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Ex-Reddit CEO on Twitter moderation
631–640 of 975 posts
Re: Ex-Reddit CEO on Twitter moderation
#632At least one missing element is that of reputation . I don't think it should work exactly like it does in the real world, but the absence of it seems to always lead to major problems. The cost of being a jerk online is too low - it's almost entirely free of any consequences. Put another way, not everyone deserves a megaphone. Not everyone deserves to chime in on any conversation they want. The promise of online discu…
Soon reputation will cost only $8 a month.
I don't know why this meme is being repeated so much. I see it everywhere.
Twitter Verification is only verifying that the account is "authentic, notable, and active".
Nothing about the Verification Process changed. At least I have not heard about any changes other then the price change from free to $8.
Re: Ex-Reddit CEO on Twitter moderation
#633Isn't it inconsistent to both say "moderation decisions are about behavior, not content", and "platforms can't justify moderation decisions because of privacy reasons". It seems like you wouldn't need to reveal any details about the content of the behavior, but just say "look, this person posted X times, or was reported Y times", etc... I find the author to be really hand-wavy around why this part is difficult. I wor…
For one, giving specific examples gives censured users an excuse to do point-by-point rebuttals. In my experience, point-by-point rebuttals are one of the behaviors that should be considered bad behavior and moderated against because they encourage the participant to think only of each point individually and ignore the superlinear effect of every point taken together. For another, the user can latch on specific examples that seem innocuous out of context and allow them to complain that their censorship was obviously heavy handed, and if the user is remotely well known then it's famous person's word versus random other commenters trying to add context. The ultimate result is that people see supposed problems with moderation far more than anyone ever says "man I sure am glad that user's gone" so there's a general air of resentment against the moderation and belief in its ineffectiveness
Re: Ex-Reddit CEO on Twitter moderation
#634I have actually worked in this area. I like a lot of Yishan's other writing but I find this thread mostly a jumbled mess without much insight. Here are a couple assorted points:
>In fact, once again, I challenge you to think about it this way: could you make your content moderation decisions even if you didnʻt understand the language they were being spoken in?
I'm not sure what the big point is here but there are a couple parts to how this works in the real world:
1) Some types of content removal do not need you to understand the language: visual content (images/videos), legal takedowns (DMCA).
2) Big social platforms contract with people around the world in order to get coverage of various popular languages.
3) You can use Google Translate (or other machine translation) to review content in some languages that nobody working in content moderation understands.
But some content that violates the site's policies can easily slip through the cracks if it's in the right less-spoken language. That's just a cost of doing business. The fact that the language is less popular will limit the potential harm but it's certainly not perfect.
>Hereʻs the answer everyone knows: there IS no principled reason for banning spam. We ban spam for purely outcome-based reasons: > >It affects the quality of experience for users we care about, and users having a good time on the platform makes it successful.
Well, that's the same principle that underlies all content moderation: "allowing this content is more harmful to the platform than banning it". You can go into all the different reasons why it might be harmful but that's the basic idea and it's not unprincipled at all. And not all spam is banned from all platforms--it could just have its distribution killed or even be left totally alone, depending on the specific cost/benefit analysis at play.
You can apply the same reasoning to every other moderation decision or policy.
The main thrust of the thread seems to be that content moderation is broadly intended to ban negative behavior (abusive language and so on) rather than to censor particular political topics. To that I say, yeah, of course.
FWIW I do think that the big platforms have taken a totally wrong turn in the last few years by expanding into trying to fight "disinformation" and that's led to some specific policies that are easily seen as political (eg policies about election fraud claims or covid denialism). If we're just talking about staying out of this business then sure, give it a go. High-level blabbering about "muh censorship!!!" without discussion of specific policies, is what you get from people like Musk or Sacks, though, and that's best met with an eye roll.
Re: Ex-Reddit CEO on Twitter moderation
#635Earlier quoted context omitted.
Soon reputation will cost only $8 a month.
I don't know why this meme is being repeated so much. I see it everywhere. Twitter Verification is only verifying that the account is "authentic, notable, and active". Nothing about the Verification Process changed. At least I have not heard about any changes other then the price change from free to $8.
> Twitter Verification is only verifying that the account is "authentic, notable, and active".
Musk has been very clear that it will be open to anyone who pays the (increased) cost for Twitter’s Blue (which also will get other new features), and thus no longer be tier to “notable” or “active”.
> At least I have not heard about any changes other then the price change from free to $8.
Its not a price change from free to $8 for Twitter Verification. It is a discontinuation of Twitter Verification as a separate thing, but moving the (revised) process and resulting checkmark to be an open-to-anyone-who-pays component of Blue, which increases in cost to $8/mo (currently $4.99/mo).
