Aren't their algorithms all designed to optimize for engagement? Isn't engagement just the measure of how much time you spend on and interacting with their system? Doesn't that mean that they're not deciding what to keep feeding us, but rather that we are?

It seems like what they've done is basically automate, "Give the people what they want.", as it were. We produce the clickbait, we click on the clickbait, then we get fed more and more of what we click on.

I tend to think that this probably boils down to rent-seeking via exploiting self-destructive human behavior/biology, so I'm not too fond of it for those reasons. But, that doesn't seem very much like Facebook censoring things as it does them feeding everyone exactly what people indicate to them with their clicks and comments they'd like to be fed.

I suppose there's an interesting discussion about what lengths companies like Facebook should go to save people from themselves, but to me they're basically another form of vice monetization like cigarettes, alcohol, etc.