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Can you imagine the reaction if a user's post on HN were edited by YC? I guess it'd be the instant death of the network. That this action a) happened on Reddi

Can you imagine the reaction if a user's post on HN were edited by YC? I guess it'd be the instant death of the network. That this action a) happened on Reddit + b) was mostly/quickly forgotten says a lot about the different demographics. Audiences who largely come for cat pictures and political snark don't have to worry about CEOs breaking the 4th wall. I've been a Redditor for 9+ years and I still am one. But today's Reddit isn't the one I signed up for.

adventured 8y ago
I casually browsed Reddit as a non-account user for five or six years, then used it frequently for roughly two years with an account. Then the practice of aggressive censorship and banning began, as they started to try to transform it into another giant social media business. I stopped visiting entirely as it turned into an unhinged disaster leading up to the 2016 election. I doubt I'll ever bother to return. I abandoned Imgur for a similar reason, a flood of political trash. I was happy to see Imgur now strips the vast majority of political content out of most viral, so I occasionally visit their homepage again.
- frogpelt 8y ago
  Wait. Do you like the corporate censorship or not?
zozbot123 8y ago
> Can you imagine the reaction if a user's post on HN were edited by YC? If the user's post was about the Pizzagate conspiracy theory and included baseless, highly offensive libel of the YC folks? Yeah, I don't think many people here would care. Especially since most users here understand that a website's comment database can be edited arbitrarily, it's not nearly as unthinkable as you assume. Don't like it, get your own website.
- simonh 8y ago
  I would care. Deleting a post is one thing and that's fine because it's clear what was done and why, but editing a post surreptitiously is a deliberate attempt to deceive and that's not acceptable.
  - zozbot123 8y ago
    It was not an attempt to deceive, it was a way of visibly trolling back people who were dumb enough to libel the Reddit CEO on his own website, in extremely offensive ways. And he owned up to it very quickly after it happened.
    - yjftsjthsd-h 8y ago
      "Fuck /u/spez" is not libel, and is not even particularly offensive. And yes, he "owned up", but without apologizing. EDIT: So actually on https://www.reddit.com/comments/5frg1n https://www.reddit.com/comments/5frg1n he did actually say that he was sorry and he wouldn't do it again. That's interesting, because I have a very strong memory of that not being the case. Weird. Either there was an initial acknowledgement that didn't have any sort of apology, or I missed something. I still stand by my minimization of the thing to which he reacted.
      - JoeSmithson 8y ago
        The entire subreddit was calling him a paedophile, this is actually mentioned in the post this thread is about, so I'm not sure how you could have missed it -https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/5ekdy9/the_admins_are_suffering_from_low_energy_have/dad5sf1/ https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/5ekdy9/the_admi... It seems a bit like your feelings on this issue are stronger than your recollection.
    - JoeSmithson 8y ago
      It's a shame you are being downvoted because you are absolutely right. The myth that has been built up around this incident is ridiculous. It was essentially the same joke as those Chrome plugins that change "feminist" to "skeleton". /u/spez's main mistake was pushing it as an actual change to the comments database. If he'd forced a CSS change or whatever this overblown censorship/deception narrative would never have arisen.
rat9988 8y ago
You are overstimating the community's reaction. There would be some backslash but nothing over the long term.
b_tterc_p 8y ago
I highly doubt HN would see a drop in activity if a single post was edited. Especially if it’s edited to remove offensive or obviously false content.
- yjftsjthsd-h 8y ago
  What if it was a user insulting a member of ycombinator, and it was edited to leave everything the same except changing the target to a mod? Principles matter, and that level of dishonesty is not acceptable.
  - b_tterc_p 8y ago
    personally I would say don’t do that again, and then get over it.
ppseafield 8y ago
Indeed. I think the comment editing (and immediate capitulation afterwards) was horrible, but the fact that they allowed the_donald to continue to break their own rules was way worse. They constantly would dox, harass, downvote brigade (in posts stickied by mods), and in general act entirely in bad faith. Other subreddits were banned for much, much less. Either they wanted their advertising money or were simply supportive of their platform/actions, but eventually it was enough for me to leave Reddit entirely.
- danlugo92 8y ago
  the_donald was censored too.
- dpau 8y ago
  I wonder if the presence of a controversial subreddit like the_donald is good for business, increasing discussion, site traffic and thus revenue? Perhaps Reddit has a financial incentive to encourage (or at least not punish) subreddit drama.
  - CM30 8y ago
    Most probably. It's about the current US president after all, and it's the closest thing to an official forum/social network his fanbase/supporters have. If Reddit banned it, then they'd likely drive said users to a competitor (like Voat) and divert all that media attention from Reddit to said competitor in the process.
    - YUMad 8y ago
      IMO, reddit banning t_d would create much more serious issues for them. The last thing they want is to get attention as a possible campaign financer. Even tho political choice is not a protected category and it's not illegal for reddit to ban t_d, since t_d clearly defines itself as rally sub for president, t_d mods follow rules and ban offending accounts quickly, and, most importantly, President Trump filed his campaign for 2020. with FEC almost immediately after becoming president. Banning t_d could be construed as political speech, and a form of political donation. And reddit most definitely doesn't want legal inquiries of that kind, I bet they have a lot of dirty laundry there - did you guys forget how "cleanly" /r/politics switched overnight (literally) from bernie central to hillary propaganda? They most definitely want to ban it, as demonstrated in leaked logs from private admin chat some time ago, but they do not dare.
DanBC 8y ago
I think it has already happened - a user doxxed someone and that info was edited out. A note was left about the edit. Maybe I'm wrong though, and it didn't happen here but somewhere else.
jancsika 8y ago
> I guess it'd be the instant death of the network. You think a critical mass of HN users would band together to bring down a social media site because the company participates in censorship?
hopler 8y ago
Forgotten? It's constantly talked about, like now
lmm 8y ago
> I guess it'd be the instant death of the network. Nonsense. HN moderators already act with zero accountability. This is possibly the only major site that shadowbans users as a matter of course.
- ddingus 8y ago
  That is not an edit. And of course! It is their house. Play nice, or see the impact. And they do have accountability. Users are here because it makes sense. Should that change, so will users do something else. Nothing out of the ordinary there.
- mnglkhn2 8y ago
  the practice of shadow banning shows how low their education level is (I'm looking at you dang)
ggm 8y ago
Can you imagine the reaction if a user's post on HN were edited by YC? I guess it'd be the instant death of the network. No. It's moderated and we love it that way. I might even have been shadowbanned and I still love it. Moderation rocks! (Not being sarcastic btw. I really do like HN moderation)

