6 ms·

Without being in the loop of the pizzagate drama, it's really hard to see this as "okay" (the actions that Spez took). I can understand frustration and wanting

by yladiz 10y ago

Without being in the loop of the pizzagate drama, it's really hard to see this as "okay" (the actions that Spez took). I can understand frustration and wanting to edit comments as payback to people that have wronged you, but this is a pretty dangerous action by an administrator. If he wanted to close the thread(s) or disallow posting on the_donald, sure, it's a visible action and I could understand that. I could even understand removing comments he finds offensive (even if it's not right, I can understand it and it's a visible action). But surreptitiously editing a comment is not okay, because while this is a relatively minor use of that power it's not unthinkable that other admins with that power might use it for less minor things.

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
Mithaldu 10y ago
Here's the problem: thedonald is a subreddit full of both real trump supporters, AND trolls who're acting surreptitiously to rile up the real supporters and piss off everyone else; which is also spilling over and affecting other parts of reddit, including /all. The problem for the reddit admins is how to control and contain it and punish the trolls without affecting real people, or being overly censurous. So for someone who's basically being sniped at by hundreds of guerilla warriors who can make thousands of other people dance as their puppets, it's not surprising they'd reach for a similar tool in frustration when attacked directly, wrongly and frivolously.
- tdkl 10y ago
  They shouldn't though, if they want to be credible and the site they own/market. Now this is lost.
  - slowmotiony 10y ago
    Was reddit ever really credible?
    - tdkl 10y ago
      They made sure in the media they are.
  - Mithaldu 10y ago
    imo he's gained credibility
    - admax88q 10y ago
      "I don't care what he did so long as it was against those I disagree with."
      - Mithaldu 10y ago
        You're thinking too shallow. :) It took people harrassing him personally, and at scale, for him to snap. And even then he did not ban anyone, but did what amounts to a prank. And even then he did not hide it, but owned it and apologized. At every turn of this he showed himself to be a greater man than most of us.
        tdkl 10y ago
        Lets hope Zuckerberg doesn't snap then, but I'm sure "dumb fucks"* will find an apology for that too. *his words, not mine
        Mithaldu 10y ago
        As long as he follows up in the same mature manner, it'll be unfortunate, but forgivable. :) Also, calling someone a dumbfuck and pretending you didn't just do that because it's "just a quote" is not the greatest a look a person can aim for. ;)
        admax88q 10y ago
        I'm not even sure who he's quoting as calling "dumb fucks"
        nostrademons 10y ago
        Mark Zuckerburg, referring to Facebook users. http://www.businessinsider.com/embarrassing-and-damaging-zuckerberg-ims-confirmed-by-zuckerberg-the-new-yorker-2010-9 http://www.businessinsider.com/embarrassing-and-damaging-zuc...
- sangnoir 10y ago
  > Here's the problem: thedonald is a subreddit full of both real trump supporters, AND trolls who're acting surreptitiously to rile up the real supporters and piss off everyone else Shouldn't the mods clean up after the trolls who don't abide by the subreddit rules? If a post stays up for days, it is safe to assume the mods condone it whether it was posted by a 'troll' or a 'real person' - this goes for any subreddit.
  - Mithaldu 10y ago
    There's a site that gives you a thing you can use to show deleted posts in reddit threads, called uneddit.com Try it on thedonald.
    - sangnoir 10y ago
      I don't quite follow the argument that you are making - are you saying they mods are overwhelmed? The whole point of having mod(erator)s is to moderate - subreddits are their own communities with the mods in charge. They are responsible for setting the ground rules and enforcing them, if you have a different understanding of how Reddit works, please let me know.
