6 ms·

Decentralized Hacker News

16 points by gj0 7y ago

Do we have a decentralized hacker news ? Something like hacker news, where users can post only after they spend a hacker coin. - For posting require a hacker coin. - Challenge/wrestle the validity of post by staking some amount of token. - Whoever wins the argument takes the opponents token. - There can be a karma component as well, where in the bad actors need to pay 1.5x amount of token if they did a bad karma last time. PS : Not a fan of everything decentralization. This post was just a thought and so decided to post here.

seren 7y ago
Much of the value of HN, apart from the community, derives also from the subtle but firm moderation. I am not sure how that would work on a decentralized system.
- gj0 7y ago
  Agree. Here is how I was thinking. - For posting require a hacker coin. - Challenge/wrestle the validity of post by staking some amount of token. - Whoever wins the argument takes the opponents token. - There can be a karma component as well, where in the bad actors need to pay 1.5x amount of token if they did a bad karma last time.
  - hazz99 7y ago
    Why would I use this over the original, iconic HN run by Ycombinator?
    - gj0 7y ago
      All iconic centralized systems have points of failure. Why do many people feel insecure or powerless by facebook ? It was iconic in its time ! PS : I am not of any extreme opinion that everything should be decentralized. This post was just a thought and so decided to post here.
      - azdacha 7y ago
        This is getting crazy. First Google, now Hacker News, Wtf ??
      - deleted 7y ago
        [deleted]
  - x2f10 7y ago
    You'd have to have some moderation - no? Otherwise, you'd be flooded with spam and illegal content. If there's moderators, there will be bias... which is what you're attempting to eliminate with a decentralized HN.
viraptor 7y ago
> Something like hacker news, where users can post only after they spend a hacker coin. You don't need the service to be decentralised to achieve this. (Or the later points) There are many hn clones - just add payment to one. What's the actual motivation for the decentralised part?
- gj0 7y ago
  Just adding payments (centralized) will result in favoring of some groups/content over other for monetary benefits for instance.
TheAlchemist 7y ago
That's one of the problems I have with this crypto stuff. There is no problem with HN - it's one of the best place on the net, but hey let's imagine a solution with crypto. A solution to what exactly ? There is no problem to begin with. Just like with 99.999% of stuff that crypto is supposed to solve. I know it's just a thought exercise as you posted, so no offense, but it actually greatly illustrate the state of crypto applications (in my opinion)
- robdachshund 7y ago
  I think plenty of people would disagree.
- Accujack 7y ago
  A while back I did a design for a fully distributed discussion board, kinda like Reddit but with no central host that can be controlled and must be funded by a single entity or group. It was heavily based on the principles developed for the old USENET news network and designed to work around the problems discovered by users of that system. I found that cryptography was a necessary component of the distributed system - it's the only clean way to solve a host of problems associated with distributed discussion boards if you want to avoid things like censorship and special interests controlling discussion. For example allowing the moderators of a group to moderate and remove spam posts and e.g. hate speech without making that mechanism vulnerable to spoofed article cancellations is tricky. The simplest way to handle the issue was to use a public key crypto system to package moderation commands. Moderation commands to edit/delete articles are sent alongside an encrypted hash for the command. The command is only valid if the public key for the moderator decrypts the auth packet and the hash matches the command text. Crypto is also great for things like non-repudiation and reputation systems, both of which are important for a discussion system application. By the way, there IS a problem with HN... several, actually, depending on your view of what's desirable in a site like this. It's not terribly scalable, it's rather biased toward a particular locality's view of the world, and like many such sites everyone is effectively anonymous. The problem with HN that a distributed system is required to address is that HN belongs to a private company that has motivations based on its own interests instead of the good of the public or promotion of free speech. HN can be controlled, edited, is in a legal jurisdiction that allows a corrupt government to obtain control of it or otherwise interfere with it, and in general suffers from all the problems of a centralized discussion board.
saxonslav 7y ago
Experiments are nice, but the practical usually blows up for unknown reasons. There's no point to change the whole site when it would mean most readers getting lost or turned off.
d0ugr0ck 7y ago
You're describing stackoverflow answers
vtrips 7y ago
this can easily be abused for monetary advantage. Also, How do you determine who won the argument? How will the Jury decide the winner? this is all subjective Winner for traditional debates between two individuals can be decided on quite simply. Whereas, for this scenario, the person staking the argument will have to defend against the whole population trying to bring it down. It won't be a "healthy" competition by any means.
duxup 7y ago
Why would a place like HN where we exchange ideas and stories for free need to be walled off behind some crypto type system? I see no value in that.
krapp 7y ago
> - Challenge/wrestle the validity of post by staking some amount of token. > - Whoever wins the argument takes the opponents token. Hacker News isn't fight club, not all posts and comments are arguments seeking refutation, and there isn't a single objective "winner" or "loser" in every discussion, nor a means to judge which is which. The people who tend to see every comment as an opportunity to "score points" tend to be the worst sort for a community... attaching an economy and gamifying that would only incentivize point scoring, gambling and rules lawyering over healthy or insightful dialogue. > - There can be a karma component as well, where in the bad actors need to pay 1.5x amount of token if they did a bad karma last time. So I can get some bot accounts and just mass downvote or flag anyone I disagree with to make it all but impossible for them to participate in the future? Good to know, I guess.
- gj0 7y ago
  1. So lets say even if an actor is trying to bring down a 'normal/good' post by staking token against it, it is eventually the one staking the token who will loose. The jury members will be there to ensure that. 2. Karma component will only kick in, once the user has been identified as a bad actor by a jury. So you will never be able to bring bot accounts and just mass downvote. Good to know, I guess :)
  - krapp 7y ago
    There's a "jury" too? A decentralized system that depends on a central source of authority? Who are the jury members? How are they selected, and by whom? How are they held accountable for their actions? How are their biases accounted for? How do we know they're not in collusion with the mods or other users? >Karma component will only kick in, once the user has been identified as a bad actor by a jury. So you will never be able to bring bot accounts and just mass downvote. So my downvotes don't count when the jury likes the person I'm voting against?
- gj0 7y ago
  Someone who disagrees with me, just downvoted one of my comments, decreased my karma without even giving a valid argument. I see more reason for a decentralized hacker news.
gj0 7y ago
Just realised someone downvoted my comment without any argument. Proves the point that we need a decentralized hacker news.
- Bjartr 7y ago
  Why couldn't such a system be implemented in a centralized manner?
  - gj0 7y ago
    If a centralized token is added, then this central authority has incentives in increasing the amount of tokens for staking because ultimately the amount collected will be going into their pockets. Checkout what upwork is doing with paid tokens/connects. Additionally this can also favor certain thoughts/groups by the central authority. ( The jury itself will be selected/hired by the central authority. ). Large number of posts get removed from social networks, because they pertain to certain thought or are against some govt.
    - Bjartr 7y ago
      One of the things I value in HN today is the top-level moderation. Are you saying that wouldn't work anymore and this new community would operate purely on self-moderation instead?
      - gj0 7y ago
        Yeah, but that's just a thought. Have a look at Kleros https://blog.kleros.io/become-a-juror-blockchain-dispute-resolution-on-ethereum/ https://blog.kleros.io/become-a-juror-blockchain-dispute-res..., they are building a "Dispute Resolution Layer". Something on these lines should work, I think.
ps101 7y ago
I don't think that this is the problem that your solution is looking for.
rkeene2 7y ago
I think there are a few implicit assumptions in your post that could be examined for a better proposal. 1. Consensus of what is valid doesn't require a tradable and fungible token so adding that game element is not required for decentralization (and I suspect would decrease the value of the service to increase the value of the game, something people are increasingly complaining about) 2. Most posts on Hacker News are regarding trading information, which is a not a zero sum game, unlike the game mechanics you are proposing. Both sides can be right.

