"Censorship by moderators"
How about:
"Curation by moderators"
Analyzing HN moderation and censorship
11–20 of 409 posts
Re: Analyzing HN moderation and censorship
#12There are two other features not listed: submission throttling for comments (which I suspect mods have some influence on) and slow banning (making the site slow for flagged users).
For a different approach to moderation, check out Lobsters.
Re: Analyzing HN moderation and censorship
#13Article doesn’t mention what I believe is one mod tool: shadow banning accounts based on IP. I had a bunch of accounts get shadowbanned for no evident reason and after a while I deduced it was based on using the account from a particular cafe’s WiFi. I just created this account and if I go use it from that place I will be banned again by some automated process.
> I had a bunch of accounts
Maybe that is the problem.
Re: Analyzing HN moderation and censorship
#14Moderators should in no way be able to bury posts or even nudge them downwards. This is a cowardly way to try to control discussion. If it isn't explicitly against the site rules, let the readers decide.
I've long come to accept that HN is a curated source, the voting is a kind of false-democracy to make it appear more democratic than it is. Yes, likely >90% of the site is done through voting, but a significant amount of pruning and bumping clearly also occurs.
It's not a democracy at all. User votes are one signal the site uses among many. It's been like that since day one.
Re: Analyzing HN moderation and censorship
#15Moderators should in no way be able to bury posts or even nudge them downwards. This is a cowardly way to try to control discussion. If it isn't explicitly against the site rules, let the readers decide.
It's a private space and they want to promote a certain kind of discussion. It's not cowardly at all.
Re: Analyzing HN moderation and censorship
#16Moderators should in no way be able to bury posts or even nudge them downwards. This is a cowardly way to try to control discussion. If it isn't explicitly against the site rules, let the readers decide.
I've long come to accept that HN is a curated source, the voting is a kind of false-democracy to make it appear more democratic than it is. Yes, likely >90% of the site is done through voting, but a significant amount of pruning and bumping clearly also occurs.
Purpose of HN is ultimately agitprop for YC. It makes sense that curation of posts occurs--this only confuses people that buy too much into the "hacker" ethos.
Re: Analyzing HN moderation and censorship
#17Paywalled articles are explicitly not against the rules.
Re: Analyzing HN moderation and censorship
#18I've noticed that a lot of submissions have had their titles changed recently (past month or two). I wasn't aware that users were allowed to change their own titles - I was chalking this up to moderators "curating" articles.
How often do users change the titles of their submissions? There's no way to tell.
Re: Analyzing HN moderation and censorship
#19Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've long come to accept that HN is a curated source, the voting is a kind of false-democracy to make it appear more democratic than it is. Yes, likely >90% of the site is done through voting, but a significant amount of pruning and bumping clearly also occurs.
It's not a democracy at all. User votes are one signal the site uses among many. It's been like that since day one.
Sure... it's still mostly about votes right?
"Popular things go to the top" is a pretty good first approximation of the algorithm. You have things getting flagged to death for generating bad conversation/flamewars (kinda like parents telling kids to stop playing rough since people are getting hurt). There's the hiring posts. At least to me, it's always felt like moderation is happening at the margins.
Re: Analyzing HN moderation and censorship
#20There are two other features not listed: submission throttling for comments (which I suspect mods have some influence on) and slow banning (making the site slow for flagged users). For a different approach to moderation, check out Lobsters.
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