No. There are short term and long term feedback cycles. They can control the short term ones. But the long term ones lead to Snap
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Replying to @benedictevans @zeynep and
Essentially you’re arguing FB could make whatever product it wants, sprinkle sugar and get use. This is partly true but only in short term
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Replying to @benedictevans @zeynep and
closer to: FB runs endless taste tests to develop foods people will consume ad nauseam. Why sprinkle sugar when you can make cake?
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Replying to @jasonkincaid @zeynep and
The sugar analogy here is terribly broken 1/3
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Replying to @benedictevans @jasonkincaid and
First, it's an argument of false consciousness - "you think you like that, but I, more enlightened, know you're wrong". Unfalsifiable. 2/3
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Replying to @benedictevans @jasonkincaid and
Second, sugar is objectively harmful. We have chemistry to prove the false consciousness. No such standard exists for the newsfeed. 3/3
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Replying to @benedictevans @jasonkincaid and
So, at a minimum, you agree if harms of personalization etc algorithms were established, it would be a public concern?
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Replying to @zeynep @benedictevans and
That makes researching this a public concern. Also, analogy isn't sugar, but what we're vulnerable in the moment—but not at all time scales.
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Replying to @zeynep @benedictevans and
People are vulnerable to junk food but also take measures—don't buy at home, have a wider menu, mandate calorie counts etc. Need such tools.
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Replying to @zeynep @benedictevans and
It's the same with Twitter. Having character limit plus RT mechanism incentivizes some methods of social approval, and not others.
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Given the stakes, and what we know of influence of choice architectures, all this makes independent research into effects more important. /
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