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How does decentralizing things combat the scourge of misinformation and fake news? Wouldn't it exacerbate the issue? Not to sound like a hipster, but I feel li

How does decentralizing things combat the scourge of misinformation and fake news? Wouldn't it exacerbate the issue? Not to sound like a hipster, but I feel like the internet went downhill when it went mainstream. That's when there was a huge incentive to take advantage of people, whether it's spam, scams, or propaganda campaigns. The centralized control of our data is a separate issue, no?

bobajeff 8y ago
If only there was some way we could control what information people were able to share. Then only the correct information would spread. /s
- chc 8y ago
  Is there anything to this comment beyond hollow, off-target sarcasm? The comment you're responding to seems like a legitimate question: The OP describes his horror at the increasingly common manipulation and misinformation campaigns on the Web as being part of Berners-Lee's motivation, but this solution seems to make them easier if anything, and certainly doesn't appear to make them harder.
  - lovemenot 8y ago
    I took that comment to say that its parent was calling for the impossible. So not off-topic. For some people including your parent perhaps, it is axiomatic that free information implies an abundance of false information. The construction was a little strange. "If only..." usually references an existing technology ironically. In this case I think they are saying there will never be such a tech.
    - setr 8y ago
      The existing tech he's referring to is what we're approaching with the web as it is now (silos of centralized systems, in which information could be controlled), and the irony is that a large part of why decentralized systems (and tim's construction) are notable is to avoid such a scenario. They explicitly do not solve the problem of fake news, because they explicitly do not want to live in the world where fake news is a solved problem (because the issues that go with its solution are far worse than the problem of fake news). The problem is that it is possible to do, and the solution to it is not something we want in general, but we're heading towards it anyways, and TBL is trying to avoid that with his machinations, and the commenter is effectively asking "how does this solve a problem that would naturally be solved with a solution we really, really don't want, and TBL is going out of his way not to solve?".
  - civility 8y ago
    I think he's saying one way to control misinformation is by applying censorship, with the obvious implication that censorship is undesirable. You take the good with the bad, whether that means freedom of speech and some misinformation, or "correct" information and censoring any other news or view points. I know which I'm more afraid of...
    - jonny_eh 8y ago
      One other option is to increase the cost of putting information out there. That's basically what we had pre-internet. Having gatekeepers isn't censorship but it does cut down on dissemination of fake news. But that too has its downsides. Another option is accountability, requiring a confirmed identity to be disclosed with any posting. If people knew who was behind fake news, it would potentially be less damaging.
frio 8y ago
There are two closely intertwined but separate issues: centralization and governance. Current web technology typically sees one entity controlling the data; if you sign up for a website, your data goes in their database. That's due to the common stack we all build on: some form of API/web server, some form of SQL/NoSQL database, some form of client. If we had a world where developers could simply and freely implement services on top of a different paradigm, we'd stop having to worry about big central entities like Facebook, Google, your local computer store, whoever -- being able to sell your data. They simply wouldn't have it. I'm not sure what that paradigm is, but IPFS, Secure Scuttlebutt, Solid, the Dat Project etc. are all interesting takes on what a solution to that problem might look like. At the other end of the spectrum is governance, which is something sorely lacking, and allows these misinformation campaigns to spread so freely. Do we still have to worry about governance in a world where we own our own data? Yes, probably, if the surge of illegal and genuinely nasty content like Child Pornography on the new big distributed networks (eg. ZeroNet) is any indicator. Censorship is a spectrum, and while I can appreciate sticking to the view that free speech is best for all, there are some behaviours which society has mostly agreed are objectionable. The current paradigm of each social service provider essentially being a self-determining fiefdom isn't too dissimilar to how humaity's always done things, I guess (for instance, different pubs/bars will have differing clienteles and degrees of socially acceptable behaviour), except for the scale -- which unfortunately probably does merit a change in how our current major sites are run (YouTube and Twitter in particular seem like they've been gamed incredibly well by cynical parties). I don't know how we solve this problem, but better technical underpinnings might make this a simpler problem to solve. Independently, however, I note that there are places like https://social.coop https://social.coop where they're trying to take that problem on head-first. It will be interesting to see what the next few years of the internet look like. My hope is that we see some of the people interested in this problem start focussing on normal people instead of other techies; suggesting to my friends that they move to Secure Scuttlebutt is pretty hard, as the majority of them really only use their phones (or tablets). Personally, I think something that tied together messaging and an event invitation/calendaring system would take a massive knock out of the people who are only hanging onto Facebook for those two things, but that's still a techy view of "kill centralisation" and not a social view of "how does that new platform get governed?".
ssivark 8y ago
If there is any loophole in a centralized system, there are huge benefits to exploiting it. So, there are strong incentives to attempt that, and a matter of time before someone finds a loophole that's not easy to patch. Correspondingly, keeping up with attacks and patching loopholes is a necessary and intensive endeavor. In a decentralized system where the parts are diverse, there is no easy way to game every subsystem at once. Further, if the parts are loosely coupled, even if someone manages to game one of the subsystems, the damage is quite isolated, and other parts can carry on unaffected.
confounded 8y ago
> a huge incentive to take advantage of people... The centralized control of our data is a separate issue, no? Not really. The more data is centralized the stronger the advantage the centralizer has over the centralized. In other words, the greater incentive/payoff to taking advantage. On the subject of misinformation, there are a two common, non-exclusive explanations: - Ordinary people are ill equipped to judge the provenance of news information on the web - Ordinary people’s news intake is being manipulated to maximize their base emotional reactions for profit. Current affairs are interwoven with cat videos and soft pornography in an endless feed to tickle the “good”/“bad” classification impulses of our slug brains. Both are true in my experience. Little short of improved and updated education programs will address the first. However, I’m hopeful that redecentralization can help with the second. I’m willing to give it a whirl!
- Proven 8y ago
  > Both are true in my experience. Little short of improved and updated education programs will address the first. Even though both may be true, nothing gives you (or the State) the right to "address" them via compulsory brainwashing ("public education").
mtgx 8y ago
When did the most "fake news" started appearing? When you could promote it on one of the most centralized platforms around: Facebook. I think it's easier to manipulate a centralized platform's algorithms. That "high efficiency" of a centralized platform is also what's making the manipulators more effective. Same with malware makers and so on. It's always easier to do something when there's a single dominant platform.
- Klasiaster 8y ago
  Specially if a platform like Facebook allows injecting promoted stuff into user's streams for money.
- PurpleRamen 8y ago
  > When did the most "fake news" started appearing? Must have been when humans started to speak. Fake News is nothing new, just the name is. In the past there were gossip and rumors, sketchy newspapers who spreaded whatever sold best, and sometimes even satirical things like Bonsai Kittens (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonsai_Kitten https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonsai_Kitten) in the '90s. The only difference today is that people moved from the streets to the net, and gossip-snakes have upgraded their game in quality because of modern tools. But whether centralized or decentralized, the game was and will always be there.

