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Information operations directed at Hong Kong

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Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#191

Post by kmonsen »

dang wrote: post #160
woah wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even here on Hacker News, a week or so ago I saw someone being chided for “breaking the HN guidelines” by calling out a sock puppet. When I looked at the comment history of the account doing the chiding, all of its comments were on China related articles, taking a pro-China view.

There are two site guidelines that apply to this. First, it's not ok to use HN primarily for political, ideological, or national battle. If a commenter is posting as you describe, we ask them to stop. Example: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20727426 . But by no means does it follow that a commenter behaving that way must be a sockpuppet, astroturfer, shill, spy, foreign agent, etc. That's where the second guide…

I think what is missing in most the the China and HN discussions is that HN is not blocked by the great firewall, so it is much easier for regular people living in China to participate. They will naturally have more pro-China views. Just like residents of every country will have more positive views of that country. And when that country is criticized they will be even more defensive and reflectively pro what is criticized.

All this without having to be paid to do so, although that is possible as well.

Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#192

Post by dang »

kmonsen wrote: post #191
dang wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are two site guidelines that apply to this. First, it's not ok to use HN primarily for political, ideological, or national battle. If a commenter is posting as you describe, we ask them to stop. Example: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20727426 . But by no means does it follow that a commenter behaving that way must be a sockpuppet, astroturfer, shill, spy, foreign agent, etc. That's where the second guide…

I think what is missing in most the the China and HN discussions is that HN is not blocked by the great firewall, so it is much easier for regular people living in China to participate. They will naturally have more pro-China views. Just like residents of every country will have more positive views of that country. And when that country is criticized they will be even more defensive and reflectively pro what is criti…

As far as I can tell, that is only a small minority of the commenters with such views. Far more are people in Western countries who have personal, familial, educational, or work ties to China, or who had experiences in China that gave them a different perspective.

In a way, though, we're talking about the same thing, because most of this follows from human loyalties—to family, tribe, country, etc.—that all of us have. It's true that some commenters are ideologically motivated, but even that is a second-order version of the same thing, since ideological commitment itself comes out of such loyalties.

Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#193

Post by laughinghan »

meerita wrote: post #47

> Covert, manipulative behaviors have no place on our service While I celebrate this from them to kill manipulation, this sentence can be applied to their own bias towards conservative people who get banned and progressive don't, even saying worse things or using the service on massive organization to take down accounts. If both parties do harm, they should be take down. But both Twitter and Facebook do enormous effo…

> their own bias towards conservative people who get banned and progressive don't

Interesting, what leads you to believe this is the case?

I've heard of this happening; I've also heard of the exact opposite happening, e.g. this post which cites examples of specific people and pieces of content that were banned as well as the specific dates and times and durations of the bans: https://medium.com/@thedididelgado/mark-zuckerberg-hates-bla...

I'm sure it is true that there are conservatives who've been banned and self-proclaimed "progressives" who've done as bad or worse things who haven't. Hopefully you also agree that the examples in that post, of progressives being banned while racists who should have been banned but weren't, probably really did happen.

Due to scale, it wouldn't surprise me that all of those examples could be true without there being any systemic bias on their service. What leads you to believe that such a bias exists?

From what I've read, there's actually some reason to believe the exact opposite bias exists: https://www.propublica.org/article/facebook-hate-speech-cens...

Again, I think all those examples are probably true. But I think they could be consistent with a bias in any direction, due to scale.

Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#194

Post by youeseh »

samstave wrote: post #190
dang wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are two site guidelines that apply to this. First, it's not ok to use HN primarily for political, ideological, or national battle. If a commenter is posting as you describe, we ask them to stop. Example: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20727426 . But by no means does it follow that a commenter behaving that way must be a sockpuppet, astroturfer, shill, spy, foreign agent, etc. That's where the second guide…

> First, it's not ok to use HN primarily for political, ideological, or national battle. You need to up the Karma req for downvotes. @Dang, Look at my current comment hist... I provide a valuable perspective. Even if others disagree with me. YC as a greater community is greater than the sum of its (unicorn) parts. Stop fucking censoring people for some lame idealogical moral standard which you dont even meet yourselv…

Maybe it isn't what you're saying but how you say it that gets you downvoted.

It is much more difficult to ask someone to stop doing something than to encourage them to do an alternative thing. Suggest how the alternative activity would bring them greater success.

While they may still disagree, at least they'll see that you're on the same team.

Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#195

Post by lawrenceyan »

dang wrote: post #160
woah wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even here on Hacker News, a week or so ago I saw someone being chided for “breaking the HN guidelines” by calling out a sock puppet. When I looked at the comment history of the account doing the chiding, all of its comments were on China related articles, taking a pro-China view.