Re: Ex-Reddit CEO on Twitter moderation
#636Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, I saw David Sacks tweet: “ The entitled elite is not mad that they have to pay $8/month. They’re mad that anyone can pay $8/month.” There must be quite a few people in here who are well versed in customer relations, at least in the context of a startup, can anyone explain to me why Musk and Sacks seem to have developed the strategy of insulting their customers and potential customers? I can think of two reasons…
> can anyone explain to me why Musk and Sacks seem to have developed the strategy of insulting their customers and potential customers? I find it fascinating that so many people are whip-crack quick to loudly criticize the $8 checkmark move. How many of these critics even use Twitter? And of those who do use Twitter, how can any of them know the outcome of such a move? Why not just wait and observe?
I think because Elon and Co. are acting so dismissive and entitled. They're acting frickin weird. Admittedly I think who you think sounds more entitled depends on your worldview. I do think the journalist reactions are strange, but probably just because they're acting to something so strange.
Elon is hardly describing a vision for this new version of twitter that people might be inspired to spend $8 for, yes something vague about plebs vs nobility, and half has many ads, but his biggest call to action has been "Hey we need the money". They're acting so shitty to everyone it's hardly a surprise people aren't fawning in confidence back. Plus I can't help but feel that these people are really just echoing what everyone else is thinking. Why am I paying $8 a month for Twitter?
Re: Ex-Reddit CEO on Twitter moderation
#637This is a very good way to pitch your afforestation startup accelerator in the guise of a talk on platform moderation. /s I'm pretty sure I've got some bones to pick with yishan from his tenure on Reddit, but everything he's said here is pretty understandable. Actually, I would like to develop his point about "censoring spam" a bit further. It's often said that the Internet "detects censorship as damage and routes ar…
I love that he’s for flame wars, go figure that’s all Reddit is
Re: Ex-Reddit CEO on Twitter moderation
#638Earlier quoted context omitted.
It is dependent on circumstances, and the people who would draw the line in the end would be the government followed by the court. Not all speech is protected speech. Graffiti is speech, and the words being spoken could be argued as protected, but the act of spraying other people properties with it is not protected. Free speech rights does not overwrite other rights. As a defense in a court I would not bet my money o…
> In theory a spammer could make non-commercial, non-misleading, non-fraudulent speech, and a site like twitter would then actually have to think about questions like first-amendment. I can't say I have ever received or seen spam like that. While I don't think I have seen it on Twitter (then again I only read it when it's linked) I have seen plenty of it in some older forums & IRC. Generally it's just nonsense like "…
You got a point. Demonstration as a form of free speech is an interesting dilemma. Review spam/bombing for example can be non-commercial, non-misleading, non-fraudulent, while still being a bit of a grey-zone. Removing them is also fairly controversial. Outside the web we have a similar problem when demonstrations and strikes are causing disruption in society. Obviously demonstration and strikes should be legal and are protected by free speech, but at the same time there are exceptions when they are not.
I am unsure if one would construct a objective fair model for how to moderate such activity.
Re: Ex-Reddit CEO on Twitter moderation
#639Earlier quoted context omitted.
1. There are plenty of places online that "don't moderate anything". In fact, nearly all of the social networks started off that way. The end result is … well, 4Chan. 2. "Self-moderation" doesn't work, because it's work. User's don't want to have constantly police their feeds and block people, topics, sites, etc. It's also work that never ends. Bad actors jump from one identity to the next. There are no "static" iden…
> The end result is … well, 4Chan. And? Your opinion of whether that's bad is subjective, yet the people there are happy with the result (presumably, as they keep using/visiting it). > Self-moderation" doesn't work, because it's work. So in other words: "I'm too lazy to curate a non-threatening experience for myself which is my responsibility because the offense being taken is my own." Whether or not you're willing t…
1. I didn't imply whether it was good or bad, just that the product you're describing already exists.
2. It's a platform problem. If you make users do work they don't want to do in order to make the platform pleasant to use, they won't do the work, the platform will not be pleasant to use, and they'll use a different platform that doesn't make them do that work.
3. "If they can't handle it, they shouldn't advertise there." Correct! They won't advertise there. That's the point.
There are already unmoderated, "you do the work, not us", "advertisers have to know what they're getting into" platforms, and those platforms are niche, with small audiences, filled with low-tier/scam ads and are generally not profitable.
Re: Ex-Reddit CEO on Twitter moderation
#640>Why is this? Because it has no value? Because itʻs sometimes false? Certainly itʻs not causing offline harm.
>No, no, and no.
Fundamentally disagree with his take on spam. Not only does spam have no value, it has negative value. The content of the spam itself is irrelevant when the same message is being pushed out a million times and obscuring all other messages. Reducing spam through rate-limiting is certainly the easiest and most impactful form of moderation.