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The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News (2019)

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Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News (2019)

#101

Post by tlb »

ksec wrote: post #54
awb wrote: post #6

Question for the mods: In the old days I don’t remember as much political / world news allowed. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html > Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, 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. But I’ve seen more types of TV news s…

I "think", most of those debate ties with technology one way or another. Say Joe Rogan's issue may not have been allowed on HN if it wasn't for Spotify. And more broadly speaking, what are the roles of technology in an extremely political sensitive climate. Should Telegram do A or B, and what about Whatsapp, Facebook moderation, Apple App Store disallow certain group, is that a curation problem or a political problem…

We should be stricter with requiring a genuine technical connection. “Has a podcast on Spotify” or “fundraised through GoFundMe” don’t count. Journalists throw in recognizable names whenever possible because they get clicks, even though the topic is completely non-technical.

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News (2019)

#102

Post by fallingknife »

zionic wrote: post #88
robertakarobin wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, in general "free speech" platforms seem to quickly turn into Alt-Right platforms that are, ironically, heavily moderated. (Looking at you, Voat)

Isn’t this just more evidence that leftism/liberalism require censorship to exist, as they cannot survive in a free market of ideas?

In the free speech days of Reddit there was all sorts of lefty content that did just fine in the presence of all the right wing stuff, so it's definately not not true. But the strange part is that a lot of people on the left implicitly think that it is true. They will never admit that to themselves, though.

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News (2019)

#103

Post by PaulDavisThe1st »

_fat_santa wrote: post #52
stickfigure wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How far back do you consider the "old days"? In the decade-plus I've been around, there has always been a small but steady stream of nontech political content. Despite the policy. My perception is that hasn't increased or decreased, though it does have periodic surges (say, US election season). I personally think it adds to the appeal of HN - in moderation, of course. Political conversations here are generally better…

I don't see political posts here getting traction very often. The ones that do usually are angled towards the community (anytime censorship bills come up, you get 500+ comment HN threads). Meanwhile, browsing the new section I found that articles that are just blatantly political ("you won't believe what AOC did in Florida!" to make up a title), often linger with few comments and votes. And even in those rare politic…

> Even in comments I've posted about China that ended with a sentence about how I disliked the leader got knocked for being counterproductive.

I think one issue with approach by up/down voters is that sometimes the "thoughtful and substantive" thing to say is inherently ideological, and I notice that being explicitly ideological (for example, making it clear that you regard a long term trend in the economy as serving the interests of a particular group of people) is viewed as counterproductive.

This mirrors a dilemma out in the "real world" where people find it hard to bring up substantive political ideas because just doing that is viewed as divisive and antagonistic. Unfortunately, sometimes (maybe even often) this is actually what is required to have "thoughtful and substantive" discussions.

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News (2019)

#104

Post by paulpauper »

awb wrote: post #6

Question for the mods: In the old days I don’t remember as much political / world news allowed. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html > Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, 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. But I’ve seen more types of TV news s…

I think there are too many:

-posts about nostalgia, how the 'old' world wide web was better, retro computing, reliving the past, etc.

-quanta magazine math articles, because the concepts are too difficult or abstract for anyone to debate or discuss them

-posts about privacy, big tech bashing (gets tired, repetitive after while)

I would like to see fewer of those kind of posts. I would like to see more:

-personal blog posts

-posts about economics findings (instead of just the 'hard' sciences)

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News (2019)

#105

Post by wormslayer666 »

optimalsolver wrote: post #4

I've noticed that all the online spaces I enjoy visiting are heavily moderated. Whenever I get linked to "free speech" loosely-moderated platforms, I usually hit the back button pretty quick.

It depends on what sort of content you're looking for. Reasoned discussion on contentious issues demands considerable moderation, but anonymous platforms are great for legitimate niche/curiosity-driven topics.

For example of the second, there was a thread on /ck/ a few weeks back where some guy (probably a grad student; I'll never know) stumbled on a few $K of food lab equipment. Thread went on with a variety of experiments/projects which ranged from "reasonable" to "why would you even consider this" (some kind of flavored oil distillate from a happy meal, used to make ice cream).

If that was on HN, it would be someone's social-climbing portfolio blog, or I would have to wonder if it's astroturfing by some lab equipment company, or Mcdonalds. I'd question if this really was a curiosity-based endeavor, or if it was just someone trying to signal to potential employers "look at my Relevant Project!" or "look how quirky I am!" to friends.

But none of that was a concern; there is really no way for that individual to profit or benefit from this in any context. It's an anonymous forum, and there's strong social pressure to not subvert that (unless it is simply by virtue of posting similar content). It takes the game theory out of the equation; nobody is trying to sell me something.

It's not for everything or everyone, and there's definitely some effort in filtering out garbage posts. The same goes for HN, except the content to manually filter out is the sea of sometimes-veiled advertisements and self-promotion rather than plain-faced flamebait.

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News (2019)

#106

Post by mesofile »

m_fayer wrote: post #48
optimalsolver wrote: post #4

I've noticed that all the online spaces I enjoy visiting are heavily moderated. Whenever I get linked to "free speech" loosely-moderated platforms, I usually hit the back button pretty quick.

Here here. This and metafilter are my two islands of quality, both very much moderated.

I think what's been even more effective than moderation for Metafilter is the imposition of a $5 flat fee to join. I would happily pay as much to stay on HN. A very affordable and worthwhile purchase for an individual, but a significant economic barrier for bot farms.

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News (2019)

#107

Post by ebbflowgo »

In a remote-first/tech world, our lives are lonely, by design. We no longer have the social touch points we typically had. Water cooler talk, coffee walks, after-work drinks with the team, and work sports are no longer a thing.

Vibehut.io is a great solution to get your social fix. Vetted video calls based on your existing social platform and crypto holdings.

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News (2019)

#108

Post by weberer »

robertakarobin wrote: post #16
optimalsolver wrote: post #4

I've noticed that all the online spaces I enjoy visiting are heavily moderated. Whenever I get linked to "free speech" loosely-moderated platforms, I usually hit the back button pretty quick.

Yes, in general "free speech" platforms seem to quickly turn into Alt-Right platforms that are, ironically, heavily moderated. (Looking at you, Voat)

You're not comparing a heavily moderated site to an a lightly moderated one. You're looking at a site that's just as over-moderated as Reddit, just in favor of the opposite side of the political spectrum. A better comparison would be something like /g/

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News (2019)

#109

Post by PaulDavisThe1st »

bnralt wrote: post #76
optimalsolver wrote: post #4

I've noticed that all the online spaces I enjoy visiting are heavily moderated. Whenever I get linked to "free speech" loosely-moderated platforms, I usually hit the back button pretty quick.

Can't say this has been my experience. Many of the places I've found with the best discussions have had little to no moderation. The old IMDB boards, for example, were almost entirely devoid of moderation, but had some of the best and most informative discussions about movies and TV shows. There are a number of niche forums I frequent that are similar. I've even seen a number of subreddits with no moderators/inactive…

> The old IMDB boards

Emphasis on "the old". Usenet in the early to mid 90s was pretty great too, but again, emphasis on "the old". Niches that haven't been discovered by many people yet will likely always function well.

Re: The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News (2019)

#110

Post by weberer »

zionic wrote: post #88
robertakarobin wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, in general "free speech" platforms seem to quickly turn into Alt-Right platforms that are, ironically, heavily moderated. (Looking at you, Voat)

Isn’t this just more evidence that leftism/liberalism require censorship to exist, as they cannot survive in a free market of ideas?

Liberalism is the free market of ideas. It is pretty distant from leftism and should not be conflated.
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