We rewatched the London Olympics opening ceremony recently (I promise my kids were genuinely interested to see it and we didn't lock them in or anything). The bit where Sir Tim Berners Lee tweets "This is for everyone" really struck me because it just doesn't feel true at ALL anymore. Maybe it never was, but for a while there it really did feel that way. Now it just feels like its the playground for a group of men who would all absolutely give women ratings out of 10.
Unfortunately when you look back at the history the whole idea of social networks started out either as dating apps, or literally to rate women comparatively (looking at you Mr Zuckerberg)).
I suppose that depends on whether or not you count the old dialup BBS network, and the late lamented USENET, as prototype "social networks". But, yes, something that eventually appeals to a large amount of the population, has a good chance of growing out of something that initially appeals to a widely-shared aspect of a large amount of the population. Hence sex (-appeal) and relationships are very likely choices.
But I think nowadays that's being used more like some sort narrative of Original Sin, explaining why it's intrinsically flawed, and must be saved by a moral priesthood dedicated to purging the base impulses and uplifting it to the purity of their worship (it's not for nothing that I jokingly refer to the Great Musk Satan). Really, it does match up very well to some literal theology - "You were born from *s*e*x*, so you must be redeemed from your fallen state by following this scripture".
It's a little more complicated, there are failure-modes.
"You could have an algorithm which rewards people for being correct, by some sort of Community Notes-style approval system."
One problem here is that "correct" and "popular" aren't identical. Community Notes is currently functional because it's shooting down "extremist" content. Which is laudable, as far as it goes. But extending that idea too much leads to the problem that unpopular but true things get "downvoted" (I know, everyone claims this, but it's still a problem).
"You could have one which boosts them by their external reputation if their posts are about a topic they know about."
How do you programmatically determine that external reputation and topic expertise? And do you really want to extra-boost e.g. Alan D*rshowitz? Remember, celebrity [lawyers, pundits, even scientists] have the largest public reputation. And one often gets to be such a TEDtalker by not letting facts get in the way of a good story.
Hasn't this given us the dreaded - boo, hiss, spit, choke - *techbro*? People who have big reputations because they got rich and that's taken to mean they know about society in general? (instead of course working their way up the ranks of the chattering class, which is often regarded as the true measure of who deserves listening to).
"You could do all sorts of things."
Indeed, but some of it is not so evident. And all of it costs money.
Oh I recognise it’s a lot more complicated! You’d effectively need a citation index-style ranking - in effect you’d rebuild Google but for people. That realisation fell on me like a hammer as I was writing it, which is why I didn’t suggest anything further. Community Notes seems like the best model we have in the absence of Likes and Dislikes, but all of them can be gamed in one way or another.
But then, the real world is distressingly reluctant to cede to our certainty about who should be listened to. Maybe we need to start the whole shebang again.
We rewatched the London Olympics opening ceremony recently (I promise my kids were genuinely interested to see it and we didn't lock them in or anything). The bit where Sir Tim Berners Lee tweets "This is for everyone" really struck me because it just doesn't feel true at ALL anymore. Maybe it never was, but for a while there it really did feel that way. Now it just feels like its the playground for a group of men who would all absolutely give women ratings out of 10.
Unfortunately when you look back at the history the whole idea of social networks started out either as dating apps, or literally to rate women comparatively (looking at you Mr Zuckerberg)).
I suppose that depends on whether or not you count the old dialup BBS network, and the late lamented USENET, as prototype "social networks". But, yes, something that eventually appeals to a large amount of the population, has a good chance of growing out of something that initially appeals to a widely-shared aspect of a large amount of the population. Hence sex (-appeal) and relationships are very likely choices.
But I think nowadays that's being used more like some sort narrative of Original Sin, explaining why it's intrinsically flawed, and must be saved by a moral priesthood dedicated to purging the base impulses and uplifting it to the purity of their worship (it's not for nothing that I jokingly refer to the Great Musk Satan). Really, it does match up very well to some literal theology - "You were born from *s*e*x*, so you must be redeemed from your fallen state by following this scripture".
He was the person who specifically inspired that comment, but I imagine most of them would happily join him
It's a little more complicated, there are failure-modes.
"You could have an algorithm which rewards people for being correct, by some sort of Community Notes-style approval system."
One problem here is that "correct" and "popular" aren't identical. Community Notes is currently functional because it's shooting down "extremist" content. Which is laudable, as far as it goes. But extending that idea too much leads to the problem that unpopular but true things get "downvoted" (I know, everyone claims this, but it's still a problem).
"You could have one which boosts them by their external reputation if their posts are about a topic they know about."
How do you programmatically determine that external reputation and topic expertise? And do you really want to extra-boost e.g. Alan D*rshowitz? Remember, celebrity [lawyers, pundits, even scientists] have the largest public reputation. And one often gets to be such a TEDtalker by not letting facts get in the way of a good story.
Hasn't this given us the dreaded - boo, hiss, spit, choke - *techbro*? People who have big reputations because they got rich and that's taken to mean they know about society in general? (instead of course working their way up the ranks of the chattering class, which is often regarded as the true measure of who deserves listening to).
"You could do all sorts of things."
Indeed, but some of it is not so evident. And all of it costs money.
Oh I recognise it’s a lot more complicated! You’d effectively need a citation index-style ranking - in effect you’d rebuild Google but for people. That realisation fell on me like a hammer as I was writing it, which is why I didn’t suggest anything further. Community Notes seems like the best model we have in the absence of Likes and Dislikes, but all of them can be gamed in one way or another.
But then, the real world is distressingly reluctant to cede to our certainty about who should be listened to. Maybe we need to start the whole shebang again.