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Moot: "sterile Facebook comments over provocative YouTube comments?"

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Re: Moot: "sterile Facebook comments over provocative YouTube comments?"

#21

Post by paganel »

ghc wrote: post #15

Personally, I find that the quality of Youtube comments varies with the content of the video. Some users post videos that always lead to excellent discussion. I think the quality of Youtube comments reflects the quality of the content, more than anything else. Why else would Facebook comments be so bad and sterile? Facebook's content consists mainly of more narcissistic fluff than even a beauty magazine could contain…

> I think the quality of Youtube comments reflects the quality of the content, more than anything else.

So very true. Just last night I spent close to 2 hours reading the YouTube comments on some Romanian "lăutari" music (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C4%83utari) videos, and learning so much by doing so. But if you were to move just slightly to watching a related music style, "manele" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manele), which are more popular in this day and age, the comments would go way down, at the point where one out of three comments is either racist or a badly spelled swear word.

Re: Moot: "sterile Facebook comments over provocative YouTube comments?"

#22

Post by MostAwesomeDude »

stfu wrote: post #17
marvin wrote: post #12

I think everyone here is missing the point of moot's comment. I read this as commentary on anonymity and honest discussion. Ignore YouTube and 4chan's /b/ board for the moment. If you look at some of the communities at reddit, for instance, there are subjects that are discussed thorougly which would never see the light of day if their authors had to appear before their friends with their full name and picture. Some o…

There is so much pushing for de-anonymization from corporations and governments, that places like 4chan or reddit are those rare gardens of free speech in their purest sense that are most important to keep alive.

That 4chan is a bastion of cultural output is not something to be ignored, either, and that's something I'd hope even anti-free-speech advocates can recognize.

Re: Moot: "sterile Facebook comments over provocative YouTube comments?"

#23

Post by pork »

josh_miller wrote: post #10
sbierwagen wrote: post #7

I have never left a Facebook comment on a third party site. Partially this is due to inconvenience, (the web browser with my Facebook login credentials has always had its own VM, to prevent like button tracking) and partially because associating my real name and identity with a blog comment seems like using a cannon to kill a squirrel. If Samuel Bierwagen wants to say something about an issue, he'll write an essay ab…

If the quality of TechCrunch comments were higher would you think about it? I'd actually love to participate in an engaging discussion on AVC.com, for example. But when 200 people have commented, and 75% of them are tooting Fred's horn, it's no fun.

If 75% of them thought it worthwhile enough to "toot Fred's horn", then in general, 75% of them might enjoy the rest of the comments also "tooting Fred's horn". I agree with you, but that's not something that can be ignored. Groupthink can be intoxicating.

Re: Moot: "sterile Facebook comments over provocative YouTube comments?"

#25

Post by josh_miller »

rwolf wrote: post #24

I wish atroundtable used fragment identifiers so you could deeplink to comments. Or give each comment it's own standalone page as well, a la twitter.

we're on it! look for it on the next Roundtable (with Khoi Vinh, Garry Tan, etc).

Any other features you would like to see?

Re: Moot: "sterile Facebook comments over provocative YouTube comments?"

#26

Post by DatamancerChris »

marvin wrote: post #12

I think everyone here is missing the point of moot's comment. I read this as commentary on anonymity and honest discussion. Ignore YouTube and 4chan's /b/ board for the moment. If you look at some of the communities at reddit, for instance, there are subjects that are discussed thorougly which would never see the light of day if their authors had to appear before their friends with their full name and picture. Some o…

I think marvin has an excellent point: people as a universal culture tend to shun certain subjects and embrace others, and these change between nations, faiths, etc.. The availability of an anonymous forum in which to address these shunned portions ideas is a useful tool when it is leveraged in the right way. There are many things people would not say if they were to be held personally accountable for their thoughts and feelings by those who would rather punish their "abnormal" beliefs than appreciate their candid honesty.

I think the major issue here is the responsible use of the Anonymous tag. Too many hateful, prejudicial, or otherwise ignorant comments are tossed out from behind that shield of "you can't see me" that is the anonymous internet, and this becomes the norm by which others come to judge such communities. I firmly believe that our state of being as a society indicates there must be a striation in the internet: one where we are who we are, and one where we can discuss counter-culture or taboo subjects without fear of reprisal. Ideally these would be the same place, but realistically they cannot be until our society becomes much more accepting of itself.

