4 ms·

This is great. Websites are keen on publishing these comments and benefit from the angry clickbaits and discussions, they should then be responsible for them to

by mavdi 9y ago

This is great. Websites are keen on publishing these comments and benefit from the angry clickbaits and discussions, they should then be responsible for them too. If it's on your website and you're displaying it, then you own it. I want this applied to Facebook and all its racist, sexist and homophobic user content too.

cryptonector 9y ago
I would rather have lively discussions that sometimes attract trolls than an insipid, dry, non-discussion discussion. The moment you need to moderate every comment, and worry that you might get sued/prosecuted by people whose discrimination is different to yours, is the moment you simply become a censor or simply drop comments altogether.
- r00fus 9y ago
  With the advent of automated trolling and state and corporate propaganda machines (see: persona management automation software), maybe the default should be "off" on comments unless the forum has sufficient moderation capabilities. It's like arguing against firewalls on the open Internet.
  - cryptonector 9y ago
    How about the owner/operator of the site decides?
Gys 9y ago
It only helps the big ones to become stronger. Companies like Facebook have the partners, the tech, the lawyers, the lobbying power, etc to turn developments like this ultimately into a competitive advantage. Small players, like startups with innovative ideas, will have more and more difficulties to survive.
GCU-Empiricist 9y ago
So what is the scalable solution to allow discussion without causing automated censorship, inflicting astroturfing vulnerability, or hiring significant staff overhead that allows things like reddit to start up, or are you happy with the ecosystem we have?
- jdavis703 9y ago
  Perhaps a pay-to-post scheme. If it takes $1 to make a post people will comment a lot less, and hopefully when they do comment it'll be saying something meaningful. This will also help reduce automated span.
  - GCU-Empiricist 9y ago
    Personally I'm a fan of more speech, vice less, in hopes that more insightful things bubble up, voting algorithms are an intresting puzzle but I'd prefer to see discussion without making people who can't afford it silent.
- prepend 9y ago
  Push comments off your site and onto Twitter/Reddit.
- cryptonector 9y ago
  It's not meant to have a scalable solution. Of course, some players will be able to afford an AI-based solution. Their fora will be insipid and dry.
jdavis703 9y ago
Facebook, the New York Times and Cloudflare are all free to police or not police their platforms against hate speech as they want to be. (Thankfully they've all come around to realizing hate speech is not good). However once the government gets involved, that's when we've lost free speech. Free speech protections have always been in place to ensure you can't go to jail for what you're saying. What they aren't for, is making private individuals and corporations harbor any kind of speech on their property. It'll be truly scary if the government starts forcing corporations to censor speech. Let's leave the pressure we put on these firms to consumers, activists and shareholders.
- r00fus 9y ago
  Governments are like corporations in many ways, except they have voting rights for their constituency. They're just another group of people. Sure, governments have guns, but as long as there is a constitution preventing abuses and the rule of law, that is constrained. The bigger danger is cooption of governments by corporations and other powerful interest groups that have no such protections/limitations.
titanix2 9y ago
You may want that but there is not clear line for a blurry and highly politically charged concept like sexism. A comment such as « my gf just cook an amazing cake, she’s awesome » could perfectly be labeled as sexist by some activist because associating a woman with cooking is deemed sexist. In addition, in the European context the racism part will be used to censure comments critizing the immigration politics of Western Europe countries (which every citizen should be able to discuss given the importance of it) and any discussions about Islam that don’t go the way the government want it to go. In fact, this is already happening for years and it is a worrying fact.
- HappyDreamer 9y ago
  That's incorrect. There is no such censoring. At least as far as I've seen, and I live in Europe, in the country that has accepted the most refugees from Syria per person in the country (plus many migrants/refugees from other places in the Middle East and Africa). Everyone is free to discuss the immigration politics on the Internet and elsewhere, and plenty of people are angry about it. There are even political parties that have this thing as their main agenda.

by mavdi 9y ago

cryptonector 9y ago

I would rather have lively discussions that sometimes attract trolls than an insipid, dry, non-discussion discussion. The moment you need to moderate every comment, and worry that you might get sued/prosecuted by people whose discrimination is different to yours, is the moment you simply become a censor or simply drop comments altogether.

r00fus 9y ago
With the advent of automated trolling and state and corporate propaganda machines (see: persona management automation software), maybe the default should be "off" on comments unless the forum has sufficient moderation capabilities. It's like arguing against firewalls on the open Internet.
- cryptonector 9y ago
  How about the owner/operator of the site decides?

Gys 9y ago

It only helps the big ones to become stronger. Companies like Facebook have the partners, the tech, the lawyers, the lobbying power, etc to turn developments like this ultimately into a competitive advantage. Small players, like startups with innovative ideas, will have more and more difficulties to survive.

GCU-Empiricist 9y ago

So what is the scalable solution to allow discussion without causing automated censorship, inflicting astroturfing vulnerability, or hiring significant staff overhead that allows things like reddit to start up, or are you happy with the ecosystem we have?

jdavis703 9y ago
Perhaps a pay-to-post scheme. If it takes $1 to make a post people will comment a lot less, and hopefully when they do comment it'll be saying something meaningful. This will also help reduce automated span.
- GCU-Empiricist 9y ago
  Personally I'm a fan of more speech, vice less, in hopes that more insightful things bubble up, voting algorithms are an intresting puzzle but I'd prefer to see discussion without making people who can't afford it silent.
prepend 9y ago
Push comments off your site and onto Twitter/Reddit.
cryptonector 9y ago
It's not meant to have a scalable solution. Of course, some players will be able to afford an AI-based solution. Their fora will be insipid and dry.

jdavis703 9y ago

Facebook, the New York Times and Cloudflare are all free to police or not police their platforms against hate speech as they want to be. (Thankfully they've all come around to realizing hate speech is not good). However once the government gets involved, that's when we've lost free speech. Free speech protections have always been in place to ensure you can't go to jail for what you're saying. What they aren't for, is making private individuals and corporations harbor any kind of speech on their property. It'll be truly scary if the government starts forcing corporations to censor speech. Let's leave the pressure we put on these firms to consumers, activists and shareholders.

r00fus 9y ago
Governments are like corporations in many ways, except they have voting rights for their constituency. They're just another group of people. Sure, governments have guns, but as long as there is a constitution preventing abuses and the rule of law, that is constrained. The bigger danger is cooption of governments by corporations and other powerful interest groups that have no such protections/limitations.

titanix2 9y ago

You may want that but there is not clear line for a blurry and highly politically charged concept like sexism. A comment such as « my gf just cook an amazing cake, she’s awesome » could perfectly be labeled as sexist by some activist because associating a woman with cooking is deemed sexist. In addition, in the European context the racism part will be used to censure comments critizing the immigration politics of Western Europe countries (which every citizen should be able to discuss given the importance of it) and any discussions about Islam that don’t go the way the government want it to go. In fact, this is already happening for years and it is a worrying fact.

HappyDreamer 9y ago
That's incorrect. There is no such censoring. At least as far as I've seen, and I live in Europe, in the country that has accepted the most refugees from Syria per person in the country (plus many migrants/refugees from other places in the Middle East and Africa). Everyone is free to discuss the immigration politics on the Internet and elsewhere, and plenty of people are angry about it. There are even political parties that have this thing as their main agenda.