Good choice with Bluesky, I made the move and will make this my primary infospace. I would also advise against Mastodon because the ultimate owner is Russian.
I left all social medias 5 years ago except UA-cam. Best decision of my entire life. My mental health is a million time better without. I suggest everyone trying it!
I’ve now been going back and checking because this platform is eliminating my comments that are in no way offensive. In particular, they really do not like you questioning the behavior of certain dictators and their parties. Like you, this is my last remaining platform, so I may be going cold turkey soon.
Same here. I am 70 and want peace inside my self better than lies and manipulations. Though I think I could better see through lies than younger people.
Just one detail that I think is important: the algorithm is NOT open source. Some code for the algorithm was made public at some point last year but no updates have ever been published so we can safely assume that what is published and what is run have no relation to one another. This was all just a(nother) publicity stunt.
Yes, I would not be surprised to learn that there is a bunch of parameters that they haven't published, but I found it a bit too speculative to include in the video.
@luanjot1 Do you have a source? I saw multiple releases of code over time, but I don't pretend to be a software engineer. I tried looking into this recently and couldn't find a good source on point.
UA-cam is completely infected with Russian propaganda. The Russian Proganda agencies understand the UA-cam algorithm and play it well. They're even able to use UA-cam TOS rules to get their opponents banned, censored or blocked. They embed propaganda in the following ways 1 Sponsorship of sympathetic posters 2 Their own fake channels 3 Comments section with pro Russian comets often disguised as neutrality, peace or human rights robotic upvotes of pro Russian comments down votes of their opponents and complaints. 4 Censorship just plays into Russian hands as well..
@@mariocerame the GitHub repository was last updated over a year ago (possibly only ever one version released, I hate the web interface especially on my phone) It was released quite cryptically and removing API access makes having the source code almost useless. With the API you could find out how the cryptically named signals and variables are actually used. As it is whatever anyone tells you about it is just guesswork.
Considering well established oddities, like Kallioniemi's Vatnik Soup report on Musk constantly losing likes since it was written many months ago, I think there are lots of similar things happening that give value to Musk's russian friends.
Information space is a real domain in warfare and it should be regarded as such. Hostile disinformation really should be understood as subliminal _warfare._
Trying to have any sort of discussion on UA-cam has become an absolute pain about half a year ago. Half the comments go missing. And it doesn't matter how polite and well-written they are or what sort of political lean they have, or whether they have any words that might be keywords. I don't detect any particular unfairness, the machine is simply broken.
Yeah. UA-cam censorship is strange and completely random as well. Some people say it's because Google is "woke" and only target conservative right-wing opinions but the reality is that it targets everyone. This comment could be shadow banned, in fact. I don't know what will happen.
Try suggesting women can't have penises. Those comments disappear pretty quickly. UA-cam is incredibly woke just like most of the silicon valley companies.
Don't make more than 1 comment towards others. If you argue with someone back-and-forth on here and you make good points, there's a 100% chance that you'll eventually get flagged for 'harassment' by people you disagree with.
UA-cam's problem is that they order videos removed or demonetized or ban channels for no discernible reason, leaving users to suppose that it's either a matter of bias or of allowing advertisers to determine content.
The reason is clear and discernable, conservative content. Blaming advertisers is a red herring. Black Stone and dark money are pushing the companies and advertisers to censor the truth.
That was a surprisingly effective publicity stunt. They've always been built around commercializing user data, and amassing more and more of it. Any company becoming a monopoly becomes "evil". As did Google. They're also on the way to peak shittification, btw, but that's another matter
I see a lot of people here saying, that they would be able to recognise "lies", on social media. Please be careful, and not over confident, in your selves. I'm 40'ish, was taught the basics, of source validation and critical thinking, as a kid. I've worked in Military Intelligence, and as a software engineer. I'm in the age group, that both grew up with/matured along side the internet in the 90's. And was an adult, when social media and smart phones arrived. I have no illusions, of being able to not get tricked/manipulated. Traditional media can be dangerous, if you don't diversify your sources, and are awhere of your own biases. But the choice of source is entirely yours. But on social media, it is nearly impossible, to not get placed into an echo chamber, without even noticing. Even if you "follow" diverse sources. Because of the way recommendations work. Take this comment as an example. I see someone reasonable, presumably smart people, and want to help. So I post a "long comment". By doing so, I am telling the youtube algorithm, to show me more of Anders' videos. I have a tendancy, to comment more, in this fashion, then I do when disagreeing with the content. Hence I'll get recommended more pro Ukranean, pro democracy channels. And I will actively, have to go to, the opposite type of channels. Even though I am subscribed to both types. Basically none of the channels I disagree with, are ever recommended to me. Even though, that's probably 20% of my subscriptions.
I would admit to being overconfident. Community Notes has pulled me up several times. If a Twitter user repeatedly posts severe errors, I block or mute them.
_"Traditional media [..] choice of source is entirely yours."_ Sure? U should follow ur own advice actually: _"I have no illusions, of being able to not get tricked/manipulated."_ My point is - u don't know / are unaware how this mechanism works with trad media, which is why u make this misleading statement.
When people say twitter had a left-wing bias I don't think anyone was talking about the recommendation systems. They were mostly speaking about the human moderation on the platform and human decisions such as preventing posts about the Hunter Biden laptop, etc which clearly favor one party.
Funny how outright information suppression doesn’t count as misinformation, isn’t it? I would have counted informational denial the most powerful tool of propaganda and disinformation. Tremendously effective and very hard to disprove.
which also conveniently ignores that the reason they did this is that the other party was trying to make them complicit in influencing the election with unverified slander, and they were protecting themselves from weaponized disinfo campaigns which they learned to do after the podesta e-mail leaks in 2016
Have you read the actual story outside of Taibbi and Musk lying to you? Regarding this 24h decision, there was no evidence from which you can reasonably infer politically biased motivation. In fact, the internal hand-wringing it displayed was the most insightful part. Wonder why people making these claims never produce actual studies and analysis. Always some sensationalist story you haven't even read.
There is a difference between a “balanced” algorithm and a “content neutral” algorithm. “Balance” involves inherently subjective judgments about where the center is, what is far right, and what is far left. In the video example where he talks about adjusting the weight given by the algorithm based on the hypothetical example where Republicans prefer the like button and Democrats prefer to comment. That’s an example of balancing where the owner puts his thumb on the scale in order to achieve a preconceived. The act of balancing is inherently biased because everyone has their own opinion on where the center lies, and what the ideal proportion of left and right voices should be.
There is a counter productive fringe of both left and right though. When they have Twitter dominance any fringe will have too much influence on the policy and the bounds of acceptable debate. Kamala found that out, and Trump is going to.
here is a handy chart for you: Economic devide in politics: Left wing (=Marxism) | (Capitalism=) Right wing Political positions on societal issues: Progressive | Conservative | Reactionary Styles of governance: Liberal | Authoritarian Balancing content is not a matter of subjective judgement, these terms are well defined and universally applicable.
You're definitely missing tons of things. Whether or not any of those would be of value *_to you_* is a valid question, but it's silly to imagine that nothing of value has happened or is happening on social media. Anders, for instance, wasn't being an idiot & needlessly wasting his time for the 12 years he was heavily using Twitter. He, thoughtfully, found use & value in it as did many others.
@georgek1234 for sure. For what it's worth as context, I've never used twitter-never had an account. So I'm certainly not trying to defend it: not as it was and certainly not in it's current form. I'm just pointing out that it's a bit silly to pretend that there was never anything of value to miss on social media.
I left Twitter for entirely non-political reasons a few months ago when i started bumping into violence and pornography fairly frequently. I don't want to run across that content and i don't want my brand to be adjacent to that content. I don't foresee myself ever returning.
When Twitter started out it was mostly just porn percentage wise (I think all social sites have started out as dating apps or places for sharing lewd content). If you used Twitter for a while without encountering porn you were in a bubble but I imagine after Musk's takeover a lot of internal filters were removed that would had kept the porn away from you.
Depends on the type of violence. I can stomach the brutality of war, and it should be up to me to allow it. Disgusting, but factual and does have documentary value. If its just promotion of violence for violence's sake, or even garbage IRL streamers like Johnny Somali, it has no real value and should just be banned on platform. But youtube has turned into Disneyland, everything so politically correct and safe it no longer serves a purpose for political content and discourse. Would not be surprised if youtube shadow banned/hides my comment. They almost never survive, and I have no idea why. Just too frustrating as a platform.
Disagree that a platform can be politically unbiased in the way you suggest -- where everything is carefully balanced for neutrality. First, just practically, there aren't two political perspectives -- there are many, with all kinds of subtle differences which constantly change. For example, the "woke" left is pretty different from the "never Trump", formerly Republican Democrats. Not to mention that US politics are only one small part of the world scene. To implement your idea, a platform would have to place each user on this spectrum. That person who uses the "like" button all the time -- is that a woke left person who thinks that race and gender are all important, or a Bernie Sanders progressive who thinks it's all about economics and class, or maybe a former Sanders supporter who's moved to Trump and has now embraced some elements of white ethnic nationalism? Third, and most importantly, once you concede that "responsible" content moderation is necessary, then some political points of view are going to get suppressed because they will violate those standards. There are plenty of obvious examples for that one. And this issue will change over time -- for example, the antivax movement used to be a lunatic fringe, but became political mainstream during Covid. Suppose a party advocating some form of ethnic or racial or religious discrimination and/or violence moves out of the fringe and becomes mainstream -- do you then relax the standards? And at what level of "mainstream" do you make that decision? In the end, I think a platform just has to set standards based on some kind of ethical/moral/truth framework and let the chips fall as they will. And since ethical/moral/truth issues are inherently political, some political bias will be inevitable.
I think that's the reality of what a truly unbiased platform is - one that simply will not tolerate or host disinformation. The rest will sort itself out and that's the reality of what a true political center will look like. Unfortunately political discourse often has gotten so regularly outside of the realm of reality or objective fact (often thanks to these very algorithms no less) that we tend to fill in the blank of "not hosting misinformation or lies" as somehow "political". It's a public perception that a lot of bad actors have intentionally pushed as a strategy because there is so little consequence for lying to the public, and it speaks volumes as to how effective it's been when we needlessly have to elaborate on the difference because the blanks are already being filled in by someone's bias.
I like UA-cam because I can cuss up a storm when needed... I NEVER attempt to shame or demean someone, but saying 'fuck' now and again really doesn't hurt the conversation..
So great to hear your views of this very important area too Anders. I feel that your analysis hits it right on. I closed my account on Twitter and moved to Bsky a few days before this video :-). But nice to be confirmed that it was the right choice.
I had this discussion the other day. When social media was new, we had to change platforms on a regular basis as new platforms became more popular. There is an attitude now that the major platforms are institutions that you can't leave. If you don't like them you can go.... and if enough people do the same then platforms will be forced to follow what the people want.