adventured 8y ago

I casually browsed Reddit as a non-account user for five or six years, then used it frequently for roughly two years with an account. Then the practice of aggressive censorship and banning began, as they started to try to transform it into another giant social media business. I stopped visiting entirely as it turned into an unhinged disaster leading up to the 2016 election. I doubt I'll ever bother to return. I abandoned Imgur for a similar reason, a flood of political trash. I was happy to see Imgur now strips the vast majority of political content out of most viral, so I occasionally visit their homepage again.

frogpelt 8y ago
Wait. Do you like the corporate censorship or not?

zozbot123 8y ago

> Can you imagine the reaction if a user's post on HN were edited by YC? If the user's post was about the Pizzagate conspiracy theory and included baseless, highly offensive libel of the YC folks? Yeah, I don't think many people here would care. Especially since most users here understand that a website's comment database can be edited arbitrarily, it's not nearly as unthinkable as you assume. Don't like it, get your own website.

simonh 8y ago
I would care. Deleting a post is one thing and that's fine because it's clear what was done and why, but editing a post surreptitiously is a deliberate attempt to deceive and that's not acceptable.
- zozbot123 8y ago
  It was not an attempt to deceive, it was a way of visibly trolling back people who were dumb enough to libel the Reddit CEO on his own website, in extremely offensive ways. And he owned up to it very quickly after it happened.
  - yjftsjthsd-h 8y ago
    "Fuck /u/spez" is not libel, and is not even particularly offensive. And yes, he "owned up", but without apologizing. EDIT: So actually on https://www.reddit.com/comments/5frg1n https://www.reddit.com/comments/5frg1n he did actually say that he was sorry and he wouldn't do it again. That's interesting, because I have a very strong memory of that not being the case. Weird. Either there was an initial acknowledgement that didn't have any sort of apology, or I missed something. I still stand by my minimization of the thing to which he reacted.
    - JoeSmithson 8y ago
      The entire subreddit was calling him a paedophile, this is actually mentioned in the post this thread is about, so I'm not sure how you could have missed it -https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/5ekdy9/the_admins_are_suffering_from_low_energy_have/dad5sf1/ https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/5ekdy9/the_admi... It seems a bit like your feelings on this issue are stronger than your recollection.
  - JoeSmithson 8y ago
    It's a shame you are being downvoted because you are absolutely right. The myth that has been built up around this incident is ridiculous. It was essentially the same joke as those Chrome plugins that change "feminist" to "skeleton". /u/spez's main mistake was pushing it as an actual change to the comments database. If he'd forced a CSS change or whatever this overblown censorship/deception narrative would never have arisen.

