Why are so many people angry on social media? (pt. 5)

The third reason is that social media algorithms are also encouraging the spread of toxic content. Now, traffic is the target of almost all social platforms, which is the main way to bring profits. It leads their algorithms particularly favor those content that can bring traffic. More and more platforms prefer to rank posts by algorithm rather than in chronological order.
The algorithm choose the most forwarding and like content for more people to see. As mentioned above, emotional and angry content has been forwarded more often. Now with the blessing of the algorithm, more people will see these. And the content that can't stimulate people's emotional response, the algorithm will not like it, and fewer people will see it.

So, the product design of social media itself is stimulating us to publish more angry and toxic content, and then helping to spread it. To put it bluntly, it's a machine that makes and spreads anger.

第三个原因是，社交媒体的算法也在鼓励有毒内容的传播。现在，几乎所有社交媒体的商业模式都是，依靠流量带来广告收入，所以它们的算法都会特别青睐那些能带来流量的内容。可能你已经发现，微博上的内容排序早就不是按照时间顺序来了，而是由算法来决定，什么排在前面，什么排在后面。那么这种排序算法里面一个很重要的规则就是，如果一条内容被转发得特别多，它就会被放在很显着的位置，让更多人看到。我们刚才说到了，情绪化的、愤怒的内容本来就被转发得更多，现在有了算法的加持之后，就会有更多人看到。而那些不能刺激人情绪反应的内容，算法也就不会喜欢，看到的人就更少了。

所以说，社交媒体的产品设计本身，就在刺激我们发表更多愤怒的、有毒的内容，然后又在帮助这种内容的传播。夸张点说，它就是一台制造和传播愤怒的机器。

From: https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/FvUpV-wXxObUEPa4_rXyYg