Live data from Hacker News

Omegle 2009-2023

omegle.com

161–170 of 1001 posts

Re: Omegle 2009-2023

#161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find it interesting that the "magical period" seems to be determined by your age. For me, the internet has already lost its magic by the time the mid 2000s came around, well before Omegle came out in 2009. For me, the magical period was the early 90s, when I was growing up. In 15 years, are people going to be talking about the current internet as the time when the magic was there? It seems more about the magic of c…

Also would comport with the explanation that the Internet just gets worse and worse. Will be interesting to see if kids who grew up with TikTok et al. will, as adults, view it as affectionately as we view our childhood form of the Internet. I do think there's something to be said of an overall trend toward more consumption, less production.

It's free market dynamics. There is a constant push towards things which are more addictive and make more ad click dollars.

That's the opposite of better. Better is made with soul, and often for free.

Google has come full circle. Early Google succeeded in part because of nonintrusive ad words, scamming over banner ads. Now, Youtube.

Re: Omegle 2009-2023

#162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find it interesting that the "magical period" seems to be determined by your age. For me, the internet has already lost its magic by the time the mid 2000s came around, well before Omegle came out in 2009. For me, the magical period was the early 90s, when I was growing up. In 15 years, are people going to be talking about the current internet as the time when the magic was there? It seems more about the magic of c…

Yep, each generation thinks they're special. But I think the early internet was different since it had literally just went from 0->1

IMHO the early internet was different in one important way - you used to have to know how to use a computer that was fairly complex to even get online vs mashing glass on a touchscreen device that is always connected that you have approximately 0% idea of how it works

That is to say the idiots back then were almost smarter than the average user today

Re: Omegle 2009-2023

#163
post #90

This is so sad. For all the conventional reasons: the victim of the abuse deserves sympathy, and that abuse shouldn't happen. But also because we seem to be placing the blame for the abuse on the service, not the abuser. And that's sad because instead of being able to just make interesting stuff and put them online, we are being forced to consider "what's the worst possible thing that some evil bastard could use this…

[flagged]

I'm not an evil bastard. I have no idea what evil bastards will want to do with anything I create. I literally don't think like this and can't predict their behaviour.

Why is it my responsibility to do this?

Re: Omegle 2009-2023

#164
post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll be right back - I need to tell my local pub and parks authority that they didn't think through the basic consequences of their actions when they made a place people could meet random strangers. I'm sure they just haven't thought through what a moral failing offering public spaces are. Edit to respond to OP's Edit: Your quote you're replying to includes "And prevent it". Which made us assume you were directly imp…

Does the local pub allow minors? I’m confused

Many of them do around me. Does that matter to the point I was making? I'm not claiming there's literally no rules or laws around public spaces that have to be abided by.

Re: Omegle 2009-2023

#166

Omegle has fewer than 30 employees, according to some sites online. I can't help but wonder whether having a more robust ops and legal team would have prevented this outcome. Founders shouldn't feel like they're going to have a heart attack at 30 if they've hired the right size of team. One (probably frivolous) lawsuit for a nearly 15-year-old company shouldn't be existential.

One is fewer than 30. Did he have any? How was he making money at all?

Re: Omegle 2009-2023

#167
post #40
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As a young girl, Alice (not her real name) logged on to the popular live video chat website, Omegle, and was randomly paired with a paedophile, who coerced her into becoming a digital sex slave. Nearly 10 years later the young American is suing Omegle in a landmark case that could pave the way for a wave of lawsuits against other social platforms. This is fucked. We shouldn't have to put safety padding on everythin…

> Should we put inflatable balloons around people because cars and high velocity objects exist that we can collide with? You’re talking in hyperbole but… yeah, we do a ton of work to make roads safer than they might otherwise be. What purpose do you think pedestrian crossings serve?

To make the bodies easier to collect? (/s kinda)

Re: Omegle 2009-2023

#168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

how far do we take this? would we have motor vehicles if we knew how many people would be killed by/with them every year?

Motor vehicles are a great example. They are HEAVILY regulated and have a gigantic focus on safety.

They aren’t nearly as safe as they could be, and manufacturers have had to be dragged kicking and screaming to implement even basic safety features like seatbelts: some manufacturers even refused on the basis that adding safety features implied their products were unsafe!

Airplanes are probably the example you want - heavily regulated and very focused on safety. Not motor vehicles. After all, if they really were focused on safety, they’d have banned giant trucks and SUVs for personal use a long, long time ago.

Re: Omegle 2009-2023

#169
> From the moment I discovered the Internet at a young age, it has been a magical place to me. Growing up in a small town, relatively isolated from the larger world, it was a revelation how much more there was to discover – how many interesting people and ideas the world had to offer.

This was a not-unusual story for people active online in the '80s.

I wonder how the world-expanding has changed, now that everyone's online. I feel like I only have a partial and rough high-level understanding.

Nowadays, for example, every gay kid in every small town knows they're not alone, which is a great advance for humanity.

But everyone is also being bombarded, conditioned, tracked, manipulated, and exploited pervasively online.

What things can we contemporary techbros do, to keep all the goodness of making online accessible to everyone, but remove much of the current badness?

(I mean, after we spend 5 minutes removing various kinds of third-party trackers from sites we control, what's the next thing we can do?)

Post reply on HN