Algorithms: The Good, The Distracting, & The Misleading!
Algorithms, the social media's matchmakers curate our viewing. These sophisticated codes designed to use what we view and what we should view has evolved from providing suggestions to being an influencer. With millions of content sources flooding social media and in the before times, it was overwhelming to receive constant input. Insert the goldfish study on society's attention span. "A study from Microsoft Corp, people now generally lose concentration after eight seconds" included in this time article You Now Have a Shorter Attention Span Than a Goldfish if you are interested. To avoid losing people's attention and keep them engaged longer, social media started launching algorithms to act as librarians to sort and connect common users with their similarities.
Of course, it wasn't for the warm and fuzzy feeling of knowing they were making individuals happy. They do want positive user experience, but it is for profit! Algorithms help place marketing content at the most visible times for individuals who are most likely to interact with it. The downside to this method is echo chambers being created. Algorithms reduce exposure to different perspectives.
Social media algorithms criteria:
The article "Everything You Need to Know About Social Media Algorithms" (Adisa, 2023) breaks down the criteria used by social media platforms well. For our purposes, I have chosen the repeating criteria. They measure user engagement by their timing, frequency, keyword searches (hashtags or labels), and click through rates so marketing can be placed at the most visible time to individuals who are most likely to interact with the content. In some cases, similar locations or demographics are used for things like political voting. Algorithms have multiple layers of relational references to connect users, content, and companies. Your likes or views are as important to the algorithms as the dislike, reported content, and disregarded content in curating your user experience. If you are like me, videos are simpler for me to internalize information so I'm including "Is the Internet expanding or narrowing our minds?" to further explain.
Ethical publishing standards
Social media platforms were not created for the purpose of providing education and news in mind. As they have evolved and more "fake" information is undiscernible from facts, the movement to pressure these original entertainment sites to implement ethical publishing standards. As a graduate student in Library Science, I recently had an assignment to read the blueprint for modernizing the Privacy Act of 1974 to address these various issues because of the problems surmounting with the lack of information policies to protect users. At this stage of social media, Dr. Sofiya U Noble, board member of the Cyber Civil Rights Initiative, is one of many giving recommendations. Her suggestions, like any good reference library, is to be specific in the search terms used on Youtube to "really key in on good, quality information" and only use Youtube as a starting point of research. Dr. Noble says to "develop a deep curiosity, but back that up with expertise." You can hear her full recommendation at the link for How YouTube’s Algorithms Can Fool You. The video is about Youtube specifically, but the information applies to all social media.
References:
Adisa, D. (2023, October 30). Everything you need to know about social media algorithms. Sprout Social. https://sproutsocial.com/insights/social-media-algorithms/
McSpadden, K. (2015, May 14). Science: You now have a shorter attention span than a goldfish. Time. https://time.com/3858309/attention-spans-goldfish/
Bess, M. (2022, April 6). Is the internet expanding or narrowing our minds?. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPqI0n44zP8&t=193s
Bess, M. (2019, June 19). How YouTube’s Algorithms Can Fool You. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuFKYSSZtpo
I really like your summaries of these issues with algorithms. An echo chamber is almost unavoidable with current algorithms. Something I try to remember when on YouTube especially is that sensationalism is pushed to the top. The wild headlines will be shown to more people, because they're more likely to click on it, and more likely to continue clicking on videos from there. So the initial story gets tons of views, but if there was an error, the correction is not going to get near the same amount of eyeballs. It's important to remember that these sites were designed to entertain, not to inform, like you said. Without better regulation (that blueprint for modernizing the 1974 privacy act looks interesting), the misinformation isn't going to go away because it brings people to these sites for longer.
ReplyDeleteIt is true, algorithms are more than just an explore page now. They curate brains for better or for worse. That curation is a trap though because as we interact with our social media that we begin to believe that it's right. That perhaps those are my thoughts reflected back to me. That can lead people towards the wrong path (as we often see with incel culture). That is of no consequence to the companies that implement these algorithms however. As you said, they are for-profit and nothing seems to matter more than how they might be able to profit off any one individual. Great read!
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