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by soyiuz
1653 days ago
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True, but the financial incentives of many (most?) companies doesn't align with public benefits (see pollution, plastics, diet etc.) Why is social media singled out in our demands for them to act morally good, instead of just profitable? |
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Imagine a food company did metrics that showed the most popular food was hamburgers, so they kept optimizing and optimizing trying to serve nothing but hamburgers. It arguably wouldn't work and they'd be giving up tons of market share and $$$$$$
FB (and Twitter) seem to be trying to optimize where they believe everyone wants the same thing. Unfortunately for them, when myself and lots of others try their services we find it's shoveling stuff at us we don't want. Instead of driving our engagement it drives us away.
There is tons of content I'd like to see on Twitter but every time I check it, now down to about once a month, they shovel so much shit I'm absolutely uninterested in at me that I just remember why I don't look and I leave. If they'd let me opt out of their recommendations my engagement would go way up and over time I'd follow or and more people. Instead they just drive me away.
The same is true for FB though in different ways. They try to fill my newsfeed with stuff I'm not interested in hoping to get me to spend more time. Instead it just prompted me to delete the mobile app and only use the website on desktop since some extension helps me filter their crap out. My usage without the mobile app is probably 25% what it was and falling. Entirely their fault for removing choice and assuming everyone wants the same thing.