Using social media for daily use, usually we get to see the content we watch or see a lot again and again. The occurrence is called an algorithm and it was designated automatically by the social media company. Algorithms are sorted based on the contents we frequently watched and it also results in the advertisements promoted to us.
The CEO of Twitter, Jack Dorsey has a different view on the issue. He is picturing a future where one can choose on what to see on social media by picking their own favourite recommendation algorithm.
He broadened this vision of how a decentralised social network might work and why Twitter would want to create a network that’s beyond the control of itself or any other company.
He said Twitter would gain profit by having access to “a much larger corpus of conversation” from which it can surface relevant content to users. He also said that Twitter is eager to build features that will grant people more choice over what they see.
Twitter can create its own ranking algorithms for people to choose from and offer a “marketplace” where people select different options. He said that by saying that giving people choice will help business as well as driving more people into participating in social media.
Dorsey also viewed decentralisation as a way to point out some of the problems around Section 230, the law that gives platforms protection from user-created content.
The law mentioned is a popular target for some legislators and a decentralised network might offer Twitter a way to avoid issues if stricter rules were to be put in place. This means either the rules need more moderation or Twitter should apply a more neutral approach to the content surfaced.
For more than a year, Twitter has been slowly focusing towards creating a more decentralised social network. In December 2019, Dorsey has revealed the project, by the name of Bluesky, but the organisation is just now seeking for a project manager.
Prior to this, decentralised social networks are actually no longer foreign as there are numbers of them. However, none of them actually have a great accomplishment.
Twitter said the Bluesky team might want to collaborate with an established decentralised structure, or if the team feels that’s the right option, they may end up creating a new one.
All in all, it’s not bad to try for something new. As long as it will give a win-win situation for both parties, there is absolutely nothing wrong with it. The execution of it is something that really matters, though.
