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Inside the Instagram AI that fills Explore with fresh, juicy content

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inside the instagram ai that fills explore with fresh juicy content

Instagram has posted an article describing the behind-the-scenes machinery that fills the Explore tab in Instagram with new, interesting stuff every time you open it. It’s a bit technical, so here are five takeaways.

Even Instagram and Facebook have limited resources

Unlike the feed, which some still would prefer was simply chronological, the Explore tab needs to be algorithmically driven. But understanding what’s happening on an image-based social network and recommending new content to people is a problem that’s exactly as hard as you make it.

If these companies had infinite processing power and time, they’d probably come at the question of Explore a bit differently. But as it is they need to serve hundreds of millions of people on short notice and with merely enormous computing resources. I think they put this at the top of the post so people don’t wonder why they’re cutting corners.

It’s also easier to experiment and iterate when you can change stuff and see results quickly, they point out.

It’s all about the account, not the post

So much is posted to Instagram that it would be pretty much impossible to keep track of every photo individually, for recommendation purposes anyway. It’s simpler and more efficient to track accounts, since accounts tend to have themes or topics, from a broader one like “travel” to something highly specific, like especially round seals.

While liking one post from an account doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll like everything else from that account, it is a good indicator that you’re at least interested in the theme of that account. Even if it was this particular post of this particular cat that you wanted to heart because it reminds you of old Mittens, if you’re liking pictures from an account that mostly posts cats, that’s valuable information.

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Complex habits inform the algorithm

Notably it isn’t just image features that Instagram uses to figure out what accounts are topically linked, though of course that kind of thing can be detected too. They also use your behavior.

instagram explore ai

For instance, when you like several posts in a row, they’re more likely to be linked in some way even if Instagram’s algorithms can’t quite see it:

If an individual interacts with a sequence of accounts in the same session, it’s more likely to be topically coherent compared with a random sequence of accounts from the diverse range of Instagram accounts. This helps us identify topically similar accounts.

People just tend to look into stuff that way, going from one travel-focused account to the next, or focusing on animals because they need a pick-me up. All that information gets sucked up by the algorithm and inspected for relevance. Of course deliberate actions like “see fewer posts like this” and blocking accounts has a lot of weight as well.

From “seed accounts” to a top 25

The process of getting from a couple billion posts to just two dozen can be pretty difficult, but you can cut the problem down to manageable size by limiting the Explore tab to accounts linked in some way to accounts the user has already liked or saved posts from. These are called “seed accounts” because everything else in the process really grows out of them.

Because of how the machine learning system represents accounts and their topics inside itself, it’s super easy for it to find a couple hundred similar accounts.

Imagine if you know someone likes a particular reddish-orange marble and you need to find some more like it. If you just dip your hand into a sack of marbles you’re unlikely to find one quickly. Even if you pour them out on the floor you’ll still have to hunt around for a bit. But if you’ve already organized them by color, all you have to do is reach into the general vicinity of the marble they like and you’re almost guaranteed to pick a winner.

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The machine learning model does that by giving all these accounts a sort of location in a virtual space, and the closer two are in that space, the closer they are topically.

instagram explore ai2

So the really hard part of paring down a set of billions to a set of hundreds is basically already accomplished by the way the accounts are classified.

From there Instagram does three passes with neural networks of increasing complexity.

First, slightly confusingly, is a simpler, combined version of the next two processes, which takes it from 500 to 150 accounts. This is a little weird, but think about it this way: This neural network has seen steps 2 and 3 happen many times and has a pretty good idea of what they do. Sort of like if you’d seen cookies get made enough times that you could guess at a recipe. You’d probably get close, but you also wouldn’t want to publish it to like a hundred million people. So this step just gets the obvious stuff right.

Second is a computationally cheap neural network that uses way more signals than the simple topical similarity mentioned above. Here’s where your individual likes come into play, as well as the deeper data about accounts. You like travel, sure, but in particular you like couples traveling — both things the marble-sorting algorithm above can help with. Other parameters, like a post’s general popularity, or actually its being different from the other posts in the mix, figure in as well. That skims another 100 off the top, leaving 50.

