Live data from Hacker News

4Chan Is Turning 15–And Remains the Internet's Teenager

wired.com

61–70 of 142 posts

Re: 4Chan Is Turning 15–And Remains the Internet's Teenager

#61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> using 4chan and ignore the crap you don't care about. Can you even imagine using 4chan as a woman or a black man? Like not only in real life do you have to deal with people being racist as hell, but hey here's this forum that's entirely shameless about it too. You seem to believe that folks can just ignore being called the n-word day-in and day-out as if it doesn't really affect them. The only people who can go to…

Given the Alexa ranking of 4chan lots of women and non white people use the site so no need to imagine it because it's happening.

Yes I am aware. It's a rhetorical device. As in, "you're forgetting about all the women and black people who use 4chan" - because they do use the site, and their opinions about being called the n-word or "bitches" or being asked to show their breasts matter as well.

Re: 4Chan Is Turning 15–And Remains the Internet's Teenager

#62
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the internet nobody knows you’re a dog.

Right. But let's go /pol/ for a hot sec. Oh hey! Ctrl-F says there's 5 occurrences of the n-word (Hard -r too!). I'm not black, but I imagine that just ignoring stuff like that really gets to you after awhile. Here is a forum where people actively demean others based on the color of their skin, and not only is it normal, but if you're going to visit you need to make sure no one knows that they're actually black. So s…

[flagged]

Re: 4Chan Is Turning 15–And Remains the Internet's Teenager

#63
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the internet nobody knows you’re a dog.

Right. But let's go /pol/ for a hot sec. Oh hey! Ctrl-F says there's 5 occurrences of the n-word (Hard -r too!). I'm not black, but I imagine that just ignoring stuff like that really gets to you after awhile. Here is a forum where people actively demean others based on the color of their skin, and not only is it normal, but if you're going to visit you need to make sure no one knows that they're actually black. So s…

/pol/ is also filled with black nationalists, like NOI/Farrakhan supporters. That's the enigma of 4chan is literally everybody from every group is posting there instead of censorship that ensures only one ideology. By 'ignore what doesn't interest you', I assume that means don't visit the containment boards filled with rampant racism and trolling, you won't find holocaust denial or persistent racist threads on the other boards. It's the same how newsgroups work or discord chat channels work, some are moderated better than others.

Re: 4Chan Is Turning 15–And Remains the Internet's Teenager

#64
post #9

> There isn’t darkness without the light, it seems. So it’s probably fair to say 4channers are, at least a little bit, right: Their haven is the soul of the internet, the deep source of its sights and sounds, for worse and, occasionally, for better. I couldn't see much notable in the article, aside from a negative slew at the start, and some 'the other side of the coin' in the above quote. 15 years is noteworthy, how…

>Traffic has probably been at stable levels for years, while the price of traffic has fallen.

Absolutely not! Please take this the wrong way, but I don't see how an old friend could have not noticed the MASSIVE increase in traffic (and the problems it brought).

Here's some official 2005-2013 traffic statistics from the 10 years anniversary panel I compiled just to prove you wrong: https://i.4cdn.org/s4s/1527869817275.png

Cheers.

Re: 4Chan Is Turning 15–And Remains the Internet's Teenager

#65
post #14

How many of these anti-4chan articles are written by people that regularly use it? I'm guessing zero. 4chan is an interesting site and has better discussion from a broad userbase than reddit or here. Plenty of interesting projects were born out of 4chan, particularly /g/ but the other boards have created valuable things for humans in general, not just internet culture. The positives IMO come from the whole "FREE SPEE…

> using 4chan and ignore the crap you don't care about. Can you even imagine using 4chan as a woman or a black man? Like not only in real life do you have to deal with people being racist as hell, but hey here's this forum that's entirely shameless about it too. You seem to believe that folks can just ignore being called the n-word day-in and day-out as if it doesn't really affect them. The only people who can go to…

Although I am not black, I am Asian, and can be described by a word started with C (/csg/ if you lurk /g/), and more accurately G. I would be offended if someone calls me that in real life.

