In English at least, the algorithms considered socially problematic can be more precisely as “The Algorithm” — capitalised to hint the more specific meaning. But to understand the hint you already need to know the context of the broader conversation around corporate-interest-oriented algorithms.

So, we have an obscure inexplicit grammar that only makes sense if you already know what it means. Not great for bringing new people to the conversation.

My big problem with “algorithms” (by which I don’t mean the pedantic “well, pushing top-rated content to the top is ackshyouallee an algorithm, technically”) for controlling feeds is that algorithms are biased in subtly devastating ways. We like to think that “algorithms” are neutral because computers are neutral, but the truth is “algorithms” are designed and implemented by human beings and reflect what those human beings think is “normal” or “correct” or “important” or the like.

Every “algorithmically”-curated system I deal with I can break with ease just by thinking a wee bit outside the box and flustering the poor so-called AI by selecting things on criterion that they’re likely not programmed for because in the biased view of the AI’s programmers the criterion wasn’t “important”.

I’ve always wished that social media sites would have their algorithm be user customizable through some kind of basic syntax. There could of course be a default - but the user would be able to see what it is, how it works, and be able to customize it to their liking. Of course, this would be complicated, but it’s not like these algorithms don’t already exist. They’re just hidden.

Not really my opinion, but there is a reasonable argument to be made about even benevolent algorithms ultimately increasing your engagement with online content and alienate you from your physical surrounding and people near you. Just because you set it up yourself does not mean that it is healthy for you.

i think when it comes to algorithms that save you time, simple filters do the job perfectly. like only people you follow vs. specific hashtags, or just full posts vs. replies included, or chronological vs. “good friends” (like in instagram) first. part of the reason modern algorithms are so complex is so they can confuse us and we end up spending more time on the platform. if you’re making an algorithm for ease of use, it should be the opposite of confusing. it should probably be clarified what people mean by algorithms, since that’s a very general word, but most of the time they probably mean the complex and confusing stuff modern social media uses, rather than the simple filters that most of the fediverse uses.

more complex algorithms might be useful for a site like YouTube, since it’s an entertainment platform not a socialization platform, so you just want to see anything that will be entertaining, and discover new content whenever possible.

In theory, yes, an algorithm that shows me the posts I will like most seems great. However there are many obvious problems with big tech’s implementations.

I feel like most of those examples tend towards inherently immoral and wrong…

E.g., no news is actually urgent, and algorithmic friend sorting is wrong – serendipity is correct

Regarding informative articles, in that context there are keywords for searching

I think the only way that we’ll start getting remotely close to something moral is with fine-grained controls that will let us know exactly why an algorithm chooses what it does

Yep. Lemmy feed for example is algorithmic

I think, a big reason why techy people don’t value these algorithms as much, is because we can achieve a lot of the same (sometimes better, sometimes it just feels better) by manually setting up filter rules.

And a big reason for that, is that many of these algorithms are just hot garbage. Even Google’s supposedly unmatched algorithm knowledge and intimate knowledge of their users regularly fails to deliver anything of value.
I guess, they do have those corporate interests, and in particular don’t want to be transparent to avoid people gaming their algorithms, but then even the bloody algorithm in my IDE trying to guess what I want auto-completed feels disappointingly much like a broken clock being right twice a day.

These are all anecdotes. I’m not aware of a non-commercial social media content algorithm, so maybe this is the one field where they’re amazing.

It highly depends about which algo we are talking about.

Way back when I was on facebook and they introduced their algorithm of content filtering/showing it hid content from friends I didn’t interact with but I wanted to see. I had 200 friends, so there wasn’t much to filter. So no, hiding information from the user is not good in this regard.

@cyclohexane
> What is wrong is using them for maximizing corporate profits

It is arguably not wrong either for a company to design an algorithm in a way that serves their interest. What is definitely wrong is that the algorithms are imposed on the user.
If I want to continue exchanging with my friends that are on the platform, I need to be submitted to the algorithm.

The inherently wrong thing about algorithms is that since they are made to maximize profits by maximizing engagement, they produce addiction. I don’t see anything wrong with an opt-in option for algorithms as long as there is a warning about the fact that it may produce addiction. The problem is that for an algorithm to work more data needs to be gathered. And since many FOSS software is privacy focused they don’t tend to gather much data.