Will Google’s homepage news feed repeat Facebook’s mistakes?
https://www.theverge.com/2018/10/29/18037436/google-news-feed-homepage-algorithm-facebook-twitter-radicalization
I woke up this morning to two pieces of news that I couldn’t help but see as two sides of the same coin: Brazil elected a person who very clearly looks like a demagogue who weaponized social media to win, and Google finally placed a news feed on its mobile homepage.
These two things are, of course, not related. But after a weekend where we learned about two domestic terrorists who were radicalized by social media, all I could think about regarding Google’s new effort to push an algorithmic news feed was: “Hey Google, read the freaking room.”