Connect! - Introduce yourself and your project

[MariaEuler]

@TruthFilter,

really impressed by your experience and track record in developing true knowledge for/on the internet!

This topic is near and dear to many here! How do you go about/think about motivating your "army of fact-checkers? Do you still have collaborations with education institutes from your previous development work and tried introducing it in that context? How do you safeguard against bad actors e.g. a bunch of people being sent from a right-wing forum, for example, to rate election meddling reports suddenly as trustworthy? Is the strength in the numbers and diversity of the people contributing?

[MariaEuler]

Yay! Great to see you here @SilviaElena. Let’s find some collaboration dates for these amazing and interesting people!

[MariaEuler]

Hey @futurememe! Yes, let’s have some earl grey hot and live long and prosper!
You might like to have a look at the Culture Squad Forum where lots of artists share game ideas and project/grant opportunities as well as at the Sci-Fi Economics Lab and the Worldbuilding Akademy which is developing and open-source scifi world for authors and economists to explore together to develop new concepts of future economy where no man has gone before and even further ;).

[hugi]

@JollyOrc

I think there should be no algorithm in social media. Us humans have more than enough methods and mechanisms to connect ourselves, even if there is no computer telling us who to like

Doesn’t this seem like a statement that runs counter to the evidence? If the last 20 years have shown us anything, it is that humans seem to intuitively prefer to be shown results by an engine that’s given a little statistical data to sort through those results.

And besides - where do we draw the line on what an “algorithm” is? Simple sorting by date is an algorithm. Sorting by date and giving priority to content from people you follow is another algorithm. Add to hide content that you have already seen and you have another algorithm. Are you suggesting that social media should have none of these features?

Or are you only talking about “predictive” algorithms that make choices based on who the algorithms assumes you are based on your similarity to some profile? If so, should we also forego algorithms that giver priority to content from your geographical location (thus making the assumption that you will care more about that than about things that happen 3000 km away), given that you have shared that with the service?

[JollyOrc]

Definition first: When I write “algorithm” I mean “a method of defining the content and order of the feed where the exact mechanism is not immediately understood at gut level by the average member of parliament”. So, “here is everything from your contacts in chronological order” is not an algorithmic-based feed, but “here is the things we think you are interest in” is.

That said: Humans intuitively prefer a lot of things that aren’t good for them. And a lot of things that are probably perfectly fine in small doses are bad when they become a habit (think alcohol and addiction). Facebook et al have perfected the dopamine triggers that have firmly pushed the use of newsfeeds into the “harmful” category.

The other thing is: Yes, I think for a social platform, it is not helpful to have any automatic influence on what is displayed, regardless of reason. There can (and probably should) be filter buttons that I can visibly toggle to “show only unread things” or “show things near me”, but that needs to be a conscious choice, not something that happens by magic.

The real challenge is this: How could such a platform compete with a platform that is engineered to be sticky and addictive? And I think it can only do so by being a more pleasant space to be in.

[hugi]

@JollyOrc

“a method of defining the content and order of the feed where the exact mechanism is not immediately understood at gut level by the average member of parliament”

And the problem we end up with is that the “average member” does not really exist when the user-base is the entire human population. If you need to be at the level of a member of parliament to understand how to configure your social media feed, where does that leave the rest?

The problem any technologist that is trying to design for “everyone” is faced with is that people’s expectations differ and understanding differ so much that the average becomes a useless data point.

For example; if I had a personal assistant that had been at my side for 20 years, they might curate a list of articles and correspondence for me to read each morning. I would have a “gut level” understanding of how they did that: they know me well and thus know what is important to me. As long as their curation makes me happy, I would not really inquire deeply into their methodology - which would probably be very hard to explain and quite intuitive to them.

Now, for a lot of people who are not technologically minded, it might in fact be the intuitive thing to ask that the “algorithm” should in fact do the same thing and try to predict what will be important to them. They don’t want or need to know exactly how this happens - much as is the case with the personal assistant. If the result made them happy, their “gut level” understanding of how this works would be “the algorithm knows what I like and picks things that it thinks will be important to me”. Is that the “wrong” sort of “gut level” understanding?

