And That’s the Social Media Game

When scrolling through your social media you don’t normally just start thinking about why certain feed is showing up in your timeline but little did you know there’s a whole algorithm that helps decide what you should see. Something as little as the “like” button on Facebook is part of an algorithm. It helps Facebook decided what to show you next by pressing the like button. I found it so interesting as I read through articles about how Facebook’s algorithm has been created and continues to be developed.

I find it so fascinating that the algorithms that social media platforms use to show people’s feed is so simple yet so complicated at the same time. Facebook uses everything you do and react with to decide what it is going to show you next. Theoretically you should like this because the feed you receive should be stuff you like and want to see more of. The problem is it isn’t always correct and you might start seeing stuff that you don’t care for. The amount of work that teams put into tweaking the algorithm and testing it out is insane. Yet, no matter how amazing the algorithm is, it still isn’t human. According to the author of an article by Slate “Facebook’s algorithm, I learned, isn’t flawed because of some glitch in the system. It’s flawed because, unlike the perfectly realized, sentient algorithms of our sci-fi fever dreams, the intelligence behind Facebook’s software is fundamentally human.” This means that even though the algorithm is what “decides” supposedly what should be on your feed and in what order it also means you are in control of what you see. Everything you react to, like, look at, etc., reflects what content you see in what order. The problem with this is that you as the viewer could just be liking a photo just because it’s popular or viral or you could click on a story and then not like it after reading but the algorithm for Facebook doesn’t know that and will just gather what you have clicked on and seen.

All of this is plays into this idea of “gaming the system”. There are many different reasons for doing this. Lots of people who want to be “viral” or gain more followers and get more reaction from their content will do this. They look at how the algorithms are working with social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram and they will make their content to fit what the algorithm wants. Such as putting hashtags or posting certain content that they know is popular with people or tagging other accounts or posting at a certain time.

Now companies who are trying to advertise themselves will do the same thing by trying certain techniques that will get them to show up first due to the algorithm. According to an article in SproutSocial “Marketers often look at social media algorithms as roadblocks. But rather than try to fight with algorithms, it’s more prudent to understand how to craft the sorts of posts that algorithms want to see.” For example they will post stories that ask the audience questions to get them involved. That way people comment on the post answering the question which creates more reactions to the post and therefore the algorithm thinks the content must be liked and people will want to see it.

Algorithms help Facebook and other sites out financially because by “figuring” out what you want on your feed and what you like allows them to provide just that. This means you will see things you are more likely to want. For example if you really want a new dress and start looking at dresses you will start to see advertisements for dress pop up throughout your feed. When scrolling and seeing an ad for something you know you want makes you much more inclined to click on the think. By knowing what the audience wants to see and have, it financially benefits them. This can be scary because the audience isn’t always fully aware of these things and is being sucked into something without even knowing that they got sucked in. Though it can be nice to have your feed personalized to what you like and have convenient advertisements that are disguised to look like your feed pop up it can also be a scary thing and I believe it is good to make sure you are always a little aware of what game is being played.