(Also, I've never commented on here, but HN is the Bee Knees.)

Re: Moot: "sterile Facebook comments over provocative YouTube comments?"

#27

Post by athst »

I agree entirely. Sites like Youtube and Yahoo! Answers have been maligned in the past couple years with the rise of sites like Quora and Google Plus, but to me, the interaction on Youtube feels a lot more human and authentic than on the other sites. You don't even have to build it up into a whole thing about free speech. It's just that there's something about those communities, perhaps the anonymity, that allows people to be less guarded and it gives you a stronger sense of community.

Re: Moot: "sterile Facebook comments over provocative YouTube comments?"

#28

Post by jisaacstone »

sbierwagen wrote: post #7

I have never left a Facebook comment on a third party site. Partially this is due to inconvenience, (the web browser with my Facebook login credentials has always had its own VM, to prevent like button tracking) and partially because associating my real name and identity with a blog comment seems like using a cannon to kill a squirrel. If Samuel Bierwagen wants to say something about an issue, he'll write an essay ab…

If I have something to say I'll sign up for an account before using facebook to comment

Re: Moot: "sterile Facebook comments over provocative YouTube comments?"

#29

Post by 404error »

tsunamifury wrote: post #19
404error wrote: post #16

I wish there were more proactive comments on newspaper websites. I think communities everywhere are missing out on a great opportunity to communicate, exchange ideas, and bring real change to real problems in their own towns. Most of the time newspaper comments (in my community) are about how illegal immigration is to blame for EVERYTHING and I mean EVERYTHING. Commenters tend to rally behind the bully and pick on an…

The New York Times made a pretty good model. 1) Promote and recognize good comments 2) Remove offensive or non-constructive ones This form of hand curiation sets down rules and expectations which the community at large than reaches for. If you dont set down rules of course your discussion forums will disolve into petty nonsense. The loudest, dumbest voice always wins in a shouting match merely by employing a denial-o…

Unfortunately our editor's response to everything is "it's a staffing problem."

Our newsroom, if you want to call it that, spends most of the day re-writing (fluffing) press releases to get a paper out the next day.

Corporate has our system lock down, we don't have access to our database tables and responses to feature requests, like comment promotion, are usually..."We'll bring that up in a meeting."

In my opinion people tend to feed their ego behind a keyboard. A lot of people bite their tongue in face to face conversations, only a few will speak out and make their opinions heard.

Maybe some kind of pay-wall for us would be a possible tool against trolling.

Thank you for your reply.

Re: Moot: "sterile Facebook comments over provocative YouTube comments?"

#30

Post by marvin »

DatamancerChris wrote: post #26
marvin wrote: post #12

I think everyone here is missing the point of moot's comment. I read this as commentary on anonymity and honest discussion. Ignore YouTube and 4chan's /b/ board for the moment. If you look at some of the communities at reddit, for instance, there are subjects that are discussed thorougly which would never see the light of day if their authors had to appear before their friends with their full name and picture. Some o…

I think marvin has an excellent point: people as a universal culture tend to shun certain subjects and embrace others, and these change between nations, faiths, etc.. The availability of an anonymous forum in which to address these shunned portions ideas is a useful tool when it is leveraged in the right way. There are many things people would not say if they were to be held personally accountable for their thoughts…

You have a good point about people who hide behind anonymity just to cause damage. Thankfully, the latest generation of Internet forums has been able to keep these voices confined to places where they don't cause any damage, or, in the case of /b/, in an environment where they can actually generate something worthwhile.

I'm not sure we will ever see a society which is so diverse and open that many of the views we see in internet forums could be brought into the wider public area. It would be awesome if this happened, because you often see groups of people who have interests and views which are considered unfit in most public gatherings (a mundane example that many of us are familiar with is simply admitting that you're a nerd and talking about a technically complicated subject), but which could flourish if the people who have them were brought together. There is an idea of "the normal" which almost everyone tries to adhere to, while repressing the ideas and impulses they really care about.

In the meantime it is still very valuable to have a place where it's possible to be honest. There are way too many games and too much acting in Western society. This might be the case everywhere, but the West is the only culture I know well enough to be sure.

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