Meta Wants To Empower Users Over AI Influence On Facebook and Instagram Recommendations

On Thursday, Meta Platforms Inc. META explained how artificial intelligence (AI) influences the recommendations users see on Facebook and Instagram.

Apart from transparency in this regard, Meta also announced that it is testing new controls to give users more control over how and what they see on these social networks.

What Happened: Meta has disclosed how AI influences recommendations on Facebook and Instagram. It also announced a wider rollout of its tools to allow users to better control what they see on the two social networks.

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More specifically, the Mark Zuckerberg-led company explained that Facebook and Instagram users now have a centralized location that lets them control their feed preferences. Facebook users can head over to the ‘Feed Preferences' section to tailor the recommendations.

On the other hand, Instagram users can use the ‘Suggested Content Control Center' in the app's settings to manage their recommendations.

Additionally, Instagram users now get an option to show that they are "Interested" in a particular recommended reel, so the service will show more content of that type. This is in addition to the "Not Interested" option that has existed since 2021.

Meta is also expanding a similar feature to Facebook, allowing users to select the kind of content they would like to see more of.

Signals To Identify Content: Meta also disclosed that it is increasing the transparency concerning the recommendations, allowing users to understand why they are being recommended a post or reel, as part of its "Why Am I Seeing This?" feature.

Users will be able to see the reasons behind a recommended piece of content – Meta says this is based on the user's activity, which includes their likes, comments, and accounts they follow, apart from signals like watching a video for just a few seconds before clicking away or completing it. These signals inform its AI and help it recommend more relevant content.

Note that these signals differ from those used to identify harmful content – Meta said that while it cannot disclose these signals completely since they could be misused, it detects and limits the reach of harmful content based on its content distribution guidelines.

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