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User ban controversy reveals Bluesky’s decentralized aspiration isn’t reality

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Re: User ban controversy reveals Bluesky’s decentralized aspiration isn’t reality

#171

Post by asadotzler »

astrange wrote: post #98
greekrich92 wrote: post #3

The founder has been posting through it, Elon-style and with as much cringe. It's disappointing because I've mostly been able to replicate my Twitter experience there. It's better actually, because more funny people moved and fewer journalists so it's less of a doomscroll.

"Posting through it" is a fairly nonsensical concept. It implies you're required to agree with people yelling at you, which you aren't. Bluesky in particular has this problem because it inherited a kind of leftist crustpunk poster from 2016 Twitter. They had a weird affect where they hated "nerds" for some reason and pretended to be those jock bully characters from 80s high school movies. The modern Bluesky form has…

>They're currently working on inventing new slurs for AI chatbots which are mostly remarkably offensive.

That sounds awesome. Thanks for the tip. I'm gonna join this effort immediately.

Re: User ban controversy reveals Bluesky’s decentralized aspiration isn’t reality

#172

Post by slg »

derbOac wrote: post #18

I much prefer Bluesky to X but have had a hunch this was coming due to everything I've read about the practicality of running a Bluesky protocol service. I still think there's room for something better technically. Mastodon seems more true to the decentralized ethos but I've never quite gotten used to the server dependency experience. Nostr appeals to me technically but every time I'm on it seems swamped completely b…

It always comes back to the userbase. I don't know how many times technologists need to learn the lesson that normal people simply don't care about ideological technical principles like decentralization and often actually prefer the benefits of centralized systems like ease of use and typically stronger moderation. And when it comes to social media, businesses are naturally going to end up prioritizing the desires of the majority of their userbase.

Re: User ban controversy reveals Bluesky’s decentralized aspiration isn’t reality

#173

Post by laughing_man »

layer8 wrote: post #30
Simulacra wrote: post #22

"..systems that reward outrage only make the problem worse.” I think this is what a lot of social media has become, particularly as people isolate themselves to only those sources and feeds they agree with.

I upvoted you, and at the time I believe that the core of the problem is having ranking and reaction mechanisms.

But don't you have to have some sort of ranking system for discoverability?

Re: User ban controversy reveals Bluesky’s decentralized aspiration isn’t reality

#174

Post by lkey »

dlivingston wrote: post #117
lkey wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook and Twitter no longer bother with moderation, do you think the experience on those platforms is better or worse than 5 years ago? It used to be common sense to immediately ban creeps of all stripes, especially the obvious ones. Singal certainly qualifies. Putting aside the super annoying 'just asking questions' vitriol that he publishes to national papers, his pdf-file chat log stuff alone would warrant an i…

> This isn't an election, and popularism is a coward's appeal. These platforms were supposed to be the "digital town square". Implicit in that is the idea that anyone and everyone can discuss and share their ideas. When would you remove someone from an actual town square? Only when they are being extremely disruptive or violent. Further, it cannot be a "town square" if half the town isn't allowed to be there.

"digital town square"

These are privately owned for-profit hundred-billion+ dollar publicly traded advertising companies. These are, almost definitionally, not honest actors! Are you serious, you still believe their marketing copy from 8 years ago verbatim?

What am I witnessing here?

Re: User ban controversy reveals Bluesky’s decentralized aspiration isn’t reality

#175

Post by jazzyjackson »

TimorousBestie wrote: post #96
fellpie wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But if you really are honestly curious and unbiased, M. K. Anderson wrote a well-researched article for Protean in 2022. He misrepresents Singal's writing, uses guilt-by-association smears, and focuses more on personal vilification of Singal than substantive critique. For example his claim that Singal's writing "endangers trans lives" is hyperbolic and unsupported. This is nothing more than a hit piece penned to de…

> For example his claim that Singal's writing "endangers trans lives" is hyperbolic and unsupported. Partially due to Singal’s sensationalist journalism, trans people in the United States are about to lose access to some forms of healthcare—treatments that will remain accessible to cis people, like hormone replacement therapy. So I think history has vindicated this particular claim. I don’t expect you to agree, howev…

That's quite the leap of causation

Re: User ban controversy reveals Bluesky’s decentralized aspiration isn’t reality

#176

Post by astrange »

asadotzler wrote: post #171
astrange wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Posting through it" is a fairly nonsensical concept. It implies you're required to agree with people yelling at you, which you aren't. Bluesky in particular has this problem because it inherited a kind of leftist crustpunk poster from 2016 Twitter. They had a weird affect where they hated "nerds" for some reason and pretended to be those jock bully characters from 80s high school movies. The modern Bluesky form has…

>They're currently working on inventing new slurs for AI chatbots which are mostly remarkably offensive. That sounds awesome. Thanks for the tip. I'm gonna join this effort immediately.

