I did take Algorithms.
The definition we learned (let me know if I am wrong) is that an algorithm is a concrete set of steps to accomplish some goal in a finite amount of time given legitimate inputs.
Although in practice we use this more for stuff with a math formula and/or stuff you code. “Given the input of the world, if your eyes see it is raining outside, grab the umbrella from your closet. If you don’t see the umbrella, search for it. If the search takes 5+ minutes, just go to your destination” is an algorithm for trying to not get rained on, but in practice nobody’s going to be using that word that way.
I think the definition used online today is “some computer code that I can’t reliably determine the input/output of, that is used to my/society’s disadvantage in an exploitative way.”
Words evolve, and the word you learn in academia sometimes also gets used in real life and its usage changes in real life from what you would use in academia. And sometimes academia keeps using it that way, and real life keeps using it their different way, and so you use the same word while talking about slightly different concepts. And sometimes people in real life use it the academic way, others don’t, making things even more confusing… you just have to be aware people are using the same word to talk about two different things (or in this case, one group uses the word to talk about an unpleasant subset of the thing the other group uses the word to talk about) and clear up that misunderstanding.
I realize my wording “Gave up on All” probably came off as if I wanted to use it and was disappointed I couldn’t, so I appreciate you trying to give me advice on how I could still use it. I’m happy doing things this way though. I find Subscribed far easier to use than playing whack-a-mole with the many, many meme communities that inevitably have a “haha the world SUCKS” post, and then understandable but still-not-good-for-me-personally vents about the world sucking in the comments. Or news communities (not just politics!) that inevitably post something that could tie into politics, and then all the politics in the comments. You said it’s exhausting yourself, and I simply don’t have the energy to put quite that much effort into it. If you find it worth it anyways, more power to you, but I really don’t mind missing out on something I might like in exchange for missing out on 1) stuff I really don’t like and 2) a lot of stuff I’m ambivalent about and would rather just scroll past.
I do look at !newcommunities@lemmy.world, which is good enough for me in my opinion re: discovering new stuff, and although this isn’t really the purpose of !fedigrow@lemm.ee, it often tells me about communities I didn’t know about. And sometimes I click Communities on an instance and wander through the list.