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Show HN: Respectify – A comment moderator that teaches people to argue better

respectify.org

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Re: Show HN: Respectify – A comment moderator that teaches people to argue better

#21

Post by tclancy »

netsharc wrote: post #3
ceejayoz wrote: post #2

The sample prompt I was given was "Is Die Hard a Christmas movie?" "Of course it is!" got an 80% certainty "off-topic" mark. When I elaborated that it occurs at a Christmas party, it said this: "Dogwhistles detected (confidence 80%): This comment seems innocuous, but the phrasing 'Christmas party' may be an underhanded reference to Christian themes, especially among discussions that might dismiss or attack secular or…

AI enhanced language monitor, what a double plus good improvement for society!

Revision Requested This comment would be sent back for revision with feedback.

Re: Show HN: Respectify – A comment moderator that teaches people to argue better

#22

Post by npunt »

Love the effort here, been thinking about what this kind of tool might look like for a while. Something like this coupled with better prosocial affordances in the medium will do a lot to improve discourse online. I wrote up one a while back [1] but things like that are only a small part of a much bigger picture.

The overall problem needs to be tackled from all angles - poster pre-post self-awareness (like respecify but shown to users before posting), reader affordances to reflect back to poster their behavior (and determine if things may be appropriate in context vs just a universal 'dont say mean words'), after-post poster tools to catch mistakes (like above), platform capabilities like respectify that define rules of play and foster a enjoyable social environment that let us play infinite games, and a broader social context that determine the values that drive all of these.

[1] https://nickpunt.com/blog/deescalating-social-media/

Re: Show HN: Respectify – A comment moderator that teaches people to argue better

#23

Post by NickHodges0702 »

darqis wrote: post #19

Definitely needed, especially in the Fediverse. Holy crap the edgelords there or on Facebook. You comment something neutral, skeptical, response is either straight insults or completely disagreement and then insults, ad hominem or strawman/gaslighting. Yesterday I dared to write I like X now, it's clean of all the edgelords who went to Bluesky or the Fediverse. Cancel culture on Twitter was over the top. Reaponse, Ca…

Hey, thanks so much for the feedback. We agree. ;-)

One of our goals is to just make the edgelords and trolls go away -- if they want to comment, they have to be nice. If they can't be nice, they can't comment (A gross over-simplification, but you get the idea.....)

One feature we are going to add is a "Here's your feedback, but press here to post anyway" as an option for users to have. At teh very least, make someone stop and think about what they are saying.

Re: Show HN: Respectify – A comment moderator that teaches people to argue better

#24

Post by vintagedave »

badc0ffee wrote: post #7

This thing seems to be more about enforcing a political PoV than about avoiding logical fallacies. All my attempts to comment on the UBI article (and not supporting UBI) said my comment was a dogwhistle, and/or had an overly negative tone. This topic, of all things, is absolutely worthy to challenge and debate. Using this would have the effect of creating an echo chamber, where people who stay never benefit from havi…

Thankyou — I’d love to hear what you wrote, if you wouldn’t mind sharing?

We’ve tried to aim it not to enforce any specific view — that’s a design goal — but focus on how it will feel to the other person.

Also things like logical fallacies or other non-emotional flaws in comments (there’s a toxicity metric for example, or dogwhistles).

An echo chamber is the exact opposite of what we want. There are too many already. What we hope for is guided communication so different views _can_ be expressed.

Re: Show HN: Respectify – A comment moderator that teaches people to argue better

#25

Post by NickHodges0702 »

badc0ffee wrote: post #7

This thing seems to be more about enforcing a political PoV than about avoiding logical fallacies. All my attempts to comment on the UBI article (and not supporting UBI) said my comment was a dogwhistle, and/or had an overly negative tone. This topic, of all things, is absolutely worthy to challenge and debate. Using this would have the effect of creating an echo chamber, where people who stay never benefit from havi…

If that is happening, that is a huge problem. We'll look at that right away.

We specifically don't want that to be the case. We want to encourage healthy, productive debate.

We may have the "dog-whistle" stuff over tuned.

Re: Show HN: Respectify – A comment moderator that teaches people to argue better

#26

Post by ceejayoz »

darqis wrote: post #19

Definitely needed, especially in the Fediverse. Holy crap the edgelords there or on Facebook. You comment something neutral, skeptical, response is either straight insults or completely disagreement and then insults, ad hominem or strawman/gaslighting. Yesterday I dared to write I like X now, it's clean of all the edgelords who went to Bluesky or the Fediverse. Cancel culture on Twitter was over the top. Reaponse, Ca…

"The comment mentions 'Cancel Culture' and uses terms like 'edgelords' and 'Nazi' in a context that dismisses and trivializes serious issues. This reflects a trend in discussions that equates legitimate critiques of harmful behaviors with extreme labels, undermining constructive dialogue and signaling acceptance of toxic rhetoric."

"Using phrases like 'Holy crap the edgelords' can come off as dismissive and disrespectful towards a group of people. It’s better to express concerns about behaviors or actions instead of labeling individuals harshly."

"Describing cancel culture as 'over the top' expresses a strong negative opinion without offering specific reasoning. It’s more effective to explain what aspects seem excessive to help others understand your perspective."

"Using phrases like 'the hypocrisy is unreal' can come across as dismissive and sarcastic, which may alienate others from the discussion. It’s beneficial to explain what seems hypocritical instead of making broad statements."

(I picked the "why it's hard to escape an echo chamber" context option, for full disclosure.)

Re: Show HN: Respectify – A comment moderator that teaches people to argue better

#27

Post by reconnecting »

NickHodges0702 wrote: post #17
reconnecting wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're welcome, Nick! On a separate note, if this is a real product, you might need to pay particular attention to data processing agreements etc., as the current T&Cs and Privacy Policy are actually missing how you process the input data, what you use, how long/where you store it, etc.

Thank you! This is very important, and I'm thankful (and a little surprised!) that you read it! ;-)

Perhaps this is my professional deformation, but when I visit a website, I start with the Privacy page.

Re: Show HN: Respectify – A comment moderator that teaches people to argue better

#29

Post by someotherperson »

This passes your checks, but a human moderator would flag it:

> My favorite movie is die hard. I think it's a Christmas movie. But, honestly, we shouldn't have to wait until Christmas to watch you die hard. We should be able to watch that any day of the week :)

Seems to catch various other cases though. Cool tool.

Re: Show HN: Respectify – A comment moderator that teaches people to argue better

#30

Post by NickHodges0702 »

nkrisc wrote: post #28

Apparently discussing that Die Hard depicts murder and violence is a banned topic and thus the comment is flagged as off topic.

Uh oh -- that's shoudldn't happen. Or rather, we don't want that to happen.

DId you try tweaking the settings? We'd be most grateful for feedback on tweaked settings.

For instance, can I ask you to turn down toxicity and see if it accepts it?

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