You either die an MVP or live long enough to build content moderation

I like the general idea, but one place where it falls down is in Free press situations. For example, you are a whistleblower or dissident. And the other example is if you are a battered spouse and want to discuss it without the batterer being able to identify you.

2 theories

1. Highly technical, because the flow was scripted to work with our website. Bypassing captcha, email verification by using many different domains, email accounts and also highly distributed via many ips.

2. Non technical. Where they paid some ppl to do it manually, which doesn't seems to be due to the way they walk through many steps like piece of cake.

However, our platform was/is a target due to several reasons:

1. Easy to register and start blogging. 2. Free plan with no hard limit. 3. Quick rankings due to SEO implementation out of the box. 4. Absence of any moderation before such attack.

And probably some other possible reasons that made their job easier and us a better target.

The problem is where the line is drawn. Arguments against explicitly illegal content (like CSAM) or unhelpful content (like spam) are used to justify content moderation that goes far beyond. Moderation on the biggest social media platforms (like Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, etc.) includes more than just basic moderation to make the platform viable. They include a number of elements that are more like censorship or propaganda. These platforms ultimately bias their audience towards one set of values/ideologies based on the moderation policies they implement. And given that most of these companies are based in highly-progressive areas and/or have employee bases that are highly-progressive, it is pretty clear what their biases are. This present reality is unacceptable for any society that values free and open discourse.

I apologize, maybe you are not familiar with the details of the silk road. Ross Ulbricht was the administrator and creator of the silk road, allegedly. It's quite probable that without his arrest, it would have persisted even if on newly acquired hardware. I would argue his arrest was integral in these violent thugs "moderating" silk road away like the mob "moderates" away their competition.

Instead, after his arrest the content ended up on new platforms rather than the Silk Road platform.

> biases from creeping in and causing you to misunderstand posts and/or lash out at others.

Yes my bias is in complete, unrestricted free speech. Every single piece of content, regardless of how damaging or vulgar anyone thinks it is and regardless of if it portrays even the worst of crimes. I admit I am colored by that bias.

> lash out at others.

What are you talking about? You feel attacked because your poorly constructed argument was laid open. Your case is pretty clear. Even if the system of the internet has no useful filter of content (whether that is true or not), if a third party such as DEA comes along and decides to seize equipment and throw the operator in jail, you consider that content moderation. And I'm willing to admit from a practical perspective, that could be considered a form of moderation by a violent third party.

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Edit due to waiting on timeout to reply below:

His arrest is hand and hand with the shutdown. It was integral. You can't say you weren't mentioning Ulbricht's arrest when that arrest WAS, in part, the takedown of Silk Road. The very fact that you said you weren't speaking of the arrest lead me to say you "may not be familiar" (note the uncertain words, that your bias clouds you from understanding did not speak in certainties.)

>s, and then angrily respond to them as such.

I think you're projecting. If there's any anger, it must be yours.

>Yeah, again, you're injecting your own biases as you create assumptions about my comments

Your comment appeared to be a rebuttal to my statement that "The internet itself is unmoderated in any useful sense for conten." If it wasn't actually a rebuttal but actually an agreement, I apologize for misunderstanding you were actually supporting that argument.

>See how I used "moderated" in quotes in my very first response? That suggests that I'm using the term rather loosely.

>If something's illegal - even if you and I think it shouldn't be - then it's typically going to be removed at some point, even if it takes a while because something like Tor makes it difficult. And in that sense, yes, the internet is "moderated" for that content. That's all I've said/argued, and I truly don't understand how that is so difficult for you to grasp.

The illegal content has only progressively proliferated since the advent of the internet, and we've yet to see an effective mechanism to moderate the content of the internet as a whole. Virtually every category of content has not only not been removed but increased.

>That's all I've said/argued, and I truly don't understand how that is so difficult for you to grasp.

Yes and I'm arguing that this is incorrect, it hasn't been moderated. At best it has passed from platform from platform but no effective mechanism has managed to censor the internet as a whole.

Sometimes I wonder with all this speak of anger, misinterpretations, and clouded judgement is just you repeating to me what your own psychologist told you.

In this case, a mix of both is required. While you absolutely must plan ahead and implement as many safeguards as you can prior to launch, that's simply the beginning, and it is incredibly naive to think that all the leaks can be prevented. (Or, honestly, that really any aspect of a community can be perfectly master-planned in advance.) To operate anything like a UGC platform is to be eternally engaged in a battle against ever-evolving and increasingly clever methods someone will come up with to exploit, sabotage, or otherwise harm your platform.

This is totally fine -- you just need to acknowledge this and try not to drop the ball when things seem like they're running smoothly. Employing every tactic at your disposal from the very beginning should be viewed as a prerequisite, one that will start you off in a strong position and able to evolve without first having to play catch-up.