Yes, 'The Algorithm' REALLY IS Like That

[SkidAce]

Hence, why I do not use social media. I have watched people become more and more radicalized over the last decade plus. This is because their feeds keep giving them things that will ‘engage’ them and keep them scrolling.

It directly leads to more intolerance and hate.

It is also scary when groups of people all start using the same phrases at the same time.

It is also scary when groups of people all start using the same phrases at the same time.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

As far as the commonly understood meaning, and directly relatable to the OP and link?

Yes they do, and traditional forums are not it.

I think most people understand social media to mean "a platform where people share posts and talk in a weirdly semi-public way"

So yeah, enworld is absolutely social media, just like LiveJournal and MySpace back in the day.

 

[jian]

It has an algorithm. It's just a very simple one -- sort by post date, descending. It suppresses old content and promotes new content. The toxicity of the algorithm is a scale with a forum like this at the bottom end and, presumably, certain other platforms at the top.

And it’s greatly appreciated, thank you.

It does take me to another thought, which is that are benign social media companies such as EN World or other forums profitable? If not, why would anyone run them apart from the love of the game and community? If they charged a tiny subscription to stay solvent, how many people would still use them?

I think we can all remember when some of the more toxic social media platforms used to be more benign, but AFAIK they weren’t making any profit then, and in retrospect they were being run as loss leaders to build a user base to prepare for more profitable approaches such as data extraction. Perhaps they shouldn’t be run at all if that’s the only way they can stay afloat.

Yet another question is, what would a world without Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, X, Bluesky etc look like? It’s easy for me to say “more like the 90s when I grew up” but that’s obviously not true. It means, for instance, that nobody can play the influencer social media lottery. It means that it will be a lot harder for some communities to find each other online. What would we lose and how can it be preserved?

 

[Scribe]

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

It does take me to another thought, which is that are benign social media companies such as EN World or other forums profitable? If not, why would anyone run them apart from the love of the game and community? If they charged a tiny subscription to stay solvent, how many people would still use them?

Bluesky is trying to run a social media site without a predatory algorithm. They're still running on venture capital at this point, but they're claiming they're going to go with subscriptions to help fund the whole site.

ENWorld has those as well, although it also makes money off of advertising, which I don't think Bluesky currently intends to do.

Mastodon is doing something similar, but that's basically a network of independent hobbyists lashing their personal networks together to create a full-sized one, and those tend to be funded out of pocket by the owners or through membership drives.

In any case, yes, there are folks giving it a try.

 

[Cergorach]

I mean, we all sort of suspected this already, but this might be the first insider confirmation.

Why wouldn't they use human nature to optimize their product? Everyone else does... From cigarettes, alcohol, child labor, toxic workplace, toxic dumping, insane resource consumption (ranging from materials to things like water, energy, etc.), using people's vices, their insecurities, etc.

When companies become so large, that the customer is so far removed from the owners/management that they stop being people and just numbers that go up and down, people tend to loose perspective. And when the owners put psychopathic CEOs in charge with marching orders to optimize profit over all else, what do you expect?

I'm seeing this more often with publicly traded multinationals, privately owned multinationals tend to be a bit more stable imho (either by being good OR bad).

It has an algorithm. It's just a very simple one -- sort by post date, descending. It suppresses old content and promotes new content. The toxicity of the algorithm is a scale with a forum like this at the bottom end and, presumably, certain other platforms at the top.

With the only filters in place: the topic starters you ignore (your choice) and the topic starters that ignore you (not your choice). So there is some external 'filtering' in place, even on ENworld...

 

[Morrus]

If they charged a tiny subscription to stay solvent, how many people would still use them?

We do. At least to get rid of the ads.

 

[TheSword]

While social media has risks for the young, I think that's a separate issue from the broad social ills we work under now with respect to the tech.

I will let developmental psychologists figure out what should happen for under age users.

I daresay that if EN World had to verify ages to the level that would protect us from liability, we'd probably close our doors.

Not quite.
Remove the algorithms that present content we didn't explicitly ask for. Make it so we see content from folks we follow. No more auto-suggesting content from third parties. No more bumping paid content that isn't clearly an advertisement.

I suspect this would have legal repercussions far beyond social media, and I am not sure I am on board with that.

In a word: no.
The PTA, the local Scout Troop, your FLGS, and your municipality all have legitimate use cases for social media as a communication platform.

There would be no problem with John Smith joining a PTA group or having a badge on their profile saying they represent the PTA but no faceless PTA account. While I accept that anonymity protects people from being targeted personally, it also enables harm that is arguably worse than not using social media at all. Online bullying, online hate, trolling whatever you want to call it does more damage than the good generated by being able to promote your cause.

Age verification is pretty straightforward not sure why losing access to under 16s would make you close? Irrespective of that we have entire generations of children raised on a daily diet of social media now becoming parents. It’s not pretty. We’ll have to see how the Australia system works but I wouldn’t be surprised if more countries follow soon. UK included.

I agree about being the algorithm being the issue. I guess my concern about doomscrolling is the addiction nature of it.

If someone made a statement in a newspaper that was factually incorrect they would be liable. Similarly if it was made in a TV documentary. Influencers have fallen through the cracks. I was recently affected by a person who passed away following pretty specific health advise from an influencer and that person is still free to promote the same craze. There should be recourse. I also think that influencers should learn to understand the risks of what they promote and the consequences. Pretty uncontroversial in any setting other than social media.

 

[RealAlHazred]

We do. At least to get rid of the ads.

It's not True Capitalism unless you charge for every bell and whistle! Where's my charge for a custom avatar? Where's my charge for a comprehensible username of my own choice? Get with the program! If you're not maximally capitalistic, why even do anything?

 

[Morrus]

It's not True Capitalism unless you charge for every bell and whistle! Where's my charge for a custom avatar? Where's my charge for a comprehensible username of my own choice? Get with the program! If you're not maximally capitalistic, why even do anything?

Believe it or not, we’ve been through that phase. Over the last 26 years we’ve tried a LOT of things!