Weird Kids' Videos and Gaming the Algorithm

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Recommends JonnyNova · 2018-04 · on “YouTube is littered with mass-produced videos made by automated bots”

A video analysis of the related phenomenon: "Weird Kids' Videos and Gaming the Algorithm" [this video] It talks about possibly using machine learning to create many videos targeted at toddlers and using techniques to ensure the next autoplay item doesn't change to another channel.

Recommends hbn · 2021-10 · on “YouTube is about to pull its apps from Roku”

It's pretty reasonable, and smart I'd say. The kids content on YouTube has been heavily gamed by content farms optimizing content for SEO, making absolutely bizarre and sometimes disgusting content. Bit of a lengthy watch, but this video is pretty eye-opening: [this video] (It's a few years old at this point, but not a lot has changed, and possibly has gotten worse)

Cites pdkl95 · 2017-11 · on “New Jersey’s experiment to reduce the number of people in jail awaiting trial”

> He knew exactly what to say to the responding officer to cover his ass Replacing human judgment with algorithms is a terrible idea for many reasons, but this might be the worst. Algorithms are deterministic, and thus they can be manipulated. "SEO" services exist in spite of Google's efforts to protect their ranking algorithm. Does anybody seriously believe their local government will be more successful than Google at preventing people (i.e. police, prosecutors, etc) from "optimizing" their input to the algorithm? edit - justification for the claim that a bail algorithm would be easy to manipulate: The recent single-pixel attack[1] against image classifiers. [LINK] Google's failure to recog

Cites saltminer · 2022-02 · on “The dangers of high status, low wage jobs”

I don't see how this solves any problems. How would this hypothetical reddit coin work? Does reddit mint them or do the users have to buy them? How are they distributed? (e.g. based on interaction vs awarded by users) If this is to be a payment system, then these coins have value, value which can be taxed. Sure, meeting up with some dude and paying cash might avoid it, but the success of Coinbase shows convenience is king, and the demographics of reddit are far different than the initial Bitcoin crowd, so these exchanges would pop up much sooner. Even if reddit manages to dodge the tax situation by minting coins themselves (vs charging sales tax on purchased coins), the tax man will be more

Cites passwordoops · 2023-02 · on “YouTube has become the world's nanny”

I get what you're saying, but "the internet" has evolved alot. Even knowing the dangers that are present, and how marketers try to short-circuit your brain etc etc (which we did do, I'm very clear with my kids that every law needs an explanation and they are provided with explanations) I think 13 is still too young to be left alone. Really I don't believe there is a minimum age, it's more who can resist addictive behaviors, so you tell me. I'm not going to presume your age but at least when I was growing up, the internet was more like a giant flea market: you go in, and yes there could be things that might be bad or useless or creepy or diddly, and you really learn where the quality stuff is