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YouTube's tendency to push everyday users toward politically extreme content

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Re: YouTube's tendency to push everyday users toward politically extreme content

#231

Post by joe_the_user »

Zarath wrote: post #59
joe_the_user wrote: post #8

Just anecdotally, Youtube's recommendation system seems effectively self-referential. On virtually any subject I look at, recommended videos seem to cycle between just a few themes or even just a few specific videos. I think there's a logical reason for this. I imagine for a given topic you wind-up with: [broad video] related to [other broad but unrelated video] plus [extremist video]. And [extremist video] related t…

To add on to your point: Given my understanding of how the recommendation engine works, if you watch a video slightly related to a topic, then another video slightly related to that topic, there is a reinforcing effect whereby the engine believes you to be more interested in that topic. E.g. if I watch a video on vegetarianism, then another one, it may strengthen the confidence that I am interested in vegetarianism,…

I have a theory about this which is that there are certain recommendation loops or "attractors" that you basically cannot escape without manually flagging videos as "not interested", disliking, manually choosing an entirely different topic, or taking many days off of the platform.

I'm pretty sure this is true. However, there is one more effective around this. You have to go back and delete your history. I have one youtube identity I maintain for exactly one interest (call "interest X"). I have to essentially scrub everything not related to that from it's history or more and more unrelated crap will appear reliably. Basically, even watch 10% of something means recommendations jump up to 50% of other things even though I have a looooong history of just being interested in interest X.

Re: YouTube's tendency to push everyday users toward politically extreme content

#232

Post by fareesh »

johnleed wrote: post #85
fareesh wrote: post #26

The international corporate media has not been honest in its reporting of the refugee situation in Europe. This is becoming clearer year by year, because some of the facts that were earlier dismissed as racist rhetoric are now becoming very difficult to ignore. For example earlier this year, Chancellor Merkel finally admitted that there are "no-go" zones in the country where even the police dare not go. This is an ex…

There is an argument against one part you wrote. "There is never a good reason not to tell the truth about these things, this is the result of what happens when you go down that path." Let's make a hypothetical that a researcher has come up with a good way to measure intelligence/violence and concludes that indigenous Australians are way below everybody else in intelligence and way up in violence. What is there to ga…

For your hypothetical, that research would probably explain that averages in lack of achievement are likely to be caused by the intelligence differences, instead of some unconscious bias. Yes, I think it would be useful because it helps ensure that inaccurate conclusions are not drawn.

Re: YouTube's tendency to push everyday users toward politically extreme content

#233

Post by fareesh »

erikpukinskis wrote: post #28
fareesh wrote: post #26

The international corporate media has not been honest in its reporting of the refugee situation in Europe. This is becoming clearer year by year, because some of the facts that were earlier dismissed as racist rhetoric are now becoming very difficult to ignore. For example earlier this year, Chancellor Merkel finally admitted that there are "no-go" zones in the country where even the police dare not go. This is an ex…

It can be true and racist at the same time. If you never care about rapes except when it’s a dark skinned perpetrator in a white dominated country, then you are both racist and correct that that rape amongst refugees is an important issue.

No, it's just true. You can take a fact and use it to support a larger racist worldview composed of other facts, many of which may be false, contributing to a poorly reasoned out illogical perspective, or one that is lacking key details.

Or you can simply take that fact and look at it in isolation, or in combination with true statements, and all the necessary key details, and form a conclusion that does not involve bigotry.

What you are talking about is what people take away from the story. If the media is trying to control what people take away from the story, by not publishing it, because it could potentially help racists further ratify an already flawed worldview, then that is actually having the opposite effect right now, and it is a poor, unethical strategy. The media should report the facts, and should report on important issues with a fair amount of coverage, the volume of which is unaffected by agenda.

Re: YouTube's tendency to push everyday users toward politically extreme content

#234

Post by joe_the_user »

ekianjo wrote: post #103
Zarath wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To add on to your point: Given my understanding of how the recommendation engine works, if you watch a video slightly related to a topic, then another video slightly related to that topic, there is a reinforcing effect whereby the engine believes you to be more interested in that topic. E.g. if I watch a video on vegetarianism, then another one, it may strengthen the confidence that I am interested in vegetarianism,…

> if I watch a video on vegetarianism, then another one, it may strengthen the confidence that I am interested in vegetarianism, and conclude that they should be recommending me more content about vegetarianism Recommendation algorithms don't "conclude" anything though, they are merely statistical tools to ensure you get somewhat relevant content, but they are never perfect because there is a lot of noise in what eve…

Recommendation algorithms don't "conclude" anything though, they are merely statistical tools to ensure you get somewhat relevant content, but they are never perfect because there is a lot of noise in what everyone watches.

A. Jeesh, there's no problem with informal anthropomorophizing in this situations. When humans have a goal and feedback towards reaching a goal. When a human gets positive feedback that X gets them towards the goal, human choose X. The combined system Google-corp+developer+algorithm is also goal seeking and making choices so anthropomorphizing the system is appropriate.

B. The problem we're talking about isn't "noise" but "feedback" - a goal-seeking-system that muddies it's final result with it's initial state. Essentially, bias, a situation that's quite common in statical systems.

