Showerthought: I used to think the 'shadowban' thing was just for famous people

I posted a video about a local protest in Austin last month, and my views just stopped dead at 87. My friend sent me a link to my own post and said it didn't show up in her feed at all. I checked with a few other accounts and sure enough, it was invisible unless you had the direct URL. It wasn't about breaking rules, it was just political. Has anyone else had a post just quietly disappear like that?

3 comments

3 Comments

nguyen.blake1mo ago

Oh man, that's not a shadowban. That's the algorithm just burying it. Happens all the time with certain topics. Your stuff is still there, just no one gets shown it.

jamie8041mo ago

Wait, I see it the other way. If it's buried by the algorithm, that's basically a shadowban in practice. Your posts get zero reach, which is the whole point of being shadowbanned. The end result is the same, you're just arguing about what to call it.

-1

bennett.harper1mo ago

Yeah, the whole "just the algorithm" thing... it feels like that's everywhere now. It's not just posts, it's like how search results for local news never show the messy stuff. You get a quiet, clean version of everything. It's the same pattern, making the complicated parts of life harder to see unless you already know where to look.