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1293 points rmason | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0.29s | source
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autoconfig ◴[] No.19326043[source]
Whenever the topic of Facebook gets brought up I see a lot of comments on how "the news feed sucks". That it's filled with hateful comments. Leaving facebook is great because it takes toxic people out of your lives! What seems to be missing from the conversation is that Facebook to a large extent is what you make it to be. _You_ decide who to follow, who to keep as your friend, whose post you want to see. There is nothing stopping you from simply removing everyone except your family members and your good friends in which case I'd argue it actually becomes a great tool and a net positive.
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1. tumetab1 ◴[] No.19327123[source]
It's not that simple because imagine that you have a friend that's really cool but you can't talk with him about cars because he has unpopular opinions (or dumb) but really likes to argue for them.

If you have that friend on FB then, because he sometimes posts things about cars and it gets heated, that's what FB like try for you to engage with.

FB seeks and promotes "engagement" over "quality of experience" so it will always try to make you anger (it leads to more engagement) than to have a fulling experience.

If the algorithm can only work with chill people and very alike... it will still try to find what divides and "engages" that group of people.