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Reddit CEO Cracks Down on Abusive Content to Protect Users, Attract Advertisers

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Re: Reddit CEO Cracks Down on Abusive Content to Protect Users, Attract Advertisers

#211

Post by mtgx »

argv_empty wrote: post #42
malvosenior wrote: post #8

I would love to see a statement from Reddit/Twitter... explicitly stating that they will remain politically neutral. There’s certainly content that should legally be taken down, there’s probably content that isn’t advertising friendly and could be taken down. It seems like these companies are being very slanted in their evaluation of the latter category. Basically right leaning = bad, left leaning = good. All I want…

The subs I've heard about banning were echo chambers dedicated to the idea that "this group of people I don't like ought to be [starved|exiled|thrown from helicopters|raped|enslaved]" and such things. If that makes you think the policy is "right leaning = bad, left leaning = good," that says some pretty nasty things about the modern right, doesn't it?

One could argue /r/politics is an echo-chamber, too. I mean, it has been anti-Republican for a while, but at this point it's beyond absurd. All I see is Trump news. Like they hardly even talk about bad laws Republicans pass anymore. If it's not Trump-related, it's typically not upvoted/is downvoted.

I think it may be time for Reddit to experiment with removing the downvote button, or maybe give it 25% of the power it has now, or something along those lines.

Re: Reddit CEO Cracks Down on Abusive Content to Protect Users, Attract Advertisers

#212

Post by justaman »

grandalf wrote: post #67
malvosenior wrote: post #8

I would love to see a statement from Reddit/Twitter... explicitly stating that they will remain politically neutral. There’s certainly content that should legally be taken down, there’s probably content that isn’t advertising friendly and could be taken down. It seems like these companies are being very slanted in their evaluation of the latter category. Basically right leaning = bad, left leaning = good. All I want…

Excellent point. Sadly this will likely not happen. Google and Facebook are gradually imposing a highly censored world view. We can’t effectively reason about social media censorship by analogizing it to meatspace. Just as virality mechanisms amplify “good” content, they also change the equilibrium state of whose ideas can spread. Censorship programs work like a squirt of insecticide into a beehive, they kill off som…

Kaepernick doesnt have a job because he won like one game in his last season added to the fact that people want to watch sports for the same reason people do anything in leisure, to escape the troubles of the world(politics). He was a slower R Wilson, a smaller C Newton, and a less accurate D Brees.

Marshawn Lynch has never stood for the national anthem. Not once; even before Kaepernick. He still has a job because he is a great player.

Re: Reddit CEO Cracks Down on Abusive Content to Protect Users, Attract Advertisers

#213

Post by Spivak »

abiox wrote: post #187
sillysaurus3 wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, that's the crux: racism and misogyny are terrible enough that if you hate it, you must be correct. For me personally, the echo chamber on both sides is enough to keep me far away from both /r/politics and /r/The_Donald. For example, you cannot say anything positive about Trump on /r/politics. Nothing. There was a screenshot showing that there were 231 negative articles posted and zero positive articles. It's lite…

> Are you sure it's true that Trump's entire political franchise has had zero good ideas? there was dropping the tpp... maybe. that's probably good, but i have mixed feelings. anything else?

He/His administration negotiated a some positive trade deals with China that people who work in foreign trade seem to be happy with.

Re: Reddit CEO Cracks Down on Abusive Content to Protect Users, Attract Advertisers

#214

Post by creaghpatr »

GeneralTspoon wrote: post #169
alexanderstears wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you define "Islamophobia"? It's a serious question, I don't disagree that there's some prejudice against Islam on the western right. However, a lot of the top posts are ultimately factual claims. Sweden has a rise in grenade attacks and sexual assaults, British police looked the other way when Muslim Men formed a pedophilia group, most terrorism is motivated by Islam, and there are Islamists whose purported goal…

Could you cite some sources for the above claims? Snopes says the increase in reported sexual assaults in Sweden could possibly be to do with the definition of "sexual assault" changing in 2013[0] Regarding the Paedophile ring, I haven't read any material on it - but there have been several high profile non-Muslim paedophilia cases in Britain, and it would be unsurprising to me if police didn't turn a blind eye at so…

Citing snopes and the telegraph? Give me a break. This is a widely documented trend, made worse by the fact that it's illegal to report the demographics of offenders.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-16/crime-wav...

Re: Reddit CEO Cracks Down on Abusive Content to Protect Users, Attract Advertisers

#215

Post by Danihan »

enord wrote: post #175
sillysaurus3 wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, that's the crux: racism and misogyny are terrible enough that if you hate it, you must be correct. For me personally, the echo chamber on both sides is enough to keep me far away from both /r/politics and /r/The_Donald. For example, you cannot say anything positive about Trump on /r/politics. Nothing. There was a screenshot showing that there were 231 negative articles posted and zero positive articles. It's lite…

>Ah, that's the crux: racism and misogyny are terrible enough that if you hate it, you must be correct. As is required to maintain what I would call a "democracy" with "individual rights". We have to be vehemently intolerant of intolerance and marginalization (in general), and this is more important than free speech. Free speech is an artefact of-, not a requirement for democracy. Tolerance is required, however. Some…

>Free speech is an artefact of-, not a requirement for democracy. Tolerance is required, however.

