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Dear MG Siegler, Are you seriously upset about your photo?

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Re: Dear MG Siegler, Are you seriously upset about your photo?

#121

Post by RexRollman »

robbrown451 wrote: post #88
tptacek wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait. Wait. Wait. I'm not wading into the "debate" about whether Google can or should mess with people's profile photos. I could care less. I'm saying: It is clearly ridiculous for Google to be policing profile photos looking for people flipping other people the bird . Right? Wrong? Who cares? It's ridiculous. It can't possibly work. By doing it, Google sends a message that they're fundamentally unserious about takin…

I think Tom is right that MySpace lost out to facebook because it is underpoliced. It became the cesspool of the internet. Policing can take many forms, for instance, Facebook doesn't allow people to add a lot of "bling" to their profiles as MySpace does/did. Reddit and Slashdot crowdsource their policing, by having a rating/karma system that discourages people from posting stuff that is bothersome to others. There a…

In my opinion, Facebook was better not because of it's policing, but because it had a better UI and lacked the hideous looking profile themes of MySpace.

Re: Dear MG Siegler, Are you seriously upset about your photo?

#122

Post by icebraining »

earbitscom wrote: post #112
icebraining wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who says they would be required? The question is whether we should participate in their network considering these rules. Of course, if enough people decide to leave G+ due to them (which I doubt), these rules might actually becomes themselves bad for their business.

Sure, but good luck finding a company who cares more about letting you express your "fuck you's" than they do about money, and good luck to them in building to scale with money only from advertisers who don't mind being next to MG's middle finger.

good luck to them in building to scale with money only from advertisers who don't mind being next to MG's middle finger.

But would they have to? I mean, Google's whole business model is to match ads to the right content, and they specifically say they're good with detecting such "offensive" images, so they could simply content match advertisers who were looking for "edgy" images.

Re: Dear MG Siegler, Are you seriously upset about your photo?

#123

Post by JoshTriplett »

lmm wrote: post #119
JoshTriplett wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I found your reasoning so wrong it left me momentarily at a loss for words. No, sites don't ever become subject to a different set of rules just because the majority of people use them. That kind of thinking leads down a very dangerous road. And if you still care about "to be accepted at school", grow up. Speaking as a "four-eyes" and a nerd, some of us never bothered caring about that in the first place. Unfortunate…

Different laws apply to companies in a monopoly position, and that is right and proper. (Not that G+ is in that position yet).

> Different laws apply to companies in a monopoly position,

That doesn't necessarily mean the same thing as "used by the majority of people", since people can and do use many different sites rather than choosing one exclusively. Those laws also doesn't have anything to do with the absurd schoolyard notions suggested by the comment I responded to; monopoly laws exist primarily to keep monopolies from preventing others from entering the market and disrupting that monopoly.

> and that is right and proper.

In your opinion; I strongly disagree with the notion that such laws have any basis in morality.

Re: Dear MG Siegler, Are you seriously upset about your photo?

#124

Post by ugh »

Cl4rity wrote: post #42
twp wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tom Anderson gets it the wrong way round, and completely misses Siegler's point. The question is not is why does Siegler care. He can reasonably expect to care: it's his photo attached to his personal profile and his photo is part of how he chooses to portray himself online. Siegler now knows that he cannot be himself on Google+, and now thousands of others know that they cannot be themselves on Google+ either. The q…

Actually, Tom gets it right. It's called discretion. Use his public example, for instance. If you were, for example, a cross-dresser who loved wearing women's underwear - and only women's underwear - would that be tolerated by the general public if you were roaming around a mall? "But this is who I really am, and it's how I want to portray myself in public!" It's Google's playground, and you either play by the rules…

If I do that in public there are laws and elected officials, there are courts and ways for me to appeal. A clear and explicit notification is always given and if not I can sue. Most importantly, some things I’m definitely and always allowed to do are explicitly written down.

If you are in favor of Google treating their site like a public space then Google is doing very poorly.

(It’s a stupid comparison that gets us nowhere.)

Re: Dear MG Siegler, Are you seriously upset about your photo?

#125

Post by kschrader »

RexRollman wrote: post #120
jbjohns wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The adult thing is to not be a child who thinks flipping the bird in his profile is something to be proud of. That's the adult thing for him to do. But the adult thing for the rest of us to do is mind our own business. If I start to start a conversation with someone but find their speech offends me, I walk away. If his picture offends you, just take him off your feed. No big deal.

