Best content recommendations for whom?

Talking about the role of AI in Meta’s offerings in a recent interview on Stratechery, Mark Zuckerberg explained his vision of what people want when using social apps:

You have a few minutes and you want to discover the best content. Sometimes I want to watch specifically videos, but a lot of the times I just want the best stuff. So I think having the ability to kind of intermix video, photos, text, all these different things, content from friends, content not from friends is going to be a really big advantage, but again, that’s more a question. It’s not a technological advantage as much as it’s an advantage from the way that we look at the world and the problem that we’re trying to solve, which is a different problem than what others are trying to solve.

Translation: It’s no secret that Meta’s business model can be summarized as a predatory surveillance-based advertising network, in the guise of a popular social network. Meta needs not only to increase its revenue stream but also to prevent its users from spending time on TikTok. Monetarization of your interactions with family, friends, and people you follow is not enough to make this happen, so we are using AI to take content recommendations to a whole new level.

In Q1 2022, TikTok was the top app by worldwide downloads, surpassing Meta’s Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp for the top spot. No wonder Meta is worried about TikTok.