The power of the twitter algorithm. 3.6 million people have watched this track and field video

rojo wrote:

To me, it shows you the power of big-tech. What they view as popular is popular. I mean an INCREDIBLE 4 x 400 video from 2017, Raevyn Rogers' 4 x 400 leg that won Oregon the NCAA team title in the last major race at Hayward Field before it was torn down, only has something like 227,000 twitter views.

There is more to the world than just the US of A, Robert.

That second race must be full of meaning for you Americans but for a non-American NCAA titles and Hayward Field will mean nothing unless they specifically follow American sports.

Still, I enjoyed watching both races.

You mad dog?

Social media is a cancer. The whole Web 2.0 thing has been a disaster, in fact. (Sorry, that predates 90 percent of the visitors here.)

People like big comebacks. This could have been a 57 anchor to win a high school girl 4x4 dual meet, and folks would like it just as much.

bgrebrstb wrote:

rojo wrote:

To me, it shows you the power of big-tech. What they view as popular is popular. I mean an INCREDIBLE 4 x 400 video from 2017, Raevyn Rogers' 4 x 400 leg that won Oregon the NCAA team title in the last major race at Hayward Field before it was torn down, only has something like 227,000 twitter views.

There is more to the world than just the US of A, Robert.

That second race must be full of meaning for you Americans but for a non-American NCAA titles and Hayward Field will mean nothing unless they specifically follow American sports.

Still, I enjoyed watching both races.

Wow, you totally missed his point.

I saw the video on tik tok

getting tons of views on there too

How was popularity determined in the past? If anything, I'd say it was even more arbitrary: a very small number of "gatekeepers" (e.g. newspaper editors, book publishers, TV producers) decided what got a big audience. I don't think there was ever a perfectly unbiased state where news got attention in proportion to its true interest/importance, but I'd say that despite its obvious flaws the current system is closer to that ideal to the olden days.

grave disease wrote:

How was popularity determined in the past? If anything, I'd say it was even more arbitrary: a very small number of "gatekeepers" (e.g. newspaper editors, book publishers, TV producers) decided what got a big audience. I don't think there was ever a perfectly unbiased state where news got attention in proportion to its true interest/importance, but I'd say that despite its obvious flaws the current system is closer to that ideal to the olden days.

I don't get what you are saying. Now the gatekeeper is basically the ssame if not letss. Before itw as ABC, CBS, NBC. Now it's twitter, facebook, tiktok.

This is the perfect example of why tiktok must be US owned or banned. We can't hav ea foreign company deciding what news we get via algorithm.

point misser wrote:

bgrebrstb wrote:

There is more to the world than just the US of A, Robert.

That second race must be full of meaning for you Americans but for a non-American NCAA titles and Hayward Field will mean nothing unless they specifically follow American sports.

Still, I enjoyed watching both races.

Wow, you totally missed his point.

Wow, you get easily excited!

Agreed. What about Rupert Murdoch and Fox News.

I'm not sure why you would want to disparage this race. It was an exciting finish.

It seems like there is a bigger complaint here about social media companies and mind control, but I'm not sure what that point is.

rojo wrote:

grave disease wrote:

How was popularity determined in the past? If anything, I'd say it was even more arbitrary: a very small number of "gatekeepers" (e.g. newspaper editors, book publishers, TV producers) decided what got a big audience. I don't think there was ever a perfectly unbiased state where news got attention in proportion to its true interest/importance, but I'd say that despite its obvious flaws the current system is closer to that ideal to the olden days.

I don't get what you are saying. Now the gatekeeper is basically the ssame if not letss. Before itw as ABC, CBS, NBC. Now it's twitter, facebook, tiktok.

This is the perfect example of why tiktok must be US owned or banned. We can't hav ea foreign company deciding what news we get via algorithm.

1/10. Your second comment was way too over the top trolljo.

The point about social media algorithms is correct. But the UM race is way more exciting to watch than the OR race for the average sports fan.

rojo wrote:

https://twitter.com/UMichAthletics/status/1351178569146363907

Don't misunderstand me. Michigan frosh Ziyah Holman is a super stud, but I can't believe 3.6 million people have watched that video.

The finish isn't all that exciting and it's an utterly meaningless race as the meet wasn't even scored. Yes 51.79 is fast, but this is a woman who ran a 52.12 open 400 way back in 2019.

To me, it shows you the power of big-tech. What they view as popular is popular. I mean an INCREDIBLE 4 x 400 video from 2017, Raevyn Rogers' 4 x 400 leg that won Oregon the NCAA team title in the last major race at Hayward Field before it was torn down, only has something like 227,000 twitter views.

https://twitter.com/ESPNU/status/873708019867058177

Most people couldn't care less about an NCAA team title. The former video is more interesting to most people as a one-off as she destroys those two other runners to win coming back from way down.

team Unruly Bush wrote:

rojo wrote:

This is the perfect example of why tiktok must be US owned or banned. We can't hav ea foreign company deciding what news we get via algorithm.

1/10. Your second comment was way too over the top trolljo.

Agreed. It is silly to suggest TikTok is some sort of great misinformation company slowly creeping into our minds, ready to spring a disinformation campaign at the perfect moment. People currently go there for stupid videos, not news.

And what kind of precedence does it set? By extention, you have to ban every foreign media company, you can't just pick TikTok.

BBC news: banned!

RT: banned!

Al Jazeera: banned!

Suddenly you're China, Iran, etc. with heavy government censorship. Banning foreign media is the worst thing we would do. It makes us less safe, not more, it removes us even more from the rest of the world and their viewpoints.

Lets say you're right, and TikTok is a sleeper disinformation platform. If TikTok suddenly starts pushing massive anti American propoganda, we already know what will happen, because we saw it this election with parler: the US companies that they have to use as a platform will just kick them off. Problem solved, by private industry, with no government intervention. TikTok will be gone in 24 hours, rather than the months it would take by legal, executive, or legislative action

rojo wrote:

grave disease wrote:

How was popularity determined in the past? If anything, I'd say it was even more arbitrary: a very small number of "gatekeepers" (e.g. newspaper editors, book publishers, TV producers) decided what got a big audience. I don't think there was ever a perfectly unbiased state where news got attention in proportion to its true interest/importance, but I'd say that despite its obvious flaws the current system is closer to that ideal to the olden days.

I don't get what you are saying. Now the gatekeeper is basically the ssame if not letss. Before itw as ABC, CBS, NBC. Now it's twitter, facebook, tiktok.

The difference is that ABC, etc. had an editorial staff and a few others that made decisions about what to cover and how to spin the coverage. YouTube and Twitter don't have people sitting around deciding which tweets or videos will go viral. It just happens organically. That makes social media empowering, banal, and sinister - all at the same time.

Do you decide which threads on this forum will take off and generate a lot of discussion while others languish? Do you have some sort of algorithm, or is it just random and arbitrary?

The new video shows someone coming from an enormous way back on the next place athlete, then an enormous way to the next and so on, until she finally passes the leader in the last straightaway and gets into the lead only ten or so yards from the finish. That is dramatic. It helps that the runners she was up against seem to have been distance runners in the 4x4, to judge by how rapidly a 51.8 ran them down.

Since when is the 400 2 laps?? I was very confused...

dblizz wrote:

Since when is the 400 2 laps?? I was very confused...

When it's on a 200 meter track - as most indoor tracks are.