8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service • Hacker News Board

Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#391

Post by s9w » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 7:15 PM UTC

kaolti wrote: post #377

s9w wrote: post #335

So the campaigns against free speech show results. The wheels are in motion, the dominoes are falling. Funny how here on HN the use of the term "free speech absolutists"/"free speech absolutism" has absolutely skyrocketed for example. So are these the last days of the internet? 4chan is still there, voat too (although barely) - but I don't know how much longer. 100% legal sites are taken offline for absolutely no rea…

Yea. I find it quite ironic that HN of all places is generally speaking supportive of this. I do think though that the internet is kind of a different game though. I don't think anything can be banned altogether. People will always find a way. Ultimately we'll just end up creating new anonymous and distributed services where we can talk freely and corporations (lol) and governments can't dictate what is acceptable.

The pace has quickened though. The big corporations are all coordinated now. Hosters, domain registrars, other infrastructure, payment processors, Traditional and Social Media... everyone is locked in and blindly banning everyone who isn't theirs

Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#392

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 7:15 PM UTC

Alex3917 wrote: post #30

IMHO this reflects poorly on CloudFlare. The supreme court has ruled time and time again that the right to free speech implies the right to be heard. While CloudFlare obviously isn't legally required to serve 8chan, the only service they are really providing is making it so that 8chan can't be DDOS'd. And DDOS'ing is very clearly a tactic that violates the first amendment. So really by no longer serving 8chan, the on…

[deleted]

Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#393

Post by moab » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 7:15 PM UTC

DonHopkins wrote: post #261

nilkn wrote: post #4

I've generally been on the free speech side of this debate, as some of my previous comments on HN will show. With 8chan, I legitimately don't know what my opinion is. I've read it before, and I spent a few hours reading it this weekend, and it's beyond clear to me that it absolutely had the potential to radicalize shooters and terrorists. I'm not referring to the simple use of racial or ethnic slurs -- of course this…

I've lost good friends to 4chan/8chan. They were obsessed. At first it was cat pictures and memes, but it went way downhill from there. I've watched those sites cause the transition from normal, interesting, reasonable, open minded, intelligent, happy human beings, to horrible inexcusable pieces of shit who I never want to have anything to do with ever again. It's not just that they inspire a few shooters and mass mu…

I would not lump 4chan into this discussion. I'll concede that some boards on the site are more polemical than others and promote alt-right ideologies without a doubt, but there are many other interesting boards and people on 4chan that are not captured by the broad strokes you're outlining. I know people that browse /fit/, /lit/, /mu/ and /out/ just to name some boards that are perfectly reasonable individuals that don't lionize shooters or hold other alienated views.

Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#394

Post by mythrwy » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 7:15 PM UTC

dd36 wrote: post #196

mythrwy wrote: post #183

This might be an unpopular opinion for those who view more rules as the answer. Banning (or discontinuing or deplatforming or whatever you want to call it) may do little but harden the resolve of key ideologues of whatever stripe. For them, it leads credence to the idea that there is conspiracy against the group afoot. Besides, when has banning actually been effective? Sure, it may reduce manifestation and reduce rec…

The ideologues are already very well hardened. White supremacy isn’t a new ideology.

So we make more laws and rules which we hope we can actually enforce and hope the baddies dissipate into the ether?

Chase them from reddit to 4-chan to 8-chan then have cloudflare ban 8-chan and proclaim "mission accomplished!"?

I'm just saying I think the effective way to fix this is by breaking the echo chamber. With argument and knowledge and guidance and wit and mockery and whatever we have.

Young males of this primate species need guidance and leadership and direction. They need answers. They are a pack dog really. Without someone there personally spanking them verbally when they get out line they apparently devolve into feral internet packs. But nobody (understandably) wants to deal with them nor put up with their abuse and trash, so they coagulate into places they can find direction and meaning. That is what I think needs to be addressed. Not trying to stamp out places, which I doubt will work long term. Nor most especially encouraging them to self filter into these packs.

Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#395

Post by rnernento » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 7:15 PM UTC

rebuilder wrote: post #358

rnernento wrote: post #337

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What makes you say it's unchecked though? These are anonymous imageboards where ANYONE can say ANYTHING, there isn't anything stopping you from challenging them? Part of me wonders if we should be taking better advantage of this opportunity to reach out the people posting. Mental illness is clearly in play, but can't we as a society do better? We should be reaching out to these people and at least trying to wrestle t…

Have you tried to engage in that kind of discussion? These people use troll tactics. The first rule for them is to attack any attempt to ask for civil discussion.

Yeah they just downvote you into oblivion so no one can even read what you wrote. Oh wait...

Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#396

Post by irvwash » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 7:15 PM UTC

o_p wrote: post #180

This is a ridiculous witchhunt, 8chan is a platform for many different boards with different opinions, the media framing it as a right-wing white supremacist forum makes wonder if its ignorance or malice, /leftypol/ is probably as big as the /pol/ boogeyman, and thats just politics which is just a part of the rest of the boards. No one is asking to close Facebook because Tarrant uploaded his shooting video there, why…

8chan's /pol/ is much larger than /leftypol/. I believe it's about tied with /v/, and those two are the largest boards. There are many basically innocent parts of 8chan, but /pol/ makes up a significant fraction of the site's activity, maybe as much as a third.

