Two options from what I could see.

You can entirely opt out of algorithmic feed and just see an unfiltered list of your connections posts.

Or if you choose the algorithmic option, there's some ability for the ministers to request content be removed.

Could it be abused to remove content they don't like? Of course

Is it a marked improvement on Meta/Tiktok getting carte Blanche to select what people see? I think so.

Thanks. Reading it at first seemed like “the people” here is you know, end users, people toggle some settings on their devices, not a government employee deciding. It turns out a government employee doing it. Yeah, just because US government is goofy doesn’t somehow make others sane or good.

How you went from U16 social media ban to the worst terrorist attack in AU history since port arthur therefore social media good is staggering...

You say draft bill, but can you link to it? I can only find descriptions from the PM: https://www.pm.gov.au/media/my-feed-my-way

What you've described isn't part of this?

"The draft laws provide eSafety with the power to issue removal notices for nudify apps or websites, and streamline the child cyber-bulling and adult cyber abuse schemes to enable eSafety to deal more quickly with this harmful material."

> As is common in political shenanigans, the draft bill has a euphemistic label ('algorithmic opt-out') - what it actually does is allow unspecified bureaucrats such as the Minister for Communications to designate any individual piece of content as 'harmful' and have it banished from the internet.

Not a fan of the paternalistic/nanny state attitude of the current government or that ministers track record, but isn't this two separate things which they intend to do?

Are you not aware that Australia is a willful participant in the wholesale abrogation of human rights, in the form of Pine Gap?

Of course the US has a say in Australian affairs when it comes to matters of human rights about censorship and access to information. Without that stranglehold, the Australian public may well inform themselves about the crimes of their state, committed every single millisecond, against close to 2 billion other human beings.

It is beyond ridiculous that Australians whines about their special relationship with the US, while doing absolutely nothing about the very criminal behavior that both states are co-partners in committing.

Australia and the United States have mutual interests and investments in the Pacific. Underlying this is a sense of shared cultural values and shared legacy as former British colonies.

To act as if the United States is sticking its nose in Australia as if it's Venezuela or something shows a rather pedestrian understanding of Australian history and geopolitics.

If the United States retreats from the world the Australian people will be among those who suffer the most. The interest in each other is mutual.

Edit: I'm not endorsing any particular intervention I'm merely pointing out the parent comment's framing (basically Australia should just ignore the United States or vice-versa) is silly given the reality of the relationship between the two countries, especially right now given how Australia views the present risks associated with the growing threat of Chinese hegemony in the Pacific.

Yes.

Most Australians dislike social media. We are underrepresented on it, and it shovels the US’s issues down our throat. The current algorithms mainly send us US political propaganda and things that are supposed to make us hate nearby Asian powers like China.

> What about an algorithm that was optimized the present the user with content they would find interesting? That doesn't sound so bad on the surface.

If only we had 20+ years of scientific and societal evidence to show that regardless of what you think is "on the surface", the effects are catastrophic to mental health, democracy, the concept of truth, and everything else.

> What is an "algorithm"?

To you and me it's a very wide category, and there may be hundreds or thousands or even millions involved in me simply typing this, it being saved somewhere and then served back to you.

For lay-people though, it's become a term which means "The thing which measures your preferences and usage patterns then decides what to show you". So for lay-people to want to turn off the algorithm, they tend to mean going back to "just what your friends posted, in order"

> When does an algorithm become harmful?

I think this is a research subject. AFAICT it's pretty certain now that social media 'algorithms' have been optimised for addictiveness, which is likely to overlap somewhat with what users find interesting, but also cover things they find mildly titillating and/or outrageous.

The harms come in a bunch of forms. The never-ending scrolling of bite-sized videos seems massively destructive to attention span, and people seem to get addicted to it and may neglect other parts of their life. The platforms also seem really keen to send men and boys off to pretty hateful 'manosphere' content which is apparently making life hell for women (including teachers of teenage boys). Then we have all the body-image and anxiety issues caused in teenagers constantly exposed to influencers showing off their (faked) wealth, beauty etc.

Switching off the "shoving this all in your face" part of social media seems to me to be a win. When it was actually a way to keep in touch with friends and family it was a different game.

I'm sure the final law will outline the specific details. But the intent of the law is not algorithms in a computer science definition, but modern recommendation engines.

Showing a chronological feed of accounts you have followed in this case would be non algorithmic. This is how all social media worked before the modern hellscape we are in.

It’s a good question, and it’s not well defined. I am hoping that it allows us to customise feeds more. If I have problems with body image, don’t show me topless photos. Same goes with alcohol and gambling, which some platforms do have. The answer must not be either be subjected to content you don’t want to see or don’t use social media at all.

I think the line for algorithms is anything machine learning or neural network based, not simple ordering.

Side note: When iterating on male avatars, ChatGPT incrementally increases muscular features without being prompted to do so. There are biases in these machine-learned algorithms.