Elon Musk Also Finds Issues With Twitter’s Algorithm
The entrepreneur, who wants to take over all shares of the social network, explains that the algorithm “manipulates” or “inadvertently amplifies” certain views by attempting to guess users’ interests.
Bots are not the only thing that worries Elon Musk, who a few weeks ago submitted a proposal to take over all outstanding shares of Twitter.
The entrepreneur, who has put the acquisition deal on hold for the time being, also believes that the social network’s algorithm is flawed.
Musk has published a message from his account on the microblogging platform in which he claims that the average user would be “being manipulated by the algorithm” without noticing it. And he encourages you to check it by going to the home button and selecting the latest tweets option from the top right corner “to see the difference”.
That difference lies in the way the tweets are sorted and displayed: by chronological order or based on preferences.
“I’m not suggesting malice in the algorithm,” he explains, “but rather that it’s trying to guess what you might want to read and, in doing so, inadvertently manipulates/amplifies your views without you realizing this is happening.”
This would be compounded by other problems such as “possible bugs in the code. Open source is the way to go to solve both trust and efficiency,” he says.