That seems like a pretty grand statement to make offhand and pretend like it's objective.

Free speech is in the very first amendment. #1. Yet you feel so comfortable hand-waving it away.

Freedom of Association implies just the opposite of your argument, that intolerence is specifically protected.

Re: Reddit CEO Cracks Down on Abusive Content to Protect Users, Attract Advertisers

#216

Post by anon1385 »

nilkn wrote: post #139
jackmott wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should anyone remain politically neutral no matter what? What if the Nazi party came into power? Impartiality can impart political bias if the facts happen to lean one way or the other, as they will from time to time.

Open platforms for discussion are actually one of the best ways to prevent something like the Nazi party from coming into power. And if the Nazi party did come into power, you would not expect there to be impartiality in any major discussion forums in the nation. Example: A lot of folks are flabbergasted at /r/The_Donald, but I've always contended that that subreddit exists and developed into its current culture prec…

I'm not at all convinced that this actually works. It's a nice liberal idea and it would be great if it worked but the evidence doesn't look good. The US media thought they were doing everybody a favour by giving Trump loads of airtime to expose his awful views. It backfired massively.

I think the biggest problem is that it only works when the other side is willing to play by the rules of the game. If the opposition is willing to blatantly lie even in the face of direct evidence then the normal rules of debate just break down. (I know all politicians lie, but Trump's disregard for political norms is completely different from what you got from candidates like McCain, Obama, Romney or Bush).

Similarly from a UK perspective giving disproportionate coverage to UKIP and Farage just increased their popularity.

Re: Reddit CEO Cracks Down on Abusive Content to Protect Users, Attract Advertisers

#217

Post by sctb »

briholt wrote: post #125
jackmott wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are supposed to throw fascists from helicopters.

Any HN mods want to jump in here and suggest maybe HN is a tech forum and not the appropriate place to promote political violence? Or perhaps this brand of hate and hysteria has completely infected this community as well.

You're right, it's not OK. But adding your own flavor of inflammation doesn't help. The way we can improve threads here is to 1) flag and downvotes comments that violate the guidelines, 2) comment civilly and substantively. Add information and insight. The way to do that is patiently and thoughtfully. Slow down and resist responding reflexively—it almost always makes things worse instead of better. If you notice something egregious, feel free to email us at hn@ycombinator.com so you can be sure we'll see it.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Reddit CEO Cracks Down on Abusive Content to Protect Users, Attract Advertisers

#218

Post by odiroot »

empath75 wrote: post #79

Reddit is swarming with Russian bots and they still have a whole network of white supremecy and various hate subs, operating both out in the open and ‘quarantined’.

Oh, yes the Russian boogeyman again.

Suddenly everything in the (Internet) world can be explained with «Russia». Second coming of McCarthyism.

Re: Reddit CEO Cracks Down on Abusive Content to Protect Users, Attract Advertisers

#219

Post by SippinLean »

Fnoord wrote: post #9
godman_8 wrote: post #4

Yah, except they're hosting /r/The_Donald which has been confirmed to violate Reddit rules. Just like Twitter they cherry pick for $$$.

At least you know what you get when you visit /r/The_Donald. Is it better to have a cesspit bubble/sandbox than having none?

It's hardly a sandbox, but more of an inlet with a lot of spillover. There's anecdotally been a HUGE spike in bigotry and white supremacy on what used to be good subs since last year when that sub grew in numbers. Looking at the post history of these users, it almost always includes t_d.

Re: Reddit CEO Cracks Down on Abusive Content to Protect Users, Attract Advertisers

#220

Post by fhood »

aeorgnoieang wrote: post #182
fhood wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First off, the first amendment is specifically with respect to congress, and I don't understand why I have to say this so often. Second, society has always been self censoring, but the internet has thrown a wrench into that by allowing people to escape into pockets of like minded individuals. And you might have noticed that hacker news is fairly heavily censored, and as a result has managed to avoid turning into a ce…

> First off, the first amendment is specifically with respect to congress, and I don't understand why I have to say this so often. It's also been 'incorporated' against the states (and their sub-governments like municipalities). But free speech , as a political value, isn't restricted to the U.S. Congress. That may be why you keep repeating something that's mostly irrelevant. Wanting to "escape into pockets of like m…

About the free speech thing, people should say free speech when they mean free speech and not the first amendment. The first amendment is a specific thing with a specific meaning, and invoking it implies the weight of law. Facebook can censor speech without breaking the law. They might be violating the principle of free speech, but not the first amendment.

I agree with you about reddit.

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