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Crowdsourcing of a name is not about democracy. It doesn't appear to me that the public was widely informed that they had to make a democratic decision, instead
by return0 11y ago
Crowdsourcing of a name is not about democracy. It doesn't appear to me that the public was widely informed that they had to make a democratic decision, instead sounds like a bunch of kids trolling. I think the article is conflating two unrelated entities here.
As a sideline, what is democracy even? Democracy via elections would be oligarchy to ancient Athenians, who prefered democracy by lot anyway.
- notahacker 11y agoAnd of course Athenian democracy would be oligarchy to modern democrats, who think that more than 10% of the population should be enfranchised... Agree with your point that it doesn't really help the discussion to treat obscure and easily manipulated online polls on trivia as actual mass expressions of public will. I mean, it's about as valid as the poll Redditors brigaded to try to prove that nearly every American would vote for Sanders.
- takno 11y agoThe vote was well covered in the British press, and the people I know who voted were neither kids not anything other than completely serious about the name.
- Lawtonfogle 11y agoBoaty McBoatface is not internet trolling. Look at Mountain Dew's renaming disaster to see internet trolling.