There are two site guidelines that apply to this. First, it's not ok to use HN primarily for political, ideological, or national battle. If a commenter is posting as you describe, we ask them to stop. Example: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20727426 . But by no means does it follow that a commenter behaving that way must be a sockpuppet, astroturfer, shill, spy, foreign agent, etc. That's where the second guide…

FWIW, I think if there’s any community that can meaningfully ensure discussion from all sides can occur without irrevocably degrading the level of quality / emphasis on seeking truth within that discourse, it’s HN.

I would be careful though, as the culture of thoughtful inquiry that HN has managed to cultivate in these past few years, could easily end up being destroyed and end up going the way of Reddit.

The only reason it hasn’t, at least in my opinion, is because of the largely technical/engineering focused user base that HN caters to. There’s only a limited number of us in the world though, and if moderation from your side doesn’t keep up, it’s pretty much inevitable that the site will get overrun as it becomes more and more mainstream.

Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#196

Post by laughinghan »

i_cant_speel wrote: post #189
ssully wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not even close to an accurate comparison. It's not just paper - it's a printing press that can push your message directly to a device into the pocket of people who belong to specific groups that you want to target.

How is that different from spreading false information through newspapers when that was the primary source of people's information?

It's like the difference between the bow-and-arrow and handguns. Lower barrier to entry, greater potential for harm.

Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#197

Post by hker »

Aperocky wrote: post #109
ryanchankh wrote: post #22

HongKonger here. I have some friends in China posting similar anti-protest posts on WeChat social media. It's like the news they read has a completely different story than what it's being told in legitimate new sources. The problem of fake news does become very apparent, and I hope people in China can eventually gain awareness or at least start to question the validity of their news sources.

It's not necessarily fake, just very selective. When all you hear/see are videos of molotov cocktail, beating the reporter up for having a pro-police tshirt, and british/american flag waving (All of which did happen). You'll have a pretty different image of the protestors. I have to say this selection bias exist on the other end as well, perhaps not as blatant as mainland, where the girl gotten her eye shot or the tr…

> I have to say this selection bias exist on the other end as well, perhaps not as blatant as mainland, where the girl gotten her eye shot or the triad beating people wasn't shown at all.

There is selection bias on both sides.

A small nitpick, the news about the girl gotten her eye shot is not hidden from Chinese news, but was presented as being shot by a slingshot of a marble by the protestors (in Chinese [1], Google translate [2]). According to reporters who were at the scene, the girl was definitely shot by the police, because only the police could fire the bean bag round which was stuck in the goggles of the girl and caused such injuries. Put differently, CCP is spreading fake news via state media instead of hiding it from the public view.

Similar story for the triad beating people: it was presented as the triad was trying to protect their homes from the protestors (in Chinese [3], Google translation failed). The news was not hidden from public view.

[1]: https://news.163.com/19/0819/17/EMV7LC0V0001899O.html

[2]: https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=zh-CN&u=http...

[3]: https://news.ifeng.com/c/7odVZYB5BUn

Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#198

Post by dang »

lawrenceyan wrote: post #195
dang wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are two site guidelines that apply to this. First, it's not ok to use HN primarily for political, ideological, or national battle. If a commenter is posting as you describe, we ask them to stop. Example: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20727426 . But by no means does it follow that a commenter behaving that way must be a sockpuppet, astroturfer, shill, spy, foreign agent, etc. That's where the second guide…

FWIW, I think if there’s any community that can meaningfully ensure discussion from all sides can occur without irrevocably degrading the level of quality / emphasis on seeking truth within that discourse, it’s HN. I would be careful though, as the culture of thoughtful inquiry that HN has managed to cultivate in these past few years, could easily end up being destroyed and end up going the way of Reddit. The only re…

> I would be careful though

The #1 way for us all to be careful is to follow the guideline against insinuating astroturfing or bad faith in comments, and to encourage other community members to follow it. I hope the users who have been reading my posts about this (see https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme... for plenty more) will start doing more such encouragement. Because you're right: we can't keep up. Only the community can.

Re: Information operations directed at Hong Kong

#200

Post by interpenetrate »

AnthonyWnC wrote: post #129

Let me guess, all pro-China tweeks are blocked but anti-China are not blocked. Keep toeing the party line Twitter.

you gotta love the language: "coordinated state-backed operations" are banned. such careful language. what does that make USAID, who is undoubtedly responsible for shaping this discourse? perhaps an "uncoordinated" state-backed operation? and what does that make twitter?

it's not enough to call everyone here "dumb" or "sheeps," because all of the middle-class americans on this wretched forum are specifically acting in their self-interest by helping (in whatever pathetic way they can) to topple china. just because they won't admit to this outright and instead take advantage of careful language ("democracy" etc.) doesn't make them dumb. historically it has made them a real threat and that it is exactly why china has to issue such tight command over this conflict (and the "uyghur problems", and "free tibet", and "tank man", and ...). luckily american hegemony is waning and the front against china will fail. just sit, wait and enjoy the shit show.

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