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Protocols, Not Platforms: A Technological Approach to Free Speech (2019)

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Re: Protocols, Not Platforms: A Technological Approach to Free Speech (2019)

#231

Post by bccdee »

allarm wrote: post #226
lifty wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a very important reason why people don't run their own USENET node or Gitlab instance is because it's not easy. In fact, it's the opposite of easy. It's extremely difficult in the long run. If using your own server was as easy as using an iPhone, then we would see way more people doing it.

It will never be easy. People should understand that and take the hard part as a fun part or as a price to pay for their digital independence.

That's not true. There's no reason why hosting a server should be hard. This is a UX issue, and an eminently solvable one at that. Imagine a self-hosted, easy-to-install Heroku-style server platform with a public repository for application images.

It's not hard because it needs to be hard; it's hard because no one has invested the time and money to make it easy.

Re: Protocols, Not Platforms: A Technological Approach to Free Speech (2019)

#232

Post by cyberdelica »

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #162
fareesh wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember watching a very strange segment on American news about a man who owns a mattress and pillow company who was banned from Twitter because he continuously expressed his disbelief in the legitimacy of the election result of 2020, and was organizing various events along this theme. From what I recall the 2016 election was frequently attributed to some vague accusation of hacking from Russia but the same standar…

> From what I recall the 2016 election was frequently attributed to some vague accusation of hacking from Russia but the same standard was not applied at the time, nor is it applied today. The people espousing this view were eventually proven inconclusive in all the different inquiries into the matter, and they were far more influential than a man who sells pillows. Your recollection seems at odds with reality. There…

> Your recollection seems at odds with reality.

Their recollection matches my recollection of events.

> There has been a Senate inquiry with conclusions at odd with your recollections.

The results of that inquiry weren't released until 2020.

> The Mueller report came to conclusions at odd with your recollections.

That report wasn't released until 2019.

That means there were at least three years of unverified allegations, swarming around - espcially prevalent on social media - sans ban hammers, censorship, etc., etc.

Re: Protocols, Not Platforms: A Technological Approach to Free Speech (2019)

#233

Post by pgsimp »

jasode wrote: post #3

>a workable plan that enables more free speech, [...] That approach: build protocols, not platforms. To be clear, this is an approach that would bring us back to the way the internet used to be. The early internet involved many different protocols—instructions and standards that anyone could then use to build a compatible interface. As I've commented before[1][2], discussing protocols and advocating for them is a pop…

I think we are here because of PG and YCombinator, not because we don't want to run our own servers. Many HN users probably do run their own servers, even discussion servers.

The real problem is how to attract the right people. YC is a fascinating case, actually. WHY are we here, and not on some reddit forum?

Even though it seems PG is not very active here anymore, it seems the seeding community has stuck to some extent.

Of course they also have their theory of how to maintain a community and did some coding and moderating to try to maintain it.

To my personal taste, they have overdone it, and ruined it in a way, but I haven't found a good alternative yet.

The next iteration of online news and communities will perhaps take more than dedicated servers, it may require a usability leap. Maybe some convenient way to filter messages, that is not centralized (Twitter/Facebook algorithms don't optimize to my benefit, but to the benefit of their owners).

Re: Protocols, Not Platforms: A Technological Approach to Free Speech (2019)

#234

Post by generalizations »

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #165
fareesh wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do people really believe that it was a coup attempt though? I see people framing it that way but always assumed it was political exaggeration

What term would you use for an event, even if if doomed to fail, that involves at least hundreds of people outside (and then inside) of the building where the vice-president is present, chanting "Hang Mike Pence" ? Do you think it's just some of kiddie protest party? Do you think they didn't mean it? Do you think that because it wasn't 100,000 people it doesn't count? Do you think that because they didn't have the ar…

"Coup D'etat: a sudden decisive exercise of force in politics"

That doesn't fit the captiol protest very well. Sudden? Decisive? Exercise of force?

Re: Protocols, Not Platforms: A Technological Approach to Free Speech (2019)

#235

Post by PaulDavisThe1st »

generalizations wrote: post #234
PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What term would you use for an event, even if if doomed to fail, that involves at least hundreds of people outside (and then inside) of the building where the vice-president is present, chanting "Hang Mike Pence" ? Do you think it's just some of kiddie protest party? Do you think they didn't mean it? Do you think that because it wasn't 100,000 people it doesn't count? Do you think that because they didn't have the ar…

"Coup D'etat: a sudden decisive exercise of force in politics" That doesn't fit the captiol protest very well. Sudden? Decisive? Exercise of force?

It is unclear how the "alternative outcome" of January 6th might have gone. I'm a little skeptical that there was a carefully thought out and plausible "alternative outcome", but the sort of thing that some people have suggested was that the trump supporters would have taken control of the certification process in some important way (with or without actual violence towards various existing government members). This would have then led to Trump declaring some kind of emergency, the certification process would have "finished" with a different outcome, and a new winner of the election would have been declared.

