Meta's Ad Algorithm Directs Black Users to For-Profit Colleges
peopleofcolorintech.com
peopleofcolorintech.com
Because a higher percentage of black people already go to the school, and are connected on Meta, and because Meta bases ad delivery on subjects relevant to people similar to / connected to you, the ads for those colleges were delivered to black people more often, because black people already are highly represented at these schools.
Ok? It's a completely generic algorithm. If the school had a uniquely high percentage of any "group" of people, whether based on race, region, hobbies, interests, literally anything, ads for that school would be more likely sent to people in those groups.
The headline is pretty editorialized and presents a pretty misleading picture.
Um, oops. There are laws against discriminating on the basis of race, like, steering Black people to different schools on that basis. That's the difference.
When you say, it's a neutral algorithm because it steers people on the basis of other factors as well, you miss the whole point of having anti-discrimination laws. There's no law prohibiting steering on the bases of "hobbies, interests, literally anything". So when you say the algorithm is okay for that reason, you're saying discrimination based on race is okay if you also discriminate on other, lawful grounds. That seems to me like saying, race discrimination ought not be unlawful. If that's your opinion so be it, but an algorithm that steers people based on race is racially discriminatory.
For example, as Meta previously recognized, steering people seeking apartments based on their race was racially discriminatory, even though steering people seeking apartments based on hobbies or interests isn't that kind of discrimination. The argument you're making would apply equally to steering based on race in connection with jobs, housing, education, and all other areas of society, permitting racial steering because there's an algorithm involved that doesn't just include racial discrimination.
Meta hopefully will recognize this was a mistake, and hopefully will do the right thing by adjusting their algorithm to refrain from steering people in this way based on race.
Could never have predicted this given the domain name.
Go to these colleges and see which demographic is most prevalent. Then teach that group that those colleges are... Wait, what's the problem with for profit colleges? Is it too expensive as opposed to the cheap not for profit colleges?
Strayer University (NJ) vs Colorado State
American Intercontinental University (30 miles from Chicago) vs Fort Hayes State University (Kansas)
Monroe College (Bronx NY) vs Arizona State University
Those are your pairings... this has to be a joke.
They made ads for these schools and ran them (nothing like researchers - and I use that loosely - getting involved in their own research).
But just to play devil's advocate... are we sure that for-profit colleges aren't disproportionally targeting black people? Meta may just be the messenger here.
Additionally, we have institutions that (allegedly) function based on rational decision making by agents with access to accurate information (markets, democracy, etc). Investment in advertising beyond simply making information available to those who seek it erodes the efficacy of those institutions. It's like putting stickers on your windshield... Even if their content is not objectionable, you're going to end up less safe because you can't see past them.
For a concrete example of the latter: education outcomes are trending poorly, many teachers blame phone addiction. But if you look at what those students are doing on their phones, it's engaging with some advertising platform or another. We've created an environment where good dopamine hygiene requires skillful evasion of one of our most well funded industries. We're surely shooting ourselves, and each other, in the foot here.
If polluting the physical world with hazards waste is unethical, than surely there is something equivalently unethical regarding information.
Either all advertising is unethical (and it isn’t), or targeted advertising is not, methinks.
Lying and scamming are fraudulent. Advertising (in the usual case) is absolutely not. There is a bright line difference and equating them is not a useful logical reasoning device.
No, advertising that aims to manipulate you into an unnecessary purchase is unethical. There’s some fuzzy line here where an advertisement like “bob’s hardware: come on down to bob’s for high quality pickaxes” is acceptable and a coca cola ad isn’t. Almost all modern advertising is the latter, and it’s most certainly unethical. I’d happily call it borderline fraudulent; these companies claim through subconscious implication things like “this car will make you happy and everyone will respect you more,” which is a bold faced lie. Basically all modern advertising is unethical; it wouldn’t be the first time something unethical was widespread because it was profitable.
but it's not so clear that going to college is not benefitial. Saying it is a scam implies that these colleges are valueless to attend (which i assume is not true as education is usually pretty valuable).
I think that the vast majority of people don’t really care about privacy, and aren’t divulging anything remotely “secret” by providing all of their browsing history to ad companies.
The tools for not doing so are a two second websearch away for everyone, and most people don’t bother.
Ads are not evil.