Instagram and Facebook reveal how their AI decides what you see
Meta has faced criticism over the way it organises its feeds
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Your support makes all the difference.Meta has revealed how artificial intelligence decides what users see in their Instagram and Facebook feeds.
The company detailed the AI tools used to decide what types of content are shown on the apps in a lengthy blog post, aimed in part at address criticism over the way its apps work.
Meta uses AI in an attempt to ensure that content in feeds is “more likely that the posts you see are relevant and interesting to you”, said Nick Clegg, the former deputy prime minister and now Meta’s president of global affairs.
And he also said that Meta would add new ways for people to control those systems, allowing people to more easily control what shows in those apps.
Meta said that it had made the decision to reveal more about AI as “part of a wider ethos of openness, transparency and accountability”, and in recognition of the fact that the technology is both growing and becoming more controversial.
“With rapid advances taking place with powerful technologies like generative AI, it’s understandable that people are both excited by the possibilities and concerned about the risks,” wrote Mr Clegg. “We believe that the best way to respond to those concerns is with openness.”
The full release contains 22 “system cards” that are aimed at explaining the tools that are used on Facebook and Instagram to rank content. Those codes can be found on Meta’s transparency site.
They detail how AI works in particular features, such as Instagram Explore, the page that shows a range of posts from accounts that a user doesn’t already follow. That works by gathering up posts and checking that they abide by the rules, and then using signals such as whether people have liked similar content before, and using the second step to rank content from the first, deciding which of those posts are most likely to be interesting.
That same card highlights how users are able to control the system, in an attempt to remove content that is not interesting. The explore page has a button that allows people to say they are “not interested”, for instance, as well as a button that lets people see the page without the use of personalisation features.
Meta will also be looking to make it easier for people to better understand how that content is ranked. That includes pop-ups that show why a certain post has been highlighted, for instance, as well as a commitment to engage with researchers to better understand those AI models in a deeper way.
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