How Algorithms Amplify Our Own Biases And Shape What We See Online | Talking Points Memo

The following is an excerpt from Kris Shaffer’s book, Data Versus Democracy: How Big Data Algorithms Shape Opinions and Alter the Course of History. It is part of TPM Cafe, TPM’s home for opinion and news analysis.


This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=1244491

And yet, if I look at something like Breitbart, The Daily Stormer, or 8Chan, I still know that what I sees stinks to high heaven.

Critical thinking and evaluation of data is NOT being taught in our schools. The ignorant credulity of the majority of the American people is just mind boggling. It is why, at age 73, we just do not answer the phone anymore. If it is legit, they will leave a message, and, Hell, occasionally even the scammers leave a message. I was devastated to learn recently my social security number has been cancelled, and that there is an issue with my non-existent student loans, and that someone needed me to call a lawyer in a jail a couple counties south of where I live, and that my computer is infected and needs to be cleaned by Microsoft support.

We cannot answer the phone because there are enough ignorant rubes out there that answer the phone and still fall for this scams. And the current administration is letting the criminals run wild.

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I loved the one from the IRS telling you that you owed money and you needed to contact them immediately. Some days they called a couple of times. I think it’s still going on and people fall for it and send them gift cards and access to bank accounts. I’m here all day waiting for the “phone company” to show up to fix a land line connection, Remember the days when you could make a call to them, actually get a person on the phone and have them tell you when they would come out. This has been such a major hassle, just trying to talk to someone that I gave up for a couple weeks, then got inspired to try again. Basically, if they have to send someone out, they’re losing money.

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I try to remind people (especially older relatives) that the IRS never calls. The IRS never ever calls.

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I worried about my mother and the phone and all the solicitations (from Repubs that drove me wild). Different generation that hadn’t had to worry about all the scams.

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I try to use due diligence - opting out of tracking, use the most restrictive cookie settings or when practical a private window. I also use a VPN, search with duck duck go, turned off all my google data/tracking that I can, but I still get crappy messages from websites that have tracked me. So I’m still leaking some data to someone, somewhere. It’s crazy.

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I don’t do any of the monitoring that you do and rarely anything pops up that I haven’t asked for, but I also am not on twitter, facebook, etc. Wonder if that makes the difference or is it using a Mac? Recently discovered the private window when searching for places to stay. I should use it for everything.

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Do you get that call reminding you that your vehicle warranty has expired?
I bought my Dodge pickup in 2001 new off the lot. Never did have any vehicle repair insurance. It has never been to a shop except for an oil change or rotating the tires.
That’s the only one that calls me. One of these times I’m going to stay on the line and demand they tale me off their call list unless they really want to insure a vehicle close to twenty years old against any repairs. Actually, it looks better than new and has less than 30,000 miles on it. Always in the garage. Been retired since 2005 so don’t drive much. So far, I find it easier to just hang up.

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I’m on Windows which, when I was a developer, was wide open to letting applications into your local data, but that was 10 years ago.

I’m not on twitter, facebook, instagram, linked in or anything other social media beside TPM/Washington Post. Some websites mostly don’t allow my VPN (huffington post and jcpenney, for example) those or allow you to view them without cookies on. I’ve stopped shopping at JCPenney website - I find their tracking ridiculously invasive.

When I turned off all cookies, the WAPO comment boards stopped working, they directed me to use optout with “Web Choices” which sometimes opts you out of tracking, many of the requests are “temporarily unavailble” for hours at a time - which is ridiculous.

My favorite robocalls are calls for my sister-in-law’s timeshare. She’s been dead for over six years and was never at our current telephone number – we never had this telephone number when she was alive or in probate settling her timeshare. So we’d have to change our phone number and go unlisted which might work until the next data leak or third party data share puts it out there again. UGH.

Edited to fix spelling, again.

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I’ve been off Facebook for over a year. I’m considering returning because many of the groups I network with - use it for, well ‘networking’. (But I just watched “The Great Hack” on Netflix - and I’m more convinced than ever it’s evil.)

But I REALLY have not missed the polarity and divisiveness.

