5 ms·

Twitter is a cesspool, but isn't an open, public conversation between everyone in the world pretty much guaranteed to be a cesspool? I don't see how you can sto

by Aqueous 10y ago

Twitter is a cesspool, but isn't an open, public conversation between everyone in the world pretty much guaranteed to be a cesspool? I don't see how you can stop that from happening without compromising the principle of Twitter itself. You take on risks when you start announcing your private thoughts to the widest possible public audience. Those risks go along with being any kind of public creator. Other than because no one would really be interested in my tweets anyway, this is precisely the reason why myself and others exercise our free choice not to tweet. We don't want a trail of statements for which we are publically held to account, even if by harassers, racists and misogynists, if we can't - and shouldn't - control the audience for those tweets. If you want a limited, curated audience, go somewhere else.

cmdkeen 10y ago
Except Twitter don't want that either - as evidenced by their unannounced censoring of certain AMA sessions, and panicked deletions of trolls of famous celebrities. It turns out that they are just another company driven by commercial demands. I imagine if there was competition and a "Twitter but with anti-trolling mechanisms" network sprung up most people, and the vast majority of women and ethnic minorities would flock to that network.
- sievebrain 10y ago
  Yet no such site exists. Probably because 'anti trolling mechanisms' would mean banning people who are claimed by others to be trolls, and that'd quickly result in nearly everyone being banned. Especially a social network dominated by women! Ye gods, have you ever heard women talk about each other behind their backs? The idea that trolling and abuse is an exclusively white male behaviour is ridiculous.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
unreal37 10y ago
Is this forum a cesspool? (No.) Is it an open public conversation by anyone in the world? (Yes.) You can have conversations without it becoming a racist, bigoted mess.
- Aqueous 10y ago
  I would argue that this site is not quite public in the same sense that Twitter is. Sure - anyone can register and post comments and articles, but the community of this site is extremely self-selected to those with a specific domain of knowledge.
- GFK_of_xmaspast 10y ago
  People get banned from here all the time tho and there's plenty of racist garbage that gets posted.
  - nstart 10y ago
    Exactly. HN is a very good definition of a community that's maintained a significant standard in good communication by using relatively basic tools and quality community moderation. Twitter could have been this. But they chose to believe that no moderation would be just fine.
    - retox 10y ago
      The post count here is significantly lower than Twitter. I shudder to think how many moderators it would take to administer Twitter. You might think that the downvote mechanism here helps somewhat, and it does, but on any large community with voting such as Reddit the ability to downvote turns the community into an echo chamber where only the largest group gets a say and any dissenting voice is vanished. I dare say we see the same thing here on HN.
potatolicious 10y ago
> "You take on risks when you start announcing your private thoughts to the widest possible public audience." I think the point is that these risks are unevenly distributed. When I announce my thoughts on Twitter my risk is lower by virtue of the fact that I'm a dude, I'm straight, or any number of other qualifiers. It's not that no one experiences any risks when announcing themselves in public, it's that the risk is dramatically and severely unevenly distributed. The unequal distribution of risk (and consequently, the unequal distribution of vitriol) is IMO the entire point of the article, and has two main takeaways: - This results in some demographics experiencing relatively little abuse, and therefore assume a proportionally larger share of the conversation as those who experience high abuse quit. - The system, by virtue of the fact that it's built mostly by people who experience low-risk when using it, is in a large way blind to high-risk members of its population, and will not develop the necessary tools to combat abuse (see also: Reddit). > "If you want a limited, curated audience, go somewhere else." This is very, very evidently happening. Twitter's user growth has stalled, its total user base has plateaued, despite competing social networks continuing to grow rapidly. There are, of course, more than enough anecdotes of both high- and low-profile users fleeing the platform due to abuse, and the aggregate numbers reflect this. It's also worth noting that the younger generation has overwhelmingly chosen social networks with either more limited audiences, or more abuse management tools (see: Snapchat, Instagram). The market is speaking, though it makes me wonder if some middle ground was possible - a "public announcement" social network where the most extreme ends of the abuse spectrum could be contained. Twitter fulfills a valuable niche, and there is a certain amount of sadness that it's really not working out.
- sievebrain 10y ago
  I really don't think the kind of people who are being abusive on Twitter stop and evaluate the race or gender of who they're attacking before they do so. There's plenty of nasty tweeting directed towards white males on Twitter. If you can prove that such people get less abuse in a scientific way, go for it. I think the main difference is they tend not to start campaigns to systematically 'sanitise' Twitter nor claim to speak on behalf of their entire race/gender. They deal with it in different, much quieter ways.
sp332 10y ago
You could give individuals a way to manage their own experience. Even small tweaks could make it a lot more pleasant. https://medium.com/art-marketing/putting-out-the-twitter-trashfire-3ac6cb1af3e#.kuitez1iu https://medium.com/art-marketing/putting-out-the-twitter-tra...
wfo 10y ago
To be honest I don't think the problem is twitter. Twitter was founded and run by free-speech crusaders. It provides a platform for people to say what they wish, period. It's the expectations we've projected on twitter. A forum for anonymous messaging run by people who believe in free speech is NOT an appropriate place for an online presence as a celebrity or business. You really shouldn't tie it to your real name. It's perfectly fine for there to exist 4chan/twitter-esque cesspools of hate and wretched abuse at every turn. It's not perfectly fine for people to, as part of their job, log into thousands of racist hate-spewing garbage messages targeted at them every day, or have their online identity plastered with it. This is the kind of place that twitter is. Some are sheltered from the storm and don't notice it. Partly because you aren't the target audience for random acts of hate (maybe you're a white male in tech), and mostly because you just haven't gotten unlucky enough to attract the attention of certain hordes of hate spewing monsters. But if you use twitter to network, you're diving into the cesspool. If you invite others to network with you on twitter, you're inviting them to do the same. If you post a twitter account as part of your online presence, you're broadcasting to the world "yup, I'm part of this". And that's a real problem for twitter. You can't have both unrestrained free speech and civilized communication.
Balgair 10y ago
I'm going to defer to the people that say that the cesspool aspect of it all is actually harmful. And no, I don't mean that Stacy is, like, omg, such a bitch. Or that 14 year old /b/tards are brigading some corporate account with gore and porn. I mean the actual harmful harassment. The article mentioned that one of the co-stars of the new Ghostbusters quit online media due to the cesspool, but there are many many more instances of people taking the endless microphone of online social media and making it horrible. Though it is incredibly rare, some people are in fact driven to suicide due to the targeted harassment. Now we can debate facts and the amount of thickness your skin should be until the Zuck finally kicks the bucket. But the point I want to make is that sometimes the cesspool gets away from itself and steps over some invisible line into true harassment that can't be defended to a lot of people as simple freedom of speech (lawyers assemble!). I love that we have freedom of speech in this country, and I know that it is not meant for the things that you or I like to hear and that it is explicitly for the lowlifes and assholes to say what they want to. Still, I don't know where that line is, but I do know that it gets crossed a lot; and that from the media I consume, the line tends to be crossed a lot more if you are female or black. So, I'll defer to the people that have been bitten by the cesspool, as I have not been in their shoes and have had to stare at their phones while hate comes blasting in and all they are trying to do is order a pizza. If a lot of the people that have had these experiences say that Twitter et al need to be better, then I think I have to trust them.

