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

Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 94 posts

Re: Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

#61

Post by aldoushuxley001 »

pavel_lishin wrote: post #50
aldoushuxley001 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd rather enable users to moderate their own content by giving them better tools to do so. Reddit simply isn't built for this though, because they've already committed to the subreddit model. Ultimately though, I believe reddit's successor will find success going this route. So it's less about giving more power to minorities (which are still just groups) and more about giving power to individuals to manage their own…

> I'd rather enable users to moderate their own content by giving them better tools to do so. I hear where you're coming from, but I subscribe to a small amount of subreddits, and moderate one - and I am absolutely not willing to clean up after every troll, shill and bot that posts to all of them. As a specific example, I moderate a local meetup subreddit. We have fairly specific rules about what is and isn't allowed…

I think under the contraints of the reddit system, you're absolutely right. Moderation is required to maintain quality and prevent dilution from spamming, trolls, etc.

But I'd suggest that's again because of reddit's dynamics.

Consider a different social network that is instead focused on enabling users to group with other users they deem productive (automatically, simply through interactions, or manually they can give a score from 0-100 for each person [otherwise this score is auto-generated based on signs that indicate a productive relationship). So in this social network, each person's content is effectively cooperatively curated by people they deem productive members of the network.

I believe under a social network system like this, that moderators would not be necessary. Yes the social network, as a whole, will get spammed, trolled and diluted with many many posts. But there's other systems for helping navigate this. Ultimately though, I believe the concept of productive networks supersedes the need for most moderating functions. Will there still be a need to prevent stuff like death threats or etc. etc.? Yes absolutely, but I believe that decision is ultimately an admin-level decision, not a moderator-level decision.

Re: Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

#62

Post by sandworm101 »

baud147258 wrote: post #27
sandworm101 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Howard stern. It doesnt matter that people are angry. People who hated him listened to howard stern more/longer than his fans. Facebook doesnt care that people are screaming mad. That emotion is just proof of how connected they are to the platform.

Hate clicks are important for media companies, since they will generate more shares, links, discussion and controversy, which, in an ad-funded business, is good (in the short term)

Short term is all that matters in media when platforms can rise and fall within a few years.

Re: Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

#63

Post by slg »

malvosenior wrote: post #57
slg wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, the standards change over time. You would likely be shunned 200 years ago if you said whites and blacks had equal intellect. You would likely be shunned today if you said the opposite. Society generally moves in the right direction. "The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice." I was simply pointing out that this phenomena is not new or limited to the internet. It is inherently human. It…

> Society generally moves in the right direction. Does it? Because it's currently ok to say that "white people suck" and various other overtly racist statements that would have been interpreted as such by society as little as 10 years ago.

Firstly, the context of the quote from my next sentence is that things must be viewed from a distance to see the bend toward justice. Individual setbacks might make it seem incorrect over short periods, but history has generally showed it to be correct.

Secondly, it is not currently ok to say that "white people suck". The huge uproar over that is evidence of such. However, society has decided that saying "white people suck" is inherently different than saying "[any historically repressed minority] sucks". Society has also decided that context of those statements matters. Saying that offhandedly on Twitter as a joke is different than saying it in a campaign speech.

Re: Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

#64

Post by grandmczeb »

lordCarbonFiber wrote: post #47
grandmczeb wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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.

Moderation != censorship. When facebook can send you to jail for your speech, then we can talk about censorship. I don't want to live in a world where I can't ban bad actors from my own servers (thus violating my freedom of speech).

Censorship is not defined as illegal speech. Some forms of censorship are perfectly ok, like when you remove objectionable content from your own platform. If the government were to require you to remove that same content, it would still be censorship, but in a much worse form.

Re: Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

#65

Post by Ahjie1Ai »

marenkay wrote: post #38

Perhaps this is a stupid question but why should e.g. treat these things _so_ fundamentally different than things we already have rules and regulations for? Going back in time, what about newspapers and letters to the editor? Those had a clear range of what was allowed and acceptable. Is there really anything stopping us from using these rules except for being afraid to not post bullshit everywhere unsanctioned any l…

Because a lot more communication is done over private platforms these days. When working from home even informal work conversations are done over some cloud-hosted chat.

