AI REALITIES
AI Stands for Algor-Ithm
Does artificial intelligence already control us?
I consistently ask the question of how reliant we should be on Artificial Intelligence. I have also queried the issue of how good Artificial Intelligence could actually be if it was designed by us, fault-based humans.
Some may say that’s the point. To design a new concept of intelligence that can grow, learn and push the boundaries of perfection, helping us to rely on it, although in principle AI perfection appears to be impossible.
There are some systems that analyze, learn and control effectively, with many of these systems supporting people with disabilities or impairments that I think is tremendous.
The real heroes of modern life in my opinion, with anybody suffering any form of disability (although I personally wouldn’t call it that at all!) to live a little easier and more comfortably deserve all the help they can get.
That aside, with self-inflicted Climate Change issues, a war in Europe, poverty and hunger in the world, I also question whether so much time, effort and expense should be spent developing ‘Artificial’ Intelligence until we as a human race have cured our own issues of intelligence.
Our own traits will only be mirrored in this new tech, such as the traits of Presidents and CEOs being mirrored in the values and actions of countries and companies.
That said, being confident that real Artificial Intelligence, at least to the definition of what we think it to be, is totally impossible, I also query those who wonder when Artificial Intelligence will start to control us.
I query this because I already think it does.
How could artificial intelligence already control us?
For starters, there appear to be vast numbers of people labelling systems as Artificial Intelligence that are simply advanced systems of tech.
Case-by-case comparisons can be drawn, but let’s consider the one constant that every single one of these systems has an Algorithm.
We encounter these sacred algorithms every time we use a computer, pick up our Smartphones, conduct a job, finance or other application, they are everywhere!!
Even in door and lock accessing systems, televisions, smart devices in our homes, etc. No computerized system of any sort can function without an algorithm, or any series of algorithms being designed for it.
That includes Social Media.
Working heavily on content, the rumors and studies of algorithms across Social Media platforms are plentiful.
Whether used for information, promotion or maintaining contact, we’ve all heard how algorithms are programmed and with Facebook’s Cambridge Analytica scandal of 2018, we certainly learned how data can be manipulated.
But what about every day? Any post made across mainstream platforms tends to be promoted in perspective of the engagement received.
This means a post receiving numerous Like & Comments will be ‘floated’ higher in the platform, receiving increased distribution. This may occur at the expense of another post of equal or better quality that, for whatever reason, didn’t get the same engagement at the same time.
Some platforms desire people and organizations to pay for increased distribution, especially if those people work in Marketing or Content Management. Many do take to doing that, especially if a User or Follower base is low.
In the meantime, however, another Social Media post of lesser substance, from somebody with lesser experience, snowballs across the same platform, purely by engagement.
Is this fair?
The reason why these posts circulate in this way is due to how the platforms are designed i.e. their algorithms.
I don’t work behind the closed doors of each Social Media firm, so one or two may argue differently, but seldom is there any argument that the more popular a post appears to be, the further it travels.
However, one post may just miss its desired audience, or an audience that would have otherwise engaged, by just a few minutes. A lesser quality post may then hit its mark, being judged as being more popular or valuable.
The problematic comparison is that in real life, away from the SM.WOW’s (Social Media Windows of the World) we would have judged the second post as being of low value, instantly turning our attention to the first.
That doesn’t occur on Social Media though, the one problem being that we don’t see what we are not shown! To me, this doesn’t seem fair.
Although algorithms are designed to monitor posts across several remits, such as checking for offensive text, low-quality imagery, broken links, etc, with monitoring engagement, writing styles, and content being others. They can therefore limit distribution by being programmed in the wrong ways.
Some Gurus will say the successful has got leverage and “Good Luck to it!!”. However, for Social Media platforms to call themselves truly Social, surely they need to engage in fairer systems to support the caliber content.
Nor should they consider engagement.
How could this be rectified?
Personally I think some algorithms are over-engineered. An algorithm could be designed to check for quality alone in terms of spelling, image, avoidance of abuse and abusive language, etc, and that’s it.
Even checking for grammar can be debatable because we know text for websites and Social Media needs to be different, all due to keywords and meta-data.
We also all write and communicate in different ways, grammar not often coming into digital language.
English grammar, for instance, doesn’t come into requirements for programming or code. I know this as I was involved in designing websites at the turn of the Internet itself, the same principles and techniques still being used today.
However, if every post had the opportunity to be circulated, say three to five times over a reasonable period, before settling into the background of a platform or search engine, more posts would get noticed and more engagement would come.
An algorithm can easily be programmed not to circulate a post to Users who have already seen it in their feed, thereby avoiding repetition, although that seldom occurs at the moment.
If engagement still wanted to be used as a measurement, people could easily use settings to check for the posts with the most engagement if that’s what they really wanted, as already exists in most cases.
However again, just because a post has lots of engagement doesn’t mean that the post is better than another. It simply means it resonates with a certain profile of User that wants to engage, whilst other Users choose not to despite appreciating the content, such as high-level Execs or CEOs.
Some would argue that using this technique would create too many posts to monitor and the system would crack or bottle-neck.
However, if I were to remove all posts with spelling mistakes, lousy imagery or even those posts recycled 10 x times in 24-hours, I am convinced there would be more digital space available than there currently is now.
What do I mean by all this?
Believe it or not, this article has been a draft file for months whilst I’ve researched many of the mainframe platforms.
In that time, some of the platforms have changed such as X, some have been launched, such as Threads, whilst others report new processes and revised algorithms for use. LinkedIn being one example.
They all, as yet, still need to come up trumps with distributing quality content, many of them still churning alternative, irrelevant and repetitive ‘garbage’ (for one of a better word!!) from experiments conducted across different accounts.
This means that higher-quality content of more relevance, which has also been created with appropriate checks and measures in place, is still not receiving the correct attention. Something eventually has to change!!
Conclusion
The crazy thing with this is that if we took the suggested remedy above, we would arrive at a better place than we do now for most platforms.
It would also mean higher quality content would be circulated more frequently, that in turn would generate higher engagement and that’s exactly what Social Media platforms want.
We would also get more people wanting to create content because they would see the fruits of hard labor rewarded.
If people or companies wanted to advertise to specific target markets they still could, with paid-for data-driven insights having greater value because the above remedy would create higher caliber lead generation.
The same old problem continues nonetheless, with things that I see almost daily. Whether posting for myself or for clients in different time zones, there are different target markets with different engagement habits.
Although we should be posting in different ways for the different needs and requirements of audiences, we are constantly controlled of what to post and almost forced how to post it due to algorithmic structures.
Continuing down this path means things are likely to get even more complex and controlled in the future. The alternative is simpler, less expensive and in turn generates more engagement per post with even more revenue for those who want to pay for targeted marketing.
The crazy notion is therefore true. Whether we like it or not, when we use Social Media or content, we post or write for human beings, yet are already being controlled by machines.
Trying to find ways of beating the algorithm, getting ahead of the machines, cheating the system using Engagement Pods for those that do, whatever you want to call it, means that we humans are already being controlled.
Humans are being controlled by computerized intelligence that run off rules and logic created by humans. It feels like the building of boxes or prisons that keep you inside once you step in, yet we have created them.
Does this mean that Artificial Intelligence is already controlling us? I think it just might be. Just imagine what happens when things step up a gear!!
For who is the most intelligent now?
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