/pol/ is full of people who encourage shootings, and the website's and board's rules allow people to encourage shootings. You're not allowed to encourage shootings anywhere on Facebook, I think. That's a very significant difference between the two.

Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#397

Post by fromthestart » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 7:16 PM UTC

tepidandroid wrote: post #139

My opinion is that freedom of speech is a fine ideal to strive for, but it relies on having a stable society with some minimum level of education (moral and philosophical too, not just the technical kind). It requires people who are able to fully parse the implications of what they are hearing to make sound and rational judgements on the rejection of an idea or the embrace of it. It creates a moral duty for the peopl…

>The concept of freedom of speech falls apart if universally reprehensible speech is allowed to be publicaly espoused without being firmly challenged.

There is no such thing as universally reprehensible speech and, frankly, this is a dangerous line of thought. What is and is not acceptable is fundamentally tied to localized social norms.

Further, there is plenty of challenge on these forums, in fact arguably more so than forums like Reddit, because their very nature is antagonistic and contrarian.

>Unchecked extremism compounded by more unchecked extremism inevitably leads to scenarios like the ones we’re witnessing more and more often.

Terrorism of all flavors existed long before the internet and it's frequency has waxed and waned over the years. The drivers of this very recent trend have far more behind them than simple incubation on forums - like the dismissal of legitimate concerns by demonizing, blanket epithets like "racist" and "xenophobic". The recent growth of populism cannot be explained by the tiny minority of posters on the chans.

While the extreme actions of these recent attacks are reprehensible, if you read these manifestos, they highlight genuine problems which are deliberately ignored by "left" leaning politicians and media, although because of today's growing polarization of society, the only discussions of such issues that surface publically are mixed heavily with extreme views and extreme solutions, and the average person begins to equate, say, immigration control, with extremist racism, which is neither rational nor good for society.

Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#398

Post by lr4444lr » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 7:16 PM UTC

ethbro wrote: post #116

tombert wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think I'm on the same boat as you on this one; I tend to have a pretty libertarian view on free speech, but lately the bizarre rise of hyper-radical idiots on places like 8chan (and even YouTube to a lesser extent) has really made me question these things. It's very easy to shout the mantra of "Free speech!!! OMG!!!" but we gain nothing by acting like there aren't natural consequences to it. By having a liberal fre…

I call this Confederate flag behavior. There are a huge number of people who claim they support the Confederate flag in honor of those who lost their lives under it. Okay. It was a racist and oppressive government, but I can understand that logic. People gave their lives, and even sacrifice in favor of an unjust cause is sacrifice. That said... if that's what it's really about for them, then why didn't those folks sa…

They did try to defend it. They were what was meant by the "good people on both sides" remark. They are up against an increasingly consolidated media empire that generally does not like the man who made that comment. It's unfair to put the onus of successful promulgation of a message against a wave of misinformation and misappropriation, and condemn them for failing at that.

Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#399

Post by DonHopkins » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 7:17 PM UTC

api wrote: post #386

DonHopkins wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've lost good friends to 4chan/8chan. They were obsessed. At first it was cat pictures and memes, but it went way downhill from there. I've watched those sites cause the transition from normal, interesting, reasonable, open minded, intelligent, happy human beings, to horrible inexcusable pieces of shit who I never want to have anything to do with ever again. It's not just that they inspire a few shooters and mass mu…

The 'chans seem almost like a leaderless cult. I've also seen people get completely sucked into them in this really honestly creepy way. I suppose it's like a subculture but minus virtually everything positive like socializing with real human beings and having real experiences.

What's tragic is that they convince cat lovers to post cat pictures on "Caturday", when they should be posting them every day! That needlessly reduces their positive contribution to society to just 14.28% efficiency.

Re: 8chan goes dark after hardware provider discontinues service

#400

Post by o_p » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 7:17 PM UTC

happytoexplain wrote: post #246

o_p wrote: post #180

This is a ridiculous witchhunt, 8chan is a platform for many different boards with different opinions, the media framing it as a right-wing white supremacist forum makes wonder if its ignorance or malice, /leftypol/ is probably as big as the /pol/ boogeyman, and thats just politics which is just a part of the rest of the boards. No one is asking to close Facebook because Tarrant uploaded his shooting video there, why…

Do you have much experience with the chans? I've spent an embarrassing amount of time on them over the years, and my experience is that it would be ridiculous to compare the ratios of politically hateful, extremist content to normal content between Facebook and the chans. The difference is night and day. The chans are full of great, diverse content, but an absolutely solid core of their identity is inevitably dominat…

If we are worried about hateful propaganda the ratio is not really a relevant measure, the chans have a small user base compared to social networks, propaganda in Facebook could have a massive reach, thats a bigger risk than a fringe group in their own circlejerk, people are just irrationally attacking what they dont know about, for fear and/or pushing the agenda.