TikTok, the app constantly accused of representing the victory of superficiality in our society, was the most downloaded app of 2022.
Very short videos that are “scrolled” non-stop, apparently fuelling a general decline in the attention threshold and promoting behaviour that is not always positive.
The reason it seems to be so addictive, however, is its algorithm.
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Thanks to the cross-referencing of interest data, app searches and, above all, from interactions and viewing time, TikTok is the perfect app to make sure we always see something that entertains us, that even, at times, seems to be designed especially for us.
But what if all this were also possible with something more authoritative, such as news and information?
This is the idea that stimulated the creation of Artifact.news.
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Artifact is a social network that does not show news based on our conscious choices, as Instagram does for example (which takes into account who we follow to show us the most suitable content), but on our unconscious ones.
Exactly like TikTok, Artifact is in fact based on an algorithm that uses machine learning to learn the habits of each user, in order to offer him, in this case, newspaper articles and other news from the entire world of online information.
The founders, Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger, assure that the veracity of the contents will be verified before they are put on the app.
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The system by which this algorithm succeeds is actually not new: it was invented by Google in 2017 and is called “the transformer” , and is the neural network that enables precisely Google, but also ChatGPT (if you don't know what ChatOpenAi is or want to know how to use it, click here!) and to Dall-E, to understand, thanks to a few words, the meaning of what is being described.
This is how Artifact will read and understand the content of every article on the web, guaranteeing optimum efficiency in presenting only news that is truly relevant to the user.
HOW TO USE Artifact.news?
If you want to be among the first Italian users of this new social network, the steps are really simple. Indeed, for the moment, it is one of the few social networks that does not force you to register in order to view its contents!
It should be borne in mind that this is an app that has only recently come out of beta testing: several improvements and additions are planned (private messages, comments, sharing of content between friends), but it is already perfectly usable.
Let's see how:
Go to the Play Store (Android) or App Store and search for “Artifact.news”
- Download the app and wait for it to install
- Open Artifact.news: its logo resembles a black asterisk on a white background
- Select at least 10 interest categories (there are no limits, you can also choose all of them)
- If you are already a subscriber to online titles, you can enter them on the next screen
- After this, we are inside our customised feed
Here we are inside Artifact: we are in the section “For you” (which takes up the “for you page” of TikTok), where a lot of articles are immediately uploaded, for the moment all in English, which talk about precisely what I have indicated as my preference.
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Afterwards, it is precisely the algorithm that will understand which content will entertain me the most based on my use of the app, and will thus be able to recommend only the most suitable content for my needs.
Global data seems to prove the victory of machine learning-based systems over more traditional forms of content presentation.
Will this also be the case, so thanks to Artifact we will go back to taking the time to read full articles, instead of scrolling endlessly from one video to the next?
The question is unanswered for the time being, but in the meantime we have downloaded it.
And you?
Image AbsolutVision on Unsplash
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