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I think there's an interesting line to consider around 'engagement algorithms' being responsible for accelerating radicalization (i.e. seeing certain content an

I think there's an interesting line to consider around 'engagement algorithms' being responsible for accelerating radicalization (i.e. seeing certain content and then push notifications of same/similar content get delivered.) The 3rd rail of course, is that to fix that you would likely either enter a 'culture war' with each side challenging the others, or you just have to go back to a non-engagement tuned way to deliver updates [0]. And, you know, it's worth some sort of discussion, because I've seen that one mis-click of a youtube video on my phone (trash screen protector) or inebriated TikTok scroll session where it takes me too long to realize it was one form or another of content I didn't really care for before switching on, and then it can take up to a month before the pop ups suggesting similar content stop. But, if the algorithm is 'fair' internally, I would guess the content provider will argue that it is such and, well, sucks this person didn't click a 'save the whales' link instead? To be clear, this is why it is worth a conversation, but it is a difficult one for society for a number of reasons. However I do miss the charm of the 'old web' where we relied on word of mouth. I think MySpace really was a certain peak of Minimalistic non algo Social media; you picked your sort for who to pay attention to, you could put your links or whatever, toss a song for a mood, and it was simple. On the flip side, something like 4chan is not something, last I checked, that did engagement or anything past 'comment = bump' (-does- sage even work on it? did it ever?). AFAIK the argument would have to rest to some extent on proving that the mods failed to 'properly' follow 230... extreme example where they could be in trouble in my mind would be 'a post was reported for a legitimate violent threat and instead of removing/locking mods pinned it'. [0] - you know, when they were nice 'rollups' of what happened more like your mail vs the modern 'spam' of each thing, to get you back in the app and ideally tap each one to view so somebody meets an OKR.

spike021 3y ago
>However I do miss the charm of the 'old web' where we relied on word of mouth. I think MySpace really was a certain peak of Minimalistic non algo Social media; you picked your sort for who to pay attention to, you could put your links or whatever, toss a song for a mood, and it was simple. This is because back then you only had yourself to rely on to find the content you wanted. Now everybody has to use their algorithms to predict what you want to see, which is terrible. What I've noticed in the past couple years is that on any social platform that I admittedly choose to use, all it really takes is clicking something for one topic maybe once or twice and then half my feed is constantly full of it with no way to say "no that was a one-time thing".
- zdragnar 3y ago
  Even YouTube is bad at this. Think you clicked a game or programming tutorial article and it is actually a link to YouTube? Better not watch if you don't like having your recommendations cluttered with videos you'll never be interested in. At least with YouTube you can delete items from your watch history, but it's a few clicks to get to, so especially annoying for those one-off videos. I really, really wish there was a slightly higher threshold stopping those one-time mistakes from becoming a time sink.
  - dragonwriter 3y ago
    Turn off your watch history, and only turn it on when you specifically want to.
verdverm 3y ago
> The 3rd rail of course, is that to fix that you would likely either enter a 'culture war' with each side challenging the others, or you just have to go back to a non-engagement tuned way to deliver updates There is another option, to give users choice and control over the algorithms and content moderation. Bluesky had a recent blog post outlining their Stacked Moderation scheme and open sources project that allows anyone to create a moderation server, which you can use in Bluesky. It would seem this ought to apply to the feeds as well, which they seem to offer a better paradigm than Twitter etc Al already, but not yet what I'm talking about

spike021 3y ago

>However I do miss the charm of the 'old web' where we relied on word of mouth. I think MySpace really was a certain peak of Minimalistic non algo Social media; you picked your sort for who to pay attention to, you could put your links or whatever, toss a song for a mood, and it was simple. This is because back then you only had yourself to rely on to find the content you wanted. Now everybody has to use their algorithms to predict what you want to see, which is terrible. What I've noticed in the past couple years is that on any social platform that I admittedly choose to use, all it really takes is clicking something for one topic maybe once or twice and then half my feed is constantly full of it with no way to say "no that was a one-time thing".

zdragnar 3y ago
Even YouTube is bad at this. Think you clicked a game or programming tutorial article and it is actually a link to YouTube? Better not watch if you don't like having your recommendations cluttered with videos you'll never be interested in. At least with YouTube you can delete items from your watch history, but it's a few clicks to get to, so especially annoying for those one-off videos. I really, really wish there was a slightly higher threshold stopping those one-time mistakes from becoming a time sink.
- dragonwriter 3y ago
  Turn off your watch history, and only turn it on when you specifically want to.

verdverm 3y ago

> The 3rd rail of course, is that to fix that you would likely either enter a 'culture war' with each side challenging the others, or you just have to go back to a non-engagement tuned way to deliver updates There is another option, to give users choice and control over the algorithms and content moderation. Bluesky had a recent blog post outlining their Stacked Moderation scheme and open sources project that allows anyone to create a moderation server, which you can use in Bluesky. It would seem this ought to apply to the feeds as well, which they seem to offer a better paradigm than Twitter etc Al already, but not yet what I'm talking about