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Google, Meta, others will have to explain algorithms under new EU legislation

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Re: Google, Meta, others will have to explain algorithms under new EU legislation

#191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're doing credit scoring at the Danish bank i work at. One of our requirements is that the model and architecture has to be able to provide explanations for why yohr rating is whatever it is. Both to regulators, internal auditors, and customers. Personally, i thimk denying people a loan is a pretty impactful decision on peoples life. They deserve a reason.

There are three basic reasons people don't get a loan: - They already have too much debt - They don't earn enough to pay it off - They have a history of not paying off their debts. This should not be hard to explain to most people.

> - They have a history of not paying off their debts.

If only. In practice it's more like "They don't have a history of paying off their debts", which crucially means if you don't have a history of being in debt then you have no history of paying it off, and therefore you're considered high risk. Thus you get otherwise-nonsencial behaviours like taking out a loan only for the reason of paying it off.

Re: Google, Meta, others will have to explain algorithms under new EU legislation

#192
post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apologies for the implication you’re stupid, I didn’t really mean that and it was uncalled for at any rate. I don’t disagree regards dark patterns, your example just felt a bit irrelevant to the specific topic being discussed (Amazon pushing a paid for product / cancelling a paid subscription).

Paid vs not-paid is not an important distinction. People who think that money is the only thing that other people want are doomed to be repeatedly exploited by people who understand that there are more forms of exploitation than directly monetary.

How an Earth are you being exploited by putting a copy of your bank card on your phone?

Re: Google, Meta, others will have to explain algorithms under new EU legislation

#193
post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how it's hypocritical to give democratically elected governments different possibilities that random private companies. It's government's job to put constraints on companies, stopping them from becoming the absolute assholes they become if they have no limitations. That does not make them authoritarian.

Sure. On the other hand you can usually chose which companies to interact with. When it comes to governments the relationship is not optional. Your government usually have more ways to affekt your life than most private companies has (like no fly lists). A few years ago the true extent of the Swedish program for tracking left wing sympathisers became known. It ran from the sixties up until 1998. For example, if your…

I find it funny the right has so much fear that whats happened to the left for generations will begin happening to them.

Re: Google, Meta, others will have to explain algorithms under new EU legislation

#194
post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Feature you profit from? You feel you profit from facebook tracking as well? Regardless, these dark patterns are truly disgusting and how some can defend them so mindlessly just because they apparently found a use for a product is quite disturbing.

“You” in that context was the entity pushing the feature. I’m not sure what point you think you’re making about Facebook tracking tbh, but I don’t use Facebook so you’re asking the wrong person; to claim I am mindlessly defending dark patterns is nonsense.

You don't think amazon thinks prime is beneficial to you? Or that facebook doesn't think tracking is beneficial for their users?

Re: Google, Meta, others will have to explain algorithms under new EU legislation

#195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is itself detected by a 80PiB neural network, based on the 60TB output of new rules that another neural network spits out every week based on the temperature outside of the corner office and the taste of Sundar's coffee this morning.

So glGoogke results went to shit because the ciffee became terrible?

The coffee roast temperature and grind is decided every day by yet another ML algorithm, as Google has effectively an unlimited army of ML researchers and infinite computing power. A rogue PhD on a cocaine binge unfortunately tuned the parameters too high once, and the results have been getting worse ever since, as a result of Sundar being increasingly disappointed by the coffee, but not being able to do anything about it because "it's the algorithm"

Re: Google, Meta, others will have to explain algorithms under new EU legislation

#196
post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“You” in that context was the entity pushing the feature. I’m not sure what point you think you’re making about Facebook tracking tbh, but I don’t use Facebook so you’re asking the wrong person; to claim I am mindlessly defending dark patterns is nonsense.

You don't think amazon thinks prime is beneficial to you? Or that facebook doesn't think tracking is beneficial for their users?

You’re clearly determined to twist my words, I don’t particularly care what Amazon or Facebook think and have never claimed otherwise. Hell, I haven’t even defended either of your examples.

Re: Google, Meta, others will have to explain algorithms under new EU legislation

#197
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Remember when Xbox let you sign up for Live online, but you had to do a 3 hour interrogation on the phone to cancel? And calls would cost like 25 cents a minute or something crazy. Or the auto renewing subscriptions that either cancel your service immediately the second you turn off auto renew, even if you paid for the current time allotment, or they just prevent or ignore your request to not renew. I feel like rever…

There's also this classic attempt at cancelling Comcast service. [1] What a nightmare. [1] https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=yYUvpYE99vg

You know, I’ve heard this a lot and I hate Comcast for their abysmal upload speeds + their pricing, but I’ve cancelled Comcast at five different residences now and the experience took less than 5 minutes each time.

“Why do you want to cancel?” “I’m moving.” “Would you like us to transfer service to your new address?” “No.” “OK”

Re: Google, Meta, others will have to explain algorithms under new EU legislation

#198
post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't think amazon thinks prime is beneficial to you? Or that facebook doesn't think tracking is beneficial for their users?

You’re clearly determined to twist my words, I don’t particularly care what Amazon or Facebook think and have never claimed otherwise. Hell, I haven’t even defended either of your examples.

And I'm still struggling to see any difference.

> I’m still struggling to see the relevance though, trying to get me to buy things is very different from trying to get me to use a feature you profit from (in my opinion).

Re: Google, Meta, others will have to explain algorithms under new EU legislation

#199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We'll see how willing the EU is to levy fines for breaches. It has been very slow with GDPR, I expect it to be even slower here.

Google is rolling out one-click cookie rejection as a result of gigantic fines threatened by the French CNIL. Having already been slapped with 90M and 60M, seems like there's not much of a need for fines. They know Europe isn't playing around.

> They know Europe isn't playing around.

Haha, look how long it took. That's Billions gathered and I wonder/never heard anyone is asking the money back from these A-Z companies that make their money on the grey web.

Re: Google, Meta, others will have to explain algorithms under new EU legislation

#200
post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're doing credit scoring at the Danish bank i work at. One of our requirements is that the model and architecture has to be able to provide explanations for why yohr rating is whatever it is. Both to regulators, internal auditors, and customers. Personally, i thimk denying people a loan is a pretty impactful decision on peoples life. They deserve a reason.

Well, 90% yes and 10% no, in my opinion. Yes, because of the obvious ramifications, as you've alluded to. No, because it's a private company you're asking the loan of. If they don't want to lend to you, then they don't have to lend to you. I believe they should be able to come to this conclusion however they like, except based on the obvious factors like culture, gender (or lack/fluidity of), etc. but mostly yes. I t…

What about immediate proxies for those things? I can determine your culture, gender, etc based on things like your shopping characteristics. Maybe i just deny loans to people who don't ever buy sunscreen? Or people who prefer menthol cigarettes? Or people who donate to the wrong charities?

Saying that private businesses can just do whatever they want is basically incompatible with Western society as we know it. It only works at small scale precisely because little shops don't have access to data about their customers and they are legally barred from using the obvious clues like "wears a turban" or "has short hair and cargo pants"

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