[TruthFilter]

Hi Maria
The idea is that, like with Genius Annotations, anyone who questions an article or posting can send it to TruthFilter for evaluation by the crowd. If we can get a company like FaceBook or Google or a media outlet like the NYT or Washington Poist to host such a site, I think the participation would quickly grow to scale. The benefit to them is that they would not have to be the arbiter of truth and the crowd would be engaged to do some of the heavy lifting of fact-checking research and source evaluation.

As to your second question- this is a good one and needs to be addressed… One of the concepts of the system is that it does not allow opnions, just facts. If something is submitted as a fact and is really just an opinion stated as a fact, it will quickly be flagged as such and automatically move toward the “warning red” text color. I’m hoping that the side by side pro and con evidence display that pops up on link rollover would quickly reveal attempts to falsely rate a lie as truth. Needs some real world testing! Hoping to get the attention of an organization with the resources to run with this.

Thanks for your input!

Michael Heumann

Founder / CEO
KnowledgeFilter Inc.
TruthFilter.com
KnowledgeCenter.com
WisdomPedia.org

Cell Direct: (707) 484-3973

email: michael@truthfilter.com

[JollyOrc]

@hugi

If you need to be at the level of a member of parliament to understand how to configure your social media feed, where does that leave the rest?

At least here in Germany, the average member of parliament is more like the lowest common denominator in terms of IT knowledge you can find. So, I meant this as “even a dummy should be able to understand it”

(this is the replacement of the tired “so easy, even my grandma can do it!” trope. Because a) that is ageist and b) also sexist. Because one grandma in my family actually did cryptography during the war. Also, Grace Hopper. Also, actual members of congress.)

And yes, designing for “everyone” is very hard and for certain cases near-impossible. But there does need to be a ground level - and the classic, Facebook-style algorithmic feed is not that.

The other thing is that you can always ask your real-life-human personal assistant “why did you show me this?” Try that with Twitter.

But all that is aside the point. The point is that designing feeds that are devoid of harmful biases is really, really, really hard. And that it is even harder for us humans to recognize that bias before we get negatively affected by it. THAT is why I am arguing against such things.

[maparent]

Tell us about yourself:
I’m also working on a global sensemaking layer for information exchange. Looking at alternatives.

Tell us about your project:
https://hyperknowledge.org

Overweb Concept Category
Overweb Sensemaking Concept

[thebeautyway]

Tell us about yourself:
Systems thinker and all-win designer developing systems that support distributed cooperation and value sharing for the good of all. Also, a writer, artist, and filmmaker. www.benjaminlife.one

Tell us about your project:
Meta-politics - general inquiry into civic participation systems, digital commons spaces, and integral dialogue.

Overweb Concept Category
Overweb Sensemaking Concept

[BentleyDavis]

Tell us about yourself:
I am a web and mobile app developer and I have been working on technology to build agreement fight misinformation for over 10 years.

Tell us about your project:
Reason Score (ReasonScore.com) is a process and technology to walk a group of people through a process to build agreement and understand all the information from all the participants in an efficient way and to think transparently.

Gulli Bot (GulliBot.com) is a character that uses the Reason Score process to facilitate agreement on contentious issues on the internet.

I have several other projects in the space of people understanding complex information.

Overweb Concept Category
Overweb False Claims Concept

[liambroza]

Tell us about yourself:
@liambroza

Tell us about your project:
LifeScope.io

Overweb Concept Category
Overweb Open Concept

[MelaninInk]

Tell us about yourself:
I am Rhea Dunn, a mother, multidisciplinary artist, educator, and entrepreneur. I am the founder of a business and educational production, publishing, and consulting company Melanin Ink (www.melanin.ink).

Tell us about your project:
Melanin Ink is a business and educational consulting, publishing, and production company that is currently working on several program initiatives and community projects, which include:
•Homies2Cool, a homeschool business supporting families affected by trauma
•Black Homeschools, a network of Black homeschooling families and educators
•Black Healers Group, a network of Black health and wellness practitioners
•Multicultural Homeschools, a network of homeschool families celebrating cultural diversity
•Leap of Faith, arts production and consulting
•Several community partnerships including the following organizations: Boston COVID-19 Coalition, African Repertory Troupe, Boston Public Health Commission, All Aces, Inc.