Thanks, great perspective, helped me at least understand better what has happened! Btw, I'm a very reasonable centrist, anti-conspiracy-theory-minded, and I find youtube automatic comment moderation absolutely horrible and frustrating. It's really hard to discuss anything at all because the auto-moderation is so harsh. I have no idea if even this comment will survive or be shadow banned.
Yeah, I'm a bit of a hobbyist researcher (I wrote a few articles on Skeptical Science, which is an anti-misinformation site about global warming), and the "silent deletion with no appeals" system bothers me a lot. It discourages me from countering misinformation, because (1) why put effort into a comment that might just be deleted? and (2) saying that a video is wrong about something tends to cause fans of the OP to downvote me, which may reduce my own reputation in the eyes of UA-cam. Also, I can never provide sources because the presence of any URL (even links to other UA-cam videos) almost guarantees deletion of the whole comment.
Also, commenting on UA-cam takes a lot more time now because I need to open a private browser window to check how well each comment was received by UA-cam (i.e. how far down the list of "top comments" do I have to scroll to see it, or was it deleted, or was it shadowbanned meaning it is only visible in the "Newest first" view?) And also I have to copy-paste each comment into a document in order to make a record of what UA-cam is deleting, in case they decide to delete it without a trace. So I have a file, now, with hundreds of my comments and how UA-cam treated each one. I think more people should be aware of this because if I (as a reasonable center-left person) am being censored on a regular basis, I expect right-wing people to be much, much angrier still. It must feed heavily into their sense of victimhood.
Case in point, two minutes ago I posted a follow-up comment that was just as long as the first one, and after refreshing the page, it is now gone. If you're curious what I had to say, well, I can't say. If I did, this third comment would probably go the same way as the second one.
As always - two questions: 1. Where does it say that freedom of expression is limited to generally accepted and well founded truth? 2. Should people be punished for expressing generally accepted and well founded truths (except in some generally excepted cases like state secrets)? And that is the basis of "misinformation" - other words, "misinformation" is nothing but a euphemism for censorship. And should "the state" be the judge of what "misinformation" entails (like EUvsDisinfo)? I don't think so. It's not for nothing that state funded broadcasters have such a bad rep. The worst offenders of "misinformation" are states themselves. The Hunter Biden laptop was once "misinformation", which proved to be information. The Mueller investigation was once "information", which proved to be "misinformation". So let's conclude that yes, "misinformation" is just censorship by a different name. Yes, in the good old days the state could easily grant this sort of rights, because all the distribution of information were essentially controlled. You could flyer, reaching at best a few thousand people - and be considered a nutcase by the general public. You could write a letter to the newspaper that, if accepted at all, would be heavily redacted and abridged. But the Internet changed all that. and you won't get the genie back into the bottle. It simply boils down to this: either you have these rights - or you don't. And if you don't, at least be clear about it. At least then we know in which dystopia we live, and watch out for the thought police if you have an opinion that is not approved by the government. After all, "Ignorance is strength".
13:53: UA-cam being good in content moderation? Actually I mostly stopped to comment here, because YT deliberately removes comments by a not comprehensible pattern. And does so in masses, perhaps 50% of what I write.
Regarding comments being deleted, I think that there are two causes. I believe the channel can delete them, and I believe UA-cam deletes them based on keywords.
Why should we not believe that it is acting correctly? What is it that you say that you believe is being wrongly deleted. Surely you must see that many people who you believe SHOULD have their comments deleted, would be able to truthfully make exactly the same comment.
I am unable to figure out the comment moderation algorithm. Sometimes I'll write the most innocent, positive comment and it'll get deleted. Sometimes I'll use an occasional swear word and it IS posted. Incomprehensible.
@@thedutchfoxxxsame here. I try and write positive comments. But now my account seems to have been flagged. Some comments, even when fact based and made in a positive way are immediately removed. This must be algorithmically removed as it’s instant.
I'd like: downvote results, to be able to post links, no more comments being randomly deleted, when they are deleted a note explaining why and who deleted them.
@@alexandruraresdatcu Especially if you read and post comments or make videos responding to other videos. I don’t know if it’s true social media for those that purely watch videos without any further interaction with the UA-cam site. I don’t think UA-cam should get a clean bill of health or a pass, even if it scores better than a dung heap like Xitter.
@@alexandruraresdatcu UA-cam is extremely censorious and also complexity infected by Russian Intelligence Agency Propaganda. These agencies know how to play the UA-cam Algorithm and Polities spread Russian Talking Points within the UA-cam TOS. -They post new content, they sponsor influences with fake narratives and news -They upvote pro Russian comments -They get prop Ukrainian commentators banned and down-voted or censored. They know the algorithm well.
Basically everyone wants social media to cater to their specific worldview and people like the guy who made this video are unhappy that people they disagree with or foreign propagandists can say things they don't like. What he doesn't understand about propaganda is that its only effective on a population that accepts the source of "dude, trust me bro, I wouldn't lie lol" and thus is only limited in its effectiveness. What he's actually angry about is when someone, including propagandists, mention things that can be backed up with logic and facts. Sometimes even bad people can make good points.
I love the grounded reality of this channel!!! *If you are not in the financial market space right now, you are making a huge mistake. I understand that it could be due to ignorance, but if you want to make your money work for you..prevent inflation.*
I feel sympathy and empathy for our country, low income earners are suffering to survive, and I appreciate Wayne. You've helped my family with your advice. imagine investing $30,000 and receiving $95,460 after 28 days of trading.
Honestly, our government has no idea how people are suffering these days. I feel sorry for disabled people who don't get the help they deserve. All thanks to Mr Michael Wayne, imagine investing $1000 and receiving $5700 in a few days..
Did someone just mention Mr Wayne!? Damn! You just made my day; what a coincidence.. I've worked with him for over 2years and I can tell how good he is
I don't know what sort of research could lead to concluding UA-cam's moderation and algorithmic skewing practices are 'good and responsible', but I suggest thorough self-reflection.
there NEEDS to be WAY more information and analysis like this all over youtube and the internet, putting this topic into easily understood terms is key to the next phase of humans not being brainwashed and manipulated
I remember when I bought my first computer, an IBM XT in December of 1982, and bought the DOS manual at the bookstore. It said when getting on bulletin boards to be careful and not take things too personally. The protection of anonymity brings out the worst in users (mostly young men).
I don't think anonymity has much to do with it. I mean have you seen how people behave on f-book and even linkedin with their real name and face on full display? Face to face, these people would probably start collecting kicks in the nuts and slaps across the face, which is likely something they don't really want.
Back then you were at least only really dealing with US culture and a self selecting subset even of that. Nowadays there are at least two distinct cultures in the US alone and the whole world is online. There is no logical way to satisfy the whole world.
Twitter used to do censure, if asked by the government, but stopped with Musk. How are the alternatives? I stopped using FB, because they totally lost my trust with shadow banning etc.
After Musk has shown his colors politically, it is really striking how many moderates and left leaning people and content creators are still on X. Musk must be laughing till he wets his pants over all these "useful idiots" using his platform. It gives him revenue and the platform legitimacy. Good on you @anderspuck for leaving, but I guess most people just dont have the guts/spine to do that.
Yes, I agree. Have been wondering for a long time why these 'sophisticated' people are still hanging out on twitter/x, owned by the man who danced on Rump's stage. I have often heard people make long rationalizations about this but I think it's just laziness and inertia. Was really glad to hear Anders' very detailed and informed discussion today.
Very thoughtful discussion Anders. Vlad Vexler had a different angle on this topic and I think you both have valid points. I've also left twitter and I'm using bluesky now.
The idea of having no political bias flies out of the window the moment things like overwhelming scientific consensus, health or human rights become politicized.
Have you seen the way this platform biases search results? When searching for Anders Puck Nielsen, it recently was serving up a top result for Tim Pool’s channel, with yours listed 2nd. That’s enormously problematic.
I searched on logged in profile and incognito and got Anders first and his videos after on both cases. Coming in as 2nd isnt exactly world shattering though.
This was happening about 3-4 wks ago, more than a month AFTER Tim Pool’s parent co. Tenet had their own YT acct suspended due to DoJ’s indictment for paying Pool & others to spread RT disinfo. That is what makes it extremely problematic: they both cover Ukraine & Russia, but Anders (a legitimate analyst) was de-prioritized under a known, paid propagandist.
@anderspuck I’m very much the opposite of interested in Tim Pool. I’m subscribed to your channel, would never watch his, and I regularly watch Jake Broe, Artur Rehi, Denys Davidov, Silicon Curtain, anywhere Ben Hodges is interviewed, etc. I think the algorithm was pushing him solely on the Ukraine/Russia topic commonality… that’s what I find very problematic.
@@JAllenKaiser I wouldn't take it personally, I think the algorithm is a bit doolally at the moment. For the past two days my recommended feed has dozens of hindi language videos and livestreams in it. No idea why. Not a language I speak or have/would ever watched a video in, but at it's peak they were about one in every four or five recommendations until I started blocking the channels. Mad...
I am surprised that “avoiding polarization bias” is not on the list of requirements. Conceptually, it would make sense for social media companies to present users with increasingly amplified intensity of their existing bias: both as click bait and for easier segmentation.
community notes do a pretty good job on twitter to hold people accountable. our politicians in germany hate these for this exakt reason lol they rather want outright censorship.
One other thing you don't consider is who has control over those four parameters. Something like Mastodon is fundamentally different than all other social media services (yes, even Bluesky) in that a) there is not one answer to these questions, it's a federation of different organizations all with their own moderation policies, algorithms, etc., and more, that mastodon/fediverse is the ONLY social media service where control over those particular aspects is not held by billionaires/VC funds, etc, but instead by if not the users, than people much closer to the users.
Anders, I'm a great fan of your videos on the Ukraine situation. But I part ways with you on this one. Very confusing. Currently, I see on X all posts from those I follow and only those posts. As far as I can tell, there is no "moderation" no "algorithm". I do see ads because I haven't paid for a "Premium subscription". These concepts "algorithm" (Google) and "moderation" (Facebook) have been used in the past and are still being used by authorities to selectively suppress much true information that they don't like exposed. They intentionally distort the truth. This can't happen on X if you select "follow" for the authors of posts you trust. Other platforms explicitly promote the concept of "balanced moderation" - which is an oxymoron as far as I'm concerned.
