The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News • Hacker News Board

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News

#221

Post by lucb1e » Thu, Aug 08, 2019, 1:39 PM UTC

ppod wrote: post #135

>The site’s now characteristic tone of performative erudition—hyperrational, dispassionate, It's a good article overall, but it would be nice, just for once, to read something in a mainstream "arts and culture" outlet that wasn't absolutely dripping with fear and contempt for anything related to tech culture.

I agree. The article makes it sound like logic and humanity are disjointed, and like the most loved arguments people make here are based on impersonal data without considering ethics. I think this place is exactly the opposite. Try a logical argument in a popular reddit thread, or find the humanity in random communities. More often, arguments without focusing on what's logical creates biases and hurts a lot more feelings.

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News

#222

Post by sunstone » Thu, Aug 08, 2019, 1:42 PM UTC

Interesting that almost all the comments on this thread are related to politics whereas the primary value to me of HN are the technical topics and discussions.

There are plenty of other places on the net to argue politics with bots and paid influencers.

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News

#223

Post by jonathanwallace » Thu, Aug 08, 2019, 1:42 PM UTC

FussyZeus wrote: post #201

dunkelheit wrote: post #147

I guess it is a perfect opportunity to thank dang and sctb for their unobtrusive and friendly moderation efforts. The article itself was a bit disappointing because it focused on political issues. In my opinion the strength of HN in this regard is that it is both a "sjw cesspool" and a "haven for alt-right", as evidenced by the fact that a comment on a controversial topic can easily float near zero points while rakin…

This is actually my sole complaint with HN. I love the community and I understand where the moderators are coming from, but I feel that it's important to point out that the position of "keep politics out of $X" is the purest expression of privilege, and in general is an attitude that embraces the status quo, no matter how horrifying it might be for the unprivileged. I'm not saying HN should allow ALL political discus…

Politics, IMHO, are about applied relationship and applied power.

Ignoring the discussion of both relationships and power leads to an anemic understanding of freedom and what it takes to enable it which leaves us unbalanced and brittle as a civil society.

The exercise of this privilege is a systemic, cultural mistake and the tendency of conversations to often devolve into tribalism highlights our lack of sophistication and maturity when it comes to these topics.

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News

#224

Post by raxxorrax » Thu, Aug 08, 2019, 1:44 PM UTC

romaaeterna wrote: post #164

Hacker News is a well-moderated community, but it's illustrative to see where Hacker News fails at moderation. While Hacker News is great at protecting the community from disruptive individuals, it tends to fall down when protecting unpopular individuals against the community turned mob. I support Hacker News moderating itself however it chooses. However, if we are looking at it as a moderation model for large, open,…

I completely agree, although I like moderation here since it is actually very accepting and I might just have another definition for it than the author of the article.

Another example where moderation works well is stackexchange. I think a Q&A sites needs strict moderation to be able to stay on topic.

I think what Google is doing right now is reprehensible for example. Ghosting content because it is controversial and therefore coincidentally bad for advertising leaves a very bad taste.

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News

#225

Post by hoseja » Thu, Aug 08, 2019, 1:45 PM UTC

mieseratte wrote: post #72

I think the HN culture is slowly dying. Reflexive downvoting has become very common as of late, the eternal September is brining in more people steeped in political hivemindedness. That isn’t to say all is lost, but this site feels markedly different from the beginning of the decade.

Would you say the article itself isn't politically hiveminded?

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News

#226

Post by SolaceQuantum » Thu, Aug 08, 2019, 1:46 PM UTC

astine wrote: post #193

SolaceQuantum wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I agree with what you're saying. But I'm asking why the person posting believes that the HN community overwhelmingly believes X and their evidence for that. I presume they do have evidence and conclusions and I'd like to know about it.

I think that people tend to perceive HN as overwhelmingly believing whatever the opposite of their opinion is any time there is a significant debate on something. Unless there is overwhelming support for our own position, we feel that we are in a hostile environment.

Part of helping to work against this is to challenge and ask for genuine evidence with an open heart. I don't want to assume that that is what the poster is believing, but it also clashes with my understanding of reality.

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News

#227

Post by radcon » Thu, Aug 08, 2019, 1:53 PM UTC

dunkelheit wrote: post #147

I guess it is a perfect opportunity to thank dang and sctb for their unobtrusive and friendly moderation efforts. The article itself was a bit disappointing because it focused on political issues. In my opinion the strength of HN in this regard is that it is both a "sjw cesspool" and a "haven for alt-right", as evidenced by the fact that a comment on a controversial topic can easily float near zero points while rakin…

> HN may be an echo chamber but it is a pretty big one with a lot of voices in it.

The echo chamber effect on HN is far worse than any comparable site, it's just not as obvious because there's zero transparency.

At least there are tons of 3rd party sites that allow us to see censorship in real time on Reddit. No such thing exists for HN.

I have no sympathy for the moderators here. I believe they moderate very arbitrarily and are accountable to no one.

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News

#228

Post by gwbas1c » Thu, Aug 08, 2019, 1:54 PM UTC

dunkelheit wrote: post #147

I guess it is a perfect opportunity to thank dang and sctb for their unobtrusive and friendly moderation efforts. The article itself was a bit disappointing because it focused on political issues. In my opinion the strength of HN in this regard is that it is both a "sjw cesspool" and a "haven for alt-right", as evidenced by the fact that a comment on a controversial topic can easily float near zero points while rakin…

Honestly, I've seen some very strange moderation here.

For example, a rather good article explaining Bill Gates and Warren Buffet's concerns about cryptocurrency was removed.

Remember, Bill Gates is an excellent software engineer; and both Bill Gates and Warren Buffet know a thing or two about economics.

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News

#229

Post by NeedMoreTea » Thu, Aug 08, 2019, 1:54 PM UTC

mieseratte wrote: post #72

I think the HN culture is slowly dying. Reflexive downvoting has become very common as of late, the eternal September is brining in more people steeped in political hivemindedness. That isn’t to say all is lost, but this site feels markedly different from the beginning of the decade.

HN culture or SV culture? I suspect it may be far more a reflection of a) which continents are awake/asleep and b) the increasingly international nature of HN compared to early years.

In its earliest years HN felt to me to be a decidedly American place, steeped in the politics, culture and views you might expect of its origins. Now, there's far more Europeans, Asians - and increasingly Chinese as HN apparently isn't firewalled. The attitudes to many things have moved to being more international, whether that's in terms of politics, healthcare and regulation, or simple corrections to the trivial but often fascinating things that are just done or viewed differently around the world.

Sometimes the split shows up quite clearly with votes going one way when it's mostly the US awake, and quite another once Europe and Asia has had a chance. Early GDPR discussions were probably the clearest follower of this pattern. :)

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News

#230

Post by chmaynard » Thu, Aug 08, 2019, 1:54 PM UTC

adrian_mrd wrote: post #18

Amidst all the ambient craziness of our ever-changing world, I raise a glass to Hacker News, the team who moderate it and to all who wish to make it a community driven by erudite discussions :)

I'll drink to that. There's a constant tension in my life between time devoted to reading books vs. time perusing HN stories and comments. It's hard to reach a good balance.