I have literally no idea how a "twitter algorithm" could be published on github. Maybe I've been doing recommender systems wrong.
You can publish data flows and models to github in addition to source code components.
twitter/the-algorithm
111–120 of 403 posts
Re: twitter/the-algorithm
#112Many people have commented that it is empty. However what they do not realize is that there has never actually been an algorithm and that is why it is empty.
You don't think recent news of the EU compelling social media companies to disclose their algorithms has anything to do with this?
Re: twitter/the-algorithm
#113I don't understand the concept of open-sourcing "the algorithm". First of all, "the algorithm" is probably hundreds of thousands of lines of code, including all the tedious boilerplate like cache policies and multi-AZ logic. And second of all, doesn't the algorithm include machine learning components, which are trained on terabytes of data? That data will likely be impossible to open source. And open sourcing the neu…
Or is it six cats in a basement with a laser pointer and a mouse? The point of releasing it is to let people know exactly why they see the tweets they do in the order they do. I hope Elon just goes back to time base ordering of tweets.
Disclaimer: I'm pretty new to twitter, so I may be misunderstanding something. On my Twitter Home Screen there are three little stars on the upper right of the central container which allow you to toggle between "top tweets" (ie. 'The Algorithm') and "latest tweets" which is the time based ordering.
Re: twitter/the-algorithm
#114I don't understand the concept of open-sourcing "the algorithm". First of all, "the algorithm" is probably hundreds of thousands of lines of code, including all the tedious boilerplate like cache policies and multi-AZ logic. And second of all, doesn't the algorithm include machine learning components, which are trained on terabytes of data? That data will likely be impossible to open source. And open sourcing the neu…
Or is it six cats in a basement with a laser pointer and a mouse? The point of releasing it is to let people know exactly why they see the tweets they do in the order they do. I hope Elon just goes back to time base ordering of tweets.
I personally know a FAANG employee whose full time job is building tools to try and help understand why the company's recommendation algorithm picks the things it does (and more specifically, predict how changes to the algo will affect that).
Even the people who build these systems barely know what the algorithm is going to do, much less why. It will be a herculean task to try and convey that to an average user.
Re: twitter/the-algorithm
#115I tried to make a pull request already, haha. error forking repo: HTTP 403: The repository exists, but it contains no Git content. Empty repositories cannot be forked. ( https://api.github.com/repos/twitter/the-algorithm/forks ) My thoughts: - Explicit rules for temporary and permanent bans - Edit button - More fun and thoughtful conversations like HN - Less thought bubble Brooklyn based reporters, less VC and side g…
Care to explain "thought bubble Brooklyn based reporters"? Did you choose Brooklyn for the alliteration? Or is there something about my home I should know about?
Large amount of blue checkmark journalists live there, simple as that.
Re: twitter/the-algorithm
#116I've worked on very large scale recommendation systems at a FAANG. If Twitter's system resembles anything like ours, the concept of publishing or open sourcing "the algorithm" doesn't make sense. Even if we were to open source all associated code and publish all related documents it would be very difficult to make sense of the entire system. That is precisely why companies such as Twitter A/B test the hell out of eve…
Of course it doesn't make sense. I think it's just a dog whistle to the people who believe google have a guy in a room somewhere turning the "conservative search results" lever down a notch during elections.
Re: twitter/the-algorithm
#117Many people have commented that it is empty. However what they do not realize is that there has never actually been an algorithm and that is why it is empty.
This would be some pretty funny semantics... but, however it works, message is the same: Transparency for how these work
- Search results
- Comment Order
- Timeline Order
- Trends
- Human vs code
Personalization in general. Big gigantic “why” when it happens to you
Re: twitter/the-algorithm
#118Earlier quoted context omitted.
Twitter Locks Down Product Changes After Agreeing to Musk Bid - https://finance.yahoo.com/news/twitter-locks-down-product-ch...
> Twitter imposed the temporary ban to keep employees who may be miffed about the deal from “going rogue,” according to one of the people. What could a rogue employee do?
There was a case in 2017 of a Twitter employee who deleted Donald Trump’s account for 11 minutes.
In 2020 hackers who gained access to Twitter admin tools that were - at the time - apparently accessible to thousands of employees were able to use that access to compromise multiple verified (blue check) Twitter accounts including Jeff Bezos, Barack Obama and Bill Gates. They used it to promote a lame Bitcoin scam.
In the aftermath of that things were supposedly tightened up a little but don’t doubt a Twitter employee could do some damage.
Re: twitter/the-algorithm
#119Apples are red. The sky is blue. Twitter shadowbans and tinkers with who sees who. I wonder what the old guard will do with the codebase over the next few months.
Re: twitter/the-algorithm
#120Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, that's an algorithm. If you have to draw a diagram showing how edge cache nodes affect a user's results based on whether or not they signed in from New York or Phoenix, or if the downtime of a cluster affects the relevance rankings of tweets for a photography enthusiast, then guess what... That's an algorithm.
I don't disagree, I might even argue that twitter is comprised of many algorithms. We can argue all software is algorithms, or we can just call it software.
That just moves the terminology around and doesn't answer people's questions. Everyone would simply start asking, "what software or lines of code directly affect my timeline?"
The "timeline algorithm" is a perfectly normal way to describe what people ask about.