bobajeff 8y ago

If only there was some way we could control what information people were able to share. Then only the correct information would spread. /s

chc 8y ago
Is there anything to this comment beyond hollow, off-target sarcasm? The comment you're responding to seems like a legitimate question: The OP describes his horror at the increasingly common manipulation and misinformation campaigns on the Web as being part of Berners-Lee's motivation, but this solution seems to make them easier if anything, and certainly doesn't appear to make them harder.
- lovemenot 8y ago
  I took that comment to say that its parent was calling for the impossible. So not off-topic. For some people including your parent perhaps, it is axiomatic that free information implies an abundance of false information. The construction was a little strange. "If only..." usually references an existing technology ironically. In this case I think they are saying there will never be such a tech.
  - setr 8y ago
    The existing tech he's referring to is what we're approaching with the web as it is now (silos of centralized systems, in which information could be controlled), and the irony is that a large part of why decentralized systems (and tim's construction) are notable is to avoid such a scenario. They explicitly do not solve the problem of fake news, because they explicitly do not want to live in the world where fake news is a solved problem (because the issues that go with its solution are far worse than the problem of fake news). The problem is that it is possible to do, and the solution to it is not something we want in general, but we're heading towards it anyways, and TBL is trying to avoid that with his machinations, and the commenter is effectively asking "how does this solve a problem that would naturally be solved with a solution we really, really don't want, and TBL is going out of his way not to solve?".
- civility 8y ago
  I think he's saying one way to control misinformation is by applying censorship, with the obvious implication that censorship is undesirable. You take the good with the bad, whether that means freedom of speech and some misinformation, or "correct" information and censoring any other news or view points. I know which I'm more afraid of...
  - jonny_eh 8y ago
    One other option is to increase the cost of putting information out there. That's basically what we had pre-internet. Having gatekeepers isn't censorship but it does cut down on dissemination of fake news. But that too has its downsides. Another option is accountability, requiring a confirmed identity to be disclosed with any posting. If people knew who was behind fake news, it would potentially be less damaging.

