[KirinDave]

I was not expecting the truth to be SO much worse than the algorithmically provided view.

I'm sold on algorithmic timelines now. That Youtube is awful. People are awful. Fortnite Battle Royale is awful. I don't want to see any of those.

[bscphil]

I think it's more complicated than that. YouTube's algorithms don't just represent (or misrepresent) the truth, they also have a role in creating the truth. That is to say, if YouTube's algorithms disproportionately represent terrible (likely) sponsored videos on the trending pages and your personal feed, those videos will as a result objectively receive more views. The only way a "fair trending" approach could really work was if we somehow had access to the stats videos would receive without the distorting effects of Youtube's algorithms. We don't have that, so this project (while very interesting) is not likely to be very useful.

[goldenkey]

This is the same issue with models like Black Scholes that came to be used in pricing options. Or the confounding issues with gravitons having energy such that they themselves generate gravitons - hence the loopback effect.

Self-modifying programs are still an enigma we haven't untied.

[anonytrary]

This is such a pretentious comment, but I can't disagree with it. It's not that YouTube is stupid, it's that most people watch really stupid videos and that trending algorithms are a black mirror. Everything you see in trending is the LCD of what average people are interested in.

Twitter trends are being dominated by sports I couldn't care less about, Reddit's front page is constantly bombarded with FortniteBR posts, and YouTube is being taken over by clickbait, tabloid press and garbage. Evidently, that's what people want.

[KirinDave]

Please let people dislike trivial things without calling it "pretentious."

My comment is obviously something of a joke. It doesn't really hurt anyone except staunch FortniteBR fans, and we all know they don't have souls so that fine.

[anonytrary]

Pretentious (adjective): making usually unjustified or excessive claims (as of value or standing).

> That Youtube is awful. People are awful. Fortnite Battle Royale is awful.

I definitely used the word right, and I recognized you being facetious, but I still agree with you for the most part because there is a nugget of truth in what you said.

[KirinDave]

But you think that I'm right, so you don't think I'm unjustified. Do you think they're excessive? Should I have used like a toki-pona word or something?

[blensor]

I wish youtube had a way to directly and instantly influence the algorithmically created view.

For example. I like all those electronics, physics and music theory videos, but after weeks of same old same old, I sometimes crave for something completely different. I would like to be able to see an orthogonal view to what I usually get just to be able to break out of that self reinforcing recommendation loop.

I could search for stuff I am not interested in and watch videos I don't like just to reset the assumption youtube has about the videos I want to watch but that is tedious and probably does not what I want.

[fps_doug]

It can be even worse; I'm usually browsing youtube on my phone and then send videos I'm interested in to XBMC, so I see them on the big screen. Downside is that youtube doesn't count that as me having seen the video (even when logging in in the XBMC youtube app). So I get the same videos recommended for weeks. Literally the same; not just similar content. Makes discovering new things really hard.

[snaky]

And all those people are voters.

[rland]

I wonder. It's probably mostly children watching these videos, right? It has to be... right?

[snaky]

Voting age has a trend to going lower and lower. Even in the traditionally conservative US

> In 2013, the City of Takoma Park, Maryland became the first place in the United States to lower its voting age to 16, for local (but not general) elections and referendums. As of 2018, three additional cities have lowered the voting age to 16: Hyattsville and Greenbelt in Maryland, and Berkeley in California (for school board elections only). In 2018, a bill in the Council of the District of Columbia was proposed to lower the voting age to 16, which would make the federal district the first jurisdiction to lower the voting age for federal level elections.

[KirinDave]

I'm not sure this is the right conclusion to draw from my jokey comment.

[tormeh]

A lot of people like to veg out while watching crap. Viewing numbers are also influenced most by kids with a lot of time (the same demographic that play Fortnite the most).

But yeah, I'm also sold on personalised recommendations.

[Flimm]

Both Youtube and fairtrending.com use an algorithm to generate a list of trending videos, so your comment is confusing to me.

[GW150914]

What I hate about the algorithm is that I feel it’s constantly nudging me towards “that” youtube. It feels like someone pulling on your sleeve and saying, “You know how you watched five minutes of the Cyberpunk 2077 trailer? Maybe you’d like a dozen recommendations of GG conspiracy material and tweens screaming at FortNite? And hey, remember that time you watched a living historian cook a meal from the 1800’s? Well, here’s some dude trying to eat a dozen hot wings. You like food stuff right? RIGHT?!”

It’s still better than the pure vomit on this fair site, but it could be soooooop much better if it didn’t try to maximize engagement as the primary goal.

[KirinDave]

True. This is because they're attempting to parasite the hashtag, and because Youtube has a perilously bad conflation of conflict as "engagement."

It may also be a warning that folks looking to push social change that teens and young people want so badly should get the hell on youtube and provide worldviews that are not, "The press is bad because it lies and also I hate the 19th amendment."

[prolikewh0a]

Shows how low quality society is now.

[KirinDave]

Hardly. Go back and read old newspapers. They were all awful. This myth that societal culture is on the decline is just a failure to understand that time is a polarizing filter to remove the glare of bullshit.

[GW150914]

Now, and always. It’s not like bear baiting and midget shows were ever popular because the average person has refined tastes.

[SmellyGeekBoy]

Is it time for someone to wheel out that quote again... Aristotle, was it?

[KirinDave]

I may steal this. This insult is so sizzlingly hot and sharp it carbonized my phone and then cut it in half, and I love it.

[rahulkapil]

Not really. Centralized recommendations dont provide value to majority of clusters in the network.

[liftbigweights]

> I was not expecting the truth to be SO much worse than the algorithmically provided view.

The trending page isn't algorithmically created. It's curated by google employees.

> That Youtube is awful. People are awful. Fortnite Battle Royale is awful. I don't want to see any of those.

Then don't. I'm sure most people probably think what you are watching is awful. Isn't that the point of youtube. You watch what you are interested in? Do you think we should all be forced to watch what you want?

[KirinDave]

The funny part is: I watch a fair sum of video game content. I used to be part of that industry. The reason the content triggers me is less because of Fortnite Battle Royale (although I think the format is boring, it's less boring than predecessors) is inherently bad but because the people I see there are like... frightening people.

> The trending page isn't algorithmically created. It's curated by google employees.

It's a hybrid.

> Isn't that the point of youtube. You watch what you are interested in? Do you think we should all be forced to watch what you want?

No, wasn't this the entire premise of my joke explained back to me? If so... I mean... thanks for the review, "liftbigweights."

[liftbigweights]

> but because the people I see there are like... frightening people.

People who make silly videos are frightening? If you say so.

> It's a hybrid.

No it's not algorithmically determined like you claimed? It's superficially hybrid. Ultimately, the final decision is made by employees.

> No, wasn't this the entire premise of my joke explained back to me?

No. It was a rhetorical question outlining the absurdity of your insistence that content be curated to your personal liking. Okay "kirindave", he who wants everything his own way.

[KirinDave]

> No it's not algorithmically determined like you claimed?

You misread my post and have drawn an incorrect conclusion as to what I meant or intend to say. I do apologise for my part today's round of your confusion, Mr. Lift BigWeights.

But please, sir, I am not a "he" and I'll thank you kindly to take that mis-gendering somewhere where it's welcome. Perhaps a collapsed neutron star? That would be the biggest weight you could lift, indeed.