[pedrosorio]

> Instagram does the same thing

No, it does not.

There is a big difference between:

- showing you unconnected content you are likely to engage with

- having rules enforced with the help of human reviewers to prevent any user from getting recommendations with people deemed ugly/poor/etc.

[ViViDboarder]

I mean, if it’s the same result does it matter if it’s human or artificial moderation?

[pedrosorio]

It's not the same result. Ugly/fat/poor people can make engaging content and that will be recommended on Instagram.

The content you see depends on your interests. Making this up: if you regularly engage with topics that have a majority of fat people posting, say weight loss strategies, you will see a lot of fat people in Instagram Explore.

It's the difference between:

- Instagram: "I mostly see beautiful people" (because that's the content I and many users engage with).

- Tiktok: "I never see ugly people" (because the platform has a guideline that prevents that content from being shown to me)

[miguelmota]

Let's say there's 10 people on Instagram and 5 are ugly and 5 are non-ugly people

Suppose 10 users on average interact with 2 non-ugly persons and 1 ugly person. People like commenting on the non-ugly people's content with "wow so pretty!" and "that's awesome! ", etc, etc while ugly people don't get as many comments and maybe even receive neutral to non-positive comments.

Now a new person signs up. They get recommend non-ugly people in their feed since that's more popular based on views and interactions.

Another new person signs up and they get the same recommendation, and so on.

After 100 new sign ups, the recommendation engine has 'learned' that majority of people prefer interacting with non-ugly people.

Another new user signs up and all they see in non-ugly people recommendations.

The end result is pretty much the same. Ugly people will get pushed out enough either by the programmatic learning engine that becomes over trained and biased, or by manual reviewers that filter content based on data that shows that non-ugly people bring in more users, otherwise they'd promote ugly people content if that was driving more interactions.

[czardoz]

What's your point? Are you saying that TikTok having these guidelines is okay?

(I work at IG, but not on Explore)

[miguelmota]

The point is that at the end of the day people will always prefer looking at beautiful people over ugly people, so TikToks practices aren’t really all that absurd.

[lenkite]

No, they are extraordinarily absurd. One is a choice, the other is a directive. Also, lots of people don't even watch other people in Instagram - just pictures of scenes, animals, etc since that is their interest. And the recommendations reflect their choice of interest.

If you cannot see this critical difference between enforced directive and choice of interest, then god help you.

[kovac]

You've got some insight there. But what can we do if humans just like to see and interact with beautiful people and avoid the ugly? It makes things a bit bleak for me personally, but I guess people want what they want :B

[miguelmota]

That why I don’t understand the outrage; it’s human nature to like non-ugly things.

[haecceity]

The difference clearly in the mostly and never!

[ehsankia]

I wouldn't say it's "never" on TikTok. Having used both, I wouldn't say i've noticed a difference in how many non-model type persons I see on either platforms.

[PunchTornado]

I don't know where you see ugly people on instagram because I never saw one. it's not mostly, it's never, unless you specifically look for it. and how do you look for it?

by the same standard, you can see ugly people on tiktok, because they don't delete the post, they just supress it from popular feeds.

[dheera]

> It's not the same result. Ugly/fat/poor people can make engaging content and that will be recommended on Instagram.

That's not what happens to me. Instagram consistently pushes model-type people to me even though I hardly ever interact with those types.

[abdulmuhaimin]

It might seem related, but your example doesnt discredit what above poster said.

[noobermin]

I think this is striking at the root. Many people in tech have explained away things that where is a selection that occurs algorithmically even if it unsavoury because the black box is a black box and thus has no ill intent. However, the moderation policy does have intent. It just matters whether you value intent vs. actual consequences when you decide whether something is moral or immoral.

[ryandrake]

There is a school of thought (not sure if I agree with it) that if the outcome of a process is x-ist (racist, sexist, ageist, etc.) then the process itself is x-ist, regardless of whether there was any intent to make it so.

It kind of makes sense. Bad results can and do come out of well-intentioned decisions. In other areas (business, legislation) we judge policies by their actual effects, not by their creators' intentions.

[TheKarateKid]

More beautiful people on IG are more likely to have more followers, and therefore more likely to be recommended by Explore.

Half of my explore is memes and infographics because that’s what I interact with a lot.

[willis936]

Legally, intent defines the difference between manslaughter and murder. One is a plausibly an accident and the other is unjust.