By remarkably offensive I mean they're clearly just trying to get away with saying the N-word. The full version too. You should try living your life better.

Re: User ban controversy reveals Bluesky’s decentralized aspiration isn’t reality

#177

Post by nozzlegear »

Devasta wrote: post #151
AlexandrB wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This makes some sense if Vance was a minor, fringe figure. But he was on a ticket voted for by ~50% of US voters. This is effectively saying that the goal is to have a social media site where half the country is not welcome. The problem with that is two-fold. One, it neuters any political impact - you're effectively driving away the very voters you need to convince. And two, it creates an echo chamber that distorts r…

> This is effectively saying that the goal is to have a social media site where half the country is not welcome. That seems like a good goal. I want to chat with friends about formula one or whatever, not have to have everything messed up by some weirdo who always wants to debate whether minorities have rights.

I don't like Vance at all, but him being on the same social media platform as you isn't the same thing as him showing up uninvited to your formula one conversation.

Re: User ban controversy reveals Bluesky’s decentralized aspiration isn’t reality

#178

Post by JuniperMesos »

aucisson_masque wrote: post #125

How can people laugh and make meme at someone else murder ? Like the guy, hate him, but there is something that used to be shared amongst humans, it's that you respect the dead. That's just empathy. Seems like it's gone to the toilet in some part of the usa or maybe it's just weirdos on internet. Either case it's despicable.

> How can people laugh and make meme at someone else murder ? Like the guy, hate him, but there is something that used to be shared amongst humans, it's that you respect the dead.

This is extremely wrong. Humans do have an impulse to show respect to the dead, even in some cases dead members of some kind of enemy community. But it is also extremely common and extremely widespread for people to celebrate the deaths of their enemies, from leftists making jokes about the death of Margaret Thatcher, to British people continuing to burn Guy Fawkes in effigy for his centuries-old act of unsuccessful terrorism, to Jews continuing to disparage Haman, some 2500 years after the events that formed the basis for the Purim festival.

Re: User ban controversy reveals Bluesky’s decentralized aspiration isn’t reality

#179

Post by laughing_man »

ogou wrote: post #50
packetlost wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When speech is violence, allowing someone a platform is akin to being party to and supporting .

Speech is not violence.

True. People define the speech of others as violence because they think it makes a violent response into self defense. It isn't true and never has been. If you're responding to speech with violence... you're the baddie.

Re: User ban controversy reveals Bluesky’s decentralized aspiration isn’t reality

#180

Post by dlivingston »

astrange wrote: post #105
dlivingston wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speech is not violence, guilt by association is undemocratic, and this hypothesis of de-platforming as a tactic to limit uncouth ideas was thoroughly tested over the last ~15 years and demonstrably shown to be false: Trump, Alex Jones, and many others were banned across platforms. One of these people now sits in the White House, in part because of backlash to the deplatforming of him and others with similar politics.

It cost $44B to get him unbanned so I think that's actually pretty good evidence it worked. > One of these people now sits in the White House, in part because of backlash to the deplatforming of him and others with similar politics. It's not because of anything. Cause and effect doesn't apply to the brain of the median American voter - they live in a world of pure imagination. You could say they thought prices would…

> It cost $44B to get him unbanned so I think that's actually pretty good evidence it worked.

Good evidence that it worked to do what? Limit his influence and popularity? This is false. His unbanning had little effect besides the right wing giving Musk brownie points, but the initial ban fueled grievance politics and became a huge rallying cry for the right. It was an extraordinary backfire.

> It's not because of anything. Cause and effect doesn't apply to the brain of the median American voter - they live in a world of pure imagination.

I flatly disagree with this. Human beings are endlessly deep and complex. The extremes of the internet cause us to group people together and create 1-dimensional strawmen of them, but if you talk to any American voter -- offline and 1-on-1 -- you will find complexity, nuance, and surprise in their opinions. At least, that has been my experience, with a pretty decent sample size.

Edit: I've been loosely watching the score on these comments, and it's interesting to see how rapidly it fluctuates up and down. For those that disagree, please leave a comment. IMO what I wrote is pretty common sense and moderate, so I'm interested in hearing disagreements.

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