No, the new "adult thing" to do is try to control what other do and say, so that no one ever has to experience the traumatic effects of being offended.

If by "new" you mean "the thing that's been going on for thousands of years."

Re: Dear MG Siegler, Are you seriously upset about your photo?

#127

Post by amatheus »

jroseattle wrote: post #6

Pretty sure this would fall under Apple's "objectionable content" policies for their app store. Wonder if MG would complain about that policy, too? :-)

On the other hand, lots of people in this thread are saying google's policy is the right thing in this case. Would they say the same if apple was refusing an app with a middle finger icon? A book? A song?

I think they're both wrong, but I understand that having something open for all, you'll get adults but children too, and as a parent your definition of objectionable content for your children may differ. But for me, simply removing the content is wrong. Maybe better parental control technology may make the situation better.

Re: Dear MG Siegler, Are you seriously upset about your photo?

#128

Post by viscanti »

eropple wrote: post #115
viscanti wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems silly. I could possibly see that point if you HAD to view his public profile, but it seems like that's entirely optional. Millions of users never see his public profile image. Those offended can simply not "follow" (circle?) him. It would be easy to justify NOT removing it, even if EVERYONE else found it offensive. There's an option to not follow/view his profile. Under your view, the only votes would be those…

> If the criteria to remove something is that more than one person finds it offensive, almost everything on the internet would be removed. Reductionist strawman. While a middle finger may not be particularly offensive to most people (including me), more people are likely to be offended by it than are likely to get their knickers in a twist over such a photo being removed. Ergo, it gets removed. Waste time with warnin…

It's not at all a reductionist straw-man argument. The post I responded to argued that if more than one person flagged the post as offensive that the content should be removed. The argument assumed that there should/could be a vote on if something is offensive, and if more people found it offensive it should be removed.

That line of reasoning is flawed, especially since there's no way to vote that you're not offended (other than the original person posting). That's an absurd system, where only the offended can voice their opinion. Even if those not offended could vote, who would vote on everything they're not offended by. That's still silly. Any system that attempts to allow people to vote/flag offensive material is inherently flawed.

That leaves us (or really Google) with an arbitrary decision on what should be allowed and what should be banned. Asking me (or anyone else) to save the "well, what is offensive" argument is silly. That's the WHOLE point. It's an arbitrary decision, one we all might come to different conclusions on. That underlines my point, that it's an arbitrary decision, and one that's been made for no good reason, given a system where you don't have to follow MG on Google+. There's a natural option (and given your obvious attitude on Mr. Siegler, the one you'll likely take), just don't follow him or look at his Google+ page. There's no reason to remove the content, and Google should be called out for it. MG might have over-reacted, and might be worthy of being called out too. I'm only calling out the system of "voting" to determine what's offensive. That's just a silly system.

Re: Dear MG Siegler, Are you seriously upset about your photo?

#129

Post by rhizome »

ryguytilidie wrote: post #81
rhizome wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to mention MG Siegler's long history of self-promotion.

not to mention EVERY TECHCRUNCH WRITER's long history of self-promotion. /fyp

I have never seen any story like "ROBIN WAUTERS WONDERS WHY ROBIN WAUTERS ISN'T IN THE HEADLINES," like you see multiple times per week with MG...on HN. Is he the most gossipy person there, now? This is usually the kind of drama you see with Perez Hilton type personalities.

Re: Dear MG Siegler, Are you seriously upset about your photo?

#130

Post by eropple »

jbjohns wrote: post #117
eropple wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The adult thing is to not be a child who thinks flipping the bird in his profile is something to be proud of. Siegler's little renegade act probably wouldn't work so well with the people who still think you can be a badass tech writer if he refrained, though. MC Siegler and his fans are completely and totally allowed to share pictures of them fingering at each other (that came out wrong, but I'm leaving it for poster…

>The adult thing is to not be a child who thinks flipping the bird in his profile is something to be proud of. That's the adult thing for him to do. But the adult thing for the rest of us to do is mind our own business. If I start to start a conversation with someone but find their speech offends me, I walk away. If his picture offends you, just take him off your feed. No big deal.

He's not on my feed. I don't use G+ and wouldn't follow Siegler if I did.

I don't really see many people not minding their business, though. I see a few (including me) saying "meh, it's Google's house, they choose the rules", and that's about it.

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