frio 8y ago

There are two closely intertwined but separate issues: centralization and governance. Current web technology typically sees one entity controlling the data; if you sign up for a website, your data goes in their database. That's due to the common stack we all build on: some form of API/web server, some form of SQL/NoSQL database, some form of client. If we had a world where developers could simply and freely implement services on top of a different paradigm, we'd stop having to worry about big central entities like Facebook, Google, your local computer store, whoever -- being able to sell your data. They simply wouldn't have it. I'm not sure what that paradigm is, but IPFS, Secure Scuttlebutt, Solid, the Dat Project etc. are all interesting takes on what a solution to that problem might look like. At the other end of the spectrum is governance, which is something sorely lacking, and allows these misinformation campaigns to spread so freely. Do we still have to worry about governance in a world where we own our own data? Yes, probably, if the surge of illegal and genuinely nasty content like Child Pornography on the new big distributed networks (eg. ZeroNet) is any indicator. Censorship is a spectrum, and while I can appreciate sticking to the view that free speech is best for all, there are some behaviours which society has mostly agreed are objectionable. The current paradigm of each social service provider essentially being a self-determining fiefdom isn't too dissimilar to how humaity's always done things, I guess (for instance, different pubs/bars will have differing clienteles and degrees of socially acceptable behaviour), except for the scale -- which unfortunately probably does merit a change in how our current major sites are run (YouTube and Twitter in particular seem like they've been gamed incredibly well by cynical parties). I don't know how we solve this problem, but better technical underpinnings might make this a simpler problem to solve. Independently, however, I note that there are places like https://social.coop https://social.coop where they're trying to take that problem on head-first. It will be interesting to see what the next few years of the internet look like. My hope is that we see some of the people interested in this problem start focussing on normal people instead of other techies; suggesting to my friends that they move to Secure Scuttlebutt is pretty hard, as the majority of them really only use their phones (or tablets). Personally, I think something that tied together messaging and an event invitation/calendaring system would take a massive knock out of the people who are only hanging onto Facebook for those two things, but that's still a techy view of "kill centralisation" and not a social view of "how does that new platform get governed?".

ssivark 8y ago

If there is any loophole in a centralized system, there are huge benefits to exploiting it. So, there are strong incentives to attempt that, and a matter of time before someone finds a loophole that's not easy to patch. Correspondingly, keeping up with attacks and patching loopholes is a necessary and intensive endeavor. In a decentralized system where the parts are diverse, there is no easy way to game every subsystem at once. Further, if the parts are loosely coupled, even if someone manages to game one of the subsystems, the damage is quite isolated, and other parts can carry on unaffected.

confounded 8y ago

> a huge incentive to take advantage of people... The centralized control of our data is a separate issue, no? Not really. The more data is centralized the stronger the advantage the centralizer has over the centralized. In other words, the greater incentive/payoff to taking advantage. On the subject of misinformation, there are a two common, non-exclusive explanations: - Ordinary people are ill equipped to judge the provenance of news information on the web - Ordinary people’s news intake is being manipulated to maximize their base emotional reactions for profit. Current affairs are interwoven with cat videos and soft pornography in an endless feed to tickle the “good”/“bad” classification impulses of our slug brains. Both are true in my experience. Little short of improved and updated education programs will address the first. However, I’m hopeful that redecentralization can help with the second. I’m willing to give it a whirl!

Proven 8y ago
> Both are true in my experience. Little short of improved and updated education programs will address the first. Even though both may be true, nothing gives you (or the State) the right to "address" them via compulsory brainwashing ("public education").

mtgx 8y ago

When did the most "fake news" started appearing? When you could promote it on one of the most centralized platforms around: Facebook. I think it's easier to manipulate a centralized platform's algorithms. That "high efficiency" of a centralized platform is also what's making the manipulators more effective. Same with malware makers and so on. It's always easier to do something when there's a single dominant platform.

Klasiaster 8y ago
Specially if a platform like Facebook allows injecting promoted stuff into user's streams for money.
PurpleRamen 8y ago
> When did the most "fake news" started appearing? Must have been when humans started to speak. Fake News is nothing new, just the name is. In the past there were gossip and rumors, sketchy newspapers who spreaded whatever sold best, and sometimes even satirical things like Bonsai Kittens (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonsai_Kitten https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonsai_Kitten) in the '90s. The only difference today is that people moved from the streets to the net, and gossip-snakes have upgraded their game in quality because of modern tools. But whether centralized or decentralized, the game was and will always be there.