Wikipedia co-founder slams the ‘appalling’ internet • Hacker News Board

Re: Wikipedia co-founder slams the ‘appalling’ internet

#31

Post by krapp » Fri, Jul 05, 2019, 3:06 PM UTC

rabidrat wrote: post #26

rolha-capoeira wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear you. But this teeters dangerously close to gatekeeping, elitism, or something along those lines. I'm sure you didn't mean it that way, but I think how others feel after reading our comments does matter. Better put, because everyone is on the internet now, the real world's problems are now the internet's problems. It used to serve as an escape, true. It has made the world a smaller place, where problems from a…

Gatekeeping is the only way communities can keep themselves healthy. There is no such thing as a universal 'community'. From day one, life has been about letting in certain elements, and keeping out others. Without this selection, development and differentiation are impossible. Similarly we don't (and shouldn't) let every person into our homes, or our countries, or our servers. Why is it seen as an obvious truth that…

>Why is it seen as an obvious truth that we should allow every single person onto the Internet, without ever being able to remove them?

For the same reason it's seen as an obvious truth that everyone should be allowed to use a telephone, or send a letter in the mail. The internet is a communications platform, by definition it belongs to anyone who wants to use it.

The internet being used by everyone no more makes the development or differentiation between cultures impossible than the planet Earth being used by everyone does.

Also, because the anarchist hacker ethos that led to the internet was about liberating humanity from the constraints of gatekeepers - the systems of governance and proprietary control over access to information and freedom of expression that divided the world between the elite and the serf.

What we're seeing now is not that model breaking down, but only beginning to come into its true potential.

Yes, there may be negative effects to the ability of the internet to remove the barriers between cultures and communities, even states, but the world would be a lot worse still if it had never left the confines of a few universities simply to keep the normies out. The value of the transformative nature of the internet on civilization itself is greater than the value of the internet monoculture whose relevance it no longer recognizes.

Re: Wikipedia co-founder slams the ‘appalling’ internet

#32

Post by me_me_me » Fri, Jul 05, 2019, 3:07 PM UTC

everdrive wrote: post #12

The internet was much nicer before most people were using it. We usually focus on the technology problems here at HN: filter bubbles, skinner box addictive UIs and content feeds, algorithmic and centralized control. Has anyone simply wondered if the problem with the internet is fundamentally that everyone's on it? It used to be an escape from the problems of the real world. Now it's just a new way for the problems of…

> Has anyone simply wondered if the problem with the internet is fundamentally that everyone's on it?

Yes it is, but maybe its an example of the effect of the economical system we are in. Most of the negative stuff that pop up are driven by money making. Even filter bubbles could be classified as a vector for making money.

Personally I try to avoid all the shitty parts that come with modern internet and reap the benefits of it.

Re: Wikipedia co-founder slams the ‘appalling’ internet

#33

Post by dboreham » Fri, Jul 05, 2019, 3:08 PM UTC

raphaelj wrote: post #29

Is a decentralized social network really the solution? I'd rather enjoy having a social platform managed for the greater good, by a not-for-profit organization. The Mozilla or Wikimedia of social networks.

Doesn't most of the money supporting both Mozilla and Wikimedia come from search engine companies?

Re: Wikipedia co-founder slams the ‘appalling’ internet

#34

Post by pmoriarty » Fri, Jul 05, 2019, 3:16 PM UTC

werber wrote: post #14

I find these rants about social media patronizing, people are aware, they just don't care. It's not whistle blowing, it's self congratulatory yipping at this point. If you want to make a better solution that happens to be decentralized and works with just as little effort, then do it if you actually care rant over

You fail to take in to account the Eternal September effect.[1] Some people are aware, but others are not because they're new (or for various other reasons, such as just beginning to get interested, etc), and new people will always be coming along.

Also, some people might know but might have forgotten or had their attention shifted to something else. It's good to periodically bring it back.

There will always, always be a need to inform people. Providing information and good/better arguments for one's position will always be a valid and valuable service.

Acting constructively on that information is also needed, of course, but they're not mutually exclusive.

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_september

Re: Wikipedia co-founder slams the ‘appalling’ internet

#35

Post by metabagel » Fri, Jul 05, 2019, 3:16 PM UTC

werber wrote: post #14

I find these rants about social media patronizing, people are aware, they just don't care. It's not whistle blowing, it's self congratulatory yipping at this point. If you want to make a better solution that happens to be decentralized and works with just as little effort, then do it if you actually care rant over

Like this?

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/11/05/inventor-of-the-web-says-the...

