The Conversation: Some politicians who share harmful information are rewarded with more clicks, study finds . “What happens when politicians post false or toxic messages online? My team and I found evidence that suggests U.S. state legislators can increase or decrease their public visibility by sharing unverified claims or using uncivil language during times of high political tension. This […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/05/17/the-conversation-some-politicians-who-share-harmful-information-are-rewarded-with-more-clicks-study-finds/

The Conversation: Women’s sports are fighting an uphill battle against our social media algorithms. “Algorithms, trained to maximise engagement and profits, are deciding what appears in your feed, which video auto-plays next, and which highlights are pushed to the top of your screen. But here is the problem: algorithms prioritise content that is already popular. That usually means men’s […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/05/12/the-conversation-womens-sports-are-fighting-an-uphill-battle-against-our-social-media-algorithms/

ABC News (Australia): How to find out your TikTok personality – and become a ‘citizen scientist’. “It’s no secret that TikTok collects data about its users, but it can be hard to know exactly how it’s being used. Do you know what your data says about you? Finding the answers to that question — both for individuals and as a society — is one of the goals of the For You Research […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/17/abc-news-australia-how-to-find-out-your-tiktok-personality-and-become-a-citizen-scientist/

Concordia University: New Concordia research shows social networks are vulnerable to relatively simple AI manipulation and polarization. “It seems that no matter the topic of conversation, online opinion around it will be split into two seemingly irreconcilable camps. That’s largely a result of these platforms’ design, as the algorithms driving them direct users to like-minded peers. This […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/17/concordia-university-new-concordia-research-shows-social-networks-are-vulnerable-to-relatively-simple-ai-manipulation-and-polarization/

I doubt that most people defending the "simple reverse chronological timeline" in #Mastodon, opposing #algorithmicTimelines, have any idea of how it currently works.

Because, having debugged that code and the SQL, I can confidently say that hardly anyone can understand the current algorithms.

There's thousands (inc. dependencies) lines of code and logic, generating very complex SQL queries to fill your seemingly simple reverse chronological timeline. Complex algos already fill your timeline.

#funfact

#ARPANET1 routes around #ToxicSocialMedaOnePointOh #MLTimelnes #algorithmictimelines

Vs. #mastodon #ChronilogicalTimelines #nomlrequired

Twitter is a microphone connected to a mixer owned and controlled by Elon Musk.

If you understand how microphones and mixers work, you also understand why you can’t “stay and fight.”

Looking at the #analytics of the old site makes me sad to see the day that in less than two months the sale of #Twitter made the site completely useless and the move to #web3 accelerate beyond the #ToxicSocialMedaOnePointOh of #AlgorithmicTimelines driven by #Meta #Instagram #Snapchat #WhatsApp & #Twitter dying a horrible race to the bottom #ARPU #DAU #DAP driven #decline of #web1 & #web2 technologies.

R.I.P.
#AlgorithmicTimelines