For a browser - I use BRAVE. It does a really good job of cutting ads without too much clunkyness with most websites, including TPM. DuckDuckGO is my search engine of choice. I dropped GOOGLE and CHROME the same time I dropped Facebook.

Twitter is a 24/7 pie fight. Nothing good ever comes from it.

“Confirmation Bias” is slowly sinking into the general public’s understanding. I explain it by telling friends “It’s like when you buy a certain type of car you’ve never owned. SUDDENLY you start seeing them everywhere!” Their eyes light up and they nod.

I have more difficulty explaining Apophenia - ([/æpoʊˈfiːniə/] is the tendency to mistakenly perceive connections and meaning between unrelated things.

And pareidolia - The perception of a recognizable image or meaningful pattern where none exists or is intended, as the perception of a face in the surface features of the moon.

It’s easy to see the face of Jesus in a pancake - if you already know what he looks like.

It’s easy to see patterns of mysterious conspiracies if you already know what to look for.

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I haven’t used BRAVE. Currently using Firefox although their mobile version wasn’t allowing me to turn suggested content off without jumping through “setting flags” hoops which are tougher on a mobile phone (lots of typing).

Cutting off Google everything has been great! Now if I could just quit Amazon. :grin:

I haven’t been brave enough to go private window for everything. But I did switch to a “no track” email provider which has cut down on a lot of traffic.

Has everyone seen this? It was made shortly before Trump was elected and it’s chilling:

To prove the point to her, I called back the number that the “IRS” left for my wife in their message. There was an answer on the second ring. The IRS also never answers.

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This article makes me think back to filling out the 3 X 5 cards in elementary school at the beginning of the school year, with Name, Address, Phone Number, Favorite Color, Favorite Animal, Favorite Subject.

And we wondered how they were going to use all of that information.

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No simple solution, but we use anti-tracking and AV software, Ad block + spam block. Only answer calls from numbers we recognize. We never got on FB. Not full protection, but it all helps. Also duck duck.

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Every Sunday, my daughter and her husband and my 6 granchildren come over for Sunday dinner. The kids rush through dinner so they can go play video games in the playroom. My daughter stares at her phone throughout dinner and for the hour or two after dinner that they stay “to visit”. Sometimes I make a curmudgeonly comment asking her if I should bring out my phone so that our phones can visit with each other, but she never finds this humorous. There is almost no activity that my daughter does that isn’t posted on Instagram.

On other evenings, my wife and I watch TV. That consists of me actually watching TV and her scrolling through Facebook and responding to her 600 “friends”. I noticed that my wife, who used to be a voracious reader, has completely given up reading over the last 10 years. Completely.

I fret about this sometimes. I do not do Facebook or any other social media - TPM is the closest thing, and when I find myself spending too much time here I get off for a few days. I have decided to quit worrying or trying to change anyone’s behavior - I do see that we are all involved in a huge experiment that none of us knowingly volunteered for but most have jumped into with both feet, thumbs a-flying on our mini-computers.

As a recovered alcoholic/addict, I do recognize addiction and withdrawal when I see it.

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I constantly get calls that the warranty on my “1985 Buick” is about to expire (!!!) Obviously, I’ve never owned a Buick, and a 1985 model would be an antique - as would its “warranty”. Also the solicitiations for medical insurance, offers of loans, and notifications from The Credit Department dealing with some atrocity on my card. Why do I even answer the phone? Because it’s the main phone for our small corporation. All kinds of calls from unusual places are normal; you never know if the number may be a legitimate potential customer. Answering only makes it worse; but you’d get the same effect from letting your voicemail pickup, so there’s no clear solution at the user level.

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I don’t really use Twitter and I haven’t seen a political add on Facebook for ages. I get contributions requests from Dem candidates every-once-in-awhile on Instagram, but otherwise . . .

My kids are way into adulthood, but I see this behavior around me in public places.
It is disturbing. I can’t prove it scientifically, but I’m sure this changes the way these kids learn and retain info.
The body finishes development approx. age 19; the brain, age 28 or so. Plenty of time to acquire a head full of shit.

How Algorithms Amplify Our Own Biases And Shape What We See Online

Al Gore has rythm?