Good job contributing to the public dialogue about social media platforms and their role in our society. I haven't fully deleted my Twitter account yet, but I now check it at most once per day for 10 minutes to compare the content and level of engagement to my BlueSky feed. Most of the people who I used to follow on Twitter are now posting on BlueSky. Not all of them are posting as actively as they post on Twitter, and I'm keeping my X/Twitter account for now because I'm interested in following both platforms to observe how X has declining engagement while BlueSky's engagement is growing. Hopefully the community of people who are interested in the truth and having honest political discourses will fully abandon X within a year and switch over fully to BlueSky. You mentioned that you are using BlueSky vs Twitter not because you don't like Elon Musk but because you believe that BlueSky has what I'll briefly just describe as a greater focus on creating a more objective platform without bias from influence operations flooding the platform with bots impostering real people. I appreciate that argument. However, I'll say that it's valid to look at and judge who owns and controls the platforms. Elon Musk has personally pedaled untruths on social media over the course of at least the past 5 years. He has consciously decided to use billions of dollars of his wealth to fund disinformation campaigns through a political action committee and also use his money to gain personal political power. People in the USA, Europe and elsewhere who care about the truth and democracy should look at the emergence of oligarchies and the erosion of democracy in Russia and Hungary (just to name 2 examples) and consider that the United States is absolutely on the same path. If you support democracy and believe that it's dangerous for billionaires to collude with political elites to manipulate our information space then I believe it's reasonable to refuse to support X on principle simply because you oppose the ownership and control of public information spaces by actors who are trying to buy control of the political process while simultaneously enriching themselves when their companies receive billions of dollars of government contracts. Take a look at Yevgeny Prigozhin's career and business ventures -- supplying food to the Russian military and schools, operating political disinformation operations in the social media space, enriching himself through government contracts as he formed alliances with Russia's anti-democratic political leadership. Then look at how Elon Musk gets rich from SpaceX having billions of dollars in contracts from the USA government and how Tesla can benefit from changes in EV subsidies that disproportionately damage Tesla's competitors and also from changes in regulation of self driving cars. Consider that both of them actively worked to form a strong alliance with their country's political leadership while helping run social media disinformation campaigns to benefit the political interests of those leaders. Think about the path that democracy is on in the USA. If you don't like it, it's reasonable to take a stand by refusing to support X.
Two of the biggest issues with the first two points are also issues facing legacy media. At least in the US, much of legacy media takes "unbiased" to mean "both sides equal"...which simply isn't true. At one point, one side was merely immoral, and actual reporting would call that out...now one side is entirely unhinged and detached from reality, and being "unbiased" still means calling that out.
Vlad Vexler seems to disagree with you, saying that withdrawing from Twit means you're conceding the space and becoming "depoliticized." I would say one step in being depoliticized is continuing to act as though "X" is still a legitimate social medium when it has de-legitimized itself.
I use Twitter because it's easy to ignore the algorithm. I only use the "following" feed and I follow people mostly from discovery on other websites and occasionally from retweets from people I'm currently following.
Even the 'following' feed does not work like it used to. Also the comment sections are filled with bots and there is hardly any real engagement or interaction anymore. The only exception to this are blue mark accounts whose comments show up normally. In other words you have to pay a subscription fee to have a voice. Which actually applies to content creators as well.
That’s why I do. There has been some wobble back and forth as they tune the feed, but my “following” feed is excellent. I like it better than Facebook.
Can you tell us your thoughts on the culture war, censorship and moderator ethics in a future video? I understand that it is a bit of a touchy subject for a lot of people but since you have already dipped your toes into social media governance, it would be a logical follow up to this video.
Personal anecdote on the topic of open APIs: at the time Elon Musk bought Twitter I was working on a university group project to build a piece of software to perform consumer research on Twitter. Our entire project got kneecapped by Elon Musk’s restrictions on access to the Twitter API.
It is a reasonably well-known psychological effect, that the most fair media/algorithm is the one deemed biased by most people. A media/algorithm biased in one direction will be judged less biased by people agreeing with that bias, whereas a neutral media/algorithm will be almost universally biased. This, of course, goes for the bias of Fox, but also for the media "you" deem more unbiased.
Most people's whole idea of being unbiased only makes sense when considering a binary choice between two viewpoints that are not too far apart. Not even the US comes close to that ideal anymore, let alone the whole world. SHould social media be biased against Nazis? The KKK? Vacine deniers? Flat earthers?
Consider Reddit for instance. An absolute cesspool of propaganda and echo-chambers considering how easy it is to drown opposing viewpoints with downvotes and outright ban. It also happens to be the favorite of the supposedly liberal factions, for precisely the illiberal powers it gives them. But Twitter where they have to "tolerate" the opposing viewpoints is considered a biased platform.
The only difference between Fox and MSNBC is their market segmentation strategy. Their only purpose is to offer a defined population to the advertisers who pay them. The content they create is selected exclusively to maintain their audience. Fox didn't believe in Trump's eletion denial, they pushed it to maintain their audience.
since oct 7th '23, utoob meets none of the three points, it does not have an unbiased algorithm, it does not have transparent moderation and it does not have good public APIs.
Definitely not. One of the most useful platforms to follow Ukraine war in real time, because you had both primary sources and experts on the same platform. You just had to know how to use it. However that was before Musk bought it. The site is not usable anymore.
Never once have I twittered or been twittered at. I don't believe I have ever even googled twitter. Now, it certainly seems that folks love twittering, and also twitter-adjacent twittering, like threadsing? is that a word? I m happy that folks have found something to keep them occupied but I can tell you straight up that it is possible to have a fulfilling life without ever once having looked up a twitter.
I have never used Twitter. Maybe too old to comprehend, but the main reason is to protect myself and my identity. After all, a girl can't be too careful now, can she? Thank you 💛 Anders!!!
Ok... Not sure why you shared this comment. Doesn't add or take away from anything in the video. It's just like me taking the time to watch a 30 min video about cooking a good beef steak and then after I comment and say "well I don't like beef and think it's bad for you". Totally makes the commenter (you) look stupid.
There is nothing more difficult to plan,more doubtful of success,nor more dangerous to manage than the creation of a new order of things...Whenever his enemies have occasion to attack the innovator they to do so with the passion of partisans,while the others defend him sluggishly so that the innovator and his party alike are vulnerable.
Honestly, I don’t know how or in what way did Twitter before Musk do a good job at moderation. It was horrific. I’d rather have the free for all that it is now. I don’t want someone to take the decision what information I can and cannot see. That is what made the internet great. It went to trash when we started having moderation especially based on politics. Be it left or right.
the good part was that if you posted horrible content, you needlesly insulted people, you got suspended. you now have to write exceptionally awful stuff (like gratifying death), and if you are one of the protected users (there are several hundred profiles, mostly right wing influencers who are pointless trying to report). it was very far from perfect, but actions had consequences. nowadays X just blasts right wing disinfo into your face. You have to actively block dozens of accounts to clean up your feed. If you are a new user, the site will recommend you some seriously questionable people.
Wholly agreed. 👍 Pre-Elon Twitter was full of outrageous high-profile censorship decisions, strongly favouring the left political pole. The current Twitter is more of a Wild West - but there is much less excessive censorship.
Thanks for this. Some people were saying Bluesky would end up no better than X because all the bots would just move there but now I can see it can be better as it is better managed. But for me I spend enough time on UA-cam and Facebook 🙂
Just from the top of my head: Destin from Smarter every day has a mini-series with interviews about moderation on different platforms. And there is a great in-depth video about moderation The Free Speech Big Tech Debate, which should be viewed a lot more, in my opinion.
Thanks, Anders! I respect your opinion a lot so you’re teaching me and others l think why l/others should stay the h*ll away from xitter and other social media.
It doesn't make sense to me to talk about bias purely in terms of political leaning because some procedural standards coincide with political positions. For example, the political right are more prone to threats, bullying and racial slurs so clamping down on those can be seen as political bias. Yet they aught to be restricted for reasons that have nothing to do with political allegiance.
1) You're saying that the algorithm is not biased, but because it has been published, it is now biased because it makes it easier for bot makers. That doesn't make sense. The fact it is more vulnerable to bad actors doesn't make it biased. Also, you don't specify the bias of the bot makers. 2) You're saying that the fact that the algorithm is open source is bad because it leads to more bots. But you also want more openness in the form of better APIs - doesn't that give the bot makers more info in its own right? 3) Doesn't closing APIs make it harder for bot makers? 3) Before Musk took over, many right leaning people complained about leftist bias on X, to which left leaning people would respond that as a private company, Twitter could do what it wants. But now that the leftist bias is gone, we now need standards for specifically X? 4) Your argument for leaving X is that you don't want to legitimize the other people on the platform with your presence. What makes you think that your views are more legitimate than those of others? Would you want to convince others of your arguments or retreat into a bubble with people who think like you? 5) We know from the Twitter files and statements from Zuckerberg that the present American government has been pressuring social media platforms to suppress messages they don't like. Musk seems the only one who stands up against this government pressure. Isn't that a good thing?
Musk is the government now, how is this going to work? Your argument woul have more weight if Musk had not been so actively supporting one of the candidate. He's now bragging to anyone who wants to listen that X got Trump elected
I have a suggestion for you. Play devil's advocate and do your best to respond as you believe Anders would. You'll probably have to give the video one more listen. Then ask your remaining questions, if you have any.
@YupYuppie very well said. To me X is the best run social media. And the most responsible. I stopped using twitter 10 years ago, and I should use it more, since it has been liberated.
Ok I think there’s a really important distinction here. I consider social media to be a communications platform for users, thus, within law and reason, people should preferably and optimally be permitted to say whatever they like, as they are on a telephone, email, and so on. I wondered why you didn’t mention that at all, but I think it is because you see social media as a publishing or broadcasting service for content creators. (Which UA-cam for example absolutely is.)
Very interesting. Thank you. I do have a problem with Elon. He is using X as his bully platform now. I'm so tired of his reposts of obvious logical inconsistences...
He's always been a troll on the platform I think--I don't think that's new. And I think he's admitted to that. I am grateful for his disclosure of the Twitter Files. That was a rare view into a very serious problem. Also, if he didn't go open-source at all, bsky would not have done so either.
It's a tricky issue. I will say I'm vastly more concerned about misinformation through mandated censorship, than I am about misinformation that has to compete in the marketplace of ideas. Back when Twitter was more regulated it's important to remember we had more, not less, misinformation. As Covid taught us and the election scandals demonstrated over and over again, even in "free" countries the Government is incredibly quick and eager to forget basic liberal values and to coerce even private companies to accomplish its censorship goals. I think social media is always going to be a cesspit, the question is how easy it's going to be capable of ideological capture or not. And unfortunately, the more we regulation misinformation, the more vulnerable ideological capture AND misinformation we become. I think I'll start calling that the misinformation paradox.
I understand the misgivings one might have with Twitter these days, and I would probably share many of them. But with all due respect, to say that Twitter before the takeover by Elon Musk was politically more or less even handed is a statement which is just absurd in the extreme. The suppression of conservative voices back then was blatant and obvious.
