sites feeding content that use an algorithm to personalize feeds for each user are all compromised.
Not arguing against this at all because you’re completely correct, but this feels like a key example of governments being too slow (and perhaps too out of touch?) to properly regulate tech. People clearly like having an algorithm, but algorithms in their current form are a great excuse for tech companies to use to throw their hands up in the air and claim no foul play because of how opaque they are. “It only shows you what you tell it you want to see!” is easy for them to say, but until consumers are given the right to know how exactly each one works, almost like nutrition facts on food packaging, then we’ll never know whether they’re telling the truth. The ability for a tech company to have near unlimited control and no oversight over what millions of people are looking at day after day is clearly a major factor in what got us here in the first place
Not that there’s any hope for new consumer protections during this US administration or anything, but just something I had been thinking about for a while
In my opinion, part of what I think the message by liberals should’ve been for the last 10 years is not to just vote early and often, but to actually run for office. I can easily see how the critical deterioration of the average person’s mental health would make it challenging to reach this end. Our understanding of mental health still leaves so much to be desired