      - Mithaldu 10y ago
        I'm saying that i personally don't think the mods there give a single damn about cleaning anything.
  - siidooloo 10y ago
    If you try to clean up after the trolls they'll just shitpost at you even more. Short of nuking the entire subreddit there's nothing to do.
    - sangnoir 10y ago
      so what is the point of having moderators?
- samstave 10y ago
  You're describing a seemingly natural human reaction. However - the CEO shouldn't be reacting like this - he needs a PR team to spin it however he wants to spin it - but he shouldnt single-handedly, with one action, literally destroy any semblance of credibility the 8th largest site in the US even has. FB was allowing employees to simply READ any comments/posts/PMs between users and recall what a shitstorm that was... but now imagine if Zuck was personally freaking editing posts about him? (or if he had a team of ppl doing it for him and then admitting to it/bragging about it on corp comms???) /u/spez may have truly done a really big hit to reddits future. Can we get @DANG's opinion?
  - mcphage 10y ago
    > /u/spez may have truly done a really big hit to reddits future. Oh man, if Reddit takes a stand and says "we're not going to treat trolls and non-trolls the same anymore", I would feel a ton better about spending time there.
    - meowface 10y ago
      How does one define a troll vs. a non-troll? You also have to consider that, as incredibly ridiculous and batshit crazy as it is, a high percentage of the /r/pizzagate people 100% believe it's true and that they're uncovering a massive criminal ring.
samstave 10y ago
Regardless of anything - the CEO of reddit's personal reddit user-account SHOULD NOT have the ability (assuming he is using his reddit login creds (surely hes got 2FA etc..)) to modify comments like this.... Every black-hat should be trying to get access to /u/spez's account to see if they can pwn reddit as a whole. But I am hopeful that reddit has that account compartmentalization and security under control.
- SwellJoe 10y ago
  How would you propose that a root level administrator of a server, for a site running code he original wrote, be prevented from modifying the content of that site?
  - samstave 10y ago
    That wasn't quite what I meant: 1. the actual reddit account /u/spez would presumably be just like any other account (meaning no god-mode, where he can edit shit) - that should be compartmentalized to system level accounts for cassandra, mysql etc... such that /u/spez cannot (via the web-account login) access an option to modify content thusly. The reason for this is to assume that /u/spez's account is prolly being attacked by brute force continuously. 2. we should assume that their DB practices, hosted on AWS, have both logging and alerts such that there should be a log of any DB statements submitted are logged. 3. that logged events stat who did what when 4. It's actually far more common to not have a CEO's account having root access to everything -- this is why you create a company. We are far more advanced than that. While Zuck may have "authority" to access any single system that FB has, I doubt he knows every single password - and that he would rely on his officers and teams to access/modify anything (given their current maturity level asa company) I'd bet my life that if you put a gun to Tim Cook's head - he would not be able to login and gain access and them modify your icloud account.
    - SwellJoe 10y ago
      1 - I don't think he used his /u/spez account on reddit to make this change. I think he hit the lower level parts of the system. I can't imagine he wanted to spend hours manually editing things. 2 - How do we know it wasn't logged? I assume it was. 3 - Same as above. I assume it would have been traceable had that been necessary. But, Steve posted about it. No need for spelunking in the logs. 4 - Tim Cook didn't/couldn't build iCloud from the ground up. Zuck hasn't been a primary coder on facebook in years, and nearly always had a lot of help. Steve built almost all of reddit in the beginning, and even now, seems to still be involved in the code.