Third is a computationally expensive version of the above, which does another pass on those 50 and cuts them in half, basically by looking closer and taking the time to include, perhaps, a thousand data points each rather than a hundred.

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I guess that was kind of long for a “takeaway.” Don’t worry, the next one is quick.

And of course, no 🍑

“We want to make sure the content we recommend is both safe and appropriate for a global community of many ages on Explore,” they write. “Using a variety of signals, we filter out content we can identify as not being eligible to be recommended.”

So now you know why you don’t get any of that in Explore.

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Facebook Faces Yet Another Outage: Platform Encounters Technical Issues Again

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Facebook Problem Again

Uppdated: It seems that today’s issues with Facebook haven’t affected as many users as the last time. A smaller group of people appears to be impacted this time around, which is a relief compared to the larger incident before. Nevertheless, it’s still frustrating for those affected, and hopefully, the issues will be resolved soon by the Facebook team.

Facebook had another problem today (March 20, 2024). According to Downdetector, a website that shows when other websites are not working, many people had trouble using Facebook.

This isn’t the first time Facebook has had issues. Just a little while ago, there was another problem that stopped people from using the site. Today, when people tried to use Facebook, it didn’t work like it should. People couldn’t see their friends’ posts, and sometimes the website wouldn’t even load.

Downdetector, which watches out for problems on websites, showed that lots of people were having trouble with Facebook. People from all over the world said they couldn’t use the site, and they were not happy about it.

When websites like Facebook have problems, it affects a lot of people. It’s not just about not being able to see posts or chat with friends. It can also impact businesses that use Facebook to reach customers.

Since Facebook owns Messenger and Instagram, the problems with Facebook also meant that people had trouble using these apps. It made the situation even more frustrating for many users, who rely on these apps to stay connected with others.

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During this recent problem, one thing is obvious: the internet is always changing, and even big websites like Facebook can have problems. While people wait for Facebook to fix the issue, it shows us how easily things online can go wrong. It’s a good reminder that we should have backup plans for staying connected online, just in case something like this happens again.

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Christian family goes in hiding after being cleared of blasphemy

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Christian family goes in hiding after being cleared of blasphemy

LAHORE, Pakistan — A court in Pakistan granted bail to a Christian falsely charged with blasphemy, but he and his family have separated and gone into hiding amid threats to their lives, sources said.

Haroon Shahzad (right) with attorney Aneeqa Maria. | The Voice Society/Morning Star News

Haroon Shahzad, 45, was released from Sargodha District Jail on Nov. 15, said his attorney, Aneeqa Maria. Shahzad was charged with blasphemy on June 30 after posting Bible verses on Facebook that infuriated Muslims, causing dozens of Christian families in Chak 49 Shumaali, near Sargodha in Punjab Province, to flee their homes.

Lahore High Court Judge Ali Baqir Najfi granted bail on Nov. 6, but the decision and his release on Nov. 15 were not made public until now due to security fears for his life, Maria said.

Shahzad told Morning Star News by telephone from an undisclosed location that the false accusation has changed his family’s lives forever.

“My family has been on the run from the time I was implicated in this false charge and arrested by the police under mob pressure,” Shahzad told Morning Star News. “My eldest daughter had just started her second year in college, but it’s been more than four months now that she hasn’t been able to return to her institution. My other children are also unable to resume their education as my family is compelled to change their location after 15-20 days as a security precaution.”

Though he was not tortured during incarceration, he said, the pain of being away from his family and thinking about their well-being and safety gave him countless sleepless nights.

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“All of this is due to the fact that the complainant, Imran Ladhar, has widely shared my photo on social media and declared me liable for death for alleged blasphemy,” he said in a choked voice. “As soon as Ladhar heard about my bail, he and his accomplices started gathering people in the village and incited them against me and my family. He’s trying his best to ensure that we are never able to go back to the village.”

Shahzad has met with his family only once since his release on bail, and they are unable to return to their village in the foreseeable future, he said.

