I think this is a natural consequence of the twitter format. The short message motivates (some) users to win cheap points, offend or simply scream loudly in order to get attention. In my Luddite mind the political conversation is becoming Twitter-fied and now focuses more on short sound bites rather than a sound discourse.
Too many people have peed in the pool
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Re: Too many people have peed in the pool
#12It's a wonder he lasted as long as he did. I've joined a number of online forums through the years, and I've always ended up leaving them due to a spiral of "tone gets rough / the good people leave". I'm still in this one, but I guess we'll see how long it lasts here. Seems different somehow, but they all do in the beginning. What are some innovations in solving the asshole/quality spiral? There's lots of takes on mo…
Anonymity helps a lot, I think. This site isn't completely anonymous but it de-emphasizes usernames such that it's easy to miss them. Explicit policies are the other thing, and strong personal leadership. It's when the moderators become an unaccountable committee that a site starts to go downhill.
Re: Too many people have peed in the pool
#13It's a wonder he lasted as long as he did. I've joined a number of online forums through the years, and I've always ended up leaving them due to a spiral of "tone gets rough / the good people leave". I'm still in this one, but I guess we'll see how long it lasts here. Seems different somehow, but they all do in the beginning. What are some innovations in solving the asshole/quality spiral? There's lots of takes on mo…
Joel Spolsky wrote an excellent post on building a community: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/BuildingCommunitieswi...
Of course he later closed his flourishing community suddenly. Very suddenly. Everyone was confused.
And the worlds he's built since, such as StackOverflow, are deliberately completely devoid of all community.
The smallest remnants of the community survive and evolve at http://www.crazyontap.com/
But still, that old post was so good I had to dig it out and read it again. I think it all still stands.
Re: Too many people have peed in the pool
#14> 'to turn as swimmers into cleanness leaping.’
I had to look that one up:
Peace, by Rupert Brooke, 1914:
"A paradoxical image, comparing going to war as an act that cleanses the participants, like a dip in a pool or river."
https://movehimintothesun.wordpress.com/2010/10/22/rupert-br...
I'm assuming that connection was intentional, because Stephen Fry is smarter than me.
Re: Too many people have peed in the pool
#15I'm a bit monomaniacal about this, but the current online culture wars (and the previous offline culture wars) make me wish that secession didn't have such a bad name. It is obvious that large groups of people have irreconcilable differences of opinion on matters of free speech, sexuality, gun ownership and so on.
It is a shame that rather than a firm handshake and friendly wave goodbye, we will end up with a totalitarianism of one ideology or another, violence, or both.
Re: Too many people have peed in the pool
#16"To leave that metaphor, let us grieve at what twitter has become. A stalking ground for the sanctimoniously self-righteous who love to second-guess, to leap to conclusions and be offended – worse, to be offended on behalf of others they do not even know. It’s as nasty and unwholesome a characteristic as can be imagined. It doesn’t matter whether they think they’re defending women, men, transgender people, Muslims, humanists … the ghastliness is absolutely the same. It makes sensible people want to take an absolutely opposite point of view. I’ve heard people shriek their secularism in such a way as to make me want instantly to become an evangelical Christian."
This is a fair description of how Stephen Fry (as much as I love him) acted towards me on Twitter several years ago. (about the time I left twitter for good)
I don't think he's a bad guy, I think there is just an authoritarian streak running thru out culture right now that is so strong that a guy who, at the time, had just played a persecuted gay man in V for Vendetta was advocating for the persecution of people he didn't like! (though I'm sure he didn't realize it/recognize it/intend it.)
I think Stephen is a well intentioned guy who doesn't intend to piss in the pool, but I think propaganda has scared and manipulated him, as it has done so many others over history.
Re: Too many people have peed in the pool
#17I left Twitter last year when it looked like the 'professionally offended' were becoming too influential. They didn't affect me as I keep a low profile, but it was like seeing an omen and noticing friends were buying into their hype.
The way Twitter is now pandering to this lot with the recently announced Orwellian-style group, and other odd behaviour suggests that they approve of the current momentum.
I'm just glad to no longer have its weight on my shoulders. Life is great without social media, but it must be difficult for public figures who stick with it for the free promotion.
Re: Too many people have peed in the pool
#18I think this is a natural consequence of the twitter format. The short message motivates (some) users to win cheap points, offend or simply scream loudly in order to get attention. In my Luddite mind the political conversation is becoming Twitter-fied and now focuses more on short sound bites rather than a sound discourse.
Now? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amusing_Ourselves_to_Death
[Neil Postman] also repeatedly states that the eighteenth
century, being the Age of Reason, was the pinnacle for rational
argument. Only in the printed word, he states, could complicated
truths be rationally conveyed. Postman gives a striking example:
Many of the first fifteen U.S. presidents could probably have
walked down the street without being recognized by the average
citizen, yet all these men would have been quickly known by their
written words. However, the reverse is true today. The names of
presidents or even famous preachers, lawyers, and scientists call
up visual images, typically television images, but few, if any,
of their words come to mind. The few that do almost exclusively
consist of carefully chosen soundbites.Re: Too many people have peed in the pool
#19I think this is a natural consequence of the twitter format. The short message motivates (some) users to win cheap points, offend or simply scream loudly in order to get attention. In my Luddite mind the political conversation is becoming Twitter-fied and now focuses more on short sound bites rather than a sound discourse.
[deleted]
Re: Too many people have peed in the pool
#20Or maybe you just have to go to a pool in a better neighborhood? After all on Twitter you can choose from whom you're getting status updates, can't you?
Not since Twitter has chosen to start "shadowbanning" users. When this happens, you can explicitly follow someone, but you will not see their messages in your timeline.
Unfollowing/refollowing the user seems to clear it at least for a time, but you have to be really paying attention to even notice that it happens. I'm going to guess that it takes the form of a "silent" unfollow on their backend.
And on a more opinionated note: No prizes for guessing the political leanings of those this happens to.