Philippe Beaudoin is calling out Big Tech, saying their algorithms are helping Russia’s war effort. The 46-year-old former Google software engineer, who co-founded Element AI in 2016, has long railed against the polarizing excesses of advertising-driven algorithms used by the Googles and Facebooks of the world. Waverly, Beaudoin’s new venture, is a newsreader app that curates suggestions based on user input.
In an interview with The Logic, he took Big Tech’s so-called “recommender engines” to task for aiding the spread of misinformation about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
What did you mean when you said that these engines exploit cognitive flaws in humans?
It’s easy to trigger curiosity and anger in people. And when you do that, they spend more time thinking about your content, looking at your content or commenting on it. And the algorithms perceive all of this as signs of engagement, which help that content flow to the top. So, if you’re good at this, you can just put content that triggers people’s anger or whatever, your content will get promoted more.
What evidence have you seen of this, as far as the Russian propaganda effort is concerned?
The best examples are fake videos using video game footage. They are very graphic, and it makes people wonder, “Is that even possible?” And because of that, they get promoted more than they should. Eventually, some moderation systems may take them down. But for a short while, they get promoted very quickly, because they’ve triggered these cognitive flaws.
You worked at Google. What did you see as far as recommender engines are concerned?
I worked on a small recommender engine on Google Chrome. And it’s obviously evolved since, but the fundamental principles are the same. If you’re able to induce behaviours in people, you’re able to change what gets pushed to the top.
Among the first things that Vladimir Putin’s government did was ban Facebook and Twitter, which suggests that while social media is good at fomenting misinformation, it’s also effective at spreading proper information. What do you think about that?
Even though it’s possible to game these systems, it’s really hard to do and the entire planet is against you. If you want to control the flow of information, as the Putin regime is intent on doing, you can’t give people access to Facebook, because they’re going to see the other side of the question. Despite all their flaws, social media sites are good tools for democracy.