I agree with your statements about the current state of X. Wouldnt trust it at all. However your assessment of pre-Musk Twitter really discredits your opinion for me and it makes me extremely skeptical about Bluesky and Mastodon. If you judged pre-Musk twitter to have good moderation, then you could have misjudged these other two social media sites too. Im going to have to do more research on this, and ill recommend everyone else to as well.
@number2and3 I don't really care about your politics. I'm English myself, Musk and Trump is none of my business. My concern is just that he created a measurement to determine what a responsible social media company is. But then praises the old twitter, despite it not meeting his own measurements for a responsible social media company. And now I've looked at Bluesky, I do think it has the potential to be better than X in terms that you can filter your own content. However, whether it moderates content well will have to be seen over time. Right now, Bluesky is just full of people bitter about X and there's not much diversity of opinion on there. If it picks up people of different opinions then we can see whether it moderates content fairly or not. I've not looked at Mastodon.
@@bakersmileyface I've not looked into blue sky, I've generally decreased all social media use but the notion that Treads or anything from Meta is better or less politically bias is not true. I put many filters on both to not get any pornographic content in my feeds and they both still get it. Same before with Twitter before musk. I think most media has become more political in general.
@@peterwood6875 Whether you want to see hate speech not is a preference. But I think it's important to give people who want to speak hate a platform to speak. After all, if you can't share your opinions then you resort to more radical ways to be heard. It's just the way every human works, nobody likes to be silenced. I think X is good in that way. It's good that Bluesky lets you filter out what content you want though, rather than them doing it all for you. My concern is whether they'll have biased moderation. It's all well and good saying hate speech is not allowed, but the old twitter said the same thing and they did not apply those rules equally. I'm wondering whether Bluesky will follow the same trend since it's ran by a lot of ex-twitter employees. Still not looked at Mastodon 😂
I have a twitter account that has been dormant for years. When switching phones recently I fired up X on the old phone out of curiosity. The first thing it showed me, I kid you not, first page, top post, was full-length, uncensored corn. That's where content moderation on X is at, right now. And no, I never used that account to watch corn on twitter (was there ever corn on twitter?) so it's not the algorithm doing its job. If anything, the algorithm had very little to go on with that account, as it was used very little.
Your definition of unbalanced sounds like the definition of bias. If you have two opposing opinions, it is not for the company to ensure that both of these are given equal attention on the platform. That would be artificially boosting one of them. The platform should just give both sides equal facility to make their arguments. I do agree about the problem with bots but event then, you can't call that bias as both sides can use bots.
Have to say I think his definition of balance is too loose, impossible to meet, and would generate a continual workload of determining what idea is what “wing”, then what behaviours this week attach to that, then adjusting algorithm responsiveness to particular behaviours, then redoing the entire thing when algorithm incentives change behaviours. Quixotic at the very least.
There are constant complaints that Elon Musk deletes posts he disagrees with. And it doesn't matter if it's journalists, well-known and lesser-known people.
Hi Anders, Thanks very much for your discussion concerning Twitter & social media platforms. I found it fascinating and in depth, but presented in a way that a non-expert could fully understand and appreciate. I learned a lot from your short video and encourage you to make other videos not focused solely on the Ukraine war. I eagerly await and seek your videos because of your thorough and in depth knowledge of the subject matter. You are doing an excellent job and I want to encourage to keep up the great work. Congratulations! John Murphy
What a timely contribution to the debate on social media. Buying Twitter to destroy it was a very expensive move, buut Elon has done a great job of it.
Yes lets call it Pravda! Sorry already tried and tested. Turns out if you have to much lies on your platform people stop turning up to look for the truth. Much like twitter.
This is a very good video. I wish more people would watch it. I’m a web technologist and I definitely haven’t been on Twitter or Facebook in many many years. I’m also in epistemologist and a philosopher and everything you said I agree with and more. I still watch UA-cam though. The powers at be are exploiting a human need for social connection and a few loopholes in human thought itself.
The API thing feels like it's a researcher's argument, not really an objective one. It's something you see at work, so it looms large in your mind, but it's not really very relevant for the day to day use of the platform. Also, on the moderation front, I think you're omitting the best crowd moderation out there, Twitter's Community Notes feature. In my experience, that makes misinformation look much worse than a ban does, and it's more neutral too. I agree that the centralized moderation is probably a bit too loose, but once you consider the decentralized part of the story, I think it's actually a fair bit better than something like Facebook.
If he thought the previous twitter had good moderation. Then obviously Bluesky would be his choice. He can't see his own bias. But he's following it. And fair enough to him for that, nothing wrong with sticking to your bias.
2 reasons. 1) The protocol it uses allows users to create their own custom algorithms (though it does take some programming skill) - so if you don't trust the default Bsky algorithm - you can either create your own or use someone else's. 2) Though Bsky has a moderator, you can also subscribe to (or create a) custom moderation services at will.
@@fransliszt Exactly who do you think owns Bluesky? The majority owner, and head, of Bluesky (a public benefit corporation run on a shoestring budget) is Jay Graber. If you mean, that she worked previously in the tech industry, duh? Do you expect a juggler to just start a social media site? But usually when people write "tech bros" they mean wealthy VC men who invest in tech companies, and that's not her at all. Previous jobs of hers had been things like being a junior developer and soldering motherboards. I talk regularly with several of the devs at Bluesky and they're great people. And the whole design of the protocol (which is based on IPLD, the underlying distriubuted-content-finding layer used by IPFS) is to make it so that even if they were to go rogue, users could still migrate their content and keep the network running without them.
@@bakersmileyface he refers to scientific analysis of twitter. You could legitimately doubt the scientific methods and claim his assumptions to be objectivly wrong. But instead you blamed it to bias, like everything is just opinion.
Given the kind of money bluesky has raised, i'm not confident it'll not follow a similar direction to twitter, so i'd encourage people to use Mastodon rather, though the onboarding experience is a bit more confusing, i promise it gets better once you picked a server and start following people and tags! It's just empty at first because there is no algo to give you random popular things to read before that. I also used twitter for more than a decade, and although i had my gripes with moderation (especially in french, it was really bad at stopping conspiracy theory content like in 2020), it was certainly heaps better than the garbage fire it is now, it certainly was *trying*.
thank you, Anders, hearing a rational and intelligent view of TwitX is very refreshing. As a person in my 60s I am feeling like so much of the world is being run by the children from Lord of the Flies
it doesn’t make any difference how good your algorithms and how balanced your moderation if in the end it’s censored by government behind the closed doors
Thanks for your comments and insights into social media platforms. One question I still have about Twitter is "do you think they were demonstrating an unbiased political position when they de-platformed Donald Trump?"
Follow me on Bluesky: @anderspuck.bsky.social
Follow me on Mastodon: @anderspuck@krigskunst.social
❤
Exactly, Anders. I left Twitter as soon as Trump had his account reinstantiated by Elon and never regretted the decision. See you soon on @mastodon!
Found you on bluesky, followed. Thank you
Good choice with Bluesky, I made the move and will make this my primary infospace. I would also advise against Mastodon because the ultimate owner is Russian.
Nope
I left all social medias 5 years ago except UA-cam. Best decision of my entire life. My mental health is a million time better without. I suggest everyone trying it!
Haha I just made the same decision yesterday. The constant hate and racism just started taking a toll on my mental health.
I’ve now been going back and checking because this platform is eliminating my comments that are in no way offensive. In particular, they really do not like you questioning the behavior of certain dictators and their parties.
Like you, this is my last remaining platform, so I may be going cold turkey soon.
Same here. I am 70 and want peace inside my self better than lies and manipulations. Though I think I could better see through lies than younger people.
Same here.
Likewise & I’m happier for it!
Just one detail that I think is important: the algorithm is NOT open source. Some code for the algorithm was made public at some point last year but no updates have ever been published so we can safely assume that what is published and what is run have no relation to one another. This was all just a(nother) publicity stunt.
Yes, I would not be surprised to learn that there is a bunch of parameters that they haven't published, but I found it a bit too speculative to include in the video.
@luanjot1 Do you have a source? I saw multiple releases of code over time, but I don't pretend to be a software engineer. I tried looking into this recently and couldn't find a good source on point.
UA-cam is completely infected with Russian propaganda. The Russian Proganda agencies understand the UA-cam algorithm and play it well.
They're even able to use UA-cam TOS rules to get their opponents banned, censored or blocked.
They embed propaganda in the following ways
1 Sponsorship of sympathetic posters
2 Their own fake channels
3 Comments section with pro Russian comets often disguised as neutrality, peace or human rights
robotic upvotes of pro Russian comments
down votes of their opponents and complaints.
4 Censorship just plays into Russian hands as well..
@@mariocerame the GitHub repository was last updated over a year ago (possibly only ever one version released, I hate the web interface especially on my phone)
It was released quite cryptically and removing API access makes having the source code almost useless. With the API you could find out how the cryptically named signals and variables are actually used. As it is whatever anyone tells you about it is just guesswork.
Considering well established oddities, like Kallioniemi's Vatnik Soup report on Musk constantly losing likes since it was written many months ago, I think there are lots of similar things happening that give value to Musk's russian friends.
Information space is a real domain in warfare and it should be regarded as such.
Hostile disinformation really should be understood as subliminal _warfare._
I agree.
Hear Hear
Yes, the state should have a monopoly on disinformation.
That sounds like a call for enforcing conformity. Like the Dems did.
@@Lizardo451 Way to put words in someone's mouth.
Trying to have any sort of discussion on UA-cam has become an absolute pain about half a year ago. Half the comments go missing. And it doesn't matter how polite and well-written they are or what sort of political lean they have, or whether they have any words that might be keywords. I don't detect any particular unfairness, the machine is simply broken.
Yeah. UA-cam censorship is strange and completely random as well. Some people say it's because Google is "woke" and only target conservative right-wing opinions but the reality is that it targets everyone.
This comment could be shadow banned, in fact. I don't know what will happen.
@SianaGearz Yes. You can make a comment 100% based on well documented fact, and it will disappear with no explanation.
Google as a whole is digging their own grave..
Try suggesting women can't have penises. Those comments disappear pretty quickly.
UA-cam is incredibly woke just like most of the silicon valley companies.
Don't make more than 1 comment towards others. If you argue with someone back-and-forth on here and you make good points, there's a 100% chance that you'll eventually get flagged for 'harassment' by people you disagree with.
UA-cam's problem is that they order videos removed or demonetized or ban channels for no discernible reason, leaving users to suppose that it's either a matter of bias or of allowing advertisers to determine content.
I assume UA-cam's content moderation largely depends on what advertisers want as it's their money that keeps UA-cam afloat.
The reason is clear and discernable, conservative content. Blaming advertisers is a red herring. Black Stone and dark money are pushing the companies and advertisers to censor the truth.
