Customised social media have been far less damaging than Fox News and rightwing radio, which serve up the same package to everyone who watches/listens. And old-fashioned word of mouth is still a major vector for conspiracy theories of all kinds.
Recommendation models (aka "algorithms") might help people pick a slightly more appealing hole in the rightwing rabbit warren, but that's all.
It's strange to see a "thought experiment" on this subject ignore an archive of internal Facebook/Instagram documents at Harvard laying out a great deal of A/B test evidence of how specific design features, not just machine learning-based rec systems, shape the formation of communities and what content they consume.
No serious critic of social media suggests that it turns people into zombies or that self-rationalization and homophily aren't real. The question of wether it is an "important accelerant" is the more serious one, and it's not something that a thought experiment can address.
"The trick instead is to get competing communities into some form of social and political relationship, where they have to grudgingly take account of each others’ useful criticisms. "
I disagree. The "elite expert consensus" on (for example) climate science isn't perfect, but the answer is to improve its internal processes (peer review and so on), not to engage with the competing community of denialists. And that's true across the board, at least in the US. There is no intellectual value in engaging with the GOP/MAGA/QAnon on any issue. The only point is to peel off enough of their supporters so that we can outnumber them.
A systematic look can be enlightening and paying attention to our not-so-rational intelligence is key indeed and I really liked the use of mathematical modelling in that article. Fun. You might be interested in this: https://youtu.be/9_Rk-DZCVKE?t=1529 This is a presentation that covers a wide range of effects of the IT-revolution on organisations and societies (e.g. inertia). The link goes to the point which discusses some aspects of social media, mostly the fact that social media directly interact with some fundamental aspects of our intelligence, but the system doesn't have a lot of (stabilising) 'negative feedback', so more an engineering view than a mathematical view. 'Shared convictions' plays a role in that presentation (which lead to your 'shared rationalisations'). Without 'negative feedback' (an engineering term, not a psychological one), our convictions (and thus everything that depends on it, like societies) fragment, so social media is inherently destabilising, even without the positive feedback by attention-driving algorithms. Yes, it works without the algorithms, but that doesn't mean the algorithms have no effect.
Well stated post. Thanks! I agree with you and other commenters that the 'accelerant' part of this issue may be the one that most needs further study. I'm an academic instruction librarian (I teach about information literacy) and also trans and like to think I'm a fairly sophisticated info consumer, but I still had to quit almost all social media years ago. This was due to a combination of consternation at the free and open vacuuming and selling of our habits and data, and horror at the growing uncivility and partisan snark and bullying and conspiracy thinking that has come to so dominate many social media ecosystems (whether caused by the weaponization of that data or not). I fear though, that worse times are to come before it gets better...
I work in marketing and can't read "engagement optimization" without thinking about the paid ads component - after all, the internet is built on ads.
And I know it's a deviation from your argument, but I just wanted to add mine in.
In a capitalist society, the consumer is king - their preferences influence and regulate this economic cycle we operate in.
To ensure the balance between supply and demand works, we assume that consumers possess rationality and wield influence over their own desires. That the consumer has sovereignty.
Sovereignty implies a choice. But is there really one?
Is it a choice or were you followed by ads once you've shown any sign of interest?
Is it really consumer sovereignty or just an illusion of agency?
Is consumer desire limitless or did we create it by toying with human's natural need for belonging, social status, egotistic tendencies, etc.?
Was there a reason you didn't examine social media platforms that don't use algorithmic timelines at all? Dreamwidth, for example, has been in business since 2009 and has never wavered from its chronological timeline. Such natural experiments would be good tests for the validity of your thought-experiment model.
To be clear, I think your general conclusion is on target, but I think the argument would be stronger with some empirical evidence. We don't have to imagine about non-algorithmic platforms, because they still exist.
Customised social media have been far less damaging than Fox News and rightwing radio, which serve up the same package to everyone who watches/listens. And old-fashioned word of mouth is still a major vector for conspiracy theories of all kinds.
