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The political effects of X's feed algorithm

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Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#91

Post by daveguy »

apparent wrote: post #84
daveguy wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A 2025 study... Asking people if they "would have" voted for the winner of the election, a corrupt vindictive racist asshat already in power ? Well, I guess that's one way to conduct a study. Fortunately the shift in sentiment is clear, growing, and reflected in special elections.

Your theory is that people who didn't care enough to vote are concerned that Donald Trump is going to come after them if they don't say they would have voted for him, when surveyed anonymously? And then NPR was duped into credulously reporting on this polling? That is quite a theory.

I'm saying it doesn't take much for someone to say, "yeah, I would have voted for the guy already in power". I'm surprised it wasn't much higher than that.

So no, you definitely misrepresented my theory. It doesn't take a specific threat of violence for someone to say "sure, I would have cast a vote with the winner." And yet it was only ~1.5% higher than before the election. Are you saying you don't even recognize the bias of saying "yeah, I'm good with the winner"? Or the bias of a honeymoon period? I mean, June 2025 was before 90% of his craziest shit. But you go on.

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#92

Post by Hobadee »

tokyobreakfast wrote: post #83
SecretDreams wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like voting (up and down) but I also agree with your take. Reddit salts the votes, but maybe the solution is to allocate a certain amount of reasonable votes (up or down) total that a user can use weekly. Make it so when you are voting, it's much more meaningful and truely reflect an opinion you either really agree with or really do not agree with. Ultimately, I think it comes back to people value their online pers…

>but maybe the solution is to allocate a certain amount of reasonable votes (up or down) total that a user can use weekly Slashdot did this back in the day IIRC.

I was just gonna say that!

Yeah, you had to have sufficient rep on Slashdot, then you were randomly allocated a certain number of votes (5 or so, IIRC) that you could use to vote. There were fixed categories you could vote an item for, such as "funny", or "off topic". Once your votes were gone, that was it until you were randomly awarded more. The max score anything could get was 5, and a minimum was -1. You could use the scores to filter what you saw. (ie: show full text of >3 insightful, and summaries of 1-2, hide It worked pretty well. Obvious trolling was still down voted, and insightful stuff was up voted. The ability to just show a blurb of lower-voted stuff was nice as well; you could ignore obvious crap, but expand it if it caught your attention.

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#93

Post by apparent »

daveguy wrote: post #91
apparent wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your theory is that people who didn't care enough to vote are concerned that Donald Trump is going to come after them if they don't say they would have voted for him, when surveyed anonymously? And then NPR was duped into credulously reporting on this polling? That is quite a theory.

I'm saying it doesn't take much for someone to say, "yeah, I would have voted for the guy already in power". I'm surprised it wasn't much higher than that. So no, you definitely misrepresented my theory. It doesn't take a specific threat of violence for someone to say "sure, I would have cast a vote with the winner." And yet it was only ~1.5% higher than before the election. Are you saying you don't even recognize th…

Oh sorry, you made it sound like "corrupt" and "vindictive" were somehow relevant to the polling results.

The media seemed pretty surprised by the results, which indicates that your hypothesis is perhaps not accurate. But hey, keep doubling down, moving the goalposts, etc. I'll leave you to it.

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#94

Post by daveguy »

apparent wrote: post #93
daveguy wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm saying it doesn't take much for someone to say, "yeah, I would have voted for the guy already in power". I'm surprised it wasn't much higher than that. So no, you definitely misrepresented my theory. It doesn't take a specific threat of violence for someone to say "sure, I would have cast a vote with the winner." And yet it was only ~1.5% higher than before the election. Are you saying you don't even recognize th…

Oh sorry, you made it sound like "corrupt" and "vindictive" were somehow relevant to the polling results. The media seemed pretty surprised by the results, which indicates that your hypothesis is perhaps not accurate. But hey, keep doubling down, moving the goalposts, etc. I'll leave you to it.

Nah, just an observation. Or my hypothesis is accurate and they were just taking it at face value like you apparently did (assuming you are posting in good faith). The click bait appeal couldn't have hurt (although I agree with your expectation that they don't usually go for that). But dippy did pull their funding after all.

My goalposts never moved. Sorry you misinterpreted a few accurate adjectives.

Have a great evening!

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#95

Post by piloto_ciego »

0ckpuppet wrote: post #43
piloto_ciego wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

as opposed to the government funding turning it to the reality bending left? There was direct communication from Senators and members of Congress directing twitter to block and ban based on certain topics. And Twitter obliged.

If you think Elon's hand on the scale isn't pushing an agenda too I have a bridge to sell you. This was always about power.

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#96

Post by throw385682 »

yndoendo wrote: post #78
spankalee wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the idea that if you don't support white supremacy you should get off the site owned and run by a clear white supremacist applies regardless of how elections go.