Re: YouTube's tendency to push everyday users toward politically extreme content

#235

Post by close04 »

atlantic wrote: post #189
close04 wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the Solomon story one woman was 100% right and one was 100% wrong. Are there many social issues where the 2 sides that meed this criterion? I think a better visualization of the problem is "you can't cross a canyon in less than a single bound". Sometimes there is no meeting half way. Last but not least, compromising is sometimes not an option. It's like the paradox of tolerance where the only thing you have to be…

> Hate speech is not free speech any more than contract killing is just a financial transaction. Personal anecdote. When I moved to the UK in the 1970, there was a little platform in Hyde Park called Speaker's Corner. Anyone could step onto it and make a speech about anything, anything at all; they could do so in the strongest terms, without being bothered; there was always a small audience standing around, and often…

> people of your ilk

I think the conclusion can be drawn even without the rest of the comment. There will always be some bigot dying a little inside seeing the world is evolving and they're left behind.

Spewing out some hate for a couple of other bigots is not that much of a big deal. But today's "Speaker's Corner" has an audience of (tens of) millions. And the bigot doesn't stand up in front of anyone, they do it from afar, in anonymous comments, in podcasts, from behind a mask. If you can't understand how much of a difference that makes than maybe you belong to that age and not this one.

And there's one thing your ilk doesn't understand: you're free to make that hate speech. You shouldn't be free of the consequences. Which is why I said it should be punished, not censored. If it's censored then people might mistakenly take those bigots for worthwhile human beings :).

You'd understand the power of hate speech better if enough voices called for violence against bigoted sexagenarians or something like that.

Oh, one other popular thing in the '70s was KKK which you obviously fully support because it happened so it must be right.

Draw your own conclusions.

Re: YouTube's tendency to push everyday users toward politically extreme content

#236

Post by close04 »

pfschell wrote: post #217
close04 wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the Solomon story one woman was 100% right and one was 100% wrong. Are there many social issues where the 2 sides that meed this criterion? I think a better visualization of the problem is "you can't cross a canyon in less than a single bound". Sometimes there is no meeting half way. Last but not least, compromising is sometimes not an option. It's like the paradox of tolerance where the only thing you have to be…

>Hate speech is not free speech There is no such thing as "hate speech." It has no legal or rational construction. Hurt feelings and strenuous objections are no basis for law.

> It has no legal [...] construction

That must be a real conundrum in countries that have laws against it. Presumably clearly defined. I think you're onto some paradox here...

Hate speech is not about hurt feelings. But if that's what you understand from it with almost the entire human knowledge available to you a simple internet search away I'm sure no comment here can provide you some relief.

Telling me my shoes don't match the belt is not hate speech. But instigating people against a whole class (race, religion, ethnicity, etc.), usually suggesting violence or some otherwise harmful methods, is. And it ends up with people hurt, lives and whole communities destroyed. You'd understand a lot better if you were at the receiving end of it. Things are very easy to overlook when they never hit close to home.

But just in case, lmgtfy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hate_speech

Re: YouTube's tendency to push everyday users toward politically extreme content

#237

Post by 0x4f3759df »

pfschell wrote: post #217
close04 wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the Solomon story one woman was 100% right and one was 100% wrong. Are there many social issues where the 2 sides that meed this criterion? I think a better visualization of the problem is "you can't cross a canyon in less than a single bound". Sometimes there is no meeting half way. Last but not least, compromising is sometimes not an option. It's like the paradox of tolerance where the only thing you have to be…

>Hate speech is not free speech There is no such thing as "hate speech." It has no legal or rational construction. Hurt feelings and strenuous objections are no basis for law.

[flagged]

Re: YouTube's tendency to push everyday users toward politically extreme content

#238

Post by watwut »

everdrive wrote: post #200
ekianjo wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Not perfect is understatement They are horrible. They would be much less horrible if every time one watched videos, they would rate them in a way, instead of assuming that "watching"="interest". > And youtube rules also motivate providers to churn out a lot of content regularly (leading to quick to produce crap) and punish those who take their time to think or research before they talk. That's not just Youtube: abou…

Watching does = interest if you continue to stay on the topic. Interest certainly does not mean approval, and it often can mean "I find this content extreme and outrageous."

I am interested in topic of WWII including seeing Nazi movies. I am not interested in nazi stormtrooper adjacent alternative history channels youtube recommends to me as a result.

I am interested in scientist or writer etc youtube channel about her topic. Not so much in confident-Johnny-cranked-out crap on the same topic.

Re: YouTube's tendency to push everyday users toward politically extreme content

#239

Post by close04 »

0x4f3759df wrote: post #237
pfschell wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Hate speech is not free speech There is no such thing as "hate speech." It has no legal or rational construction. Hurt feelings and strenuous objections are no basis for law.

[flagged]

Truth and lies are also political weapons. What does this say about them?

Re: YouTube's tendency to push everyday users toward politically extreme content

#240

Post by pjc50 »

atlantic wrote: post #189
close04 wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the Solomon story one woman was 100% right and one was 100% wrong. Are there many social issues where the 2 sides that meed this criterion? I think a better visualization of the problem is "you can't cross a canyon in less than a single bound". Sometimes there is no meeting half way. Last but not least, compromising is sometimes not an option. It's like the paradox of tolerance where the only thing you have to be…

> Hate speech is not free speech any more than contract killing is just a financial transaction. Personal anecdote. When I moved to the UK in the 1970, there was a little platform in Hyde Park called Speaker's Corner. Anyone could step onto it and make a speech about anything, anything at all; they could do so in the strongest terms, without being bothered; there was always a small audience standing around, and often…

Ah. The halcyon days of free speech when certain elected MPs were banned from speaking on television; the Zircon affair, the prosecution over Spycatcher, the McLibel trial, and so on?

Perhaps you were free to be racist, but certain kinds of speech affecting the power structure were definitely not free.

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