[Syonyk]

> Why has Twitter the company and its employees not taken action to deal with this?

Because it's not their job to moderate this stuff.

Angry, pissed off, outraged users are, from the perspective of social media companies, the best users. They refresh constantly (so more ad views), they come back constantly, and if they've gone away for too long, you can just figure out what's likely to piss them off the most, send them a notification, and they're right back into the ad delivery mill, engaged and outraged.

And all that means more money for the company. Which is their interest.

YouTube's guiding goal (at least some years back, as I heard it) was to increase hours watched. Period. Hours watched was the metric they optimized for, above all else. And it showed in the various recommendations that looked very broken from the outside world, but those tended to add hours watched.

I don't think the algorithms were nearly smart enough to know that they were recommending some conspiracy theorist gateway video, or extreme political content, or such. They simply knew, "If we get people to watch this video, they will then spend a lot more time on YouTube." So, the more people that watch that video one way or another, the more hours watched, problem improved! It's very "paperclip maximizer" seeming sort of algorithm.

Given that it's been known for years how to "drive your users nuts to keep them coming back" and social media companies have refined this to near perfection (it's Vegas in your pocket, without any of the regulations and rules Vegas casinos have to abide by), I'm in favor of some regulation on this sort of stuff, but I'm not at all sure it will actually matter. :/

[1234letshaveatw]

"So what if our AI is becoming self-aware and making questionable decisions? Or job is to win government contracts" - skynet employee, August 3rd, 1997 :)

[commandlinefan]

> Because it's not their job to moderate this stuff

And I'm not sure it would be better if it were. I don't care if a bunch of people I've never met are talking about what a horrible person I am (well ok, I do, but that's more of a me problem than a them problem). I do care when my employer joins the mob and ignores any evidence I might present of my innocence. What we need are for the people who can mete out the consequences to start thinking longer and harder before they capitulate to the outrage mob. A little less "better him than me" and a little more "I'd hate to be treated this way myself".

[AndrewUnmuted]

> it's Vegas in your pocket, without any of the regulations and rules Vegas casinos have to abide by

> I'm in favor of some regulation on this sort of stuff

You really nailed the problem but I am not so sure about your solution. The gambling industry's regulations do not do very much to reduce the volume of lives ruined by the gambling industry.

We've been gambling since the paleolithic period, and like other vices, its regulation serves largely to hide it from public view, rather than actually fix any social problems. Regulating social media in any meaningful way will do the same; compliance with these regulations will force the issue further into the corporate depths and away from public view.

We already know the social media firms collude with governments around the world in secretive tribunals to deal with issues of "national security." We don't want to encourage further developments on this front.

[Syonyk]

> The gambling industry's regulations do not do very much to reduce the volume of lives ruined by the gambling industry.

No, but if I walk into a casino, there's at least some chance I can come out with more money than I went in with.

Consider a slot machine app. Not only do you have no idea what the payout is, you're guaranteed to lose money if you pay for any coins in that game, which I assure you, people do. For reasons I don't understand, but I've seen it happen.

[listenallyall]

Not defending online casinos, but there are some people who enjoy playing slot machines even without the possibility of winning money, just like some people like playing Candy Crush -- or Call of Duty, for that matter.

[AndrewUnmuted]

A lot of people strike gold on social media, as well.

The list of people who had their 15 minutes of fame on social media platforms is endless and constantly growing.

[dwaltrip]

Companies have moral responsibilities. Societies must incentivize and regulate companies such that they strive to meet these responsibilities.

In addition, individual citizens (not “consumers” or “users”) matter immensely as well. Companies are aggregations of individuals and the behavior of each of us determines the behavior of companies. The cultural, legal, biological, and environmental factors that affect all of us individuals determine the macro behaviors of companies and governments. We can and must strive to improve these factors and thus improve the macro dynamics.

Obviously, the details of this will involve endless debate and there are many ways to approach the problem. But if we don’t try, we are asking to live in a shitty world.

P.S. These are rough thoughts that I quickly typed up and could definitely use some polishing. Some other time…

[edmundsauto]

> Angry, pissed off, outraged users are, from the perspective of social media companies, the best users

In the long term, these users make a community toxic and less viable in the long run. People don't come back after a long enough time.