As I said, I am not sure I buy that anyone with half a brain thought that a plan could work, but there seems to be some supporting evidence that something like this had been imagined by at the very least some of the people at the protest. How far into the Trump administration that might have gone, I don't know (or if went into it at all).

Had something like that happened, it would definitely have been a decisive, sudden show of force in politics.

Re: Protocols, Not Platforms: A Technological Approach to Free Speech (2019)

#236

Post by WClayFerguson »

mcguire wrote: post #230
WClayFerguson wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, if you watched the M5M you won't really know about any of it. lol. Thanks for helping make my point!

M5M? https://m5mfoundation.org/ ? Do you mean "main stream media"? If so, no, I don't tend to pay attention to QAnon, OAN, InfoWars, or whatever those who use "main stream media" as a slur watch. Prefer the Beeb, actually. I still can't find any actual evidence of "violent murdering thugs" "looting entire cities".

The MSM has only themselves to blame for their record low levels of trust by Americans. You're right that the term MSM is basically a slur at this point. Great point. Thanks again for helping me make my points.

Re: Protocols, Not Platforms: A Technological Approach to Free Speech (2019)

#237

Post by blacklight »

jasode wrote: post #3

>a workable plan that enables more free speech, [...] That approach: build protocols, not platforms. To be clear, this is an approach that would bring us back to the way the internet used to be. The early internet involved many different protocols—instructions and standards that anyone could then use to build a compatible interface. As I've commented before[1][2], discussing protocols and advocating for them is a pop…

> A lot of us don't want to run a USENET node or manage our own git server to share code.

Now you're suddenly making me feel alone :(

Re: Protocols, Not Platforms: A Technological Approach to Free Speech (2019)

#239

Post by krapp »

coldtea wrote: post #163
majormajor wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Because the point isn't to have no moderation, it's for the power of "moderation" not to be vested in a small number of oligarchs pressured by angry mobs spurred on by media companies with bad incentives to want to damage their political opponents and market competitors. This is not a statement many people who have been angry recently would agree with. Trump would've gotten himself banned from any of the forums I h…

> This is not a statement many people who have been angry recently would agree with. Well, what "angry people would agree with" is a pretty strange basis for an argument, anyway... > Trump would've gotten himself banned from any of the forums I hung out in from 2000 to now. Not for being conservative, for being an asshole. And that would be neither here nor there, cause your forums are not so massive as to shape publ…

>And that would be neither here nor there, cause your forums are not so massive as to shape public opinion and influence elections and news.

Maybe assholes shouldn't be able to use these platforms to shape public opinion and influence elections and news. Maybe having a Twitter account is a privilege, and not a right, and that privilege is correctly granted on the precondition that one will not use the platform to act like an asshole.

Then again maybe we shouldn't elect assholes President to begin with, but that's also neither here nor there.

>When one side, in a major public-opinion-influencing service can ban a whole side of the political spectrum though, and even the sitting president, that's a problem.

Except the "whole side" of the Republican, conservative, or even pro-Trump spectrum hasn't been banned. I don't know why people keep repeating this when even a cursory look on any popular social media site will show that there's still plenty of that speech active online.

Re: Protocols, Not Platforms: A Technological Approach to Free Speech (2019)

#240

Post by striking »

henry_bone wrote: post #219
justinboogaard wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think I would visit HN if the voting system worked like this. I like hearing the popular opinion, but I also like hearing the popular contrary opinion and very often - like with your comment - the popular contrary sits right below the popular. What I don’t like reading is “zinger” comments - stuff like “X is bad and people that think X is good are dumb”. From what I’ve seen - these are the comments downvoted…

Can I comment on moderation since this thread is about censorship and free speech? I guess we'll find out. Seems I've lost a point. Someone took exception to what I said above. Not sure how I went wrong, but if enough people feel similarly, then my post will fade away. It will be censored. Make of that what you will. UPDATE: I've got a point back since I wrote this comment. I won't keep editing this comment each time…

Although it does seem a little meta, I'd like to do you the favor of telling you why I downvote every time I see someone complain about their downvotes or their post being grayed out.

It's boring. It doesn't make for good conversation. It's not falsifiable and there's nothing to be said about it. You're just unhappy about it, and it just bores me.

Maybe you feel like you're being censored, but really there can only be so much noise amidst the signal. And really, truly, an overlong and doubly updated comment where you are telling us to have our way with you is the least signal you could possibly have generated.

There are lots of complaints to be had about HN, but this is not one of them.

And to be even kinder and open to changing my mind, I thought I might see which comments you were unhappy about having cast into the gray. Would I see some glittering gems worth rescuing?

Unfortunately (predictably?), said comments employ double question marks or otherwise read angrily, or otherwise are simplistic and disagreeable and bring very little insight to the table. (And, you have a number of comments that have not been downvoted, so it's not like this is complete randomness or an inability on HN's part to accept basic facts. There is a correlation to be observed, one that perhaps you're ignoring.)

HN isn't perfect, but I think you doth protest a bit much.

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