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Looks like it's a bigger problem for moderators than for users: >“There have been unquestionably instances [where] moderators of other subreddits were targeted
by a_bonobo 10y ago
Looks like it's a bigger problem for moderators than for users:
>“There have been unquestionably instances [where] moderators of other subreddits were targeted by users in The_Donald,” Reddit told Gizmodo, and the leaked chatlogs reveal the extent.
>Some moderators had been flooded with constant harassing messages. “One threatened to kill my fucking dog,” a moderator pleaded in the leaked Slack chat. A The_Donald user hacked r/politics and booted half of the moderation team, another told Gizmodo in an email.
>“We have had multiple moderators doxxed and sent death threats, we had one moderator who had his truck broken into and vandalized,” an r/politics mod told Gizmodo over Reddit private message.
- wheelerwj 10y agoYeah, this is what was REALLY shitty about /u/Spez's debacle. Profanity, hate speech, bullying, harassment aren't protected by free speech. And you see PLENTY of it coming out of the_donald. You don't have to tolerate that shit, you have every right to shut it down. But no, lets degrade ourselves by trolling the trolls. What a strategic waste. non-edit: greglindahl below me makes an excellent point on my choice of vocabulary. I won't edit my post, I'll just concede that I chose poorly while trying to articulate my point.
- greglindahl 10y agoYou're being sloppy with terms. In the US, obscenity isn't protected by free speech, but non-obscene profanity is. Hate speech? Threats of violence aren't free speech, but a lot of odious hate speech is. Court cases about bullying frequently fail. Of course Reddit, being private, has the right to do whatever it wants. But it's important to realize where the lines are drawn for public discourse.
- a_bonobo 10y agoI don't think harassment via private messages counts as public discourse
- greglindahl 10y agoI agree. I wasn't talking about private messages in my comment. One nice thing about public discourse is that it's public, i.e., it's easy for everyone to debate how odious it is. Private messages are very different, and should be filtered quite differently. From a sunlight point of view, being able to make private messages public is quite effective, albeit a feature which should be disclosed in advance.
- anigbrowl 10y agoGiven that Reddit's business model relies on volunteer moderators (which is why I'm not shedding any tears over its problems - that's what you get for building a business on free labor), I'd say it's gonna be a big problem for their shareholders as ad revenue drops and then for the remaining users as it sinks past the threshold of tolerability.