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This problem is easy to solve: give users the tools to do their own filtering. But services like to pretend that it's a hard problem because they don't want to

This problem is easy to solve: give users the tools to do their own filtering. But services like to pretend that it's a hard problem because they don't want to actually cede that control to their users. The whole point of controlling the communication networks is to control what and how people say and hear.

prepend 9y ago
It’s surprising how much social media bullshits on this issue. RSS had the standard and solution a decade ago. Being able to filter even by simple regex would be so much better than Facebook/Google’s “algorithm.” But it would allow us to filter out ads. It would also allow for community-driven white/black lists. But again, wouldn’t allow Coke and HBO to make you look at stuff.
- sbarre 9y ago
  Indeed.. Social media users don't get those tools because they are not the customers, they are the product.
  - Torwald 9y ago
    The people who downvoted you are idiots.
    - sls 9y ago
      I didn't downvote, but it may be that those that did are tired of seeing this same "insight" on every single story about a free service.
    - dang 9y ago
      Please don't do this here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- gowld 9y ago
  And Usenet and email had the solution a decade or two before RSS. The march of progress is in dumbing things down so the average person doesn't have to think, and the intelligent person isn't permitted to think.
  - ep103 9y ago
    Harrison Bergeron
- indigochill 9y ago
  I actually use some combination of Tampermonkey and uBlock to filter out Facebook ads (I forget which finally did it, since they work hard to make those things tricky to block). Haven't thought about using it to filter out offensive posts, but that's because I just unfollow people if they pass a completely subjective tolerance barrier. By virtue of delivering content to your browser, Facebook has put the power in your hands. It's how you use your browser that determines what you see. ;)
slx26 9y ago
I don't think that's so easy or a good enough solution for everyone, but I agree it's a good tool. In particular, I think it would also be more effective if we had better internet accounts, which were more transversal and could be used with more services.
steveplace 9y ago
Twitter has keyword filtering at the user level and it's magical.
wmeredith 9y ago
This is absolutely it. You can mark the day that Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, et all started to suck and it's when the removed control of what was in their actual feed from the users.
anigbrowl 9y ago
Yeah, it's a platform vs protocols issues. I much preferred the Usenet model and wish there were some capital/effort behind rehabilitating it. The web internet comment protocol seems promising but I have yet to see it implemented anywhere.
wmf 9y ago
That sounds great for people who are already invested in Reddit but terrible for newcomers who don't want to do a bunch of work to get Reddit into a usable state.
- cuckcuckspruce 9y ago
  Reddit has default subreddits. It could easily have default filters that users could change/augment if they wanted to.
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    > Reddit has default subreddits. Didn't it get rid of them a year ago?
0x00000000 9y ago
Absolutely. The internet is a tremendously powerful tool for politically motivated entities to control exactly what content and ideas hundreds of millions of people consume in a very ironically authoritarian and anti-neutral way, despite what they have done a fantastic job of convincing people. Also that is why I enjoy playing Valve's online games and not Blizzard's or Riot's. No politics or baby sitting. Just the ability to mute everyone if you so choose. The "no BS" approach is also quite apparent in the game design itself too
simias 9y ago
I strongly disagree, although unfortunately I can't really propose a better solution. Filtering just enhances the echo chamber, it's true that social networks are proactive about it and "pre-filter" things but I think they're actually getting pretty good about it, they give the users what they want. And what we want is content that agrees with us, makes us feel right and confirms our biases. People effectively "filter" by selecting who they follow, what they subscribe to etc... Furthermore I don't think filtering "toxicity" on huge open communities can really work because most people out there are terrible at "not feeding the trolls". I've tried /ignoring trolls on IRC for instance, but then you're left with the messages of other people engaging the troll and it's somewhat even worse because you don't have the context. Then you try to block the people replying to the troll but then you have people replying to the people replying to the troll... Personally I feel it's mostly a non problem, I don't have twitter, I don't have a reddit account, I don't have facebook... I'm only active on smaller communities like HN. I think humans simply suck at behaving correctly in large crowds, especially anonymously online. There's no fixing reddit or facebook, they've just become the modern equivalent of scribbling a swastika on a bathroom stall. Cat gifs, pun threads, racist comments, it's the same thing really, instant gratification without any effort, just watch the karma go up or down. If you don't set any bar for acceptable content then you're bound to be overrun with low-effort content.
nitwit005 9y ago
Most of us solve it by not visiting the political subreddits.
jsonne 9y ago
Reddit actually has this and it essentially saved my experience of the site and kept me around as a user. I browse r/all frequently to discover new content and then use their subreddit filtering as essentially a robust negative keyword list.
a_bonobo 9y ago
I don't think it's that easy. Having a toxic sub-community leaks into other communities. I've noticed that myself, the /lit/ subboard no literate on 4chan has been taken over by /pol/ users. It has been shown that when Reddit banned two toxic subreddits, the users of those subreddits either left completely or drastically reduced their hate speech in other subreddits: >Within the frame RQ1 and RQ2 provide, we find that the ban worked for Reddit. Many more accounts than expected discontinued their use of the site; and, among those that stayed active, there was a drastic decrease (of at least 80%) in their hate speech use See http://comp.social.gatech.edu/papers/cscw18-chand-hate.pdf http://comp.social.gatech.edu/papers/cscw18-chand-hate.pdf In other words, even if you filter your own subreddits to the ones you 'like', chances are that the toxicity leaks into your favorites. (This is the same paper quoted in the OP's text)

prepend 9y ago

It’s surprising how much social media bullshits on this issue. RSS had the standard and solution a decade ago. Being able to filter even by simple regex would be so much better than Facebook/Google’s “algorithm.” But it would allow us to filter out ads. It would also allow for community-driven white/black lists. But again, wouldn’t allow Coke and HBO to make you look at stuff.

