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Facebook’s algorithm isn’t surfacing one-third of Chicago Tribune’s posts

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Re: Facebook’s algorithm isn’t surfacing one-third of Chicago Tribune’s posts

#101

Post by strict9 »

padseeker wrote: post #72
strict9 wrote: post #16

FB has always prioritized content which doesn't lead them to see ads elsewhere (like photos instead of links), but maybe it's something else. I live in Chicago and subscribe to the Sunday edition. I also read the digital edition, and have found it lacking, particularly since inauguration. In recent months Michael Ferro became the majority shareholder in the Tribune, a person obsessed with celebrities and not so much…

I work for the Trib, and read it every day. While your comment about Ferro is true, being interested in hanging with celebrities, I have not noticed a change in the content with Ferro in charge. The Trib has always focused on very local stuff - city and state politics, the midwest, local sports teams, the spike in murders, etc. I don't think that is going to change. I think the editorial board would like to believe i…

I don't disagree with the type of local content (crime, politics, sports) you describe. But that's only a small part of what people are interested in. Though the writing is sometimes sensationalist and click-baity, DNAinfo is eating the Trib's lunch for local engaging content. The number of links to DNA in my fb or twitter feed vastly outnumber Trib ones because friends share/click articles about their city or neighborhood -- that go well beyond only the crime/politics/sports staples.

You're right in that I did miss the point of the article, but not entirely. The fb engagement on what the Trib seems to cover (national/international focus) has likely decreased because of Trump, while resulting in more clicks on WaPo/NYT. While it's likely fb changed their algorithm, content also makes a big difference in what gets surfaced. And I think the original article ignored the role that it may have played.

It sucks that journalism and livelihoods can suffer because of a monolithic walled garden, but there is probably more to the story.

Re: Facebook’s algorithm isn’t surfacing one-third of Chicago Tribune’s posts

#102

Post by marricks »

revicon wrote: post #90
marricks wrote: post #43

When I had Facebook I was passionate about several topics, but I limited my posting to only 1 - 2 times a month. Initially when I started I got some engagement, questions, etc. As the years wore on I gained some friends who cared about those topics too, who liked my posts, shared, etc. Dozens of likes at times. Well, turns out people paid less attention over time, or seemed too. Those posts got fewer likes and shares…

For me, I'm only interested in postings about "stupid life updates" as you call them when I'm on Facebook. I got so sick of the "10 ways batman is better than superman" articles that I started blocking every external site I saw being posted on my feed. And I mean everything, wsj, nyt, USA Today, etc etc etc. Facebook is not a newsreader, it's a place where I go to see "stupid life events" from my friends and family t…

As I grow older, one thing I value more and more from friends is their opinions​, knowing what they care about and perspectives they have to share.

I don't think I was alone in spending too much time on Facebook thinking I was connecting to my "friends" talking about important things. Facebook seems to have intentionally or unintentionally stifled that, so I left.

If you view it as a "vapid" place to share, and do important talking elsewhere I think that makes sense, I find it hard to separate those though, and think many do.

Re: Facebook’s algorithm isn’t surfacing one-third of Chicago Tribune’s posts

#103

Post by alttab »

pier25 wrote: post #37
jschuur wrote: post #5

People simply like too many pages that produce too much content. There has to be prioritization and people have a natural limit to how much time and attention they have to scroll down all the way. So this is a fundamentally hard problem to solve. You can already prioritize posts from a page to appear at the top of your feed if you really don't want to miss posts. The real issue is that people underestimate the amount…

Which is why I much prefer Reddit than Facebook. Content is curated by each community and not some corporation. There is a "hot" algorithm but you are free to switch to "top", "new", etc, if it doesn't work for you.

LOL - Reddit has been caught literally editing the content. They then play the "community powered" card when in reality the mods are groomed and selected for major sub-reddits.

The level of total control is the same - the mechanisms are different. Nothing else.

Re: Facebook’s algorithm isn’t surfacing one-third of Chicago Tribune’s posts

#104

Post by frik »

> Facebook’s algorithm isn’t surfacing one-third of Chicago Tribune’s posts

Of course. That's the whole premise of the FB Newsfeed. It started in late 2011 - up to that point the news stream was in chronological order and you saw all posts (depending on your geographic the feature was enabled maybe on a different date). Then the newsfeed showed what FB algorithms provided you depending on your click-, browsing-, friend- and like-history. It's called a filter-bubble, you suddenly see just mote of the same, no variation. It marked the tipping point of FB as social network tool (at least for me).