by yladiz 10y ago

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

Mithaldu 10y ago

Here's the problem: thedonald is a subreddit full of both real trump supporters, AND trolls who're acting surreptitiously to rile up the real supporters and piss off everyone else; which is also spilling over and affecting other parts of reddit, including /all. The problem for the reddit admins is how to control and contain it and punish the trolls without affecting real people, or being overly censurous. So for someone who's basically being sniped at by hundreds of guerilla warriors who can make thousands of other people dance as their puppets, it's not surprising they'd reach for a similar tool in frustration when attacked directly, wrongly and frivolously.

tdkl 10y ago
They shouldn't though, if they want to be credible and the site they own/market. Now this is lost.
- slowmotiony 10y ago
  Was reddit ever really credible?
  - tdkl 10y ago
    They made sure in the media they are.
- Mithaldu 10y ago
  imo he's gained credibility
  - admax88q 10y ago
    "I don't care what he did so long as it was against those I disagree with."
    - Mithaldu 10y ago
      You're thinking too shallow. :) It took people harrassing him personally, and at scale, for him to snap. And even then he did not ban anyone, but did what amounts to a prank. And even then he did not hide it, but owned it and apologized. At every turn of this he showed himself to be a greater man than most of us.
      - tdkl 10y ago
        Lets hope Zuckerberg doesn't snap then, but I'm sure "dumb fucks"* will find an apology for that too. *his words, not mine
        Mithaldu 10y ago
        As long as he follows up in the same mature manner, it'll be unfortunate, but forgivable. :) Also, calling someone a dumbfuck and pretending you didn't just do that because it's "just a quote" is not the greatest a look a person can aim for. ;)
        admax88q 10y ago
        I'm not even sure who he's quoting as calling "dumb fucks"
        nostrademons 10y ago
        Mark Zuckerburg, referring to Facebook users. http://www.businessinsider.com/embarrassing-and-damaging-zuckerberg-ims-confirmed-by-zuckerberg-the-new-yorker-2010-9 http://www.businessinsider.com/embarrassing-and-damaging-zuc...
sangnoir 10y ago
> Here's the problem: thedonald is a subreddit full of both real trump supporters, AND trolls who're acting surreptitiously to rile up the real supporters and piss off everyone else Shouldn't the mods clean up after the trolls who don't abide by the subreddit rules? If a post stays up for days, it is safe to assume the mods condone it whether it was posted by a 'troll' or a 'real person' - this goes for any subreddit.
- Mithaldu 10y ago
  There's a site that gives you a thing you can use to show deleted posts in reddit threads, called uneddit.com Try it on thedonald.
  - sangnoir 10y ago
    I don't quite follow the argument that you are making - are you saying they mods are overwhelmed? The whole point of having mod(erator)s is to moderate - subreddits are their own communities with the mods in charge. They are responsible for setting the ground rules and enforcing them, if you have a different understanding of how Reddit works, please let me know.
    - Mithaldu 10y ago
      I'm saying that i personally don't think the mods there give a single damn about cleaning anything.
- siidooloo 10y ago
  If you try to clean up after the trolls they'll just shitpost at you even more. Short of nuking the entire subreddit there's nothing to do.
  - sangnoir 10y ago
    so what is the point of having moderators?
samstave 10y ago
You're describing a seemingly natural human reaction. However - the CEO shouldn't be reacting like this - he needs a PR team to spin it however he wants to spin it - but he shouldnt single-handedly, with one action, literally destroy any semblance of credibility the 8th largest site in the US even has. FB was allowing employees to simply READ any comments/posts/PMs between users and recall what a shitstorm that was... but now imagine if Zuck was personally freaking editing posts about him? (or if he had a team of ppl doing it for him and then admitting to it/bragging about it on corp comms???) /u/spez may have truly done a really big hit to reddits future. Can we get @DANG's opinion?
- mcphage 10y ago
  > /u/spez may have truly done a really big hit to reddits future. Oh man, if Reddit takes a stand and says "we're not going to treat trolls and non-trolls the same anymore", I would feel a ton better about spending time there.
  - meowface 10y ago
    How does one define a troll vs. a non-troll? You also have to consider that, as incredibly ridiculous and batshit crazy as it is, a high percentage of the /r/pizzagate people 100% believe it's true and that they're uncovering a massive criminal ring.

samstave 10y ago

Regardless of anything - the CEO of reddit's personal reddit user-account SHOULD NOT have the ability (assuming he is using his reddit login creds (surely hes got 2FA etc..)) to modify comments like this.... Every black-hat should be trying to get access to /u/spez's account to see if they can pwn reddit as a whole. But I am hopeful that reddit has that account compartmentalization and security under control.

SwellJoe 10y ago
How would you propose that a root level administrator of a server, for a site running code he original wrote, be prevented from modifying the content of that site?
- samstave 10y ago
  That wasn't quite what I meant: 1. the actual reddit account /u/spez would presumably be just like any other account (meaning no god-mode, where he can edit shit) - that should be compartmentalized to system level accounts for cassandra, mysql etc... such that /u/spez cannot (via the web-account login) access an option to modify content thusly. The reason for this is to assume that /u/spez's account is prolly being attacked by brute force continuously. 2. we should assume that their DB practices, hosted on AWS, have both logging and alerts such that there should be a log of any DB statements submitted are logged. 3. that logged events stat who did what when 4. It's actually far more common to not have a CEO's account having root access to everything -- this is why you create a company. We are far more advanced than that. While Zuck may have "authority" to access any single system that FB has, I doubt he knows every single password - and that he would rely on his officers and teams to access/modify anything (given their current maturity level asa company) I'd bet my life that if you put a gun to Tim Cook's head - he would not be able to login and gain access and them modify your icloud account.
  - SwellJoe 10y ago
    1 - I don't think he used his /u/spez account on reddit to make this change. I think he hit the lower level parts of the system. I can't imagine he wanted to spend hours manually editing things. 2 - How do we know it wasn't logged? I assume it was. 3 - Same as above. I assume it would have been traceable had that been necessary. But, Steve posted about it. No need for spelunking in the logs. 4 - Tim Cook didn't/couldn't build iCloud from the ground up. Zuck hasn't been a primary coder on facebook in years, and nearly always had a lot of help. Steve built almost all of reddit in the beginning, and even now, seems to still be involved in the code.