Filter Bubbles

Filter bubbles are all over the internet and all over our lives. A filter bubble is where an isolation occurs. A website will make use of algorithms to selectively assume the information you would want to see and then give you the information according to its assumptions. Websites make these assumptions related to the information you have clicked on or have in your browser history or even your location. In a result, you are separated from information that disagrees with your viewpoints and are in a way trapped in your own cultural and ideological bubble.

On my personal Facebook account when I first created it I was very active, from liking everything my friends posted to copy and pasting those Jesus posts that if you scroll past you’re going down under. I had never thought of what I did would then affect what I was able to view and what would be more likely to pop up. As I have aged, I give a rare like here and there and am not very active. I’m sitting here looking at my Facebook and noticing that all those “druggies” from high school don’t really show up and I don’t know the last time I’ve seen a post from them. Only my good friends and people I’ve liked before have been showing up, also I am an avid Facebook video watcher, and I noticed anyone, even a person who liked a video, the video will show up, and you have instantaneously grabbed my attention.

To see if this really worked, being the skeptic I am, I asked my husband to search Donald Trump on his computer, and I would do the same. Now my husband was very on top of the election and researched every candidate and knew his stuff. I, on the other hand, did not take part in the recent election only watching the news ever so rarely. Both popped up with the latest video of course and Wikipedia, but after that, it changed. My husband’s search brought up Donald Trump’s official website page. Mine, on the other hand, brought up a chain of videos on Bing and YouTube. The algorithms targeted what we were most interested in and what would catch our attention more. I agree that it seems crazy, but I feel like we’re always being watched. 

 https://www.techopedia.com/definition/28556/filter-bubble

 http://thinkmakebelieve.blogspot.com/2014/08/filter-bubble.html