Your commission: prepare a defensible briefing for a school digital-wellbeing group and student media team. They want to know whether a feed can improve discovery while respecting users and supporting creators. Choose a priority; support it with a mechanism and evidence. This classroom commission is invented. The TikTok investigation and YouTube policies below are real.
Case boundary: recommendation, user control and creator opportunity
TikTok describes a personalized recommendation system. In February 2026, the European Commission reported a preliminary finding concerning addictive design under the Digital Services Act, including a highly personalized recommender alongside other features. YouTube publishes policies for eligible creator revenue sharing. These establish different things: a provider account of a mechanism, a regulator’s preliminary risk finding and a payment contract. They do not establish an individual creator’s income or the causal effect of one design feature.
Inquiry: To what extent should a feed prioritize engagement rather than discovery, and what can the available evidence tell us about the consequences?
How TikTok recommends videos #ForYou
TikTok Newsroom · Read the primary source
Assigned locator: Sections “What factors contribute to For You?” and “Diversifying recommendations”; locate the paragraph beginning “A strong indicator of interest…”
Paraphrased claim: The account groups signals into interactions, video information and device/account settings. It describes finishing a longer video as a stronger indicator than shared country, and acknowledges filter-bubble risk.
Origin, purpose and evidence: Official provider explanation of design; intended to explain and build trust. It is a primary account of what the provider states, not an independent measurement.
Relationship to another source: Compare its risk acknowledgement with C. Different dates and questions mean one cannot simply “prove” or “disprove” the other.
Limit: Historical description; exact current weights, individual experiences and independently measured harm are absent.
You decide: What exact sentence or section supports your chosen claim? Which part of your inquiry can this source answer?
Commission preliminarily finds TikTok’s addictive design in breach of the Digital Services Act
European Commission · Read the primary source
Assigned locator: Opening finding and sections on addictive design/risk assessment; paragraph listing infinite scroll, autoplay, push notifications and the highly personalized recommender.
Paraphrased claim: The Commission reports a preliminary finding concerning addictive design. Its investigation considers scientific research, internal documents/data and expert interviews, among other evidence.
Origin, purpose and evidence: Official EU regulatory communication summarizing an investigation. It has a regulatory purpose and provides a bounded account, rather than raw study data for classroom re-analysis.
Relationship to another source: Relate its personalization concern to A’s description of signals and diversification. Separate acknowledged risks from demonstrated safeguards.
Limit: Preliminary, not final. Several design features are considered together. It does not isolate the recommender’s causal effect or establish worldwide creator income.
You decide: What exact sentence or section supports your chosen claim? Which part of your inquiry can this source answer?
YouTube partner earnings overview
YouTube Help · Read the primary source
Assigned locator: “How much does YouTube pay?” → ad revenue sharing: Watch Page Monetization Module and Shorts Monetization Module.
Paraphrased claim: The policy distinguishes 55% of net Watch Page ad revenue from 45% of a Shorts Creator Pool share allocated to the creator. Other earning routes include fan funding.
Origin, purpose and evidence: Platform policy/help page: useful for contractual bases and eligibility language; not a dataset on typical earnings.
Relationship to another source: Connect revenue eligibility and allocation to the exposure mechanism. More exposure alone does not prove paid or higher-valued views.
Limit: No guaranteed payment; different percentage bases; no individual earnings or distribution data.
You decide: What exact sentence or section supports your chosen claim? Which part of your inquiry can this source answer?
Rapid growth of digital economy calls for coherent policy response
International Labour Organization · Read the primary source
Assigned locator: Opening summary and paragraphs describing digital labour platforms, workers and policy responses.
Paraphrased claim: The research summary situates platform work within a global digital economy and discusses opportunities and working-condition challenges.
Origin, purpose and evidence: ILO research communication based on its platform-work report; a broader labour lens than a provider’s product description.
Relationship to another source: Use with A/Y to ask who performs work and who controls market access. It adds context, not TikTok-specific wage evidence.
Limit: Historical, cross-platform summary. Do not treat it as a 2026 survey of TikTok creators or infer current wages.
You decide: What exact sentence or section supports your chosen claim? Which part of your inquiry can this source answer?
Source passport and 3Cs
For A and C: record exact locator, supported claim, origin/date/purpose, evidence/method, corroboration, limitation and usefulness. Compare on one theme before writing a conclusion. These are paraphrase cards; open the original when exact wording matters. If blocked, use the attributed card and name the access limit.
Concept: choose power, systems, values and ethics, or expression. Content: identify the operation or data property that matters. Context: explain why a school user, EU regulator, advertiser and creator may judge the same outcome differently. Compare two stakeholders’ goals and actual control.