UK says Big Tech is "manipulating lives", launches investigation into its algorithms 📦

57    22 Jan 2021 13:43 by u/Shatterbrain

5 comments

3 u/libertarianets 22 Jan 2021 14:52
This is overkill. Everyone can hit refresh and see that they’re being manipulated. The simple solution is to set up different tax structures for companies that show posts in the order that they were posted (from all subscribed channels) vs companies that do “curated” (censored) feeds. Charge the latter a LOT more. You skip the investigation altogether, it’s extremely easy for anybody to hit refresh and show that feeds are “curated.”
6 u/None 22 Jan 2021 15:32
Manipulation is not (just) about order of posts/comments. It includes what you get to see and what you don't get to see. Good luck finding out what stories are purposefully being hidden from you by refreshing a site that is not showing them to you. Your proposed solution requires that there is something to tax. Tech companies would be able to close their remote office in your country and bypass your solution.
1 u/Wingo 22 Jan 2021 16:17
If only they replaced “Big Tech” with “government” and “algorithms” with “policies”.
1 u/nomad_cz 22 Jan 2021 19:59
What a surprise. I wonder if media or politicians are manipulating lives ...
1 u/None 24 Jan 2021 10:53
So it's bad when Big Tech manipulate the way we think, but people who use big tech, such as twitter, to express the way they think get calls from the police to check their thinking, and are recorded as non crime hate crimes.