Author | Lightnews

Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · 1d

Doing so might help improve users' experiences while also fostering healthy pluralism.

Talia Stroud's research on using a "respect" instead of a "like" button gives a sense of how the words we use for reactions can make a difference: www.prosocialdesign.org/library/resp...

Respect Button – Prosocial Design Network

Decrease partisan behavior

www.prosocialdesign.org

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Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · 1d

work against pluralism by reducing exposure to viewpoints people dislike - even when they value seeing diverse views. Bsky may want to test alternatives to "dislike", for example "not interesting", so they avoid conflating content that people don't want to see with content that they disagree with.

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Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · 1d

Bsky announced it will start testing "dislikes" letting users privately signal types of content they want to see less of. Negative feedback is an important way to give people agency in shaping their feed and online experience, but the word "dislike" may inadvertently....
bsky.social/about/blog/1...

Progress Update: Building Healthier Social Media - Bluesky

Over the next few months, we’ll be iterating on the systems that make Bluesky a better place for healthy conversations. Some experiments will stick, others will evolve, and we’ll share what we learn a...

bsky.social

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Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · 9d

Imagine sophisticated social media feed algorithms - but built with users' and communities' wellbeing in mind. There's now an ambitious team trying to make that reality.
greenearthsocial.substack.com/p/introducin...

Introducing GreenEarth

We're building advanced open source algorithms for social media

greenearthsocial.substack.com

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Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · 22d

Seriously impressed with the two high school students who built an ML-driven app to short-circuit teens' smartphone dopamine loop.
www.primeopenaccess.com/scholarly-ar...

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Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · 24d

Instagram rolls out giving users more control over their Reels algorithm:
www.socialmediatoday.com/news/instagr...

Instagram Tests Reels Algorithm Control Options

Instagram's got a new Reels algorithm control tool — but will people actually use it?

www.socialmediatoday.com

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Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · Sep 28

According to new Pew data, mass social media continues to be central to our national public square - with over 50% of Americans getting at least some of their news from social media sites, and YouTube & TikTok taking a larger share. (Only 2% of us here at Bsky.) www.pewresearch.org/journalism/f...

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Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · Sep 24

The reactions platforms choose aren't neutral; they can cue division or inspire curiosity and understanding. So it's great to see Sparkable put "prosocial reactions" front and center. blog.sparkable.cc/prosocial-re...

Prosocial reactions: a new way to surface high-quality content

Sparkable is pioneering a new way to evaluate the prosocial effects of a post.

blog.sparkable.cc

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Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · Sep 17

New study challenges the conventional wisdom that anonymity and prosocial behavior are at odds.
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Anonymity as a catalyst for good: Linking social media anonymity to prosocial behavior

Social media anonymity is associated with cyberbullying and aggressive behavior. By the same token, such anonymity can promote positive outcomes. The …

www.sciencedirect.com

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Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · Sep 13

Meta update on Community Notes. Interestingly they've added a feature to alert users who previously engaged with a post that a Community Note was later added. That's important because Notes most often don't appear until well into a post's life-cycle.
www.socialmediatoday.com/news/meta-ad...

Meta Updates Community Notes, Shares Stats on Usage

Meta says that it now has over 70k Community Notes contributors.

www.socialmediatoday.com

Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · Sep 5

Pinterest is expanding its school-hour prompt to "take a break" from the app. We're not aware of internal tests, but research suggests these interventions can be effective at reducing time on distracting apps (www.prosocialdesign.org/library/digi...).
www.socialmediatoday.com/news/pintere...

Pinterest Expands Alerts To Get Teens off the App During School

Pinterest has been testing the prompts in North America.

www.socialmediatoday.com

Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · Sep 4

A paper from over a year ago: research participants were only able to correctly identify AI agents from humans in an online discussion 42% of the time (even when told to expect AI agents). Odds are that percentage would be much lower today.
arxiv.org/html/2402.07...

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Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · Sep 1

Thanks for calling our attention to Semble, @newpublic.org. What a great use of ATProto to harness expert knowledge!