Re: Wikipedia co-founder slams the ‘appalling’ internet

#36

Post by ataturk » Fri, Jul 05, 2019, 3:16 PM UTC

everdrive wrote: post #12

The internet was much nicer before most people were using it. We usually focus on the technology problems here at HN: filter bubbles, skinner box addictive UIs and content feeds, algorithmic and centralized control. Has anyone simply wondered if the problem with the internet is fundamentally that everyone's on it? It used to be an escape from the problems of the real world. Now it's just a new way for the problems of…

Is there a name for that phenomenon? I recall the early days of eBay and how cool it was and then everyone jumped in and ruined it. Same with Craigslist, Reddit, well, everything. What is the term for how this happens? Internet "stuff" works when the communities are relatively small and then something happens when they hit a certain critical mass and they just turn to shit.

Re: Wikipedia co-founder slams the ‘appalling’ internet

#37

Post by CharlesW » Fri, Jul 05, 2019, 3:16 PM UTC

skribbj wrote: post #24

hirundo wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I also strongly encourage him to look at state of wikipedia moderations. I think that the solution is similar to what he's proposing for the social networks: decentralization. One example would be to take hint from github, and allow articles to be forked when they reach some threshold of editing warfare. Embrace and aggregate partisan takes rather pursuing the noble but chimeric goal of neutrality.

Forking Wikipedia articles based on partisanship is actually a super interesting idea.

Like Conservapedia? https://www.conservapedia.com/

Re: Wikipedia co-founder slams the ‘appalling’ internet

#38

Post by ataturk » Fri, Jul 05, 2019, 3:18 PM UTC

krapp wrote: post #31

rabidrat wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gatekeeping is the only way communities can keep themselves healthy. There is no such thing as a universal 'community'. From day one, life has been about letting in certain elements, and keeping out others. Without this selection, development and differentiation are impossible. Similarly we don't (and shouldn't) let every person into our homes, or our countries, or our servers. Why is it seen as an obvious truth that…

>Why is it seen as an obvious truth that we should allow every single person onto the Internet, without ever being able to remove them? For the same reason it's seen as an obvious truth that everyone should be allowed to use a telephone, or send a letter in the mail. The internet is a communications platform, by definition it belongs to anyone who wants to use it. The internet being used by everyone no more makes the…

Yes! I got into tech to liberate humanity. That's an excellent idealistic explanation for why. And I'm extremely annoyed and pissed off about how things have turned out lately.

The "true potential" you mention must be to enable global tyranny by the looks of it. We aren't removing any barriers! Look at what Google and others are doing to try and bow to the worst humanity has to offer in China. They're enabling not just totalitarianism, they're like IBM helping the Nazis figure out who to send to the gas chambers. How quickly we forget.

The Internet has become a means of spewing propaganda and using mass deception to distract and generally dis-empower citizens of every nation. This is not what it was supposed to do.

Re: Wikipedia co-founder slams the ‘appalling’ internet

#39

Post by orbifold » Fri, Jul 05, 2019, 3:18 PM UTC

rolha-capoeira wrote: post #16

everdrive wrote: post #12

The internet was much nicer before most people were using it. We usually focus on the technology problems here at HN: filter bubbles, skinner box addictive UIs and content feeds, algorithmic and centralized control. Has anyone simply wondered if the problem with the internet is fundamentally that everyone's on it? It used to be an escape from the problems of the real world. Now it's just a new way for the problems of…

I hear you. But this teeters dangerously close to gatekeeping, elitism, or something along those lines. I'm sure you didn't mean it that way, but I think how others feel after reading our comments does matter. Better put, because everyone is on the internet now, the real world's problems are now the internet's problems. It used to serve as an escape, true. It has made the world a smaller place, where problems from a…

I pretty sure everyone has a real life filter bubble around them, that is they disproportionately interact with certain people in real life (think rich people socialize with rich people, academics with academics and so on). Part of what makes mass social media unpleasant (in the same way that tabloids are unpleasant) is that you are reminded of how the average person thinks, which is very different from how a people in your social circle might think. The social networks are maybe too effective in creating echo chambers on the other hand (the distribution of people you interact with is far more peaked than in real life)

Re: Wikipedia co-founder slams the ‘appalling’ internet

#40

Post by AndrewKemendo » Fri, Jul 05, 2019, 3:23 PM UTC

everdrive wrote: post #12

The internet was much nicer before most people were using it. We usually focus on the technology problems here at HN: filter bubbles, skinner box addictive UIs and content feeds, algorithmic and centralized control. Has anyone simply wondered if the problem with the internet is fundamentally that everyone's on it? It used to be an escape from the problems of the real world. Now it's just a new way for the problems of…

Eternal September or the September that never ended[1] is Usenet slang for a period beginning in September 1993,[2][3] the month that Internet service provider America Online (AOL) began offering Usenet access to its many users, overwhelming the existing culture for online forums.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September