Cohost was an attempt to do exactly this, a chronological-only feed that just showed the users and tags you had explicitly decided to follow. And it died. Things aren't looking great these days.
Kill your Feeds – Stop letting algorithms dictate what you think
271–280 of 332 posts
Re: Kill your Feeds – Stop letting algorithms dictate what you think
#272Earlier quoted context omitted.
> So yes, totally. Turn it off and go read a book. For what its worth, 500 years ago people were just as worried about books as we are today about newsfeeds. But it took a long time for books to ultimately decentralize enough to become a more egalitarian, community knowledge. But even that's not entirely the case now. Books can be propaganda just like everything else.
Books can be propaganda, certainly. However, books promote long attention span. Social media generally removes that aspect and focuses on dopamine hits. It’s hard to condition critical thinking when jumping from one truth sentence to another truth sentence without context.
What's weird about the kind of responses in this thread stating "books" or whatever "can also be bad so social media is no different" is that it's not as if we don't already have data about this. We have a lot of data on the outcomes of people that spend time reading books vs people glued to social media, regarding attention spans, etc. The proof is in the eating, we don't have to speculate about hypotheticals.
Re: Kill your Feeds – Stop letting algorithms dictate what you think
#273In a lot of ways I really like recommendation algorithms, regularly I've had youtube recommend a video that's converted into new sub (eg. LiamTronix and his electric tractor conversion). What we really need is "responsible" recommendation systems (that allow the joy of discovery while aggressively damping rage bait and extreme view points). They'd need to be trained with some kind of socially beneficial reward functi…
How do you decide what is an extreme view point? This "socially beneficial reward function" could, and actually has, lead to things Google Gemini's depiction Founding Fathers or Vikings, etc.
Re: Kill your Feeds – Stop letting algorithms dictate what you think
#274Re: Kill your Feeds – Stop letting algorithms dictate what you think
#275Earlier quoted context omitted.
> neo nazis I have heard this a few times now, what is going on? The news hasn't mentioned anything about Neo Nazis, and there is no large organized effort to round up the Jews, let alone exterminate them. This seems like hyperbolic language that is in really poor taste, which undermines the seriousness of what the second world war was fought over.
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See, your comment is an example of the problem. This is the kind of propaganda that is peddled in these leftist social media channels, influencers, etc. It's not even that subjective, the ADL, who are not known not being sensitive enough, came out to say they did not these gestures were as you describe; of course they did not like Musk's humorous puns regarding the reaction but that is another matter.
Re: Kill your Feeds – Stop letting algorithms dictate what you think
#276[deleted]
Re: Kill your Feeds – Stop letting algorithms dictate what you think
#277Earlier quoted context omitted.
> neo nazis I have heard this a few times now, what is going on? The news hasn't mentioned anything about Neo Nazis, and there is no large organized effort to round up the Jews, let alone exterminate them. This seems like hyperbolic language that is in really poor taste, which undermines the seriousness of what the second world war was fought over.
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This is more of the same propaganda that is being discussed that social media creates. I'm surprised that you don't see it. You're making these claims like "vilifying immigrants", which is just virtue signaling that you have "all the Correct Opinions" regarding liberal politics. There are no concentration camps as those from the bad people you are referencing. Regarding immigration, would you refer to Obama as a member of the Third Reich? I doubt that you would, which speaks for itself. It's extremely hyperbolic and I don't think you realize how you implying that enormous amounts of people have no problem or even think it is quite a good thing for the government to be doing things that you are likening to a group that committed actual atrocities. If Mexico was an extremely successful economic powerhouse, or Uganda, whatever, do you think they would have unfettered immigration?
Re: Kill your Feeds – Stop letting algorithms dictate what you think
#278Earlier quoted context omitted.
In the spirit of the video (and the article), I'm watching this on Freetube [0] while hiding the comments, recommended videos tab, and pretty much everything else apart from the video description. [0] https://freetubeapp.io/
… and you are watching it because the HackerNews algorithm put this link on the top of its feed.
No algo, but upvotes plus some curation from @dang.
Re: Kill your Feeds – Stop letting algorithms dictate what you think
#279I agree with the sentiment that algorithms do affect what we see in our feeds and often the things we see are chosen because they are deemed more engaging by said algorithm, but I also think we're overstating the effects of the algorithms and putting too much blame on them. I think we need to recognize that the technology we've built is inherently addictive and also making human connections more impersonal. If you to…
Well, I agree with you. I would add that in some ways this entire thread is an example of the problem it's trying to address. There is a kind of bubble here of virtue signaling how much you disable all recommendations or get off entirely of social media, unless it is only used some Correct, Zen sort of way. This acts a social contagion if you like and how the Correct Opinion is established. I think certainly for impressionable minds, it is quite problematic. For adults that have self-control, maybe it is good to have the feeds so you can test yourself? A lot of people talk about how their mental health has improved so dramatically now they follow the Correct Way and disable social media or whatever... that's good, I mean, I'm happy for them, but maybe it could help you establish mental resilience by facing those feeds without adverse mental health outcomes? I don't know.
Re: Kill your Feeds – Stop letting algorithms dictate what you think
#280Glad to see Bluesky mentioned. I look forward to trading custom feed algorithms like Pokémon: https://stronglytyped.uk/articles/bluesky-firehose-meet-hack...
Recommendation for the EU, please force social media platforms to offer support for custom feed algorithms/plugins. If they don't offer them, ban them from the EU market. Long term, once we figure out how to generate feeds that are aren't socially corrosive dumpster fires. Mandate platforms default to using one of a set of approved models (maybe we need a recommendation engine benchmark that scores social divisivenes…
Wouldn't it be much better for the European Union to do what it would prefer which is to simply jail anyone that produces any content that doesn't follow correct opinions?