“We are not together,” he told Morning Star News. “They are living at a relative’s house while I’m taking refuge elsewhere. I don’t know when this agonizing situation will come to an end.”

The Christian said the complainant, said to be a member of Islamist extremist party Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan and also allegedly connected with banned terrorist group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, filed the charge because of a grudge. Shahzad said he and his family had obtained valuable government land and allotted it for construction of a church building, and Ladhar and others had filed multiple cases against the allotment and lost all of them after a four-year legal battle.

“Another probable reason for Ladhar’s jealousy could be that we were financially better off than most Christian families of the village,” he said. “I was running a successful paint business in Sargodha city, but that too has shut down due to this case.”

Regarding the social media post, Shahzad said he had no intention of hurting Muslim sentiments by sharing the biblical verse on his Facebook page.

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“I posted the verse a week before Eid Al Adha [Feast of the Sacrifice] but I had no idea that it would be used to target me and my family,” he said. “In fact, when I came to know that Ladhar was provoking the villagers against me, I deleted the post and decided to meet the village elders to explain my position.”

The village elders were already influenced by Ladhar and refused to listen to him, Shahzad said.

“I was left with no option but to flee the village when I heard that Ladhar was amassing a mob to attack me,” he said.

Shahzad pleaded with government authorities for justice, saying he should not be punished for sharing a verse from the Bible that in no way constituted blasphemy.

Similar to other cases

Shahzad’s attorney, Maria, told Morning Star News that events in Shahzad’s case were similar to other blasphemy cases filed against Christians.

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“Defective investigation, mala fide on the part of the police and complainant, violent protests against the accused persons and threats to them and their families, forcing their displacement from their ancestral areas, have become hallmarks of all blasphemy allegations in Pakistan,” said Maria, head of The Voice Society, a Christian paralegal organization.

She said that the case filed against Shahzad was gross violation of Section 196 of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC), which states that police cannot register a case under the Section 295-A blasphemy statute against a private citizen without the approval of the provincial government or federal agencies.

Maria added that Shahzad and his family have continued to suffer even though there was no evidence of blasphemy.

“The social stigma attached with a blasphemy accusation will likely have a long-lasting impact on their lives, whereas his accuser, Imran Ladhar, would not have to face any consequence of his false accusation,” she said.

The judge who granted bail noted that Shahzad was charged with blasphemy under Section 295-A, which is a non-cognizable offense, and Section 298, which is bailable. The judge also noted that police had not submitted the forensic report of Shahzad’s cell phone and said evidence was required to prove that the social media was blasphemous, according to Maria.

Bail was set at 100,000 Pakistani rupees (US $350) and two personal sureties, and the judge ordered police to further investigate, she said.

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Shahzad, a paint contractor, on June 29 posted on his Facebook page 1 Cor. 10:18-21 regarding food sacrificed to idols, as Muslims were beginning the four-day festival of Eid al-Adha, which involves slaughtering an animal and sharing the meat.

A Muslim villager took a screenshot of the post, sent it to local social media groups and accused Shahzad of likening Muslims to pagans and disrespecting the Abrahamic tradition of animal sacrifice.

Though Shahzad made no comment in the post, inflammatory or otherwise, the situation became tense after Friday prayers when announcements were made from mosque loudspeakers telling people to gather for a protest, family sources previously told Morning Star News.

Fearing violence as mobs grew in the village, most Christian families fled their homes, leaving everything behind.

In a bid to restore order, the police registered a case against Shahzad under Sections 295-A and 298. Section 295-A relates to “deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings of any class by insulting its religion or religious beliefs” and is punishable with imprisonment of up to 10 years and fine, or both. Section 298 prescribes up to one year in prison and a fine, or both, for hurting religious sentiments.

Pakistan ranked seventh on Open Doors’ 2023 World Watch List of the most difficult places to be a Christian, up from eighth the previous year.

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Morning Star News is the only independent news service focusing exclusively on the persecution of Christians. The nonprofit’s mission is to provide complete, reliable, even-handed news in order to empower those in the free world to help persecuted Christians, and to encourage persecuted Christians by informing them that they are not alone in their suffering.

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