Billionaire Elon Musk has claimed that Twitter users are being “manipulated” by a news feed algorithm.
In his tweet, today, Sunday, Musk indicated the need to replace the default “Twitter” news feed, which displays tweets based on popularity and user interests.
“You are being manipulated by the algorithm in ways you don’t realize,” he told his followers, and asked them to “fix” their Twitter feed to show their “latest tweets”, by clicking on the star in the top right of the screen.
But Elon Musk’s opinion was opposed by Jack Dorsey, the former head of Twitter, who emphasized that the algorithm’s function is a way to inform followers of trending news, and it can be changed easily.
Dorsey explained to Musk:
“It’s simply designed to save you time when you’ve been away from the app for a period of time, and its importance is to highlight things you might otherwise miss by not scrolling.”
Jack Dorsey, one of the users who got involved in the discussion, denied that the newsfeed algorithm was designed to manipulate users, stressing that it was designed to catch up on what they missed.
Next, Elon Musk replied to Jack Dorsey that “he’s not suggesting a grudge from the algorithm, but it’s trying to guess what you might want to read, inadvertently manipulating/inflating your views, without realizing that it’s happening,” he says.
it was designed simply to save you time when you are away from app for a while.
pull to refresh goes back to reverse chron as well.
— jack (@jack) May 14, 2022
no it wasn’t designed to manipulate. it was designed to catch you up and work off what you engage with. that can def have unintended consequences tho.
which is why one should be able to choose if they use an algo or not, and which one. simple solution to all this.
— jack (@jack) May 15, 2022
The “Twitter” algorithm was a main talking point for Mask, who wants it to be open source to increase confidence in the platform, as he said last Friday that his acquisition of the company is pending pending confirmation that only 5% of the site’s accounts belong to the automated “robot” (fake accounts). ).
Twitter’s legal team told Musk that by tweeting he violated the company’s non-disclosure agreement.
This is the latest development in Elon Musk’s troubled acquisition of Twitter.