He who pays wins
I remember when Google proudly had "Do No Evil" as a mission statement.
Yes, and how weird is it for a company to drop it.. I mean its kinda okayish to never have had it, but to drop it??
That was a surprisingly effective publicity stunt. They've always been built around commercializing user data, and amassing more and more of it. Any company becoming a monopoly becomes "evil". As did Google. They're also on the way to peak shittification, btw, but that's another matter
companies say a lot of things, and then do a lot of other things.
zionist snakes google
Google today: “Evil is a subjective term”
2018: De-platforming users
2024: De-usering platforms
Truth.
Let them tweet cake
2027: Depopulating the planet.
@@adamstanway7720 😁 😁 😁
I see a lot of people here saying, that they would be able to recognise "lies", on social media. Please be careful, and not over confident, in your selves.
I'm 40'ish, was taught the basics, of source validation and critical thinking, as a kid. I've worked in Military Intelligence, and as a software engineer.
I'm in the age group, that both grew up with/matured along side the internet in the 90's. And was an adult, when social media and smart phones arrived.
I have no illusions, of being able to not get tricked/manipulated.
Traditional media can be dangerous, if you don't diversify your sources, and are awhere of your own biases.
But the choice of source is entirely yours.
But on social media, it is nearly impossible, to not get placed into an echo chamber, without even noticing. Even if you "follow" diverse sources. Because of the way recommendations work.
Take this comment as an example.
I see someone reasonable, presumably smart people, and want to help. So I post a "long comment".
By doing so, I am telling the youtube algorithm, to show me more of Anders' videos.
I have a tendancy, to comment more, in this fashion, then I do when disagreeing with the content.
Hence I'll get recommended more pro Ukranean, pro democracy channels.
And I will actively, have to go to, the opposite type of channels. Even though I am subscribed to both types.
Basically none of the channels I disagree with, are ever recommended to me. Even though, that's probably 20% of my subscriptions.
I would admit to being overconfident. Community Notes has pulled me up several times. If a Twitter user repeatedly posts severe errors, I block or mute them.
_"Traditional media [..] choice of source is entirely yours."_
Sure? U should follow ur own advice actually: _"I have no illusions, of being able to not get tricked/manipulated."_
My point is - u don't know / are unaware how this mechanism works with trad media, which is why u make this misleading statement.
@ the greatest power of the propagandist is silence. There is no more potent tool of deception than to outright deny information.
When people say twitter had a left-wing bias I don't think anyone was talking about the recommendation systems. They were mostly speaking about the human moderation on the platform and human decisions such as preventing posts about the Hunter Biden laptop, etc which clearly favor one party.
Funny how outright information suppression doesn’t count as misinformation, isn’t it? I would have counted informational denial the most powerful tool of propaganda and disinformation. Tremendously effective and very hard to disprove.
which also conveniently ignores that the reason they did this is that the other party was trying to make them complicit in influencing the election with unverified slander, and they were protecting themselves from weaponized disinfo campaigns which they learned to do after the podesta e-mail leaks in 2016
Ahead of a trial some information is sub judice.
Have you read the actual story outside of Taibbi and Musk lying to you? Regarding this 24h decision, there was no evidence from which you can reasonably infer politically biased motivation. In fact, the internal hand-wringing it displayed was the most insightful part. Wonder why people making these claims never produce actual studies and analysis. Always some sensationalist story you haven't even read.
Ye he miss that out totally 🤨 I wounder if his bais in his analysis? 🙄
There is a difference between a “balanced” algorithm and a “content neutral” algorithm.
“Balance” involves inherently subjective judgments about where the center is, what is far right, and what is far left. In the video example where he talks about adjusting the weight given by the algorithm based on the hypothetical example where Republicans prefer the like button and Democrats prefer to comment. That’s an example of balancing where the owner puts his thumb on the scale in order to achieve a preconceived. The act of balancing is inherently biased because everyone has their own opinion on where the center lies, and what the ideal proportion of left and right voices should be.
Great point!
Also you can't pretend that flat-Eathers and anti-vaxers should have the same platforming as sane people who have functioning brains.
Indeed. I just left a similar comment before reading this.
There is a counter productive fringe of both left and right though. When they have Twitter dominance any fringe will have too much influence on the policy and the bounds of acceptable debate. Kamala found that out, and Trump is going to.
here is a handy chart for you:
Economic devide in politics:
Left wing (=Marxism) | (Capitalism=) Right wing
Political positions on societal issues:
Progressive | Conservative | Reactionary
Styles of governance:
Liberal | Authoritarian
Balancing content is not a matter of subjective judgement, these terms are well defined and universally applicable.
I have never been on social media except this platform, I don’t feel that I’m missing anything 🇬🇧
same
Unfortunately UA-cam bot comment filters are horrible too. Half of them disappear.
You're definitely missing tons of things. Whether or not any of those would be of value *_to you_* is a valid question, but it's silly to imagine that nothing of value has happened or is happening on social media. Anders, for instance, wasn't being an idiot & needlessly wasting his time for the 12 years he was heavily using Twitter. He, thoughtfully, found use & value in it as did many others.
@@Psittacus_erithacusTrue... but X chgd the rules and APN left the platform, sadly not all have .
@georgek1234 for sure. For what it's worth as context, I've never used twitter-never had an account. So I'm certainly not trying to defend it: not as it was and certainly not in it's current form. I'm just pointing out that it's a bit silly to pretend that there was never anything of value to miss on social media.
I left Twitter for entirely non-political reasons a few months ago when i started bumping into violence and pornography fairly frequently. I don't want to run across that content and i don't want my brand to be adjacent to that content. I don't foresee myself ever returning.
Same, not American so the politics although annoying to flush through, were second to all the anti-social trash.
When Twitter started out it was mostly just porn percentage wise (I think all social sites have started out as dating apps or places for sharing lewd content). If you used Twitter for a while without encountering porn you were in a bubble but I imagine after Musk's takeover a lot of internal filters were removed that would had kept the porn away from you.
Depends on the type of violence. I can stomach the brutality of war, and it should be up to me to allow it. Disgusting, but factual and does have documentary value.
If its just promotion of violence for violence's sake, or even garbage IRL streamers like Johnny Somali, it has no real value and should just be banned on platform.
But youtube has turned into Disneyland, everything so politically correct and safe it no longer serves a purpose for political content and discourse.
Would not be surprised if youtube shadow banned/hides my comment. They almost never survive, and I have no idea why. Just too frustrating as a platform.
Yeah, porn has been a constant on Twitter
Odd, i don't see that even in the 'for you' tab. I used to see a lot of replies by obvious bots but i noticed they've been hidden for a while.
Disagree that a platform can be politically unbiased in the way you suggest -- where everything is carefully balanced for neutrality. First, just practically, there aren't two political perspectives -- there are many, with all kinds of subtle differences which constantly change. For example, the "woke" left is pretty different from the "never Trump", formerly Republican Democrats. Not to mention that US politics are only one small part of the world scene. To implement your idea, a platform would have to place each user on this spectrum. That person who uses the "like" button all the time -- is that a woke left person who thinks that race and gender are all important, or a Bernie Sanders progressive who thinks it's all about economics and class, or maybe a former Sanders supporter who's moved to Trump and has now embraced some elements of white ethnic nationalism? Third, and most importantly, once you concede that "responsible" content moderation is necessary, then some political points of view are going to get suppressed because they will violate those standards. There are plenty of obvious examples for that one. And this issue will change over time -- for example, the antivax movement used to be a lunatic fringe, but became political mainstream during Covid. Suppose a party advocating some form of ethnic or racial or religious discrimination and/or violence moves out of the fringe and becomes mainstream -- do you then relax the standards? And at what level of "mainstream" do you make that decision? In the end, I think a platform just has to set standards based on some kind of ethical/moral/truth framework and let the chips fall as they will. And since ethical/moral/truth issues are inherently political, some political bias will be inevitable.
I think that's the reality of what a truly unbiased platform is - one that simply will not tolerate or host disinformation. The rest will sort itself out and that's the reality of what a true political center will look like.
Unfortunately political discourse often has gotten so regularly outside of the realm of reality or objective fact (often thanks to these very algorithms no less) that we tend to fill in the blank of "not hosting misinformation or lies" as somehow "political". It's a public perception that a lot of bad actors have intentionally pushed as a strategy because there is so little consequence for lying to the public, and it speaks volumes as to how effective it's been when we needlessly have to elaborate on the difference because the blanks are already being filled in by someone's bias.
I like UA-cam because I can cuss up a storm when needed... I NEVER attempt to shame or demean someone, but saying 'fuck' now and again really doesn't hurt the conversation..
So great to hear your views of this very important area too Anders. I feel that your analysis hits it right on. I closed my account on Twitter and moved to Bsky a few days before this video :-). But nice to be confirmed that it was the right choice.
I had this discussion the other day. When social media was new, we had to change platforms on a regular basis as new platforms became more popular. There is an attitude now that the major platforms are institutions that you can't leave. If you don't like them you can go.... and if enough people do the same then platforms will be forced to follow what the people want.
Thanks, great perspective, helped me at least understand better what has happened! Btw, I'm a very reasonable centrist, anti-conspiracy-theory-minded, and I find youtube automatic comment moderation absolutely horrible and frustrating. It's really hard to discuss anything at all because the auto-moderation is so harsh. I have no idea if even this comment will survive or be shadow banned.
Yeah, I'm a bit of a hobbyist researcher (I wrote a few articles on Skeptical Science, which is an anti-misinformation site about global warming), and the "silent deletion with no appeals" system bothers me a lot. It discourages me from countering misinformation, because (1) why put effort into a comment that might just be deleted? and (2) saying that a video is wrong about something tends to cause fans of the OP to downvote me, which may reduce my own reputation in the eyes of UA-cam. Also, I can never provide sources because the presence of any URL (even links to other UA-cam videos) almost guarantees deletion of the whole comment.
Also, commenting on UA-cam takes a lot more time now because I need to open a private browser window to check how well each comment was received by UA-cam (i.e. how far down the list of "top comments" do I have to scroll to see it, or was it deleted, or was it shadowbanned meaning it is only visible in the "Newest first" view?) And also I have to copy-paste each comment into a document in order to make a record of what UA-cam is deleting, in case they decide to delete it without a trace. So I have a file, now, with hundreds of my comments and how UA-cam treated each one. I think more people should be aware of this because if I (as a reasonable center-left person) am being censored on a regular basis, I expect right-wing people to be much, much angrier still. It must feed heavily into their sense of victimhood.
Case in point, two minutes ago I posted a follow-up comment that was just as long as the first one, and after refreshing the page, it is now gone. If you're curious what I had to say, well, I can't say. If I did, this third comment would probably go the same way as the second one.
Couldn't agree more. YT effectively encourages conspiracy theories by blocking URLs.
