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Twitter thread by Guillaume Chaslot

Trustworthy AI / Mozilla Fellow / https://t.co/55RnnVmrPX / Advisor at

Center for Humane Technology / Ex-Google

https://twitter.com/gchaslot/status/1094359564559044610

YouTube announced they will stop recommending some

conspiracy theories such as flat earth.

I worked on the AI that promoted them by the *billions*.

Here is why it’s a historic victory. Thread. 1/

Continuing our work to improve recommendations on YouTube

Source: blog.youtube

Brian is my best friend’s in-law. A er his dad died in a

motorcycle accident, he became depressed. He fell down the
rabbit hole of YouTube conspiracy theories, with flat earth,
aliens & co. Now he does not trust anyone. He stopped
working, seeing friends, and wanting kids. 2/

Brian spends most of his time watching YouTube, supported

by his wife.

For his parents, family and friends, his story is heartbreaking.

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But from the point of view of YouTube’s AI, he’s a jackpot.

3/

We designed YT’s AI to increase the time people spend online,

because it leads to more ads. The AI considers Brian as a
model that *should be reproduced*. It takes note of every
single video he watches & uses that signal to recommend it to
more people 4/

YouTube Now: Why We Focus on Watch Time

This is the first of a series called “YouTube Now,” which we’ll use to
explain how we’re evolving the site, and why. Would you like to su...

Source: youtube-creators.googleblog.com

How many people like Brian are allured down such rabbit
holes everyday day?

By design, the AI will try to get as many as possible.

5/

Brian's hyper-engagement slowly biases YouTube:

1/ People who spend their lives on YT a ect

recommendations more
2/ So the content they watch gets more views
3/ Then youtubers notice and create more of it
4/ And people spend even more time on that content. And
back at 1

6/

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This vicious circle was also observed with , and it explains

why the bot became racist in less than 24 hours.

=> Platforms that use AIs o en get biased by tiny groups of

hyper-active users.

7/

Twitter taught Microsoft’s friendly AI chatbot to be a racist asshole in

less than a day
It took less than 24 hours for Twitter to corrupt an innocent AI chatbot.
Yesterday, Microsoft unveiled Tay — a Twitter bot that the company
described as an experiment in "conversational...

Source: theverge.com

http://tay.ai

Example of YT vicious circle: two years ago I found out that

many conspiracies were promoted by the AI much more than
truth, for instance flat earth videos were promoted ~10x more
than round earth ones 🌎🤯

8/

How YouTube’s A.I. boosts alternative facts

YouTube’s recommendation A.I. is designed to maximize the time
users spend online. Fiction often outperforms reality.

Source: medium.com

I was not the only one to notice AI harms. @tristanharris

talked about addiction. @zeynep talked about radicalization.

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@noUpside, political abuse and conspiracies. @jamesbridle,

disgusting kids videos. @google's @fchollet, the danger of AI
propaganda:

9/

What worries me about AI

Disclaimer: These are my own personal views. I do not speak for my
employer. If you quote this article, please have the honesty to
present…

Source: medium.com

Since then many newspapers spoke about AI harms, as for

instance: @wsj @guardian @nytimes @BuzzFeed
@washingtonpost @bloomberg @hu post @dailybeast @vox
@NBCNews @VICE @cjr @techreview

Journalism matters

10/

There are 2 ways to fix vicious circles like with "flat earth"

1) make people spend more time on round earth videos

2) change the AI

YouTube’s economic incentive is for solution 1).

A er 13 years, YouTube made the historic choice to go
towards 2)

Will this fix work? 11/

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The AI change will have a huge impact because a ected

channels have billions of views, overwhelmingly coming from
recommendations. For instance the channel secureteam10
made *half a billion* views with deceiving claims promoted
by the AI, such as:

12/

https://bit.ly/2Bgkii5

Note that #secureteam10 was the most liked channel of

Buckey Wolfe, who came to believe his brother was a “lizard”
and killed him with a sword.
To understand how he fell down the rabbit hole, see his 1312
public likes here:

13/

Seattle man who stabbed his brother to death with 4-foot sword
thought he was a lizard, police say
A Seattle man who police said killed his brother with a four-foot sword
Sunday may be mentally ill, according to prosecutors.

Source: clickondetroit.com

https://www.youtube.com/user/Buckeywolfe/videos?shelf_id=0&sort=dd&vi

ew=15

This AI change will save thousands from falling into such

rabbit holes

(If it decreases between 1B and 10B views on such content,

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and if we assume one person falling for it each 100,000 views,

it will prevent 10,000 to 100,000 "falls") 14/

A concern remains that other rabbit holes are arising. I

created to identify and monitor harmful content
recommended by the AI.

15/

http://algotransparency.org

Conclusion: YouTube's announcement is a great victory

which will save thousands. It's only the beginning of a more
humane technology. Technology that empowers all of us,
instead of deceiving the most vulnerable.

If you see something, say something.

16/

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