Trolls are winning the internet, technologists say • Hacker News Board

Re: Trolls are winning the internet, technologists say

#251

Post by ashark » Sat, Apr 01, 2017, 12:25 AM UTC

ryandrake wrote: post #219

watwut wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Twitter/facebook/email can all be erased." That can mean professional or social isolation for quite a lot of people - or at least disadvantage. The moment your blog, github account, facebook account or twitters matters for employers, peers, business, conferences you would like talk at or negotiations is the moment when walking away affects you.

That's a little exaggerated I think. I don't have a blog, an active GitHub account, and don't use Facebook or Twitter at all. Yet, by some miracle, I have a robust social life and am gainfully employed. I think people overstate the importance of these services (most of which, by the way, did not even exist 15 years ago). I choose to post here but could stop tomorrow and it would have zero effect on my personal or pro…

B-b-but how will I growth hack my way to a 4-hour-workweek selling ebooks about how to growth hack, without constant, obnoxious self promotion under my real name on all corners of the Web?! God's sake, I can't possibly be a thought leader anonymously! You savage.

Re: Trolls are winning the internet, technologists say

#252

Post by ashark » Sat, Apr 01, 2017, 12:36 AM UTC

defined wrote: post #129

return0 wrote: post #38

If you give people a big wall and free spray paint, of course they 'll fill it with dicks. Unlike real life, there is nobody to paint over them. Trolling is a natural part of the internet, its the price for having relative freedom, i dont have a problem with it. If that puts off people who don't have the capacity to tune it out, all the better.

Sure, but if the big wall is a map, and you're trying to find something on that map, all the dicks make it so much harder to find it that giving up in despair is often the reaction. It's hard to tune out a cubic mile of dicks when you're looking for a pearl.

Well, in that case the Internet "map"'s problem is less the dicks drawn here and there than its being covered on every square centimeter by ads. Oh wait, I think I see the part of the map I needed... oh, no, just another ad designed to make me think it was part of the map.

Re: Trolls are winning the internet, technologists say

#253

Post by caf » Sat, Apr 01, 2017, 12:43 AM UTC

kazinator wrote: post #218

bhntr3 wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, the meaning has shifted. It used to be that if people knew you were trolling, you weren't a good troll. Now a troll is just an asshole on the internet.

Some of the newbies don't understand that "troll" refers to "trolling" as in "fishing troller": evoking the metaphor of casting a net to collect responses like fish. They imagine "troll" as a metaphor invoking the humanoid creature from Scandinavian folklore, which, in the Three Billy Goats Gruff story, is a nasty, unpleasant, violent creature who wants to eat everyone who crosses his bridge: https://en.wikipedia.org…

As always with human language, the word ends up meaning whatever a substantial plurality believe it to mean.

Re: Trolls are winning the internet, technologists say

#254

Post by ahartman00 » Sat, Apr 01, 2017, 12:55 AM UTC

freeflight wrote: post #152

pdeuchler wrote: post #137

The internet is as it always was, the only difference is more people, and more importantly more people without technological prowess and forum/bbs/irc experience, are accessing it and moving increasingly larger chunks of their life to the internet. As someone who fell in love with the internet when I was young because nobody knew I was young , it constantly surprises me when people put intimate details online and the…

>The internet doesn't magically make social, political, religious, and ideological rifts magically disappear, it just seemed like it did because nobody could associate users with their backgrounds. But one could argue that our modern "Social Media Internet" gives exactly that impression. Whether it's Google, Facebook, Twitter or whatnot: People are being funneled into "ideological bubbles" based on their preferences…

"People are being funneled into "ideological bubbles""

I'm not as convinced they are being funneled. I remember back in high school, my friends and I would sit around in a circle, in meat space.

"War is wrong"

And we would go around the circle: "yup", "absolutely", etc

"Some other liberal talking point"

yup, of course, so true....

I feel they are self selecting. Look at the election, when liberals were 3x more likely to unfriend people. [1] And I think they have been self selecting since before the internet. Also there is a geographic component. Rural areas vote red, urban vote blue. We have had geographic filter bubbles for decades.

1. http://fortune.com/2016/12/19/social-media-election/

Re: Trolls are winning the internet, technologists say

#255

Post by mirimir » Sat, Apr 01, 2017, 12:58 AM UTC

noobermin wrote: post #173

pdeuchler wrote: post #137

The internet is as it always was, the only difference is more people, and more importantly more people without technological prowess and forum/bbs/irc experience, are accessing it and moving increasingly larger chunks of their life to the internet. As someone who fell in love with the internet when I was young because nobody knew I was young , it constantly surprises me when people put intimate details online and the…

The majority of people who say "don't feed the trolls" have never been the focus of a trolling campaign, I've found. It is easy to claim this when you aren't under constant violent harassment and scrutiny. It is not fair to expect everyone else to have a "battle-hardened" stoicism when you've probably never experienced such a life. I've never experienced such harassment myself and used to sing the "ignore" mantra too…

Well, one can dox "violent harassers".