It survived!
As always - two questions: 1. Where does it say that freedom of expression is limited to generally accepted and well founded truth? 2. Should people be punished for expressing generally accepted and well founded truths (except in some generally excepted cases like state secrets)?
And that is the basis of "misinformation" - other words, "misinformation" is nothing but a euphemism for censorship. And should "the state" be the judge of what "misinformation" entails (like EUvsDisinfo)? I don't think so. It's not for nothing that state funded broadcasters have such a bad rep. The worst offenders of "misinformation" are states themselves. The Hunter Biden laptop was once "misinformation", which proved to be information. The Mueller investigation was once "information", which proved to be "misinformation". So let's conclude that yes, "misinformation" is just censorship by a different name.
Yes, in the good old days the state could easily grant this sort of rights, because all the distribution of information were essentially controlled. You could flyer, reaching at best a few thousand people - and be considered a nutcase by the general public. You could write a letter to the newspaper that, if accepted at all, would be heavily redacted and abridged. But the Internet changed all that. and you won't get the genie back into the bottle.
It simply boils down to this: either you have these rights - or you don't. And if you don't, at least be clear about it. At least then we know in which dystopia we live, and watch out for the thought police if you have an opinion that is not approved by the government. After all, "Ignorance is strength".
13:53: UA-cam being good in content moderation? Actually I mostly stopped to comment here, because YT deliberately removes comments by a not comprehensible pattern. And does so in masses, perhaps 50% of what I write.
My experience with YT comments is the same.
Regarding comments being deleted, I think that there are two causes. I believe the channel can delete them, and I believe UA-cam deletes them based on keywords.
Why should we not believe that it is acting correctly?
What is it that you say that you believe is being wrongly deleted.
Surely you must see that many people who you believe SHOULD have their comments deleted, would be able to truthfully make exactly the same comment.
I am unable to figure out the comment moderation algorithm. Sometimes I'll write the most innocent, positive comment and it'll get deleted. Sometimes I'll use an occasional swear word and it IS posted. Incomprehensible.
@@thedutchfoxxxsame here. I try and write positive comments. But now my account seems to have been flagged. Some comments, even when fact based and made in a positive way are immediately removed. This must be algorithmically removed as it’s instant.
I'd like: downvote results, to be able to post links, no more comments being randomly deleted, when they are deleted a note explaining why and who deleted them.
I never got into social media or Facebook. I haven't dealt with any of the ridiculous drama everyone else have gone through
UA-cam is a social media.
@@alexandruraresdatcu Especially if you read and post comments or make videos responding to other videos. I don’t know if it’s true social media for those that purely watch videos without any further interaction with the UA-cam site.
I don’t think UA-cam should get a clean bill of health or a pass, even if it scores better than a dung heap like Xitter.
@@alexandruraresdatcu And has the ridiculous drama.
@@alexandruraresdatcu UA-cam is extremely censorious and also complexity infected by Russian Intelligence Agency Propaganda.
These agencies know how to play the UA-cam Algorithm and Polities spread Russian Talking Points within the UA-cam TOS.
-They post new content, they sponsor influences with fake narratives and news
-They upvote pro Russian comments
-They get prop Ukrainian commentators banned and down-voted or censored. They know the algorithm well.
Basically everyone wants social media to cater to their specific worldview and people like the guy who made this video are unhappy that people they disagree with or foreign propagandists can say things they don't like.
What he doesn't understand about propaganda is that its only effective on a population that accepts the source of "dude, trust me bro, I wouldn't lie lol" and thus is only limited in its effectiveness. What he's actually angry about is when someone, including propagandists, mention things that can be backed up with logic and facts. Sometimes even bad people can make good points.
I love the grounded reality of this channel!!!
*If you are not in the financial market space right now, you are making a huge mistake. I understand that it could be due to ignorance, but if you want to make your money work for you..prevent inflation.*
I feel sympathy and empathy for our country, low income earners are suffering to survive, and I appreciate Wayne. You've helped my family with your advice. imagine investing $30,000 and receiving $95,460 after 28 days of trading.
Honestly, our government has no idea how people are suffering these days. I feel sorry for disabled people who don't get the help they deserve. All thanks to Mr Michael Wayne, imagine investing $1000 and receiving $5700 in a few days..
Well, I engage in nice side hustles like investing, and the good thing is I do it with one one of the best(Michael Wayne), he's really good!
Did someone just mention Mr Wayne!? Damn! You just made my day; what a coincidence.. I've worked with him for over 2years and I can tell how good he is
It's great to see you guys talking about Michael Wayne, This man changed the game for me. Good Man❤️
I don't know what sort of research could lead to concluding UA-cam's moderation and algorithmic skewing practices are 'good and responsible', but I suggest thorough self-reflection.
Anders, I really appreciate this video. You have simplified this rather confusing issue. Thank you.
The algorithm before might have been more fair, but human moderators, including company leadership were not. Jack personally banned folks.
And that was a lot of the problem - many outrageous censorship decisions of pre-Elon Twitter were done by hand, by "the moderation team".
How that is different from Musk personally suspending journalists on X with no explanation?
there NEEDS to be WAY more information and analysis like this all over youtube and the internet, putting this topic into easily understood terms is key to the next phase of humans not being brainwashed and manipulated
I remember when I bought my first computer, an IBM XT in December of 1982, and bought the DOS manual at the bookstore. It said when getting on bulletin boards to be careful and not take things too personally. The protection of anonymity brings out the worst in users (mostly young men).
ua-cam.com/video/Tnm351D9wkE/v-deo.html
apparently the author had zero experience with teenage girls 🤣
Old men too (Personal guilty)
Love the time when it actually gave meaning to read the DOS manual :) (And was possible)
I don't think anonymity has much to do with it. I mean have you seen how people behave on f-book and even linkedin with their real name and face on full display? Face to face, these people would probably start collecting kicks in the nuts and slaps across the face, which is likely something they don't really want.
Back then you were at least only really dealing with US culture and a self selecting subset even of that. Nowadays there are at least two distinct cultures in the US alone and the whole world is online. There is no logical way to satisfy the whole world.
Twitter used to do censure, if asked by the government, but stopped with Musk. How are the alternatives? I stopped using FB, because they totally lost my trust with shadow banning etc.
After Musk has shown his colors politically, it is really striking how many moderates and left leaning people and content creators are still on X.
Musk must be laughing till he wets his pants over all these "useful idiots" using his platform. It gives him revenue and the platform legitimacy.
Good on you @anderspuck for leaving, but I guess most people just dont have the guts/spine to do that.
True, and it would be different story if Musk would be conservative in using his power as owner politically.. but obviously he is not.
Yes, I agree. Have been wondering for a long time why these 'sophisticated' people are still hanging out on twitter/x, owned by the man who danced on Rump's stage. I have often heard people make long rationalizations about this but I think it's just laziness and inertia. Was really glad to hear Anders' very detailed and informed discussion today.
they are people who want to have their say and not cry that their opponents have a say too, you people are silly little babies
Surprisingly interesting video!
I'd love to hear more about your research, Anders.
Very thoughtful discussion Anders. Vlad Vexler had a different angle on this topic and I think you both have valid points. I've also left twitter and I'm using bluesky now.
The idea of having no political bias flies out of the window the moment things like overwhelming scientific consensus, health or human rights become politicized.
Have you seen the way this platform biases search results? When searching for Anders Puck Nielsen, it recently was serving up a top result for Tim Pool’s channel, with yours listed 2nd. That’s enormously problematic.
I searched on logged in profile and incognito and got Anders first and his videos after on both cases. Coming in as 2nd isnt exactly world shattering though.
I also suspect that it is a recommendation that is made to fit just your profile. UA-cam must somehow think that you are interested in Tim Pool.
This was happening about 3-4 wks ago, more than a month AFTER Tim Pool’s parent co. Tenet had their own YT acct suspended due to DoJ’s indictment for paying Pool & others to spread RT disinfo. That is what makes it extremely problematic: they both cover Ukraine & Russia, but Anders (a legitimate analyst) was de-prioritized under a known, paid propagandist.
@anderspuck I’m very much the opposite of interested in Tim Pool. I’m subscribed to your channel, would never watch his, and I regularly watch Jake Broe, Artur Rehi, Denys Davidov, Silicon Curtain, anywhere Ben Hodges is interviewed, etc. I think the algorithm was pushing him solely on the Ukraine/Russia topic commonality… that’s what I find very problematic.
@@JAllenKaiser I wouldn't take it personally, I think the algorithm is a bit doolally at the moment. For the past two days my recommended feed has dozens of hindi language videos and livestreams in it. No idea why. Not a language I speak or have/would ever watched a video in, but at it's peak they were about one in every four or five recommendations until I started blocking the channels. Mad...
I am surprised that “avoiding polarization bias” is not on the list of requirements. Conceptually, it would make sense for social media companies to present users with increasingly amplified intensity of their existing bias: both as click bait and for easier segmentation.
community notes do a pretty good job on twitter to hold people accountable.
our politicians in germany hate these for this exakt reason lol
they rather want outright censorship.
One other thing you don't consider is who has control over those four parameters. Something like Mastodon is fundamentally different than all other social media services (yes, even Bluesky) in that a) there is not one answer to these questions, it's a federation of different organizations all with their own moderation policies, algorithms, etc., and more, that mastodon/fediverse is the ONLY social media service where control over those particular aspects is not held by billionaires/VC funds, etc, but instead by if not the users, than people much closer to the users.
Anders, I'm a great fan of your videos on the Ukraine situation. But I part ways with you on this one. Very confusing. Currently, I see on X all posts from those I follow and only those posts. As far as I can tell, there is no "moderation" no "algorithm". I do see ads because I haven't paid for a "Premium subscription". These concepts "algorithm" (Google) and "moderation" (Facebook) have been used in the past and are still being used by authorities to selectively suppress much true information that they don't like exposed. They intentionally distort the truth. This can't happen on X if you select "follow" for the authors of posts you trust. Other platforms explicitly promote the concept of "balanced moderation" - which is an oxymoron as far as I'm concerned.
Congrats man, thats a very good video
Good job contributing to the public dialogue about social media platforms and their role in our society.
I haven't fully deleted my Twitter account yet, but I now check it at most once per day for 10 minutes to compare the content and level of engagement to my BlueSky feed. Most of the people who I used to follow on Twitter are now posting on BlueSky. Not all of them are posting as actively as they post on Twitter, and I'm keeping my X/Twitter account for now because I'm interested in following both platforms to observe how X has declining engagement while BlueSky's engagement is growing. Hopefully the community of people who are interested in the truth and having honest political discourses will fully abandon X within a year and switch over fully to BlueSky.
