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Tell HN: Announcing tomhow as a public moderator

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Re: Tell HN: Announcing tomhow as a public moderator

#131

Post by layer8 »

nailer wrote: post #113
JoshTriplett wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For example, having the opinion that manifest V3 is good for users is an opinion that will not thrive on HN. That's not a moderation issue. You can post that opinion, and people will disagree with it, post responses to it, and downvote it. It will not be flagged out of existence, unless it's also violating site policy in other ways.

A polite well worded post that disagrees with the mainstream will indeed still exist, but it will be moderated to unreadably transparent and hidden by default. It’s not a great experience. Meanwhile personal attacks and hyperbole regarding Elon Musk and Trump have become very common on HN.

Downvoting and flagging is not moderation.

Re: Tell HN: Announcing tomhow as a public moderator

#133

Post by layer8 »

raverbashing wrote: post #111
layer8 wrote: post #104

I always wondered how HN manages to do moderation 24/7 around the clock. Australia makes sense.

A lot of it boils down on dang being oversubscribed. And having some automations to help him

What do you mean by “oversubscribed”?

Automation, sure. But people need to sleep sometime, and maybe also have some life outside HN, for mental health. ;)

Re: Tell HN: Announcing tomhow as a public moderator

#134

Post by xboxnolifes »

otterley wrote: post #66
roflyear wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really don't think that HN lets dissenting opinions thrive (well, not anything that is truly controversial but not clearly hateful). That may feel cozy but it's not a reflection of anything pure or good, imo.

Then you're not spending enough time reading the comments on controversial stories. Disagreement is alive and well on HN.

I disagree. People will frequently say that downvoting is not for disagreeing, but in every controversial thread dissenting opinions are quickly downvoted and frequently flagged. Some recover, but many die or end up pushed down into obscurity.

Mildly controversial opinions sometimes survive and get discussion, but anything past that rarely get a reply and just get downvoted and flagged into oblivion. This isn't exactly a slight against HN, as this happens basically everywhere past a tiny userbase community. But I don't think it's particularly right to put HN on a pedestal for its ability to handle controversy.

Re: Tell HN: Announcing tomhow as a public moderator

#135

Post by tptacek »

pvg wrote: post #127
ryandrake wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since it's such a powerful action, it would be nice if flaggers had to at least justify the flag. Is it breaking a site rule? Is it spam? Is it not the original source? Does it actually violate the rules, or are you just using "Flag" as a mega-downvote for articles you don't personally like?

Yeah, that's the 'receipts for everything' idea and if you think it through, you'll realize it's at a minimum impractical and more likely just an outright bad idea. Where are these 'reasons' going to go? Who is going to read them or act on them? It sort of wants to stick it to those bad flaggers and misinformed downvoters or whatever but think about it applied to you. Do you not recoil at being asked by some random w…

A lot of HN mechanism makes more sense if you can accept the idea that the goal is to promote good threads, and not, as so many people believe, to promote one set of opinions over another. Requiring justification for flags would immediately crud up threads with meta-debates.

A hard thing for people to accept, something that I think is an unstated part of the HN ethos but nevertheless real, is that it's almost always better to have no thread at all than a shitty one. Important topics will inevitably get an airing in one thread or another.

Re: Tell HN: Announcing tomhow as a public moderator

#136

Post by ziddoap »

timeon wrote: post #128
eddyg wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of people don't read the Hacker News Guidelines⁽¹⁾ before submitting and deserve to be flagged. Quoting (emphasis mine): Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, or celebrities, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic. ⁽¹⁾ https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguid…

> unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon Maybe time will tell if it was actually OT.

>Maybe time will tell if it was actually OT.

When that time comes, if it comes, then you'd be within the guidelines to post it.

Preemptively posting it just in case it later becomes some new phenomenon is not ideal.

Re: Tell HN: Announcing tomhow as a public moderator

#137

Post by maccard »

kccqzy wrote: post #60
pstuart wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure about that, but a lot of it depends on what you consider to be "dissenting opinions".

For example, having the opinion that manifest V3 is good for users is an opinion that will not thrive on HN. Personally I hope Tom will bring new moderation policies that will truly let unpopular opinions thrive, but I don't have high hopes here since this is just an announcement of a new moderator, not an announcement of new moderation policies.

I’m a fairly steadfast holder of the “I like apples walled garden, it’s my choice to be there” argument, and I think as a dissenting opinion on this forum I get a lot of flak for it. But that’s not a moderation problem, it’s the fact that my opinion is different and I have 10x the number of people disagreeing with me than agreeing with me.

Re: Tell HN: Announcing tomhow as a public moderator

#138

Post by JoshTriplett »

layer8 wrote: post #131
nailer wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A polite well worded post that disagrees with the mainstream will indeed still exist, but it will be moderated to unreadably transparent and hidden by default. It’s not a great experience. Meanwhile personal attacks and hyperbole regarding Elon Musk and Trump have become very common on HN.

Downvoting and flagging is not moderation.

Flagging does seem to primarily be a tool for moderation. But for comments, at least, I've mostly not observed flagging being used to hide things that shouldn't be; if anything, I think flagging is underused on comments.

(It's still regularly abused on stories as a downvote, perhaps in part because stories don't have downvotes. HN sometimes "rescues" stories that get over-flagged, but it's still a problem.)

Re: Tell HN: Announcing tomhow as a public moderator

#139

Post by Teever »

perching_aix wrote: post #94
roflyear wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really don't think that HN lets dissenting opinions thrive (well, not anything that is truly controversial but not clearly hateful). That may feel cozy but it's not a reflection of anything pure or good, imo.

Is that a moderation issue? Because to me that's more of a system / culture issue. You can't argue in people's stead. If most dissenting commentary is hurtful, inciteful, manipulative, generally demagogue, etc., it's going to get culled, and you get a situation where "dissent isn't thriving ".

Moderation drives culture and should in the very least offset the worst tendencies of culture.

Otherwise, what exactly is moderation for?

Re: Tell HN: Announcing tomhow as a public moderator

#140

Post by [deleted] »

kccqzy wrote: post #60
pstuart wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure about that, but a lot of it depends on what you consider to be "dissenting opinions".

For example, having the opinion that manifest V3 is good for users is an opinion that will not thrive on HN. Personally I hope Tom will bring new moderation policies that will truly let unpopular opinions thrive, but I don't have high hopes here since this is just an announcement of a new moderator, not an announcement of new moderation policies.

[deleted]
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