sbarre 9y ago
Indeed.. Social media users don't get those tools because they are not the customers, they are the product.
- Torwald 9y ago
  The people who downvoted you are idiots.
  - sls 9y ago
    I didn't downvote, but it may be that those that did are tired of seeing this same "insight" on every single story about a free service.
  - dang 9y ago
    Please don't do this here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
gowld 9y ago
And Usenet and email had the solution a decade or two before RSS. The march of progress is in dumbing things down so the average person doesn't have to think, and the intelligent person isn't permitted to think.
- ep103 9y ago
  Harrison Bergeron
indigochill 9y ago
I actually use some combination of Tampermonkey and uBlock to filter out Facebook ads (I forget which finally did it, since they work hard to make those things tricky to block). Haven't thought about using it to filter out offensive posts, but that's because I just unfollow people if they pass a completely subjective tolerance barrier. By virtue of delivering content to your browser, Facebook has put the power in your hands. It's how you use your browser that determines what you see. ;)

slx26 9y ago

I don't think that's so easy or a good enough solution for everyone, but I agree it's a good tool. In particular, I think it would also be more effective if we had better internet accounts, which were more transversal and could be used with more services.

steveplace 9y ago

Twitter has keyword filtering at the user level and it's magical.

wmeredith 9y ago

This is absolutely it. You can mark the day that Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, et all started to suck and it's when the removed control of what was in their actual feed from the users.

anigbrowl 9y ago

Yeah, it's a platform vs protocols issues. I much preferred the Usenet model and wish there were some capital/effort behind rehabilitating it. The web internet comment protocol seems promising but I have yet to see it implemented anywhere.

wmf 9y ago

That sounds great for people who are already invested in Reddit but terrible for newcomers who don't want to do a bunch of work to get Reddit into a usable state.

cuckcuckspruce 9y ago
Reddit has default subreddits. It could easily have default filters that users could change/augment if they wanted to.
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  > Reddit has default subreddits. Didn't it get rid of them a year ago?

0x00000000 9y ago

Absolutely. The internet is a tremendously powerful tool for politically motivated entities to control exactly what content and ideas hundreds of millions of people consume in a very ironically authoritarian and anti-neutral way, despite what they have done a fantastic job of convincing people. Also that is why I enjoy playing Valve's online games and not Blizzard's or Riot's. No politics or baby sitting. Just the ability to mute everyone if you so choose. The "no BS" approach is also quite apparent in the game design itself too

simias 9y ago

I strongly disagree, although unfortunately I can't really propose a better solution. Filtering just enhances the echo chamber, it's true that social networks are proactive about it and "pre-filter" things but I think they're actually getting pretty good about it, they give the users what they want. And what we want is content that agrees with us, makes us feel right and confirms our biases. People effectively "filter" by selecting who they follow, what they subscribe to etc... Furthermore I don't think filtering "toxicity" on huge open communities can really work because most people out there are terrible at "not feeding the trolls". I've tried /ignoring trolls on IRC for instance, but then you're left with the messages of other people engaging the troll and it's somewhat even worse because you don't have the context. Then you try to block the people replying to the troll but then you have people replying to the people replying to the troll... Personally I feel it's mostly a non problem, I don't have twitter, I don't have a reddit account, I don't have facebook... I'm only active on smaller communities like HN. I think humans simply suck at behaving correctly in large crowds, especially anonymously online. There's no fixing reddit or facebook, they've just become the modern equivalent of scribbling a swastika on a bathroom stall. Cat gifs, pun threads, racist comments, it's the same thing really, instant gratification without any effort, just watch the karma go up or down. If you don't set any bar for acceptable content then you're bound to be overrun with low-effort content.

nitwit005 9y ago

Most of us solve it by not visiting the political subreddits.

jsonne 9y ago

Reddit actually has this and it essentially saved my experience of the site and kept me around as a user. I browse r/all frequently to discover new content and then use their subreddit filtering as essentially a robust negative keyword list.

a_bonobo 9y ago

I don't think it's that easy. Having a toxic sub-community leaks into other communities. I've noticed that myself, the /lit/ subboard no literate on 4chan has been taken over by /pol/ users. It has been shown that when Reddit banned two toxic subreddits, the users of those subreddits either left completely or drastically reduced their hate speech in other subreddits: >Within the frame RQ1 and RQ2 provide, we find that the ban worked for Reddit. Many more accounts than expected discontinued their use of the site; and, among those that stayed active, there was a drastic decrease (of at least 80%) in their hate speech use See http://comp.social.gatech.edu/papers/cscw18-chand-hate.pdf http://comp.social.gatech.edu/papers/cscw18-chand-hate.pdf In other words, even if you filter your own subreddits to the ones you 'like', chances are that the toxicity leaks into your favorites. (This is the same paper quoted in the OP's text)