Recommender systems like Twitter are as much about data as they are about code. Without the dataset and the derived statistics and models that are used for ranking and recall, the code is not going to help much with transparency.
> Recommender systems like Twitter are as much about data as they are about code. Without the dataset and the derived statistics and models that are used for ranking and recall, the code is not going to help much with transparency.
And also other way around, data depends on algorithms and tools that created them. You can't have insightful understanding of data without knowing how and why they were created.
True - however the thrust of the arguments for opening Twitter seem to be focused on opening up the code - so the “code without data” scenario is the one worth honing in on.
Right. It’s a bit worrisome that people (even people in this very thread) know nothing about how recommendation and ranking work but think they know everything. “Release the code” is nonsensical.
This is a ridiculous claim. While you won’t be able to make use of the code, it would still provide insight of the inputs in relative terms, and evidence methods that do not apply.
It would provide insight but if the goal is to increase transparency to the point of meaningfully improving trust in the centralized actor that is Twitter, I don’t see it moving that needle much. Given the right data you can kind of coax a lot of these algorithms into arbitrary outputs, so if you’re starting from a place of distrust then if you can’t replicate the outputs yourself you wont have evidence to alter priors significantly with just code imo.
The point is to increase transparency, period. And you are the one arguing against that. Nobody is saying it’s enough, but it’s objectively better than nothing, and it would make it possible to ask more specific questions and make more specific arguments for the value of more transparency. Again, you are the one arguing against it but you have not provided a reason why.
I’m not arguing against it - I’m arguing that people who are focused on the idea of releasing the code are miscalibrated on the marginal impact of doing so given a lack of domain knowledge.
The net suggestion is to demand more, and start describing solutions, today, to get data visibility without compromising other things, to help offset the inevitable objections that will come once people are forced to demand it when they realize the code didn’t really solve the fundamental problem.
The point I'm stuck on in this whole conversation is why you'd continue to use Twitter if you felt they were untrustworthy. Why are we discussing freedom of speech when you can just load another app and get all the freedom you want?
The reason people are complaining is we have found ourselves in a situation where Twitter is arguably already or indisputably will become what amounts to a global public square.
The early philosophical developments around freedom of speech didn’t foresee this but now that it is here, we have to ask the question of what ought we want if we are to uphold the principle that people should be free to speak unpopular ideas without censorship or fear of excommunication, given that a key ingredient in progress, revelation of the truth, and finding compromise to avoid violence.
Twitter is of course a private company, and can do what they want. But what those who wish to see free speech principles upheld say is we ought to want those in twitters position to be as lenient as possible so as to not stifle the free exchange of ideas. And, perhaps failing that, we ought to want to see another mechanism that is less susceptible to widespread censorship and overreach. Too many people seem counter someone explaining that they feel the status quo is undesirable with an is/ought fallacy - it’s our job in liberal democracies to continually raise and debate issues regarding basic freedoms and the ability for our society to continue to evolve according to shared principles.
I dunno, I deleted my twitter when they banned the sitting president for being too hyperbolic.
A social network complaining about hyperbolism and outrageous claims being made on it's platform is like complaining people are breathing too much air.
Twitter is not a place grownups should be participating.
I’m sure twitters algorithms take advantage of all interaction data, like impressions, scrolls, and clicks. Agree tho it’s good a lot of the data is public.
Sure seems like it could be - I wouldn’t opt-in to allowing mine to be distributed, why would I? And I don’t think Twitter has the rights to do so. So you’d at least need to solve the anonymization problem, or you’d have to package a data release such that you can replicate the ranking algorithm without it.
Oh, you mean the matrix came up with rule to ban people talking about lab leak? but matrix can't figure out simple crypto bots and need humans to report and manually ban them?
