Undress or fail: Instagram’s algorithm strong-arms users into showing skin hablan del tema y me gustó leerlo porque 'resuena' con mi propia impresión.

Hablan de una investigación realizada por ellos donde ponen a prueba estos supuestos, relativos a la desnudez y la priorización de los contenidos:

An exclusive investigation reveals that Instagram prioritizes photos of scantily-clad men and women, shaping the behavior of content creators and the worldview of 140 millions Europeans in what remains a blind spot of EU regulations.

Habla de una usuaria, que veía como sus fotos no tenían la misma exposición cuando no eran fotos en bañador:

But on Instagram, which is heavily oriented towards photos and videos, she felt that her pictures did not reach many of her 53,000 followers unless she posed in swimwear. Indeed, four of her seven most-liked posts of the last few months showed her in a bikini

Podría ocurrir que fueran las preferencias de los propios usuarios, claro.

It could be the case that their audiences massively prefer to see Sarah and Ely in bathing suits.

Pero lo mejor era intentar verificarlo, comprobando qué fotos tendrían prioridad para Instagram, con 26 voluntarios y un experimento diseñado adecuadamente.

To understand what pictures Instagram prioritized, the European Data Journalism Network and AlgorithmWatch asked 26 volunteers to install a browser add-on and follow a selection of professional content creators.

Si Instagram no toca el orden, la observación automatizada de estos usuarios seleccionados se podría ver la diversidad necesaria y adecuada. Si favorece los intereses y gustos de cada usuario, también se podría observar.

If Instagram were not meddling with the algorithm, the diversity of posts in the newsfeed of users should match the diversity of the posts by the content creators they follow. And if Instagram personalized the newsfeed of each user according to their personal tastes, the diversity of posts in their newsfeeds should be skewed in a different way for each user.

Se analizaron las entradas de estos usuarios y se encontró que, efectivamente, parece que se prioriza un cierto tipo de contenidos (los que muestran más carne, por decirlo de alguna manera: mujeres en bikini o ropa interior; hombres mostrando el pecho).

Between February and May, 1,737 posts published by the content creators we monitor, containing 2,400 photos, were analyzed. Of these posts, 362, or 21%, were recognized by a computer program as containing pictures showing women in bikinis or underwear, or bare chested men. In the newsfeeds of our volunteers, however, posts with such pictures made up 30% of all posts shown from the same accounts (some posts were shown more than once).

Algunos, sin embargo, sí que parece que veían entradas más parecidas a sus intereses.

The skew towards nudity might not apply to all Instagram users. While it was consistent and apparent for most volunteers, a small minority were served posts that better reflected the diversity published by content creators.

Como decíamos arriba, esta red social prohíbe la desnudez, pero favorece las entradas que muestran más piel. La hipocresía de lo que está permitido frente a lo que luego se muestra y se favorece con la selección algorítmica.

Instagram’s guidelines state that nudity is “not allowed” on the service, but favors posts that show skin. The subtle difference between what is encouraged and what is forbidden is decided by unaudited, and likely biased, computer vision algorithms.

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