I think there was a brief time with algorithmic feeds were actually good, and I remember getting quite a few recommendations from news aggregators and the like which actually were of interest to me, but those days are long gone. These days... no.
Odd example here, but bear with me: I have a separate Twitter account just for following ahem adult content. Even before Elno bought them out the "For You" section was completely nonsensical. I followed nothing but adult artists and performers showing T&A, and every 8th entry in my "For You" feed was Sports or Politics or rage-bait in general. It wasn't what I wanted, it was what Twitter wanted me to want.
Puts to words a lot of my feelings about mainstream social media.
It’s a big ball of algorithms that skew “communication platforms” away from facilitating the thing they were created for.
If you’re not spending as much time in comment sections, actually reading what people have to say, and writing responses, as you do scrolling, that media ain’t “social”.
And the communication that does occur on most platforms, is parasocial. While that’s not inherently bad, facilitating only that kind of “exchange”, is.
Algorithms are incredibly bad for organic relationships, you should see the thoughts and events around the people you know when they happen, not when some corporation thinks you should be more receptive. Direct feeds and chatrooms are much better at being social environments.
That said, there is an inevitable parasocial aspect to media and that is not necessarily bad. I don't want to build a relationship with actors, even thinking that is a possibility is unhealthy. I just want to see their work for entertainment, and the same applies for many artists and influencers for social media. For that purpose, it wouldn't be too bad to have algorithms, as long as users could tweak them to their own liking. That would help a lot with discoverability.
The problem is that these algorithms are 100% obscured and driven by company interests, such as getting people to scroll forever (and see more ads) by shoving posts which elicit outrage at their face. Even though there are issues I care deeply about, in algorithm driven social media I got into the habit of just skipping and muting whatever is too revolting, because if I so much as browse it too much, they start to show solely that sort of misery, all the time. It's just bad for people's sanity and it doesn't even help anyone at the end of the day.
Well said, your comment reminded me of this essay I recently read by @carl that has a great opening analogy:
Imagine all the squares, streets, parks, and venues you visit or live by in are owned by just one or a few companies. They not only own all these places but also determine what they are to be used for, and who can use them. They decide who can be there and who cannot. Mostly, it's free rent, for these companies finance everything through advertising.
Because of this, all places are designed so that everyone will consume the advertising. In the town hall, the agenda of the municipal council is adapted according to the length of advertising breaks. In the park, you can hear advertisements over the loudspeakers at regular intervals. At the playground, there's advertising targeted at the very youngest, and at the retirement home, ads for the very oldest.
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