I liked "Whatever features within their algorithms that are creating the addictions, especially in teenagers — they can disable those features. That could be another thing."
The algorithm isn't trying to help, but YouTube or Reddit or FB or whatever is addicting anyways unless they design an algorithm explicitly to reduce engagement by giving you stuff you don't like.
> unless they design an algorithm explicitly to reduce engagement by giving you stuff you don't like.
I don't think they need to go that far. The algorithms could be optimized for long-term personal growth. Always pushing you to expand your boundaries in healthy ways. That kind of growth is usually mildly uncomfortable but rewarding. You'll only want so much of it per day. They'd be replacing endless cheap carbs with exercise.
Long term personal growth in what direction? And on Twitter? Facebook? Not to be dismissive but Twitter does what Twitter does best when people shout their opinions into a void or stick their job title up and LARP as the authority on X and Facebook does what Facebook does best when it filters blogs and baby photos to your newsfeed and you meet groups of people around a shared interest or hobby or arrange outings with large groups of people.
YouTube maybe could be optimized that way, but if the banners they stick in my way that take no feedback and accept no dismissal as an invitation to never return are any indication they would do a hatchet job tweaking their algorithm in that direction. What they do very well is introducing me to new music and interesting videos on old tech and games. Absolutely fantastic entertainment platform and probably no more addictive than television was but I feel like I’m also the only one that likes the YouTube algorithm.
Also that kind of tweak would just be paternalistic nonsense, on principle.
do you trust the government to? That's all this is doing.
companies curate, but ultimately we're talking about user generated content, whose popularity at some point in life came from the fact that a lot of people chose to engage with it. The only difference now is that you dont need to be some a-list celebrity to get this engagement. A camera, an idea, and a bit of video editing can make you go viral.
even if we stripped down all the engagement algorithms and made it some "pure" HN-style "votes determine curation" (which is a trap in and of itself, but I diagress), you'd be surprised how similar the site layout would look. Arguably even worse because bigger creators get more views and likes by nature of being big.
I don't trust either the government or tech companies. You shouldn't either. You should be free to make your own judgements without either interfering or manipulating you. I assume you're in America, after all?
I don't even want that sort of paternalism. With an old-school forum, you knew when you were "done", and you had to come back 12-24 hours later for enough other posters to have said anything worthwhile.
They could have tips that encourage breaks, or even have hard limits, they do not have to reduce quality necessarily. It could be an opportunity to introduce people to another product/site/app, 'now for something completely different'.
The algorithm isn't trying to help, but YouTube or Reddit or FB or whatever is addicting anyways unless they design an algorithm explicitly to reduce engagement by giving you stuff you don't like.