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Ask HN: Is it time for HN to implement a form of captcha?

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Re: Ask HN: Is it time for HN to implement a form of captcha?

#101

Post by lovich »

_DeadFred_ wrote: post #63
chasebank wrote: post #60

We've always wanted to build a service which provides authentication through credit score verification. Whether its applied to dating apps, product review sites, HN. I'd sure love to filter by 650+ only. I'm certain it's illegal but it sure would help.

Hell yes! Not just a social credit score, but one that permanently locks in/enforces a class system. Tech bros even manage to enshittify social credit scores to be even more shitty. Amazing work.

If you wait around long enough you’ll also start hearing them complain about China’s Totally Different Credit Score System that is only for social control, unlike the American system which is obviously just good business sense and doesn’t exert any control into seemingly unrelated portions of your life

Re: Ask HN: Is it time for HN to implement a form of captcha?

#102

Post by FloorEgg »

baxuz wrote: post #87
FloorEgg wrote: post #82

I explored a startup idea that really didn't make sense unless there was a way to ensure users were unique humans in an anonymous and privacy preserving way. Researched it substantially and realized it's an unsolved problem. Anything that makes a dent is incomplete and comes with ugly tradeoffs. For a time I wondered if I should try and solve it myself, but I could never think any solution that hadn't already been/be…

It is a solved problem with ZKPs

I studied ZKPs. You and I must have very different understandings of the actual scope of the problem. Like I said, everything that exists or is being worked on that makes a dent (including ZKPs) is incomplete or has ugly trade offs.

Maybe you are thinking purely from a math / theoretical perspective, but I'm thinking of a compete solution that's practical to use to solve the problem for sites like HN and many others.

Re: Ask HN: Is it time for HN to implement a form of captcha?

#103

Post by rented_mule »

losvedir wrote: post #3

I've been thinking the same. I'm actually building a little site that presents a textarea that you can type your comment into and it will track its changes over time (typing, editing, pasting, etc) and provide a little playback widget so someone can see the composition of the comment. The idea being you can include a link to the playback in your comment that you post here and someone can eyeball it and see if it look…

My favorite code editor is where I write anything longer than a sentence or two, including this comment. Then I paste the result into its final destination. Given that I tend to heavily edit my writing, the muscle memory I've built up in that editor helps me focus more deeply on my writing. So I guess I'll look pretty suspicious? Let me add an em-dash — everyone knows that real humans don't use those. ;-)

Re: Ask HN: Is it time for HN to implement a form of captcha?

#104

Post by Imustaskforhelp »

rd wrote: post #5

I've always wished there was a "block comments from this user" feature that didn't rely on vibe-coding my own Chrome extension (and thus not work on Safari where I spent at least 50% of my HN time). I imagine it could even work like Sponsorblock does, and we could crowdsource people who's comments are inflammatory. I've also noticed that very obviously LLM-generated comments are called out, and the community tends to…

> I imagine it could even work like Sponsorblock does, and we could crowdsource people who's comments are inflammatory

Let's discuss how to make this reality.

Do you want a ranking system where more the people downvote some person, the better? if so how do you prevent spam in that, do you take metrics like karma or what exactly?

I don't think that captcha is a solution either but also that I don't know how to feel about removing entire swaths of people, I can think someone writing something bad once and probably get into this "black-list"

Another aspect is once again the black list, I don't know but do we really need a system of essentially a communal ban?

The only thing I can see it reasonable is if there is a slop bot comment poster but I rarely face this issue but if you do, you can probably create a tampermonkey script and tampermonkey scripts work on chrome,firefox and "Userscripts" which should work on safari as well and that script is most likely gonna be compatible on both tampermonkey and userscripts.

Re: Ask HN: Is it time for HN to implement a form of captcha?

#105

Post by basilikum »

tptacek wrote: post #51
lagniappe wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>There are forums that silo themselves in various ways. HN is an experiment in how far you can get without any of those kinds of features, Normally I'd agree, but we have shadowbans, which really irks me.

Only for actual bad actors --- spammers, overt griefers, and people evading bans. A lot of HN's shadowban rep comes from Paul Graham's stewardship of the site (this whole site was a side-hustle of a side-hustle for him) and ignores over a decade of Dan's work professionalizing it. Almost everyone banned on HN is banned publicly, with a public message explaining why.

I've had submissions and comments of mine on this very account shadowbanned before I got some karma. It's just how the spam detection system works. So no, it's not just for bad actors, but for anyone an automated system suspects to be spammy enough. It's also easy to see whether your submission was shadowbanned by just looking for it while being logged out; only works if you know you might be shadowbanned though. So unsuspecting people who just got falsely flagged might never find out they are not being displayed to others.

Re: Ask HN: Is it time for HN to implement a form of captcha?

#107

Post by stock_toaster »

rd wrote: post #5

I've always wished there was a "block comments from this user" feature that didn't rely on vibe-coding my own Chrome extension (and thus not work on Safari where I spent at least 50% of my HN time). I imagine it could even work like Sponsorblock does, and we could crowdsource people who's comments are inflammatory. I've also noticed that very obviously LLM-generated comments are called out, and the community tends to…

One problem with this is it often leads to a missing stair[1] syndrome for new users not knowing whom to block and finding the place overall too toxic.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missing_stair

Re: Ask HN: Is it time for HN to implement a form of captcha?

#109

Post by sgentle »

metadope wrote: post #77
l33tbro wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A preliminary discussion is more efficacious than polling uniformed users.

[flagged]

And "picturing" is just a florid way of saying "imagining", no?

The art of language lives in its redundancy; every unforced choice is a venue for self-expression.

Re: Ask HN: Is it time for HN to implement a form of captcha?

#110

Post by vivzkestrel »

- here is an idea for a captcha

- write this number in words

- 486436546497964136564768756456455824164567575646875812445676854253154782125

- four quadrigintilion eight hundred sixty four trigintillion three hundred sixty five duovigintillion four hundred sixty four unvigintillion nine hundred seventy nine vigintillion six hundred forty one novemdecillion three hundred sixty five octodecillion six hundred forty seven septendecillion six hundred eight seven sexdecillion five hundred sixty four quindecillion five hundred sixty four quatuordecillion five hundred fifty eight tredecillion two hundred forty one duodecillion six hundred forty five undecillion six hundred seventy five decillion seven hundred fifty six nonillion four hundred sixty eight octillion seven hundred fifty eight septillion one hundred twenty four sextillion four hundred fifty six quintillion seven hundred sixty eight quadrillion five hundred forty two trillion five hundred thirty one billion five hundred forty seven million eight two thousand one hundred twenty five

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