On 4chan though, I myself really don't get offended in any way. Someone explained it this way: you're only supposed to be offended if someone calls you a n* f* in a setting that not everyone is. On 4chan, everyone is already a n* f* so it kinda levels the playing field.

I get it that others minority people might not share the same view.

Re: 4Chan Is Turning 15–And Remains the Internet's Teenager

#66
post #22

> "The design remains proudly undesigned" I've always thought 4chan was beautifully designed. Its hyperfunctional in a way that wired.com designers will never know because they are too busy injecting ads into every inch of available space.

I wish the comments would nest, even if it's just one level like Stack Exchange.

Re: 4Chan Is Turning 15–And Remains the Internet's Teenager

#67
post #56
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are things called containment boards on 4chan for a reason. Seems that they also contain any outside perspective on the site as well. /b/ and /pol/ are particularly egregious, but they're worth suffering to live if it means I can keep /g/ and /tg/. The open format of the site also, while it does contain a lot of posting, does have a curious cross contamination effect. You may learn about an entirely unrelated t…

From what I can see /pol/ in particular is extremely popular and massively influential in the promotion of shockingly vile politics of a sort that until recently I've never encountered anywhere even close to the mainstream. It is my understanding that it was created as a containment board, but it's popularity and relative power has soured me on the whole site. Here's the problem: /pol/ gets so much traffic that I can…

No more so than you are contributing to the incredibly toxic subreddits like Redpill or the like by posting on any other reddit.

Re: 4Chan Is Turning 15–And Remains the Internet's Teenager

#68
post #67
post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From what I can see /pol/ in particular is extremely popular and massively influential in the promotion of shockingly vile politics of a sort that until recently I've never encountered anywhere even close to the mainstream. It is my understanding that it was created as a containment board, but it's popularity and relative power has soured me on the whole site. Here's the problem: /pol/ gets so much traffic that I can…

No more so than you are contributing to the incredibly toxic subreddits like Redpill or the like by posting on any other reddit.

4chan is smaller and tighter. It's a different beast. Reddit is massive and those boards account for a small percentage of its activity.

Re: 4Chan Is Turning 15–And Remains the Internet's Teenager

#69
post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> using 4chan and ignore the crap you don't care about. Can you even imagine using 4chan as a woman or a black man? Like not only in real life do you have to deal with people being racist as hell, but hey here's this forum that's entirely shameless about it too. You seem to believe that folks can just ignore being called the n-word day-in and day-out as if it doesn't really affect them. The only people who can go to…

Although I am not black, I am Asian, and can be described by a word started with C (/csg/ if you lurk /g/), and more accurately G. I would be offended if someone calls me that in real life. On 4chan though, I myself really don't get offended in any way. Someone explained it this way: you're only supposed to be offended if someone calls you a n* f* in a setting that not everyone is. On 4chan, everyone is already a n*…

> you're only supposed to be offended

Folks have the right to be offended whenever they want to be.

If you aren't offended, then that's your decision and you're free to make it. But ultimately I still believe you should respect the opinions of those who are offended. If they hate 4chan, I'm not going to argue with them about it.

There's a lot of folks in this thread claiming that if you're offended by speech on 4chan, then it's really you who has the problem and that's mainly who I'm trying to address.

Re: 4Chan Is Turning 15–And Remains the Internet's Teenager

#70
post #18

Indeed, nearly every evil of the internet begins, or picks up steam, on the site. To invoke yet another metaphor: It’s a breeding ground. (The fact that 4chan has been called so many things suggests a feeble attempt to make sense of chaos.) Many of the recruitment techniques of the so-called alt-right were piloted there; many white nationalists started out as 4channers. It’s unclear if or how one ages out of the site…

They're ignoring the fact that much of current internet culture also originated there.

Yes, I'm sure r/memeeconomy and other very serious and important people are grateful.
Post reply on HN