Mike Masnick:

People also seem to forget that recommendation algorithms aren’t just telling you what content they think you’ll want to see. They’re also helping to minimize the content you probably don’t want to see. Search engines choosing which links show up first are also choosing which links they won’t show you. My email is only readable because of the recommendation engines I run against it (more than just a spam filter, I also run algorithms that automatically put emails into different folders based on likely importance and priority).

Algorithms aren’t just a necessary part of making the internet usable today. They’re a key part of improving our experiences.

Yes, sometimes algorithms get things wrong. They could recommend something you don’t want. Or demote something you do. Or maybe they recommend some problematic information. But sometimes people get things wrong too. Part of internet literacy is recognizing that what an algorithm presents to you is just a suggestion and not wholly outsourcing your brain to the algorithm. If the problem is people outsourcing their brain to the algorithm, it won’t be solved by outlawing algorithms or adding liability to them.

It being just a suggestion or a recommendation is also important from a legal standpoint: because recommendation algorithms are simply opinions. They are opinions of what content that algorithm thinks is most relevant to you at the time based on what information it has at that time.

And opinions are protected free speech under the First Amendment.