Dancing for the robot

The default “For You” feed on Threads is algorithmic: it shows you what it thinks you should see, and is not chronological or completist. In my “For You” feed I see many posts related to writers and writing, because the algorithm has decided — based on who I follow, and the posts I’ve liked, and other factors I’m unaware of — that this is what I like. It’s not entirely wrong.

But I don’t see everything from the people I follow, unless I read my “Following” feed. The gods of Threads do not seem to let you, at present, make “Following” your default feed. They want you to keep scrolling your “For You” feed forever, drip-feeding you algorithmically identified posts, keeping you on the platform. Ultimately, I’m sure ads will appear here (there goes the neighbourhood, etc).

For a poster — such as me, keen to make himself known and to promote his current and upcoming books — this means you are at the whim of an unknowable Post Emperor, a robot behind a curtain, who decides whether to up-thumb or down-thumb everything you write based on Certain Factors, including Special Secret Sauce. Sometimes a post is popular; sometimes it languishes.

I thought it would be interesting to show you the effect of the algorithm on a few of my recent posts. I currently have 40 followers on Threads (I know, I’m a veritable star of social media), so I might consider a “popular post” to be one that has over 40 views, and an “unpopular post” to be everything else.

Let’s take a look at some recent posts.

https://www.threads.net/@anthonycamber/post/DELbJ7fKCBH

A snarky post, I’d say. 132 views. Popular!

Compare with:

https://www.threads.net/@anthonycamber/post/DELO3poquBe

Same day (two hours earlier), an update about my writing. 17 views. Likely half the people who follow me — ostensibly because I’m a writer — weren’t shown this update on my writing.

Here’s a photo post, automatically cross-posted from Instagram:

https://www.threads.net/@anthonycamber/post/DEX6bcaOebg

This has had 6 views. I’ve heard people say that “posts with images aren’t shown as often” which seems mad to me. No idea if it’s true or not: everyone is reading tea leaves.

Now this one:

https://www.threads.net/@anthonycamber/post/DEewRkFqtiL

More snark. 221 views. OK, snark is popular?

Note that none of the posts I’ve shown so far have been favourited or reposted. The algorithm isn’t using those metrics to promote or demote these posts. Is it doing semantic analysis?

And finally:

https://www.threads.net/@anthonycamber/post/DEiX3T3uNwg

Here I’m quote-posting a famous writer and trying to be All Witty And That™. So far: 4 views. (Patrick Ness’s post that I’m quoting has 551 views; he has over 8,000 followers.)

This is at the top of my “For You” feed as I write:

https://www.threads.net/@fractured_fairy_tales/post/DEjntEZx2Yi

This currently has 791 views. The user has 144 followers.

I will, of course, continue to post my daily writing updates into the void. But that won’t help me sell books, because nobody’s seeing the posts. Nobody knows who I am. The algorithm absolutely promotes popular posts, so if people don’t see my posts, people won’t see my posts.

My challenge, then, is to figure out whether juggling or farting or poetry or dancing or pratfalling or snark or dumb questions or shitposting or trolling or something else will please the current Post Emperor, that he may be willing to permit others to see my performance and thereby entice them to my small table at the back of the echoing hall on which lie my lonely manuscripts.

It’s all one step removed. I can’t promote myself: I have to sucker people in with lollipops first.

And then repeat for all other algorithm-driven sites I might be interested in.

It’s so very tiring.