Filterworld: How Algorithms Flattened Culture

by Kyle Chayka

I must admit that my admiration for this period is driven in part by nostalgia. We all dream of that period of youth when the self is relatively unformed and encounters with art have a staggering power. Teenagers are more open to new experiences, regardless of what technology they use to consume them, and have the tendency and time to indulge obsessions, to become connoisseurs. But I’ve realized that what I appreciated so much about those online interactions is that they were built on person-to-person recommendations, not automated ones. Someone had to care enough to tell me what they liked, and I had to care enough to trust them and give it a fair try. Such cultural recommendations—communicating approval—are social and moral acts. We tell each other that we like things the same way that bees perform dances to pass on the location of a particularly fruitful flower. The very act brings us together.