Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Annotation is now a web standard

hypothes.is

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 164 posts

Re: Annotation is now a web standard

#71

Post by dwhly »

robbles wrote: post #46

Federated comments/annotations sound really cool from a developer's point of view, but also seem like a nightmare for publishers. If you cede administrative control over the comments on your site, how do you control trolls/attacks/spam/etc.? Services like hypothes.is can do some filtering automatically, but this is missing the level above that - editorial privileges on comments on your own domain.

In terms of controlling for trolls/spam, etc annotation service providers will need to use the same combination of automatic filtering and editorial or community moderation that are relied on widely elsewhere. The success of any individual service will presumably at least partly depend on how good of a job they do.

Ultimately annotation is something that readers choose to enable by adding to their browser, and by choosing the service they prefer-- just as they may elect to have a discussion about the page on reddit, twitter, facebook, etc.

With regard to whether sites should be able to have editorial privileges on their own domain, or to what degree should page owners have consent over annotation, we've blogged about that here: https://hypothes.is/blog/involving-page-owners-in-annotation...

There's a wide diversity of opinion. Some suggested a flag where site owners could register their preference not to be annotated. Overriding that flag would invite additional scrutiny from moderators. Others have suggested that such a flag not be able to be overridden.

We also facilitated a panel discussion on this discussion at our last I Annotate conference in 2016. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2yFnu_pCGI&list=PLmuJEyeapl...

Re: Annotation is now a web standard

#72

Post by anamoulous »

jdavis703 wrote: post #67
anamoulous wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For one, the Genius proxy server violates copyright and does not provide an opt-out.

How does a proxy server violate copyright? Maybe I don't understand what exactly Genius is doing, but how is this different from say blocking ad servers in my hosts file?

https://genius.it/11417147/news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1374...

Re: Annotation is now a web standard

#73

Post by dwhly »

tyingq wrote: post #70
dragonwriter wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It just decouples commenting communities from publishers of the content being commented on, it doesn't change (increase or decrease) the work required or tools available for moderation. In effect, it just provides a standard structure for consumer-driven discovery of what already happens in off-site discussions that already happen (e.g., via sharing and dicussing the source on social media.)

It increases the discoverability significantly. The negative information or spam that's not on your site is suddenly...on your site. It's like making it mandatory for restaurants to have a live updating Yelp! review display scrolling at the front door. (assuming I understand the proposal correctly...I didn't see much control there for website owners)

Certainly if browsers integrate annotation natively, it would increase the discoverability of conversation considerably which is of course the point.

I personally think if that is done it should require the user to purposely choose an annotation service as well. The actual act of inviting the conversation to pages should involve a user choice.

See further thoughts on the question of page owner consent-to-be-annotated in another of my replies above.

Re: Annotation is now a web standard

#75

Post by dwhly »

mcbits wrote: post #25

This is the first I've heard of this annotation initiative, so maybe I'm misunderstanding... Annotations are tied to a particular location within the content but maintained independently of the content and publisher? What happens if the content changes? Random example: Someone highlights a picture of salad and notes "my favorite food!" and then the publisher changes the image to show roadkill instead of salad.

Our implementation at Hypothesis uses a robust anchoring approach we call Fuzzy Anchoring. https://hypothes.is/blog/fuzzy-anchoring/

Re: Annotation is now a web standard

#76

Post by dwhly »

Animats wrote: post #52

So who manages Annotation Central? Disqus? Google? Facebook? The State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television of the People's Republic of China?

Part of the goal of making it a standard, and one in particular where annotation clients could listen to multiple annotation service providers, is precisely to avoid "Annotation Central". Our client does not currently operate this way, but our intention is to move that direction this year. Many underlying architectural changes are being made now to support that change.

Re: Annotation is now a web standard

#77

Post by blueyes »

I know Dan Whaley, the author of the post, personally. This is not about promoting a company. This is about allowing people with knowledge to combat fake news. He has been working to make annotation a web standard for years. The fake news that he, in particular, is worried about is climate change denial. The pages of the WSJ and much of the Web are riddled with BS. This annotation enablement will allow, for example, climate scientists to set up channels that annotate the falsehoods and point to credible sources and facts.

Re: Annotation is now a web standard

#78

Post by dwhly »

rrix2 wrote: post #65
jccalhoun wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If this is going to be used they will have to figure out how to deal with spam, vandalism, and harassment.

I'm especially worried about harassment, honestly. The fact that your domain can be marked up in a browser with no moderation capabilities is just going to lead to worse gamergate style brigading and harassment. https://ellacydawson.wordpress.com/2016/03/25/how-news-geniu...

We agree that this is an issue that deserves attention. We've discussed it here.

https://hypothes.is/blog/involving-page-owners-in-annotation...

Re: Annotation is now a web standard

#79

Post by dwhly »

Dangeranger wrote: post #3

If I leave an annotation with this standard must that annotation be public? Are there options for private annotations? How much private data about my browser and my host am I leaving when an annotation is created? Is there a practical way to delete these both from the page and the public record, or would they be stored in perpetuity?

Hypothesis supports private "only me" annotations, as well as the ability to create ad-hoc private groups. Only about 24% of annotations made through our service are public.

Re: Annotation is now a web standard

#80

Post by dwhly »

jachee wrote: post #20

This is interesting. I hope it doesn't slow things down too much or become another spam vector. Aside: That interactive SVG slide-show is pretty impressive in itself.

> That interactive SVG slide-show is pretty impressive in itself.

That is @shepazu's work.

Post reply on HN