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The political effects of X's feed algorithm

werd.io

21–30 of 107 posts

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#21

I honestly don't understand how or why people are using Twitter to keep up with the news. The only thing I use it for is to follow artists, and even that has been going down in recent weeks with most of my favorites moving over to BlueSky. Maybe I'm just a long-winded idiot, but the character limits barely let me have a conversation on either platform. How are people consuming news like this? It just baffles me how d…

You follow artists, and they are not tweeting their political opinions? Cool.

I gave up on Twitter when everyone I followed kept adding politics. Even if I agreed with it, I just don't want to a marinade in the anger all day.

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#22
post #7

I don’t know if I buy the explanation that this was due to the feed algorithm. It looks like an artifact of being exposed to X’s current user base instead of their old followers. When Twitter switched to X there was a noticeable shift in the average political leanings of the platform toward alignment with Musk, as many left-leaning people abandoned the platform for Bluesky, Mastodon, and Threads. So changing your fee…

Is this the result of a feedback loop from musk joining or did they just accelerate the overall decline of the platform with him joining? Some might say it was going this way even before he picked it up, but it was certainly an inflection point when he joined either way. All modern social media is pretty toxic to society, so I don't participate. Even HN/Reddit is borderline. Nothing is quite as good as the irc and fo…

The moderation changes absolutely changed posting behavior. People got banned for even faintly gesturing the wrong direction on many issues and it frightened large accounts into toeing the line.

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#23
Lovely thought Ben. Good to hear from you!

I spent a lot of my life and money thinking about building better algorithms (over five years).

We have a bit of a chicken / egg problem. Is it the algorithm or is it the preference of the Users which is the problem.

I'd argue the latter.

What I learned which was counter-intuitive was that the vast majority of people aren't interested in thinking hard. This community, in large part, is an exception where many members pride themselves on intellectually challenging material.

That's not the norm. We're not the norm.

My belief that every human was by their nature "curious" and wanting to be engaged deeply was proven false.

This isn't to claim that this is our nature, but when testing with huge populations in the US (specifically), that's not how adults are.

The problem, to me, is deeper and is rooted in our education system and work systems that demand compliance over creativity. Algorithms serve what Users engage with, if the Users were to no longer be interested in ragebait, clickbait, focused on thoughtful content -- the algorithms would adapt.

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#24
It is interesting to see a general bias taken away from the study, which I wouldn't necessarily guess given my own experience. My X "For You" feed mostly does not read pro-Trump - instead mostly pushing very intense pro-European and pro-Canadian economic and political separation from the USA, and pushing very negative narratives of the USA, although I suppose it occasionally also introduces pro-Trump posts, and perhaps those do not sway me in the same way given I am a progressive American.

That said, the Trending tab does tend to push very heavy MAGA-aligned narrative, in a way that to me just seems comical, but I suppose there must be people that genuinely take it at face value, and maybe that does push people.

Less to do with the article:

The more I think about it, I'm not really even sure why I use X these days, other than the fact that I don't really have much of an in-person social life outside of work. Sometimes it can be enjoyable, but honestly the main takeaway I have is that microblogging as a format is genuinely terrible, and X in particular does seem to just feed the most angry things possible. Maybe it's exciting to try and discuss opinions but it is also simultaneously hardly possible to have a nuanced or careful discussion when you have limited characters, and someone on the other end that just wants to shout over you.

I miss being a kid and going onto some forums like for Scratch or Minecraft or whatever. The internet felt way more fun when it was just making cool things and chatting with people about it. I think the USA sort of felt more that way too, but it's hard to know if that was just my privilege. When I write about X, it uncomfortably parallels to how I would consider how my interactions have evolved with my family and friends in real life.

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#25
post #2

And this is why the price for Twitter was, in the end, remarkably low.

Yeah, this was always the play looking back in hindsight. Like, I didn't get it, "why would you pay that kind of money for a web forum?!" It wasn't the forum that was important, Twitter (for better or worse) has wormed it's way into the fabric of American discourse. He was basically buying the ideological thermostat for the country and turning the dial to the right.

This is even worse outside of NA. In many countries it is the de facto communication channel of government and businesses.

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#26
post #7

I don’t know if I buy the explanation that this was due to the feed algorithm. It looks like an artifact of being exposed to X’s current user base instead of their old followers. When Twitter switched to X there was a noticeable shift in the average political leanings of the platform toward alignment with Musk, as many left-leaning people abandoned the platform for Bluesky, Mastodon, and Threads. So changing your fee…

I don't know what changes have been made more recently, but I know there was a definite change to the Twitter algorithm a few months ago that filled the feeds of conservatives with posts from liberals and vice versa. It seemed to be specifically engineered to provoke conflict.

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#27
Underrated in X's changes is how blue checkmark users are shown first underneath popular tweets. Most people who pay for blue checkmarks are either sympathetic to Musk's ideology or indifferent. Many blue checkmark users are there to make money from engagement.

The result is underneath any tweet that gets traction you will see countless blue checkmark users either saying something trolling for their side or engagement-baiting.

The people who are more ideologically neutral or not aligned with Musk are completely drowned out below the hundreds of bulk replies of blue checkmarks.

It used to be that if you saw someone, like a tech CEO, take an interesting position you'd have a varied and interesting discussion in the replies. The algorithm would show you replies in particular from people you follow, and often you'd see some productive exchange that actually mattered. Now it's like entirely drivel and you have to scroll through rage bait and engagement slop before getting to the crumbs of meaningful exchange.

It has had a chilling effect on productive intellectual conversation while also accelerating the polarization of the platform by scaring away many people who care about measured conversation.

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this the result of a feedback loop from musk joining or did they just accelerate the overall decline of the platform with him joining? Some might say it was going this way even before he picked it up, but it was certainly an inflection point when he joined either way. All modern social media is pretty toxic to society, so I don't participate. Even HN/Reddit is borderline. Nothing is quite as good as the irc and fo…

The moderation changes absolutely changed posting behavior. People got banned for even faintly gesturing the wrong direction on many issues and it frightened large accounts into toeing the line.

[dead]

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#29

Why anyone is still using X after 2025 is a mystery (I know, it's where everyone is, but the moral implications are wild)

Seriously. The CEO is opening posting white supremacist content like it's Stormfront. If you don't support that, you should get out.

I don’t know which country you’re in, but in the US Trump won the popular vote. Plenty of people here are perfectly happy with Stormfront.

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#30

Lovely thought Ben. Good to hear from you! I spent a lot of my life and money thinking about building better algorithms (over five years). We have a bit of a chicken / egg problem. Is it the algorithm or is it the preference of the Users which is the problem. I'd argue the latter. What I learned which was counter-intuitive was that the vast majority of people aren't interested in thinking hard. This community, in lar…

It is not the norm here either.
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