Comment by wayne_skylar | Hacker News Reader

Comment by wayne_skylar | Hacker News Reader

We all walk around with our model of the world in our heads. When we see something that reinforces our model we get a dopamine hit. "I knew I was right!" Instead of Fox or MSNBC selecting stories for a target audience facebook uses machine learning to find the perfect selection of stories to keep you hooked.

Before Facebook had an algorithm you'd see peoples posts in chronological order. The moment they altered that was where they began to influence behavior.

I do think that facebook is in the position to do something about its negative influence. And taking no action or saying "it's too hard to fix" is basically being complicit. You don't get to profit off of this machine without being responsible for its negative externalities. At least from a moral standpoint.

The solution? Stop the manipulation of what users see based on machine learning. Users should see what their friends and groups post chronologically. What would be the downside of that? I'd spend less time on facebook (an upside if you ask me) and facebook would make less money.

This is a very interesting solution: in effect _remove_ our interventions.

If done cautiously, it could be very effective.

Some of the counter to it could look like this:

a. "Addicting" can be another synonym for "something people want, despite themselves", which means that it may not be up to Facebook:

  - If you remove sugar from snickers for example, it doesn't immediately follow that they will eat less sugar: they could just as well buy kit kats instead.

The interesting question could be: how can we remove the machine learning intervention, while keeping engagement high?

I'd argue that engagement is the wrong metric. For example, when Microsoft made the Windows Phone OS, they tried to keep interactions with the phone as brief as possible. Palm, too, had a three-click-maximum rule for their UI design.

If we can't think of a good metric that should apply to everyone, just give users more control over what they see so they have a chance of figuring out something for themselves.

This issue lies in the example: why isn’t windows phone dominant today?

We may argue that engagement is the wrong metric, but ultimately what matters is what customers will choose. If choosing between A and B, they choose the more engaging one, you’re in a tough spot.

I agree with your alternative, but with a twist: in effect you need to come up with something, that users will like _more_ then what they are doing now. More customization could be an option, but this hasn’t proven to be true in the market.

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