Recommendation models (aka "algorithms") might help people pick a slightly more appealing hole in the rightwing rabbit warren, but that's all.
It's strange to see a "thought experiment" on this subject ignore an archive of internal Facebook/Instagram documents at Harvard laying out a great deal of A/B test evidence of how specific design features, not just machine learning-based rec systems, shape the formation of communities and what content they consume.
No serious critic of social media suggests that it turns people into zombies or that self-rationalization and homophily aren't real. The question of wether it is an "important accelerant" is the more serious one, and it's not something that a thought experiment can address.
"The trick instead is to get competing communities into some form of social and political relationship, where they have to grudgingly take account of each others’ useful criticisms. "
I disagree. The "elite expert consensus" on (for example) climate science isn't perfect, but the answer is to improve its internal processes (peer review and so on), not to engage with the competing community of denialists. And that's true across the board, at least in the US. There is no intellectual value in engaging with the GOP/MAGA/QAnon on any issue. The only point is to peel off enough of their supporters so that we can outnumber them.
A systematic look can be enlightening and paying attention to our not-so-rational intelligence is key indeed and I really liked the use of mathematical modelling in that article. Fun. You might be interested in this: https://youtu.be/9_Rk-DZCVKE?t=1529 This is a presentation that covers a wide range of effects of the IT-revolution on organisations and societies (e.g. inertia). The link goes to the point which discusses some aspects of social media, mostly the fact that social media directly interact with some fundamental aspects of our intelligence, but the system doesn't have a lot of (stabilising) 'negative feedback', so more an engineering view than a mathematical view. 'Shared convictions' plays a role in that presentation (which lead to your 'shared rationalisations'). Without 'negative feedback' (an engineering term, not a psychological one), our convictions (and thus everything that depends on it, like societies) fragment, so social media is inherently destabilising, even without the positive feedback by attention-driving algorithms. Yes, it works without the algorithms, but that doesn't mean the algorithms have no effect.
How our intelligence is 'convictions-based' (an evolutionary advantage, as these are in fact useful for speed and efficiency, see https://ea.rna.nl/2022/10/24/on-the-psychology-of-architecture-and-the-architecture-of-psychology/) and not so much observations- and rationalisations-based is something that the current phase of the IT revolution is bringing to light.
Well stated post. Thanks! I agree with you and other commenters that the 'accelerant' part of this issue may be the one that most needs further study. I'm an academic instruction librarian (I teach about information literacy) and also trans and like to think I'm a fairly sophisticated info consumer, but I still had to quit almost all social media years ago. This was due to a combination of consternation at the free and open vacuuming and selling of our habits and data, and horror at the growing uncivility and partisan snark and bullying and conspiracy thinking that has come to so dominate many social media ecosystems (whether caused by the weaponization of that data or not). I fear though, that worse times are to come before it gets better...
I work in marketing and can't read "engagement optimization" without thinking about the paid ads component - after all, the internet is built on ads.
And I know it's a deviation from your argument, but I just wanted to add mine in.
In a capitalist society, the consumer is king - their preferences influence and regulate this economic cycle we operate in.
To ensure the balance between supply and demand works, we assume that consumers possess rationality and wield influence over their own desires. That the consumer has sovereignty.
Sovereignty implies a choice. But is there really one?
Is it a choice or were you followed by ads once you've shown any sign of interest?
Is it really consumer sovereignty or just an illusion of agency?
Is consumer desire limitless or did we create it by toying with human's natural need for belonging, social status, egotistic tendencies, etc.?
Was there a reason you didn't examine social media platforms that don't use algorithmic timelines at all? Dreamwidth, for example, has been in business since 2009 and has never wavered from its chronological timeline. Such natural experiments would be good tests for the validity of your thought-experiment model.
To be clear, I think your general conclusion is on target, but I think the argument would be stronger with some empirical evidence. We don't have to imagine about non-algorithmic platforms, because they still exist.
Edward L. Bernays said that people are rarely aware of the real reasons which motivate their actions. Thanks, a very interesting post. Really.