I recommend _Culture in Nazi Germany_ by Michael H Kater. [0] It is very dry but goes into detail of the culture of the era from late 1920s to end of WWII. One aspect he highlights at the end is that Fascism was not rejected by the current and former citizens, those that migrated, of Germany. In their mind it was incorrectly implemented. A number of Zionist that migrated from Germany to Palestine were supporters of F…

You keep making this claim as some kind of sick attempt at comparing Jews to Nazis. It’s simply not true.

No one was even talking about zionism here, you are just looking for places to push your hateful agenda.

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#97

Post by SecretDreams »

Hobadee wrote: post #92
tokyobreakfast wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>but maybe the solution is to allocate a certain amount of reasonable votes (up or down) total that a user can use weekly Slashdot did this back in the day IIRC.

I was just gonna say that! Yeah, you had to have sufficient rep on Slashdot, then you were randomly allocated a certain number of votes (5 or so, IIRC) that you could use to vote. There were fixed categories you could vote an item for, such as "funny", or "off topic". Once your votes were gone, that was it until you were randomly awarded more. The max score anything could get was 5, and a minimum was -1. You could us…

This was good insight. I do think this system would work better. I like the min rep aspect too. The things you've listed would go a long way to preserve the filtration effects of a voting system while possibly mitigating abuse and bot proliferation.

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#98

Post by cyrusradfar »

rl3 wrote: post #89
cyrusradfar wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's true -- I do enjoy this community even though it's failed to serve my every thought with the love that I surely deserve!

Odd reply, but OK. For what it's worth I largely agree with everything else you said. >> 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. Technically that's true. Thing is,…

I think we're relatively aligned. But you're sharing another chicken & egg problem of whether the algorithm (and engagement with it) is driving the design of the feeds or the other way around.

Arguably, the initial design was a shot in the dark and they're approaching some local maxima with data-driven design trying to improve metrics that we probably all agree aren't the best for our mental health or wellbeing.

Nice chat, apologies if my response was off-putting. It was intended to be self-deprecating humor.

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#99

Post by Herring »

throw385682 wrote: post #96
yndoendo wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recommend _Culture in Nazi Germany_ by Michael H Kater. [0] It is very dry but goes into detail of the culture of the era from late 1920s to end of WWII. One aspect he highlights at the end is that Fascism was not rejected by the current and former citizens, those that migrated, of Germany. In their mind it was incorrectly implemented. A number of Zionist that migrated from Germany to Palestine were supporters of F…

You keep making this claim as some kind of sick attempt at comparing Jews to Nazis. It’s simply not true. No one was even talking about zionism here, you are just looking for places to push your hateful agenda.

https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/06/03/most-peop...

Dude everybody knows what happened to your country. It's actually sad/horrific, not hateful.

Re: The political effects of X's feed algorithm

#100

Post by yndoendo »

throw385682 wrote: post #96
yndoendo wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recommend _Culture in Nazi Germany_ by Michael H Kater. [0] It is very dry but goes into detail of the culture of the era from late 1920s to end of WWII. One aspect he highlights at the end is that Fascism was not rejected by the current and former citizens, those that migrated, of Germany. In their mind it was incorrectly implemented. A number of Zionist that migrated from Germany to Palestine were supporters of F…

You keep making this claim as some kind of sick attempt at comparing Jews to Nazis. It’s simply not true. No one was even talking about zionism here, you are just looking for places to push your hateful agenda.

I recommend _Culture in Nazi Germany_ by Michel H Kater [0] for the fact it examines the complexity of reality during this time. He actually went and talked to the musicians, actors, and writers of the era to have a better understanding of the culture and view points that the people still held after the war. I will take his expertise over those of the modern era that have not engaged with these people that lived through it.

People scoff at the idea _Jews for Hitler_. Reality is that a number of Jewish Germany actually supported Hitler and Fascism in the 1920-1930s and latter. It latches onto the idea that that modern day people would be able to pick out Fascism and reject it ... which has shown to be the opposite with populism.

By the way, I consumed _Mein Kampf_ by Adolf Hilter. It was not to align with his ideology but to understand it and have an independent reference to _like Hilter_ that politicians, the media, and pop culture use, and as a base understand of Fascism. I in fact reject Fascism, Nazism, and Adolf Hitler.

Example is that Hilter's take over of Europe was under the disguise that resources are ours for the taking and are needed to support the country. He states this in his book. This is the same statement that Donald Trump and his executive branch uses against Greenland. Yet history proved Hilter wrong. Technology is what drives the economy not direct resource access. Japan, USA, South Korea proved this after WWII.

[0] https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/central-european-his...

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Hans_Kater

P.S. Based on your post history your account is shell account with only two comments that only drive pro Israel ideology.

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