The 134th Block: Alexa, why does the algorithm push disgusting food recipes to my feed?
Also, beware of more racist, fascist posts on your Twitter feed.
This week…
I’m moving so I’ve been busy.
Anyway, here’s a selection of top stories on my radar, a few personal recommendations, and the chart of the week.
Amazon Alexa is a “colossal failure,” on pace to lose $10 billion this year
Ron Amadeo for Ars Technica:
One internal document described the business model by saying, “We want to make money when people use our devices, not when they buy our devices.”
That plan never really materialized, though. It’s not like Alexa plays ad breaks after you use it, so the hope was that people would buy things on Amazon via their voice. Not many people want to trust an AI with spending their money or buying an item without seeing a picture or reading reviews. The report says that by year four of the Alexa experiment, “Alexa was getting a billion interactions a week, but most of those conversations were trivial commands to play music or ask about the weather.” Those questions aren’t monetizable.
Well, in other news, you can change Alexa’s accent (Umar Shakir, The Verge). I don’t have Alexa, but I wonder what Canadian Alexa sounds like.
Why the worst recipes imaginable are blowing up on TikTok
Jessica Lucas for The Verge:
Their first few posts — things like fried mayonnaise, ramen noodles stewed in chocolate milk or cookie-and-milk-based slop warmed in the microwave, all consumed on camera — were sent out to a small circle of friends. A month later, clips of [Eli Betchik] eating bologna glazed in Jolly Rancher-based syrup and instant hot chocolate brewed in hot dog water began to pick up thousands of views from people outside of their social circle. They scored their first truly viral video in 2021 after they created “cheesy mashed potatoes” from Lay’s chips boiled in water and rice wine vinegar. The clip was watched more than a million times, generating a string of copycats and press coverage that ranged from fawning to horrified.
Betchik, it seemed, was on to something. People were horrified but captivated. The more outrage they caused, the more their following grew. Their account, @elis_kitchen — which carries the official tagline “the most evil chef on TikTok” — has drawn more than 100,000 followers since launch.
On Garbage Day, Ryan Broderick explains why gross food videos are a "growth-hacked evolution" to gamify the algorithm.
Twitter fails to delete 99% of racist tweets aimed at footballers in run-up to World Cup
Shanti Das for The Guardian:
Tweets hurling racist abuse at footballers, including the N-word, monkey emojis and calls for them to be deported, are not being removed by Twitter.
New research shows the platform failed to act on 99 out of 100 racist tweets reported to it in the week before the World Cup.
Only one was removed after being flagged on Wednesday, a tweet that repeated a racial slur 16 times. All the others remained live [last] weekend.
Surprised? No. Extremist accounts previously banned have been reinstated, while people like antifascist researcher Chad Loder have been suspended.
What I read, listen, and watch…
I’m reading “From the Classroom to the Newsroom,” a critical route to introduce AI in journalism education by Leslie Salgado Arzuaga on Facts & Frictions.
I’m listening to Nature Podcast’s episode, “Science and the World Cup,” on how big data is transforming football. Also available in text here.
I’m watching Sean Morrow, the guy behind the viral “insulin is free” tweet. Unsurprisingly, he is with More Perfect Union.
Reviews, opinion pieces and other stray links:
What was ethical consumption under capitalism? by Malcolm Harris for The Drift.
What French-language audiences might not see in their climate change news by Frédéric Guarino and Patrick White for J-Source.
Controversial online streaming bill being amended by senators after waiting more than a year by Anja Karadeglija for The National Post.
Instagram told to reinstate music video removed at request of Met police by Alex Hern for The Guardian.
A man won the legal right to not be ‘fun’ at work after refusing to embrace ‘excessive alcoholism’ and ‘promiscuity’ by Stephanie Stacey for BI.
Chart of the week
Martin Armstrong on Statista provides some figures on Twitter and selected microblogging platforms for 2022: 238 million active users on Twitter, 135 million on Tumblr, 3.6 million on Mastodon, and 0.01 million on Cohost.
And one more thing
Shall we throw away our Alexa then, you think?