by Aqueous 10y ago

cmdkeen 10y ago

Except Twitter don't want that either - as evidenced by their unannounced censoring of certain AMA sessions, and panicked deletions of trolls of famous celebrities. It turns out that they are just another company driven by commercial demands. I imagine if there was competition and a "Twitter but with anti-trolling mechanisms" network sprung up most people, and the vast majority of women and ethnic minorities would flock to that network.

sievebrain 10y ago
Yet no such site exists. Probably because 'anti trolling mechanisms' would mean banning people who are claimed by others to be trolls, and that'd quickly result in nearly everyone being banned. Especially a social network dominated by women! Ye gods, have you ever heard women talk about each other behind their backs? The idea that trolling and abuse is an exclusively white male behaviour is ridiculous.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]

unreal37 10y ago

Is this forum a cesspool? (No.) Is it an open public conversation by anyone in the world? (Yes.) You can have conversations without it becoming a racist, bigoted mess.

Aqueous 10y ago
I would argue that this site is not quite public in the same sense that Twitter is. Sure - anyone can register and post comments and articles, but the community of this site is extremely self-selected to those with a specific domain of knowledge.
GFK_of_xmaspast 10y ago
People get banned from here all the time tho and there's plenty of racist garbage that gets posted.
- nstart 10y ago
  Exactly. HN is a very good definition of a community that's maintained a significant standard in good communication by using relatively basic tools and quality community moderation. Twitter could have been this. But they chose to believe that no moderation would be just fine.
  - retox 10y ago
    The post count here is significantly lower than Twitter. I shudder to think how many moderators it would take to administer Twitter. You might think that the downvote mechanism here helps somewhat, and it does, but on any large community with voting such as Reddit the ability to downvote turns the community into an echo chamber where only the largest group gets a say and any dissenting voice is vanished. I dare say we see the same thing here on HN.