You mentioned that you are using BlueSky vs Twitter not because you don't like Elon Musk but because you believe that BlueSky has what I'll briefly just describe as a greater focus on creating a more objective platform without bias from influence operations flooding the platform with bots impostering real people.
I appreciate that argument. However, I'll say that it's valid to look at and judge who owns and controls the platforms. Elon Musk has personally pedaled untruths on social media over the course of at least the past 5 years. He has consciously decided to use billions of dollars of his wealth to fund disinformation campaigns through a political action committee and also use his money to gain personal political power. People in the USA, Europe and elsewhere who care about the truth and democracy should look at the emergence of oligarchies and the erosion of democracy in Russia and Hungary (just to name 2 examples) and consider that the United States is absolutely on the same path. If you support democracy and believe that it's dangerous for billionaires to collude with political elites to manipulate our information space then I believe it's reasonable to refuse to support X on principle simply because you oppose the ownership and control of public information spaces by actors who are trying to buy control of the political process while simultaneously enriching themselves when their companies receive billions of dollars of government contracts.
Take a look at Yevgeny Prigozhin's career and business ventures -- supplying food to the Russian military and schools, operating political disinformation operations in the social media space, enriching himself through government contracts as he formed alliances with Russia's anti-democratic political leadership. Then look at how Elon Musk gets rich from SpaceX having billions of dollars in contracts from the USA government and how Tesla can benefit from changes in EV subsidies that disproportionately damage Tesla's competitors and also from changes in regulation of self driving cars. Consider that both of them actively worked to form a strong alliance with their country's political leadership while helping run social media disinformation campaigns to benefit the political interests of those leaders. Think about the path that democracy is on in the USA. If you don't like it, it's reasonable to take a stand by refusing to support X.
Two of the biggest issues with the first two points are also issues facing legacy media.
At least in the US, much of legacy media takes "unbiased" to mean "both sides equal"...which simply isn't true. At one point, one side was merely immoral, and actual reporting would call that out...now one side is entirely unhinged and detached from reality, and being "unbiased" still means calling that out.
Thank you for declaring your bias. All people should do that, so everybody knows how to properly interpret them.
It sucks when you are this great voice of reason and any Mike, Joe, or Ivan can point to all the times you were wrong without being shadow banned.
I agree with Anders! We should all keep calling it Twitter.
Great stuff. Very relevant ❤
Great. Will you do the same analysis for Bluesky, facebook, Mastodon etc?
Vlad Vexler seems to disagree with you, saying that withdrawing from Twit means you're conceding the space and becoming "depoliticized." I would say one step in being depoliticized is continuing to act as though "X" is still a legitimate social medium when it has de-legitimized itself.
I use Twitter because it's easy to ignore the algorithm. I only use the "following" feed and I follow people mostly from discovery on other websites and occasionally from retweets from people I'm currently following.
90% of users of any software run with default parameters.
Same, I'm not having the problems described
That sounds lik you don't like free speech 😂😂😂
Even the 'following' feed does not work like it used to.
Also the comment sections are filled with bots and there is hardly any real engagement or interaction anymore. The only exception to this are blue mark accounts whose comments show up normally. In other words you have to pay a subscription fee to have a voice.
Which actually applies to content creators as well.
That’s why I do. There has been some wobble back and forth as they tune the feed, but my “following” feed is excellent. I like it better than Facebook.
Can you tell us your thoughts on the culture war, censorship and moderator ethics in a future video? I understand that it is a bit of a touchy subject for a lot of people but since you have already dipped your toes into social media governance, it would be a logical follow up to this video.
I joined Bluesky today and started following you and Jake Broe. Thanks for your videos. They're very informative
Personal anecdote on the topic of open APIs: at the time Elon Musk bought Twitter I was working on a university group project to build a piece of software to perform consumer research on Twitter. Our entire project got kneecapped by Elon Musk’s restrictions on access to the Twitter API.
😂
It is a reasonably well-known psychological effect, that the most fair media/algorithm is the one deemed biased by most people. A media/algorithm biased in one direction will be judged less biased by people agreeing with that bias, whereas a neutral media/algorithm will be almost universally biased. This, of course, goes for the bias of Fox, but also for the media "you" deem more unbiased.
Most people's whole idea of being unbiased only makes sense when considering a binary choice between two viewpoints that are not too far apart. Not even the US comes close to that ideal anymore, let alone the whole world. SHould social media be biased against Nazis? The KKK? Vacine deniers? Flat earthers?
Consider Reddit for instance. An absolute cesspool of propaganda and echo-chambers considering how easy it is to drown opposing viewpoints with downvotes and outright ban. It also happens to be the favorite of the supposedly liberal factions, for precisely the illiberal powers it gives them. But Twitter where they have to "tolerate" the opposing viewpoints is considered a biased platform.
The only difference between Fox and MSNBC is their market segmentation strategy. Their only purpose is to offer a defined population to the advertisers who pay them. The content they create is selected exclusively to maintain their audience. Fox didn't believe in Trump's eletion denial, they pushed it to maintain their audience.
since oct 7th '23, utoob meets none of the three points, it does not have an unbiased algorithm, it does not have transparent moderation and it does not have good public APIs.
I quit Twitter all the way back in 2017, long before Musk it was already bad
Definitely not. One of the most useful platforms to follow Ukraine war in real time, because you had both primary sources and experts on the same platform. You just had to know how to use it.
However that was before Musk bought it. The site is not usable anymore.
Never once have I twittered or been twittered at. I don't believe I have ever even googled twitter. Now, it certainly seems that folks love twittering, and also twitter-adjacent twittering, like threadsing? is that a word? I m happy that folks have found something to keep them occupied but I can tell you straight up that it is possible to have a fulfilling life without ever once having looked up a twitter.
There can't be something called "responsible social media" It would be a contradiction against their business model.
I have never used Twitter. Maybe too old to comprehend, but the main reason is to protect myself and my identity. After all, a girl can't be too careful now, can she? Thank you 💛 Anders!!!
A wise decision, whether male or female. That so many people give up highly personal and sensitive information to corporations always boggled my mind.
Girl detected. Start hacking procedures immediately.
@@montecarlo1651
My impression is that Facebook wants to know everything about everyone
but doesn't want anyone to know anything about Facebook.
Ok... Not sure why you shared this comment. Doesn't add or take away from anything in the video. It's just like me taking the time to watch a 30 min video about cooking a good beef steak and then after I comment and say "well I don't like beef and think it's bad for you". Totally makes the commenter (you) look stupid.
There is nothing more difficult to plan,more doubtful of success,nor more dangerous to manage than the creation of a new order of things...Whenever his enemies have occasion to attack the innovator they to do so with the passion of partisans,while the others defend him sluggishly so that the innovator and his party alike are vulnerable.
Honestly, I don’t know how or in what way did Twitter before Musk do a good job at moderation. It was horrific. I’d rather have the free for all that it is now. I don’t want someone to take the decision what information I can and cannot see. That is what made the internet great. It went to trash when we started having moderation especially based on politics. Be it left or right.
the good part was that if you posted horrible content, you needlesly insulted people, you got suspended. you now have to write exceptionally awful stuff (like gratifying death), and if you are one of the protected users (there are several hundred profiles, mostly right wing influencers who are pointless trying to report). it was very far from perfect, but actions had consequences.
nowadays X just blasts right wing disinfo into your face. You have to actively block dozens of accounts to clean up your feed. If you are a new user, the site will recommend you some seriously questionable people.
Wholly agreed. 👍
Pre-Elon Twitter was full of outrageous high-profile censorship decisions, strongly favouring the left political pole.
The current Twitter is more of a Wild West - but there is much less excessive censorship.
Thanks for this. Some people were saying Bluesky would end up no better than X because all the bots would just move there but now I can see it can be better as it is better managed. But for me I spend enough time on UA-cam and Facebook 🙂
Intelligent and inciteful as ever, thanks Anders
Excellent explanation, as always on this channel!
Almost sounds like a counter argument to a vlad vexler video. Hmmmmm
Vlad loves Elon haha
Fascinating. Thankyou.
Just from the top of my head: Destin from Smarter every day has a mini-series with interviews about moderation on different platforms.
And there is a great in-depth video about moderation The Free Speech Big Tech Debate, which should be viewed a lot more, in my opinion.
Thanks, Anders!
I respect your opinion a lot so you’re teaching me and others l think why l/others should stay the h*ll away from xitter and other social media.
Thank you for always being a voice of reason, Anders. Excellent video.
Just another Yankee dog 😂😂😂
It doesn't make sense to me to talk about bias purely in terms of political leaning because some procedural standards coincide with political positions. For example, the political right are more prone to threats, bullying and racial slurs so clamping down on those can be seen as political bias. Yet they aught to be restricted for reasons that have nothing to do with political allegiance.
1) You're saying that the algorithm is not biased, but because it has been published, it is now biased because it makes it easier for bot makers. That doesn't make sense. The fact it is more vulnerable to bad actors doesn't make it biased. Also, you don't specify the bias of the bot makers.
2) You're saying that the fact that the algorithm is open source is bad because it leads to more bots. But you also want more openness in the form of better APIs - doesn't that give the bot makers more info in its own right?
3) Doesn't closing APIs make it harder for bot makers?
3) Before Musk took over, many right leaning people complained about leftist bias on X, to which left leaning people would respond that as a private company, Twitter could do what it wants. But now that the leftist bias is gone, we now need standards for specifically X?
4) Your argument for leaving X is that you don't want to legitimize the other people on the platform with your presence. What makes you think that your views are more legitimate than those of others? Would you want to convince others of your arguments or retreat into a bubble with people who think like you?
5) We know from the Twitter files and statements from Zuckerberg that the present American government has been pressuring social media platforms to suppress messages they don't like. Musk seems the only one who stands up against this government pressure. Isn't that a good thing?
Musk is the government now, how is this going to work? Your argument woul have more weight if Musk had not been so actively supporting one of the candidate. He's now bragging to anyone who wants to listen that X got Trump elected
Well said. Also, Community Notes is far more transparent than secret algorithms.
I have a suggestion for you. Play devil's advocate and do your best to respond as you believe Anders would. You'll probably have to give the video one more listen.
Then ask your remaining questions, if you have any.
@YupYuppie very well said. To me X is the best run social media. And the most responsible. I stopped using twitter 10 years ago, and I should use it more, since it has been liberated.
Musk is a bad actor.
Excellent analyse ❤
As sunlight is the best disinfectant, open discussion is the best education. When moderation is discussed, one has to ask who benefits?
exactly
No moderation would lead to pr0n, b0ts and tr0lls taking over everything.
@@NoX-512 Which is precisely what's happened to X.
@@NoX-512 Porn disgusts me, but censorship of 'non-approved' or 'incorrect' speech is an unthinkable alternative.
@@johnr8252 You mean Reddit?
Ok I think there’s a really important distinction here.