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Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · Aug 25

An RCT with 269 Danish teens shows that two smartphone interventions - forcing a brief breathing exercise or asking teens to plan the length of their session - dropped social media phone use 36%. A third intervention, asking them to reflect on their use, had no effect.
en.kfst.dk/media/5t4dsc...

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Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · Aug 24

One platform is taking steps to keep its engagement authentic and bot-lite:
www.socialmediatoday.com/news/linkedi...

LinkedIn Outlines New Measures To Combat Fake Engagement

LinkedIn has officially noted that it will reduce the visibility of comments made via automation tools.

www.socialmediatoday.com

Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · Aug 16

More ways GenAI is working for the public good:
blog.cosmos-institute.org/p/introducin...

Introducing the First Cohort of AI x Truth-Seeking Grant Winners

Meet the 27 builders advancing open inquiry and intellectual freedom in AI

blog.cosmos-institute.org

Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · Jul 13

It comes up a lot in conversations at PDN: how would you create a measure of platform prosociality? It looks like Rachel Kowert has been thinking for a while along the same lines, but in games. A thoughtful read from an expert gaming T&S.
rachelkowert.substack.com/p/developing...

Developing a Measure of Community Health in Games

Let’s talk about (digital) community health.

rachelkowert.substack.com

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Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · Jul 12

We love a literature review. This one looks at how tech interventions - everything from social media reduction to conversation robots - can reduce loneliness and isolation. 40 RCTs with mixed results - and group psychological interventions (below) for the win.
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

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Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · Jul 2

Update: Yahoo Japan now reports seeing a 24% drop in offensive comments since instituting the feature: asianews.network/japans-yahoo...

Japan’s Yahoo News site has AI feature asking commenter to reconsider vulgar words, phrases

Offensive comments posted on the site declined by over 20% since the feature was introduced.

asianews.network

Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · Jun 28

Casey Newton charts one small - but promising - step in building the fediverse (which - in concept - could free users from platform fiefdoms).
www.platformer.news/threads-fedi...

The dream of the Fediverse is alive on Threads

Decentralized media is off to an agonizingly slow start — but there are glimmers of progress

www.platformer.news

Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · Jun 27

Something to keep an eye on: According to CJR, Digg is reinventing itself using AI/LLM-fueled content moderation that look like they could include some prosocial interventions, like intervening to de-escalate tense conversations, "allowing users to dig deeper."
www.cjr.org/analysis/new...

The New Digg’s Plan to Use AI for Community Moderation

Humans weigh in.

www.cjr.org

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Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · Jun 17

We've shared before about efforts to foster "Better Feeds" that create long-term value - as opposed to short-term dopamine hits - for users. One strategy is to rely on user surveys (over, say, clicks) - an approach Pinterest recently wrote about from their experience: medium.com/pinterest-en...

Healthier Personalization with Surveys

Leif Sigerson | Senior Data Scientist, Data Platforms Science, Stephanie Chen | Staff Quantitative Product Researcher, Product Research…

medium.com

Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · Jun 15

A year in the making, the Council on Technology and Social Cohesion's Blueprint on "Prosocial Tech Design Governance" is out - and gives platforms and policy makers a guide to building spaces that foster social cohesion, "the glue that holds society together."
toda.org/assets/files...

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Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · May 21

One of the critiques of Community Notes is that they can be gamed - and so can be biased. It looks like X has taken note: www.socialmediatoday.com/news/x-forme...

X Implements New Measures To Detect Manipulation of Community Notes

X has added a new method to detect coordinated notes activity.

www.socialmediatoday.com

Prosocial Design Network @prosocialdesign.bsky.social · May 20

Japan may be ahead of the curve in using AI to foster healthy discussions. Yahoo! News, one of Japan's most popular sites, suggests ways users can rephrase their comments to be more constructive - going back to last fall.
www.thepickool.com/yahoo-news-j...

Yahoo! News Japan Introduces AI-Powered Comment Review System

Yahoo! News Japan introduces AI-powered "Comment Review Model" to promote healthier discussions by suggesting revisions to potentially offensive comments.

www.thepickool.com

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