During the process of the Overweb Challenge Webinar I had several ideas for possible projects and teams that could work in multidisciplinary ways on things like:
•safety and security assessment, evaluation, enforcement
•health and wellness
•science and research studies related to things like healing arts sciences…and more
•education and self-directed learning programs and homeschooling

Overweb Concept Category
Overweb Education Concept

[MariaEuler]

Welcome, @maparent!

What kind of alternatives are you looking for?

I find the 3 different layers describe in context with hyperknowlege quite interesting. Could you maybe write/post a bit about those here as they could an interesting concept and vocabulary for multiple projects and people could easier engage directly with the details of your projects?

otherwise, I would also recommend to you to maybe check out our SSNA stuff, and how we are exploring different conversation and sensemaking layers with that, e.g. here: NGI Ethnography Preliminary Findings - October 2020

[MariaEuler]

Hello @thebeautyway great to have such an artistic polymath join :).

Maybe your interests might overlap with @futurememe. And @concordis and @maparent are working in the same overweb challenge category as you, maybe you could look into joining forces?

And eitherway, I think at the Sci-Fi Economics Lab and the Worldbuilding Akademy which is developing an open-source sci-fi world for authors and economists to explore together to develop new concepts of the future economy could be interesting for you looking at how art and speculation can inform/empower our thinking about what is possible in economics and politics.

[MariaEuler]

Welcome @liambroza!

When following the link to LifeScope.io I find the

“Control of your personal data is a human right. LifeScope is an open platform for personal data whereby ownership is returned to the user.”

Could you tell us a bit more about the project?

Just yesterday we had a seminar and workshop series on the topic of Data Policy and rights. check it out here: Data and Policy - Seminar - 20th January Maybe there would be some people that conversing and collaborating with might be interesting for you or that would like to hear about LifeScope and share it around.

[johncoate]

Welcome @thebeautyway. You have quite a few fascinating projects going on. It will take a little time to study up on it all, but it looks like you have thought deeply about the world and are doing something about it. I hope you find this event, and our community here worthwhile!

[johncoate]

Welcome @BentleyDavis - your projects look very interesting indeed. I hope they can help people come to agreement on controversial issues. I hope you enjoy your time here enough to keep up updated on your progress as well as sharing with us your ideas.

[NdidiWrites]

Tell us about yourself:
I don’t have a tech/AI background but I have worked in the nonprofit and community development sector for 12+ years. My education is in finance and business and I work at the intersection of community development, social enterprise and fighting the wealth gap.

I work with nonprofits that fight covid, health, food and economic disparities in the most impacted and hard-hit communities - largely Black and Brown. I also work and have leadership positions of the Muslim American community.

I am concerned about
-The wealth gap, economic disparity and techs impact
-Social enterprise
-New trends in tech that Black and Brown communities can use to counter economic disparity

Tell us about your project:
I want to create a digital space for Black Muslim Americans that has a self sustaining business model to it.

Overweb Concept Category
Overweb SDG Concept

[maparent]

Thank you Maria!

Maybe alternatives was not exactly the right word; but I am interested in the various systems people are designing for a Web of ideas, because it is my goal that these various systems should remain connected. Not only technical interoperability, but semantic interoperability of evolving semantic networks, which I think requires an event-driven architecture. Another non-obvious design constraint is that diverse sensemaking communities use different names for similar concepts: so grounding topic identity in language is a non-starter for me. Don’t get me wrong, it is perfectly appropriate for individual communities to converge on a unifying vocabulary, and to observe (as you did) connections at that level; but the inter-community layer cannot make this assumption.

So… I am developing this layer to describe language independent links to evolving concepts, and I am curious to see who else is thinking about this problem space at this level. I am also working on the layer above that, describing the argumentation network on this base layer. There are many people working at that level, and I’d be happy to have the conversation about why I think it needs to be built on this lower layer I’m working on.

Regards to all,
Marc-Antoine