By: Citizen Scribe
For those of you who believe in the “algorithm” defense (as employed by “social media” providers), believe me, that’s utter bullshit.
My whole career is about algorithms. It’s what I do.
An algorithm DOES WHAT YOU TELL IT TO DO. That is all. If it develops biases, that’s because YOU WROTE IT THAT WAY.
This horse crap about “it’s not human controlled” is just that. Horse crap.
Look, a Rube Goldberg machine is a physically manifested algorithm. You can set it in motion and then act surprised when, after some initial 20 mechanical motions, the little lever releases a ball which rolls down a ramp, knocking over a balanced hammer, striking a mug, spilling Tom’s coffee all over his desk, but the suspension of disbelief needed to presume that to be true would require industrial strength delusion.
There is no “responsible algorithm.” There’s an intricate Rube Goldberg software system programmed to knock over YOUR coffee mug.
Like Soylent Green, it’s people.
And they are lying to you.
Well…at some sites (e.g. Craigslist and Twitter), if a certain number of people flag a post, it’s suppressed. If that many people who hate your posts (as it might be because they want their Craigslist ads to stay on the top of the page) have nothing better to do than annoy you, you will be flagged. Humans are doing this, but not the same humans who set up the site.