rat9988 8y ago

You are overstimating the community's reaction. There would be some backslash but nothing over the long term.

b_tterc_p 8y ago

I highly doubt HN would see a drop in activity if a single post was edited. Especially if it’s edited to remove offensive or obviously false content.

yjftsjthsd-h 8y ago
What if it was a user insulting a member of ycombinator, and it was edited to leave everything the same except changing the target to a mod? Principles matter, and that level of dishonesty is not acceptable.
- b_tterc_p 8y ago
  personally I would say don’t do that again, and then get over it.

ppseafield 8y ago

Indeed. I think the comment editing (and immediate capitulation afterwards) was horrible, but the fact that they allowed the_donald to continue to break their own rules was way worse. They constantly would dox, harass, downvote brigade (in posts stickied by mods), and in general act entirely in bad faith. Other subreddits were banned for much, much less. Either they wanted their advertising money or were simply supportive of their platform/actions, but eventually it was enough for me to leave Reddit entirely.

danlugo92 8y ago
the_donald was censored too.
dpau 8y ago
I wonder if the presence of a controversial subreddit like the_donald is good for business, increasing discussion, site traffic and thus revenue? Perhaps Reddit has a financial incentive to encourage (or at least not punish) subreddit drama.
- CM30 8y ago
  Most probably. It's about the current US president after all, and it's the closest thing to an official forum/social network his fanbase/supporters have. If Reddit banned it, then they'd likely drive said users to a competitor (like Voat) and divert all that media attention from Reddit to said competitor in the process.
  - YUMad 8y ago
    IMO, reddit banning t_d would create much more serious issues for them. The last thing they want is to get attention as a possible campaign financer. Even tho political choice is not a protected category and it's not illegal for reddit to ban t_d, since t_d clearly defines itself as rally sub for president, t_d mods follow rules and ban offending accounts quickly, and, most importantly, President Trump filed his campaign for 2020. with FEC almost immediately after becoming president. Banning t_d could be construed as political speech, and a form of political donation. And reddit most definitely doesn't want legal inquiries of that kind, I bet they have a lot of dirty laundry there - did you guys forget how "cleanly" /r/politics switched overnight (literally) from bernie central to hillary propaganda? They most definitely want to ban it, as demonstrated in leaked logs from private admin chat some time ago, but they do not dare.

DanBC 8y ago

I think it has already happened - a user doxxed someone and that info was edited out. A note was left about the edit. Maybe I'm wrong though, and it didn't happen here but somewhere else.

jancsika 8y ago

> I guess it'd be the instant death of the network. You think a critical mass of HN users would band together to bring down a social media site because the company participates in censorship?

hopler 8y ago

Forgotten? It's constantly talked about, like now

lmm 8y ago

> I guess it'd be the instant death of the network. Nonsense. HN moderators already act with zero accountability. This is possibly the only major site that shadowbans users as a matter of course.

ddingus 8y ago
That is not an edit. And of course! It is their house. Play nice, or see the impact. And they do have accountability. Users are here because it makes sense. Should that change, so will users do something else. Nothing out of the ordinary there.
mnglkhn2 8y ago
the practice of shadow banning shows how low their education level is (I'm looking at you dang)

ggm 8y ago

Can you imagine the reaction if a user's post on HN were edited by YC? I guess it'd be the instant death of the network. No. It's moderated and we love it that way. I might even have been shadowbanned and I still love it. Moderation rocks! (Not being sarcastic btw. I really do like HN moderation)