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US criticises Australia's proposed algorithm opt-out laws as 'censorship'

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Buttons840 · 1790132383 · focus · HN ↗
What is an "algorithm"? Showing the 20 most recent posts is an algorithm, but I doubt that's what they're targeting with the law.
I'm not just trying to find a technical gotcha here. I think it's worth identifying what exactly about an "algorithm" causes it to cross the line and become harmful.
When does an algorithm become harmful?
When it is designed and optimized to maximize the amount of time it engages the user?
What about an algorithm that was optimized the present the user with content they would find interesting? That doesn't sound so bad on the surface.
What about an algorithm that maximizes the amount of ads people see? Or the amount of money that the company makes?
1. Nursie · 1790134426 · focus · HN ↗
  > What is an "algorithm"?
  To you and me it's a very wide category, and there may be hundreds or thousands or even millions involved in me simply typing this, it being saved somewhere and then served back to you.
  For lay-people though, it's become a term which means "The thing which measures your preferences and usage patterns then decides what to show you". So for lay-people to want to turn off the algorithm, they tend to mean going back to "just what your friends posted, in order"
  > When does an algorithm become harmful?
  I think this is a research subject. AFAICT it's pretty certain now that social media 'algorithms' have been optimised for addictiveness, which is likely to overlap somewhat with what users find interesting, but also cover things they find mildly titillating and/or outrageous.
  The harms come in a bunch of forms. The never-ending scrolling of bite-sized videos seems massively destructive to attention span, and people seem to get addicted to it and may neglect other parts of their life. The platforms also seem really keen to send men and boys off to pretty hateful 'manosphere' content which is apparently making life hell for women (including teachers of teenage boys). Then we have all the body-image and anxiety issues caused in teenagers constantly exposed to influencers showing off their (faked) wealth, beauty etc.
  Switching off the "shoving this all in your face" part of social media seems to me to be a win. When it was actually a way to keep in touch with friends and family it was a different game.
  1. drdaeman · 1790137517 · focus · HN ↗
    > The thing which measures your preferences and usage patterns then decides what to show you
    That (plus a clause that exempts algorithms with user controls with full informedness and ability to confidently and reliably predict the outcome = old good filters and such) is the thing that should be in the legislation’s definitions section.
    But then in the actual law it’s worse than “algorithm”, they’re actually banning broad over generalizations and design patterns instead, stuff like this:
    >> recommender features – content selected and displayed based on information associated with the user’s account;
    (Obvious legit use cases are regional content and user preferences.)
    >> endless-feed features – continuous feeds of end-user content;
    (Pure design pattern, pagination can be addictive at any span size.)
    Arainach · 1790138813 · focus · HN ↗
    Dark patterns are called that for a reason. Having to click "next page" is a point of friction that slows and stops consumption. Pageless increases engagement in an addictive way - it's why companies do it.
    I disagree that any of this is "overly broad" - it's all long overdue
    drdaeman · 1790200721 · focus · HN ↗
    I respectfully disagree. I’ve clicked way too many “next page”s (or refreshed pages, or whatever) to be aware that while the friction is real, it’s not the actually addictive component.
    Endless scrolling aids, but isn’t what makes a system addictive. Continuous relevance gamble “maybe the next one is good, or the one after” is the actual driver, and “I stop at this page” is a weak stopper condition. Not negligible (as proven by testing) but not the fundamental piece.
    Arainach · 1790201104 · focus · HN ↗
    Your disagreement means nothing compared to the mountains of telemetry which app companies have showing that it works.
    drdaeman · 1790204331 · focus · HN ↗
    Upd: found an experiment that strengthens with my point: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49823933">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49823933; leaving the below unredacted.
    (Sigh) And what exactly does it show? What makes you think you interpret the statistics correctly?
    It shows a correlation that suggests - at best - that certain design patterns decrease friction and increases duration of engagement, making system more captive. It does NOT show that those design patterns are captive (= are a problem) by themselves.
    Have those mountains of telemetry ever included an experiment where the addictive component was intentionally not present or maybe even designed to be anti-addictive (next element becomes increasingly less likely to be interesting/relevant past some threshold, frustrating the viewer) but the endless scrolling remains, so we test on its presence alone? Ideally, with an engagement-optimized feed as a separate control.
    I don't know of such experiments, so I cannot counter your point with a definitive proof. But your interpretation isn't a proof either - there are multiple factors and no control to tell them apart. Those mountains of telemetry didn't have a goal of isolating factors to determine their actual effect, they just had to optimize engagement, find the best combo that works.
    If someone ran something like that - I'd love to hear about it, and what they show. I'm utterly confident (as someone who had dealt with various addictions) that it'll show endless scrolling would have mild effects at best (maybe just a bit longer engagement compared to classic pagination as telemetry suggests, but I expect it to pale in comparison to an actual addictive/engagement-increasing feed source logic).
    drdaeman · 1790205097 · focus · HN ↗
    Actually, I found an experiment that directly contradicts your statement. So my disagreement is IMHO valid and your appeal to "mountains of telemetry" is not. To me it seems that you've just parroted the chorus without trying to understand the problem by decomposing it into pieces and trying to attribute the potential causes. Which just happens to be something that I spent some time doing (total amateur hour and N=1 but sort of worked for my purposes).
    <a href="https://www.slideshare.net/slideshow/design-for-continuous-experimentation/15456119" rel="nofollow">https://www.slideshare.net/slideshow/design-for-continuous-e... - look for the slide 32.
    Etsy ran A/B tests with and without endless scrolling. Same content source. Infinite scroll haven't produced any increased engagement: surprisingly, it decreased it - people searched less. Potential reason: it was a store, not a social media feed, the feed wasn't addictive in its nature (decreased relevancy, lower chances of finding something good buried down further and further) and the whole alternative pagination design didn't help at all. This is my interpretation, but c'mon - if you're appealing to the telemetry: here's the telemetry, how'd you explain it?
    In the neighboring comment, I was mistaken in that it would still increase length of browsing a bit, turns out it was off-putting.
    Arainach · 1790212355 · focus · HN ↗
    With addictive content, endless scroll makes it more addictive and increases consumption.
    I'm not sure why you think this is a slam dunk. Fruity flavors increase the adoption of vaping because it tastes better, but that doesn't work when you apply it to broccoli. Doesn't mean we shouldn't regulate flavored vapes.
    drdaeman · 1790232828 · focus · HN ↗
    Yes, exactly, with addictive content it boosts the engagement even further. We all agree about that. And - my point here I’m trying to convey - with nonaddictive content it doesn’t do that. Which is why I’m saying “we need to classify better”. I don’t understand why you’re against a more nuanced approach, when the goal is to allow non-harmful cases. I’m very much favor of regulation, just a more careful one.
    Vaping analogy is not perfect, as it doesn’t hold true in some aspects, but... Nobody makes vapes that go unpleasantly sour for a while after a fourth puff. But if they do we’d better not ban them from adding flavors, when the flavoring here does the right thing.
    We’d still want to regulate vaping on other aspects (such as harm to health, which - unlike speech - doesn’t get protections), but that’s another, different story.

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