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Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

nytimes.com

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Re: Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

#11

Post by replies_to_all »

notveryrational wrote: post #2

Having been censored multiple times by tech firms, I fall squarely into one camp. During the Snowden Disclosures, I took to Facebook with the documents getting published and started to do my own summaries. Facebook implemented a policy in which it would not let any post that contained a link to a Snowden Document. In some cases they would let the content get posted, but I confirmed with a friend's account that it was…

we already have a solution with memo.cash, and Bitcoin Cash, why people are not use it is beyond me.

Re: Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

#12

Post by lordCarbonFiber »

notveryrational wrote: post #2

Having been censored multiple times by tech firms, I fall squarely into one camp. During the Snowden Disclosures, I took to Facebook with the documents getting published and started to do my own summaries. Facebook implemented a policy in which it would not let any post that contained a link to a Snowden Document. In some cases they would let the content get posted, but I confirmed with a friend's account that it was…

I love the unspoken sentiment behind your experience.

"I took to facebook to post links to grey legal documents rather than hosting them myself because I wanted facebook to be liable; Im shocked when they told me they didn't appreciate the transfer of risk. It's literally censorship I tell you!"

Freedom of speech is not, and hopefully never will be,"freedom to post on other people's servers unmoderated".

Re: Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

#13

Post by aldoushuxley001 »

Ahjie1Ai wrote: post #4

I like the reddit and 4chan model. Content is clearly compartmentalized by topic with different rules for each subcommunity. Of course they are not totally free of moderation but it still allows a greater diversity of opinions with seemingly diametrically opposed groups existing side by side. Many of the big social networks lack compartmentalization. On the other hand twitter demonstrates that it's not necessary, jus…

Moderators have too much power in the reddit model. Subreddit's become their own lil fiefdoms... literally virtual real estate that different special interests vie for influence of.

Unforuntately, minority voices are stifled in almost every single subreddit. Sure you can say people are free to make their own subreddits for those voices, but for example a community like /r/canada has a very valuable virtual real estate in its name. Most new canadian redditors will at one point check out /r/canada because it's canada's subreddit. Unfortunately moderators largely stifle conservative perspectives, forcing them out to subreddits like /r/metacanada.

Re: Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

#14

Post by pavel_lishin »

Ahjie1Ai wrote: post #4

I like the reddit and 4chan model. Content is clearly compartmentalized by topic with different rules for each subcommunity. Of course they are not totally free of moderation but it still allows a greater diversity of opinions with seemingly diametrically opposed groups existing side by side. Many of the big social networks lack compartmentalization. On the other hand twitter demonstrates that it's not necessary, jus…

> Of course they are not totally free of moderation

If there is one thing I wish I could beat into people's heads with a stick about online discourse, is that any place free of moderation is not going to be a free speech haven, but a cesspit where the people with the most free time will dominate and drive out others.

It's incredibly cheap and easy to shit up a conversation, but quite costly to have an engaging dialogue. By having no moderation, you're actively choosing to reward shitposters, and punish quality contributors.

And, no, adding an up/downvote mechanism does not solve this problem.

Re: Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

#16

Post by grandmczeb »

lordCarbonFiber wrote: post #12
notveryrational wrote: post #2

Having been censored multiple times by tech firms, I fall squarely into one camp. During the Snowden Disclosures, I took to Facebook with the documents getting published and started to do my own summaries. Facebook implemented a policy in which it would not let any post that contained a link to a Snowden Document. In some cases they would let the content get posted, but I confirmed with a friend's account that it was…

I love the unspoken sentiment behind your experience. "I took to facebook to post links to grey legal documents rather than hosting them myself because I wanted facebook to be liable; Im shocked when they told me they didn't appreciate the transfer of risk. It's literally censorship I tell you!" Freedom of speech is not, and hopefully never will be,"freedom to post on other people's servers unmoderated".

> It's literally censorship I tell you!

It literally is. Most people would say that is justifiable given that Facebook owns the platform, but that dosen't change the fact that they're censoring what users say.

Re: Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

#18

Post by always_good »

aldoushuxley001 wrote: post #13
Ahjie1Ai wrote: post #4

I like the reddit and 4chan model. Content is clearly compartmentalized by topic with different rules for each subcommunity. Of course they are not totally free of moderation but it still allows a greater diversity of opinions with seemingly diametrically opposed groups existing side by side. Many of the big social networks lack compartmentalization. On the other hand twitter demonstrates that it's not necessary, jus…

Moderators have too much power in the reddit model. Subreddit's become their own lil fiefdoms... literally virtual real estate that different special interests vie for influence of. Unforuntately, minority voices are stifled in almost every single subreddit. Sure you can say people are free to make their own subreddits for those voices, but for example a community like /r/canada has a very valuable virtual real estat…

One problem is that the `/r/:subreddit` url creates name-squatting and the illusion of canonical forums.

/r/canada is like .com: anything else looks second-rate. /r/canada2? /r/bettercanada? /r/altcanada? /r/the_canada? /r/mapleleaf?

I think reddit should've gone with `/r/:username/:subreddit` to remind everyone that every subreddit is just some random person's forum, not some canonical message board on that topic. It also makes it much easier to migrate to another subreddit because you aren't stuck picking some second-rate subreddit name like /r/bitcoin -> /r/btc.

/r/spez/politics, for example, reminds you that it's the politics of whoever spez is (reddit co-founder) and his mod team.

Re: Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

#19

Post by whatshisface »

lordCarbonFiber wrote: post #12
notveryrational wrote: post #2

Having been censored multiple times by tech firms, I fall squarely into one camp. During the Snowden Disclosures, I took to Facebook with the documents getting published and started to do my own summaries. Facebook implemented a policy in which it would not let any post that contained a link to a Snowden Document. In some cases they would let the content get posted, but I confirmed with a friend's account that it was…

I love the unspoken sentiment behind your experience. "I took to facebook to post links to grey legal documents rather than hosting them myself because I wanted facebook to be liable; Im shocked when they told me they didn't appreciate the transfer of risk. It's literally censorship I tell you!" Freedom of speech is not, and hopefully never will be,"freedom to post on other people's servers unmoderated".

Were the Snowden documents really legally grey? The Guardian had no problem publishing them.

Re: Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

#20

Post by dsfyu404ed »

geggam wrote: post #15
geggam wrote: post #9

HN voting is a groupthink censor

Watching the points go up and down on this is interesting

I wrote a script to track my up-votes/down-votes based on time. I've only been running it a few months but I predict that this will get hit hard with down-votes around 4PM GMT and 7PM GMT (assuming this topis is still on the front page by then). Let's see if I'm right.

Edit: Down-voted for trying to make a prediction without even passing judgement on the topic. Funny how that works.

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