Re: Facebook’s algorithm isn’t surfacing one-third of Chicago Tribune’s posts

#105

Post by Natanael_L »

basch wrote: post #74
marricks wrote: post #43

When I had Facebook I was passionate about several topics, but I limited my posting to only 1 - 2 times a month. Initially when I started I got some engagement, questions, etc. As the years wore on I gained some friends who cared about those topics too, who liked my posts, shared, etc. Dozens of likes at times. Well, turns out people paid less attention over time, or seemed too. Those posts got fewer likes and shares…

>"hurt user engagement" if Facebook is personalizing everyones feed based on what they click, isnt the clicker to blame for the result of personalization, not the technology provider. it sounds like your friends didnt engage with your posts, they did engage with other posts, and the facebook feedback loop built them a filter bubble of things they liked more than your posts.

It could also be that they fail to understand the metrics. A topic rarely showing up gets fewer chances for the user to express interest.

Re: Facebook’s algorithm isn’t surfacing one-third of Chicago Tribune’s posts

#106

Post by davidf18 »

I wish FB let you select certain categories. For example, only postings from Friends.

Or only postings from other feeds that I follow.

There is all of this garbage that I don't want, so as a result I rarely look.

Twitter use Tweetbot seems to work a lot better in this regard as I can follow those groups I wish to follow without the junk.

Re: Facebook’s algorithm isn’t surfacing one-third of Chicago Tribune’s posts

#107

Post by Declanomous »

icebraining wrote: post #99
Declanomous wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I blame Facebook. I've ranted on HN about what I consider to be an abuse of 'curation' in the past, but I think 'curation' is killing the internet. I agree with the grandparent about Facebook killing engagement, but the place I noticed it first was Last.fm. I used to spend tons of time on Last.fm looking up music. I made sure every track I played was scrobbled, and I listened to their recommendations all of the time.…

Seems like you dislike bad curation specifically, rather than curation itself. After all, Last.fm was already curating the songs they recommended (it wasn't like they literally threw a random sample of all their catalog). That said, I agree with you that this kind of "finding the closest match" model is quite silly for recommendation systems. And you can see the same problems with ad matching too.

>Seems like you dislike bad curation specifically, rather than curation itself.

Yeah, that's what I was trying to get at by putting 'curation' in single quotes. It's not really curation if you aren't specially choosing things. For instance, if I used Google to search for "bands that sound like [x]", nobody would claim the results are 'curated'.

These systems are basically search functions that return the most similar results that are distinct from the ones you already know about.

I think the fundamental issue is that Markov Chains are actually really terrible at curating content in the long term, but in short-term they are fantastic.

Re: Facebook’s algorithm isn’t surfacing one-third of Chicago Tribune’s posts

#109

Post by sharun »

marricks wrote: post #43

When I had Facebook I was passionate about several topics, but I limited my posting to only 1 - 2 times a month. Initially when I started I got some engagement, questions, etc. As the years wore on I gained some friends who cared about those topics too, who liked my posts, shared, etc. Dozens of likes at times. Well, turns out people paid less attention over time, or seemed too. Those posts got fewer likes and shares…

Well Zuckerberg in his infinite wisdom is trying to tell you to be a little more like Kim Kardashian or Trump.

Re: Facebook’s algorithm isn’t surfacing one-third of Chicago Tribune’s posts

#110

Post by quantumwannabe »

gnicholas wrote: post #91
sigmar wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>only 1 - 2 times a month I have suspected that facebook punishes your visibility if you don't post frequently (like a few times a day). Have you tried posting much more often than two times a month? Try two a day and see if your average engagement increases.

I've found the opposite — posting frequently results in decreased visibility in my experience. My wife and I trade off posting family photos of our kid, and whenever one of us has recently posted the photo gets much less of a reaction (i.e., 25 likes instead of 65).

I've also found the opposite: Facebook sends me notifications to check out a friend's post if they make a post after not posting for a while.
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