Bubble Filter

“IT WILL BE VERY HARD FOR PEOPLE TO WATCH OR CONSUME SOMETHING THAT HAS NOT IN SOME SENSE BEEN TAILORED FOR THEM.”

-ERIC SCHMIDT, GOOGLE

The Internet is meant to connect the whole world but now there is a shift in how information is flowing online, And it's invisible! And if we don’t pay attention to it, it could be a real problem.

So, I first noticed this in a place where I spend a lot of time, my Instagram page. I didn't realize that I'm spending most of my time scrolling Instagram feed and watching reels and I totally enjoyed it. The reason behind getting addicted to an app is the content that is being shown to the user which is interesting, exciting and entertaining. When a user continuously watches or reads a particular type of content, similar type of content is shown to the user again .

Picture credits: Unsplash: Alexander Shatov

This is very commonly noticed for many other apps too. User behaviour is tracked and content of interest is predicted for the user. This can be further explained through an ordinary activity such as Google Search. When two individuals search on Google using the same search terms at the same time they may get very different results. Even if a user is logged out, Google tracks 57 signals including the type of computer, browser, location. This helps in customizing the query results to each user.

Apps providing news, entertainment, shopping and a host of other services  show us what it thinks we want to see, but not necessarily what we need to see using the filters to present the content. All these filters together are called Filter Bubbles. Filter Bubble is your own personal, unique universe of information that you live online.

What's on your filter bubble depends upon who you are and what you do. But the main thing is you don’t decide what gets in. And more importantly, you don’t see what gets edited out.

One of the problems with the filter bubble was discovered by some of the researchers at Netflix. Suggestions on Netflix is based on what you have watched before or a similar movie or series you have saved for watching later. This personalized filter is because Netflix's algorithms capture your clicks and thus you end up surrounded by information junk.

So it's really important to create a virtual universe, that you wouldn't regret being in. It's important to tailor the quality of your searches for the betterment of your good. It's like spoiling a kid, only to a limit where they don't forget their morals, values and are harmless. To sum up, we cannot live without the Internet in our daily lives. How not to let it dictate our lives is in our hands.

 “We really need the Internet to be that thing that we all dreamed of it being. We need it to connect us all together. We need it to introduce us to new ideas and new people and different perspectives. And it’s not going to do that if it leaves us all isolated in a Web of one.”

— Eli Pariser