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I helped build ByteDance's censorship machine

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Re: I helped build ByteDance's censorship machine

#21

Post by throwaway8581 »

ehmmmmmmmm wrote: post #10
kypro wrote: post #4

It would be interesting if someone from China could comment on censorship in China. Is there a fraction of people who agrees with it or is almost it universally disapproved of? Some of these arguments for censorship made in this article sound eerily similar to how we justify censorship in the West. > Our role was to make sure that low-level content moderators could find "harmful and dangerous content" as soon as poss…

> It would be interesting if someone from China could comment on censorship in China. Is there a fraction of people who agrees with it or is almost it universally disapproved of? In general people don't agree with it. However, for a lot of people, it's not actually on their radar. The reality is most people in China are so engrossed in their work and day-to-day life that censorship isn't really actually an issue for…

That attitude is catching on in America. The censorship and consent apparatus is more privatized and not officially backed by state power (but see threats from politicians to tech companies to remove “disinformation” “or else”) but most people just put their heads down and toe the “official” line. You might even put on a little show about how woke you are to prove your loyalty. Such acting is common in all regimes.

This happens in every society. There is an official ideology and whether through central direction or self-organizing systems, that ideology is enforced. Occasional periods of lighter repression (when the official ideology is something like classical or Rawlsian liberalism) end up just being openings for more assertive ideologies to take control. America recently exited such a period.

Re: I helped build ByteDance's censorship machine

#22

Post by vulcan01 »

the_only_law wrote: post #18

Has this article been discussed here before? I could have sworn I recall seeing this article maybe a week or two ago on the front page but I can’t find a past thread with any activity.

It has: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26192988

(You have a good memory!)

Re: I helped build ByteDance's censorship machine

#23

Post by choppaface »

the_only_law wrote: post #18

Has this article been discussed here before? I could have sworn I recall seeing this article maybe a week or two ago on the front page but I can’t find a past thread with any activity.

Yeah I don't get it. I submitted it last week but it got no attention. ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26190172 )

It's a really eye-opening article because everybody does Trust & Safety differently and in ByteDance's case there appears to be a huge divide between how US and Chinese users are treated.

Re: I helped build ByteDance's censorship machine

#24

Post by int_19h »

cirenehc wrote: post #13
throwaway2474 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s very different. The West begins with privacy as a basic expectation, and is surprised when it doesn’t exist. In China it is never assumed in the first place (between individuals and the state). People accept the surveillance and mostly trust the state to act responsibly, or at least don’t see it as a major problem the way it’s seen in the US. Companies proudly display this kind of censorship and surveillance tec…

I think the concept of privacy directly conflicts with anti-censorship. The most private system is also 100% censored.

By its owner, which is as it should be.

Re: I helped build ByteDance's censorship machine

#25

Post by hong_kong »

ehmmmmmmmm wrote: post #10
kypro wrote: post #4

It would be interesting if someone from China could comment on censorship in China. Is there a fraction of people who agrees with it or is almost it universally disapproved of? Some of these arguments for censorship made in this article sound eerily similar to how we justify censorship in the West. > Our role was to make sure that low-level content moderators could find "harmful and dangerous content" as soon as poss…

> It would be interesting if someone from China could comment on censorship in China. Is there a fraction of people who agrees with it or is almost it universally disapproved of? In general people don't agree with it. However, for a lot of people, it's not actually on their radar. The reality is most people in China are so engrossed in their work and day-to-day life that censorship isn't really actually an issue for…

Any assertion of what 'most' Chinese citizens want is unprovable given the lack of any representation on any level of society.

Plenty of China watchers are happy to claim that Chinese people all support their government - and yet the government is curiously unwilling to test this assertion in democratic polls. Tells you something about how strongly held these beliefs are (hint: not very).

Re: I helped build ByteDance's censorship machine

#26

Post by int_19h »

kypro wrote: post #4

It would be interesting if someone from China could comment on censorship in China. Is there a fraction of people who agrees with it or is almost it universally disapproved of? Some of these arguments for censorship made in this article sound eerily similar to how we justify censorship in the West. > Our role was to make sure that low-level content moderators could find "harmful and dangerous content" as soon as poss…

> Some of these arguments for censorship made in this article sound eerily similar to how we justify censorship in the West.

The gist of any centralized top-down censorship is that some ideas are just too dangerous to allow them in public discourse. It can be dressed up in slightly different terms - "social harmony" or "threat to democracy" etc - but it's fundamentally about the same thing.

Re: I helped build ByteDance's censorship machine

#27

Post by int_19h »

throwaway8581 wrote: post #21
ehmmmmmmmm wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It would be interesting if someone from China could comment on censorship in China. Is there a fraction of people who agrees with it or is almost it universally disapproved of? In general people don't agree with it. However, for a lot of people, it's not actually on their radar. The reality is most people in China are so engrossed in their work and day-to-day life that censorship isn't really actually an issue for…

That attitude is catching on in America. The censorship and consent apparatus is more privatized and not officially backed by state power (but see threats from politicians to tech companies to remove “disinformation” “or else”) but most people just put their heads down and toe the “official” line. You might even put on a little show about how woke you are to prove your loyalty. Such acting is common in all regimes. T…

What point would you define as the beginning of that period that we're supposedly exiting?

Re: I helped build ByteDance's censorship machine

#29

Post by [deleted] »

kypro wrote: post #4

It would be interesting if someone from China could comment on censorship in China. Is there a fraction of people who agrees with it or is almost it universally disapproved of? Some of these arguments for censorship made in this article sound eerily similar to how we justify censorship in the West. > Our role was to make sure that low-level content moderators could find "harmful and dangerous content" as soon as poss…

[deleted]
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