellington 4y ago

> I can't buy the conspiracy theory that this is done intentionally. They have an algorithm that chooses what videos to show you based on types of videos you view. I'm not sure how that doesn't qualify as intentional.