Re: Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

#66

Post by lordCarbonFiber »

grandmczeb wrote: post #64
lordCarbonFiber wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Moderation != censorship. When facebook can send you to jail for your speech, then we can talk about censorship. I don't want to live in a world where I can't ban bad actors from my own servers (thus violating my freedom of speech).

Censorship is not defined as illegal speech. Some forms of censorship are perfectly ok, like when you remove objectionable content from your own platform. If the government were to require you to remove that same content, it would still be censorship, but in a much worse form.

No, that's the point. Censorship is a specific thing, and to muddy the waters by claiming moderation is censorship means that during times of actual governmental overreach it will be that much harder to recruit people to your cause.

It's fairly easy to get people onboard with the idea of moderation, once you insist that that's censorship you now have a population that's "ok with censorship" which is exactly what the fascists trying to make the equality want.

Re: Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

#67

Post by malvosenior »

slg wrote: post #63
malvosenior wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Society generally moves in the right direction. Does it? Because it's currently ok to say that "white people suck" and various other overtly racist statements that would have been interpreted as such by society as little as 10 years ago.

Firstly, the context of the quote from my next sentence is that things must be viewed from a distance to see the bend toward justice. Individual setbacks might make it seem incorrect over short periods, but history has generally showed it to be correct. Secondly, it is not currently ok to say that "white people suck". The huge uproar over that is evidence of such. However, society has decided that saying "white peopl…

> However, society has decided that saying "white people suck" is inherently different than saying "[any historically repressed minority] sucks". Society has also decided that context of those statements matters.

I think that debate is far from settled.

Re: Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

#68

Post by pavel_lishin »

aldoushuxley001 wrote: post #61
pavel_lishin wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd rather enable users to moderate their own content by giving them better tools to do so. I hear where you're coming from, but I subscribe to a small amount of subreddits, and moderate one - and I am absolutely not willing to clean up after every troll, shill and bot that posts to all of them. As a specific example, I moderate a local meetup subreddit. We have fairly specific rules about what is and isn't allowed…

I think under the contraints of the reddit system, you're absolutely right. Moderation is required to maintain quality and prevent dilution from spamming, trolls, etc. But I'd suggest that's again because of reddit's dynamics. Consider a different social network that is instead focused on enabling users to group with other users they deem productive (automatically, simply through interactions, or manually they can gi…

I think you've just invented Google+'s Circles.

I also think that system would work well as long as you're interested in the people in the system, and not in topics in the system.

Re: Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

#69

Post by notveryrational »

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".

In no way was there an attempt to transfer risk.

Facebook was a community platform where I could reach out to the people I knew and loved - my friends and family. That's the only reason I made Facebook posts.

Regarding moderation - do you agree that something can be both moderation and censorship at the same time?

To make this more clear, consider Facebook's relationship with the Turkish government. Facebook will moderate the content in Turkey to what is allowed speech in that country, including moderation to remove criticism of the government.

Is that moderation or censorship? Or is it both?

Re: Gatekeepers or Censors? How Tech Manages Online Speech

#70

Post by MorrisofOrange »

pavel_lishin wrote: post #21
aldoushuxley001 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

The problem isn't moderator power, it's name squatting. Do you have a concrete suggestion for giving the moderators less power, while still ensuring that subreddits don't get overrun with trolls? Keep in mind that physical in-world minorities can amplify their voices vastly online. Sometimes this is something we want (by allowing, e.g., African-Americans to point out systemic injustice) and sometimes it's not (Fascis…

But the upvote/downvote solves this issue when these voices hit the frontpage. for example r/the_Donald always complained that when their posts make the front page Reddit would"lower their score". what was happening was it was reaching the people outside their safespace who downvoted it to oblivion. OTOH the Bangladesh students didn't see this issue because people on reddit tend to agree with them.
Post reply on HN