potatolicious 10y ago

> "You take on risks when you start announcing your private thoughts to the widest possible public audience." I think the point is that these risks are unevenly distributed. When I announce my thoughts on Twitter my risk is lower by virtue of the fact that I'm a dude, I'm straight, or any number of other qualifiers. It's not that no one experiences any risks when announcing themselves in public, it's that the risk is dramatically and severely unevenly distributed. The unequal distribution of risk (and consequently, the unequal distribution of vitriol) is IMO the entire point of the article, and has two main takeaways: - This results in some demographics experiencing relatively little abuse, and therefore assume a proportionally larger share of the conversation as those who experience high abuse quit. - The system, by virtue of the fact that it's built mostly by people who experience low-risk when using it, is in a large way blind to high-risk members of its population, and will not develop the necessary tools to combat abuse (see also: Reddit). > "If you want a limited, curated audience, go somewhere else." This is very, very evidently happening. Twitter's user growth has stalled, its total user base has plateaued, despite competing social networks continuing to grow rapidly. There are, of course, more than enough anecdotes of both high- and low-profile users fleeing the platform due to abuse, and the aggregate numbers reflect this. It's also worth noting that the younger generation has overwhelmingly chosen social networks with either more limited audiences, or more abuse management tools (see: Snapchat, Instagram). The market is speaking, though it makes me wonder if some middle ground was possible - a "public announcement" social network where the most extreme ends of the abuse spectrum could be contained. Twitter fulfills a valuable niche, and there is a certain amount of sadness that it's really not working out.

sievebrain 10y ago
I really don't think the kind of people who are being abusive on Twitter stop and evaluate the race or gender of who they're attacking before they do so. There's plenty of nasty tweeting directed towards white males on Twitter. If you can prove that such people get less abuse in a scientific way, go for it. I think the main difference is they tend not to start campaigns to systematically 'sanitise' Twitter nor claim to speak on behalf of their entire race/gender. They deal with it in different, much quieter ways.

sp332 10y ago

You could give individuals a way to manage their own experience. Even small tweaks could make it a lot more pleasant. https://medium.com/art-marketing/putting-out-the-twitter-trashfire-3ac6cb1af3e#.kuitez1iu https://medium.com/art-marketing/putting-out-the-twitter-tra...

wfo 10y ago

To be honest I don't think the problem is twitter. Twitter was founded and run by free-speech crusaders. It provides a platform for people to say what they wish, period. It's the expectations we've projected on twitter. A forum for anonymous messaging run by people who believe in free speech is NOT an appropriate place for an online presence as a celebrity or business. You really shouldn't tie it to your real name. It's perfectly fine for there to exist 4chan/twitter-esque cesspools of hate and wretched abuse at every turn. It's not perfectly fine for people to, as part of their job, log into thousands of racist hate-spewing garbage messages targeted at them every day, or have their online identity plastered with it. This is the kind of place that twitter is. Some are sheltered from the storm and don't notice it. Partly because you aren't the target audience for random acts of hate (maybe you're a white male in tech), and mostly because you just haven't gotten unlucky enough to attract the attention of certain hordes of hate spewing monsters. But if you use twitter to network, you're diving into the cesspool. If you invite others to network with you on twitter, you're inviting them to do the same. If you post a twitter account as part of your online presence, you're broadcasting to the world "yup, I'm part of this". And that's a real problem for twitter. You can't have both unrestrained free speech and civilized communication.

Balgair 10y ago

I'm going to defer to the people that say that the cesspool aspect of it all is actually harmful. And no, I don't mean that Stacy is, like, omg, such a bitch. Or that 14 year old /b/tards are brigading some corporate account with gore and porn. I mean the actual harmful harassment. The article mentioned that one of the co-stars of the new Ghostbusters quit online media due to the cesspool, but there are many many more instances of people taking the endless microphone of online social media and making it horrible. Though it is incredibly rare, some people are in fact driven to suicide due to the targeted harassment. Now we can debate facts and the amount of thickness your skin should be until the Zuck finally kicks the bucket. But the point I want to make is that sometimes the cesspool gets away from itself and steps over some invisible line into true harassment that can't be defended to a lot of people as simple freedom of speech (lawyers assemble!). I love that we have freedom of speech in this country, and I know that it is not meant for the things that you or I like to hear and that it is explicitly for the lowlifes and assholes to say what they want to. Still, I don't know where that line is, but I do know that it gets crossed a lot; and that from the media I consume, the line tends to be crossed a lot more if you are female or black. So, I'll defer to the people that have been bitten by the cesspool, as I have not been in their shoes and have had to stare at their phones while hate comes blasting in and all they are trying to do is order a pizza. If a lot of the people that have had these experiences say that Twitter et al need to be better, then I think I have to trust them.