Resource: https://www.flickr.com/photos/binaryape/5151286161/
Algorithm is not a new term in Internet age. It is a set of instructions to solve problems and was first published in 1843. However, algorithm is now heavily applied to the Internet construction to predict what users want.
The first time I realize the exist of algorithm is when I browse my Instagram feed, the similar product I’ve searched before always pop up. At beginning, I think such highly customized ads are very user-friendly. But then it annoys me and makes me feel my privacy has been violated: my preferences and data are being shared by different platforms. Such advertisements always encourage me to purchase products and trying to get money from my pocket (but I have to admit that my ability of self-control is not strong enough).
This is not the worst. When I am overwhelmed by the promotion posts, my cousin says he doesn’t have such troubles. His Instagram feed is not that consumerized.
On the social media platform, women are usually targeting as consumer group. The marketing strategy is doing the best to make women pay the real money. There are practical reasons behind this phenomenon: according to statistics, the purchasing power of women is significantly higher than men. Obviously, the algorithm has mastered this law.
Resource: https://girlpowermarketing.com/statistics-purchasing-power-women/
In addition to this, many of my female friends, including myself, have received this kind of message on Instagram:
It is a new-type scam on social media. Luring young girls on Instagram become brand ambassadors and ask them pay for “free” jewelries. The senders are mostly robot account and run by program. In this case, the algorithm again chooses to target female.
What really makes me uncomfortable is, everything happens here are too invisible. We think that the program has no bias, but forget that people who wrote them has it. In Safiya Umoja Noble’s book, she uses Google search engine to illustrate how algorithm has bias on colored female: when she type keywords “black girls” into searching box, the first page of results is filled with porn. Such discrimination is not inherent in search engines, but a projection of society. When we think that we have entered a brand new and civilized Internet age, no, the history just repeats itself on the new platform. And with the cover of digital screen, all this happened naturally, because we don’t see a real discriminator in front of us.
This invisible injustice has penetrated into social media. Another phenomenon I notice is that many high-liked videos on short video platforms always cater to male gaze.
What would algorithm do here is, when you liked these videos, there will be more and more similar videos occur in your feed. And creators will continue to produce such content in order to gain more likes. Although algorithmic recommendation brings highly personalized feed to users, it has generated a vicious circle on platforms and reinforce the prejudices of society in an invisible way.
The point here is we should realize that new technology is not non-bias. As a product of human and society, algorithm is inevitably containing the domain ideology. It is crucial to aware of this fact and be critical to what we have seen on our feed. I’d like to use a quotation from George Orwell’s renowned book 1984 as the end of this reflection:
Who controls the past controls the future.
Who controls the present controls the past.
George Orwell