I consider social media to be a communications platform for users, thus, within law and reason, people should preferably and optimally be permitted to say whatever they like, as they are on a telephone, email, and so on.
I wondered why you didn’t mention that at all, but I think it is because you see social media as a publishing or broadcasting service for content creators. (Which UA-cam for example absolutely is.)
Twitter is a massive broadcast if content that has been created.
@@knoll9812 Twitter is a short message communications platform.
See? Assertions are just that easy!
Very interesting. Thank you. I do have a problem with Elon. He is using X as his bully platform now. I'm so tired of his reposts of obvious logical inconsistences...
Concerning.
That is why advertisers want to flee.
He's always been a troll on the platform I think--I don't think that's new. And I think he's admitted to that.
I am grateful for his disclosure of the Twitter Files. That was a rare view into a very serious problem. Also, if he didn't go open-source at all, bsky would not have done so either.
Tak, Anders, det er en meget vigtig diskussion, som jeg håber får mere opmærksomhed fremover.
It's a tricky issue. I will say I'm vastly more concerned about misinformation through mandated censorship, than I am about misinformation that has to compete in the marketplace of ideas. Back when Twitter was more regulated it's important to remember we had more, not less, misinformation.
As Covid taught us and the election scandals demonstrated over and over again, even in "free" countries the Government is incredibly quick and eager to forget basic liberal values and to coerce even private companies to accomplish its censorship goals. I think social media is always going to be a cesspit, the question is how easy it's going to be capable of ideological capture or not. And unfortunately, the more we regulation misinformation, the more vulnerable ideological capture AND misinformation we become.
I think I'll start calling that the misinformation paradox.
I understand the misgivings one might have with Twitter these days, and I would probably share many of them. But with all due respect, to say that Twitter before the takeover by Elon Musk was politically more or less even handed is a statement which is just absurd in the extreme. The suppression of conservative voices back then was blatant and obvious.
I agree with your statements about the current state of X. Wouldnt trust it at all.
However your assessment of pre-Musk Twitter really discredits your opinion for me and it makes me extremely skeptical about Bluesky and Mastodon.
If you judged pre-Musk twitter to have good moderation, then you could have misjudged these other two social media sites too.
Im going to have to do more research on this, and ill recommend everyone else to as well.
It seemingly goes to strictly polarizing Musk and Trump by proxy. He is Danish, complaining about the USA rules and regulations.
@number2and3 I don't really care about your politics. I'm English myself, Musk and Trump is none of my business.
My concern is just that he created a measurement to determine what a responsible social media company is. But then praises the old twitter, despite it not meeting his own measurements for a responsible social media company.
And now I've looked at Bluesky, I do think it has the potential to be better than X in terms that you can filter your own content.
However, whether it moderates content well will have to be seen over time. Right now, Bluesky is just full of people bitter about X and there's not much diversity of opinion on there. If it picks up people of different opinions then we can see whether it moderates content fairly or not.
I've not looked at Mastodon.
@@bakersmileyface I've not looked into blue sky, I've generally decreased all social media use but the notion that Treads or anything from Meta is better or less politically bias is not true.
I put many filters on both to not get any pornographic content in my feeds and they both still get it. Same before with Twitter before musk.
I think most media has become more political in general.
The moderation on the old Twitter was also terrible. But what I have seen on bluesky so far is much better - there is far less hate speech around.
@@peterwood6875 Whether you want to see hate speech not is a preference. But I think it's important to give people who want to speak hate a platform to speak. After all, if you can't share your opinions then you resort to more radical ways to be heard. It's just the way every human works, nobody likes to be silenced. I think X is good in that way.
It's good that Bluesky lets you filter out what content you want though, rather than them doing it all for you.
My concern is whether they'll have biased moderation. It's all well and good saying hate speech is not allowed, but the old twitter said the same thing and they did not apply those rules equally. I'm wondering whether Bluesky will follow the same trend since it's ran by a lot of ex-twitter employees.
Still not looked at Mastodon 😂
I have a twitter account that has been dormant for years. When switching phones recently I fired up X on the old phone out of curiosity. The first thing it showed me, I kid you not, first page, top post, was full-length, uncensored corn. That's where content moderation on X is at, right now. And no, I never used that account to watch corn on twitter (was there ever corn on twitter?) so it's not the algorithm doing its job. If anything, the algorithm had very little to go on with that account, as it was used very little.
Your definition of unbalanced sounds like the definition of bias. If you have two opposing opinions, it is not for the company to ensure that both of these are given equal attention on the platform. That would be artificially boosting one of them. The platform should just give both sides equal facility to make their arguments. I do agree about the problem with bots but event then, you can't call that bias as both sides can use bots.
Have to say I think his definition of balance is too loose, impossible to meet, and would generate a continual workload of determining what idea is what “wing”, then what behaviours this week attach to that, then adjusting algorithm responsiveness to particular behaviours, then redoing the entire thing when algorithm incentives change behaviours. Quixotic at the very least.
There are constant complaints that Elon Musk deletes posts he disagrees with. And it doesn't matter if it's journalists, well-known and lesser-known people.
Hi Anders, Thanks very much for your discussion concerning Twitter & social media platforms. I found it fascinating and in depth, but presented in a way that a non-expert could fully understand and appreciate. I learned a lot from your short video and encourage you to make other videos not focused solely on the Ukraine war. I eagerly await and seek your videos because of your thorough and in depth knowledge of the subject matter. You are doing an excellent job and I want to encourage to keep up the great work. Congratulations! John Murphy
What a timely contribution to the debate on social media. Buying Twitter to destroy it was a very expensive move, buut Elon has done a great job of it.
Let's have a Ministry of Truth and enshrine in the State a monopoly over disinformation.
Yes lets call it Pravda! Sorry already tried and tested. Turns out if you have to much lies on your platform people stop turning up to look for the truth. Much like twitter.
Put Marjorie Taylor Greene in charge of it!
@@Lizardo451 biden tried that
@@blaydCA😂😂😂
Never been on Twitter but now following you on Bluesky
Bluesky has been such a pleasant experience: a positive and easy platform with common-sense moderation.
Unless you have the wrong politics. Then you will get banned on bluesky.
@@PepsiMagt Can you back this up?
@@georgelionon9050 now YT is removing comments
@@thedutchfoxxx I tried to answer you, but YT keeps removing it. Ironic
@@PepsiMagt yeah it sucks, its their bot detection going amiss, happens to me all the time too. tip, dont put in any links and/or insults..
Thank you Anders for being that voice of reason and competence.
This is a very good video. I wish more people would watch it. I’m a web technologist and I definitely haven’t been on Twitter or Facebook in many many years. I’m also in epistemologist and a philosopher and everything you said I agree with and more. I still watch UA-cam though. The powers at be are exploiting a human need for social connection and a few loopholes in human thought itself.
Important and good video, thank you.
I wish you had made clear that Twitter or X didn't block all access to APIs, it started charging a fee for access.
True, but the price for access is so enormous that it's the same in practice.
When Trump said the Pandemic came from a Chinese lab the biggest social media banned mention of it as fake news.
They made access so expensive as to be effectively the same thing
They wanted the money from the AI companies so decided to charge for API acces to sell userdata.
Reddit did the same thing unfortunately
The API thing feels like it's a researcher's argument, not really an objective one. It's something you see at work, so it looms large in your mind, but it's not really very relevant for the day to day use of the platform.
Also, on the moderation front, I think you're omitting the best crowd moderation out there, Twitter's Community Notes feature. In my experience, that makes misinformation look much worse than a ban does, and it's more neutral too. I agree that the centralized moderation is probably a bit too loose, but once you consider the decentralized part of the story, I think it's actually a fair bit better than something like Facebook.
What makes you trust Bluesky?
If he thought the previous twitter had good moderation. Then obviously Bluesky would be his choice.
He can't see his own bias. But he's following it. And fair enough to him for that, nothing wrong with sticking to your bias.
2 reasons.
1) The protocol it uses allows users to create their own custom algorithms (though it does take some programming skill) - so if you don't trust the default Bsky algorithm - you can either create your own or use someone else's.
2) Though Bsky has a moderator, you can also subscribe to (or create a) custom moderation services at will.
I wonder that too. It's literally owned by a bunch of tech bros.
@@fransliszt Exactly who do you think owns Bluesky?
The majority owner, and head, of Bluesky (a public benefit corporation run on a shoestring budget) is Jay Graber. If you mean, that she worked previously in the tech industry, duh? Do you expect a juggler to just start a social media site? But usually when people write "tech bros" they mean wealthy VC men who invest in tech companies, and that's not her at all. Previous jobs of hers had been things like being a junior developer and soldering motherboards.
I talk regularly with several of the devs at Bluesky and they're great people. And the whole design of the protocol (which is based on IPLD, the underlying distriubuted-content-finding layer used by IPFS) is to make it so that even if they were to go rogue, users could still migrate their content and keep the network running without them.
@@bakersmileyface he refers to scientific analysis of twitter. You could legitimately doubt the scientific methods and claim his assumptions to be objectivly wrong. But instead you blamed it to bias, like everything is just opinion.
Would love to see your original research.
Given the kind of money bluesky has raised, i'm not confident it'll not follow a similar direction to twitter, so i'd encourage people to use Mastodon rather, though the onboarding experience is a bit more confusing, i promise it gets better once you picked a server and start following people and tags! It's just empty at first because there is no algo to give you random popular things to read before that.
I also used twitter for more than a decade, and although i had my gripes with moderation (especially in french, it was really bad at stopping conspiracy theory content like in 2020), it was certainly heaps better than the garbage fire it is now, it certainly was *trying*.
Twitter was just fine until Elon took over. Elon is the problem, not financing.
Appreciate this analysis, captures my emotional reaction to twitter
Spot on. Musk didn't want his platform to be analysed by anyone other than himself.
Twitter is the only platform with free speech right now
@@equim7363Far from it.
@@equim7363 Except if you disagree with His Majesty Musk.
@@Eder-bk5mm that's why Trump's account was banned in 2020, right?
Last thing I heard was APIs cost now $40k, I guess, that’s why “researchers” like Anders are a bit salty now.
So much useful information to make up our own minds! Thanks!
thank you, Anders, hearing a rational and intelligent view of TwitX is very refreshing. As a person in my 60s I am feeling like so much of the world is being run by the children from Lord of the Flies
After nearly 15 years I also left Twitter in the last week. I am happy with my decision.
it doesn’t make any difference how good your algorithms and how balanced your moderation if in the end it’s censored by government behind the closed doors
This is the key problem that I have with all social media platforms
Thanks for your comments and insights into social media platforms. One question I still have about Twitter is "do you think they were demonstrating an unbiased political position when they de-platformed Donald Trump?"
Great video, Anders. Thank you for your integrity.