Re: Trolls are winning the internet, technologists say

#256

Post by ahartman00 » Sat, Apr 01, 2017, 1:04 AM UTC

aantix wrote: post #104

jknoepfler wrote: post #67

I don't understand this article at all. I participate in two large professional forums (one for poker, one for development). The professionals are winning the internet there. There are dedicated subforums for trolls and random bs, which are pretty funny sometimes, but serve as an outlet for the garbage. I browse hacker news... It is what it is, I'm happy with it as a content sharing platform. My biggest gripe is the…

Oh man, have you ever tried to have a political discussion on Facebook? Even citing sources, trying to be diligent... And then, the only response you get is... "that's not right!". And that response is somehow given equal weighting? I actually wish Facebook, the place where a majority of Internet discussion probably occurs, WOULD institute a dislike button and suppress those comments that get down voted too much (lik…

"And then, the only response you get is... "that's not right!". And that response is somehow given equal weighting?"

I noticed this long before the internet became this popular. Its more about the anti intellectualism than it is technology.

Re: Trolls are winning the internet, technologists say

#257

Post by mirimir » Sat, Apr 01, 2017, 1:05 AM UTC

bandushrew wrote: post #224

noobermin wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The majority of people who say "don't feed the trolls" have never been the focus of a trolling campaign, I've found. It is easy to claim this when you aren't under constant violent harassment and scrutiny. It is not fair to expect everyone else to have a "battle-hardened" stoicism when you've probably never experienced such a life. I've never experienced such harassment myself and used to sing the "ignore" mantra too…

I have multiple internet presence's. My "real" presence is empty of anything except professional presence. LinkedIn, github etc etc. My "real" presence never engages, never debates and is effectively not there except when it engages with the real world via resumes etc. My actual presence is scattered across the internet in multiple pseudonymous social networks and eagerly discusses topics I am passionate about. It oc…

Yes, I do exactly that. Also, all of my meatspace professional writing is private, so the chances of stylometric outing are minimal. Mirimir is currently my online professional persona, and I generally don't get into arguments using it. There are other personas for that.

Re: Trolls are winning the internet, technologists say

#258

Post by mirimir » Sat, Apr 01, 2017, 1:06 AM UTC

chansecodina wrote: post #239

bandushrew wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have multiple internet presence's. My "real" presence is empty of anything except professional presence. LinkedIn, github etc etc. My "real" presence never engages, never debates and is effectively not there except when it engages with the real world via resumes etc. My actual presence is scattered across the internet in multiple pseudonymous social networks and eagerly discusses topics I am passionate about. It oc…

All it takes is a couple opsec slip-ups to give a dedicated group of attackers the clue they need to link your identities together. Maybe you'll never make a mistake or say something that the wrong kind of person takes umbrage with, but is it really fair to put that task on every single Internet user?

Back in the day, it was standard advice for n00bs.

Re: Trolls are winning the internet, technologists say

#259

Post by mirimir » Sat, Apr 01, 2017, 1:09 AM UTC

jackvalentine wrote: post #234

bandushrew wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have multiple internet presence's. My "real" presence is empty of anything except professional presence. LinkedIn, github etc etc. My "real" presence never engages, never debates and is effectively not there except when it engages with the real world via resumes etc. My actual presence is scattered across the internet in multiple pseudonymous social networks and eagerly discusses topics I am passionate about. It oc…

I don't say this to troll you but googling your HN name reveals more than enough to know your real name, where you live and start linking it all to other non-programming hobbies (piano!).

Yes, that can be problematic. But hey, maybe it's misdirection ;)

Who do you think Mirimir is?

Re: Trolls are winning the internet, technologists say

#260

Post by enraged_camel » Sat, Apr 01, 2017, 1:10 AM UTC

arcseco wrote: post #249

enraged_camel wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>Do you assume these people are stupid I dunno... every time Trump fucks up in a big way, the_donald folks genuinely think he is playing "five-dimensional chess" and that he fucked up on purpose as a way to outmaneuver his opponents without them realizing it. So yes, they are absolutely, definitively stupid. I mean how else do you explain the attribution of superhuman intelligence to someone who is an incredible cre…

The exact same thing could be said about the people celebrating the DNC and Hillary's race to the White house on reddit. An obviously flawed actor with few redeeming qualities, yet still held in high regard in the minds of people on r/politics. The only difference I see on the left side of the divide is lack of humour (which tends to invite trolling).

I don't want to get into a political argument, especially with someone who thinks Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are even remotely comparable. And I say that as someone with a deep dislike of Hillary.

Interesting that you think the left side lacks humor. Last time I checked, all parody shows on TV were liberal. What is the right-wing equivalent of SNL?