16 points by gj0 7y ago

seren 7y ago

Much of the value of HN, apart from the community, derives also from the subtle but firm moderation. I am not sure how that would work on a decentralized system.

gj0 7y ago
Agree. Here is how I was thinking. - For posting require a hacker coin. - Challenge/wrestle the validity of post by staking some amount of token. - Whoever wins the argument takes the opponents token. - There can be a karma component as well, where in the bad actors need to pay 1.5x amount of token if they did a bad karma last time.
- hazz99 7y ago
  Why would I use this over the original, iconic HN run by Ycombinator?
  - gj0 7y ago
    All iconic centralized systems have points of failure. Why do many people feel insecure or powerless by facebook ? It was iconic in its time ! PS : I am not of any extreme opinion that everything should be decentralized. This post was just a thought and so decided to post here.
    - azdacha 7y ago
      This is getting crazy. First Google, now Hacker News, Wtf ??
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
- x2f10 7y ago
  You'd have to have some moderation - no? Otherwise, you'd be flooded with spam and illegal content. If there's moderators, there will be bias... which is what you're attempting to eliminate with a decentralized HN.

viraptor 7y ago

> Something like hacker news, where users can post only after they spend a hacker coin. You don't need the service to be decentralised to achieve this. (Or the later points) There are many hn clones - just add payment to one. What's the actual motivation for the decentralised part?

gj0 7y ago
Just adding payments (centralized) will result in favoring of some groups/content over other for monetary benefits for instance.

TheAlchemist 7y ago

That's one of the problems I have with this crypto stuff. There is no problem with HN - it's one of the best place on the net, but hey let's imagine a solution with crypto. A solution to what exactly ? There is no problem to begin with. Just like with 99.999% of stuff that crypto is supposed to solve. I know it's just a thought exercise as you posted, so no offense, but it actually greatly illustrate the state of crypto applications (in my opinion)

robdachshund 7y ago
I think plenty of people would disagree.
Accujack 7y ago
A while back I did a design for a fully distributed discussion board, kinda like Reddit but with no central host that can be controlled and must be funded by a single entity or group. It was heavily based on the principles developed for the old USENET news network and designed to work around the problems discovered by users of that system. I found that cryptography was a necessary component of the distributed system - it's the only clean way to solve a host of problems associated with distributed discussion boards if you want to avoid things like censorship and special interests controlling discussion. For example allowing the moderators of a group to moderate and remove spam posts and e.g. hate speech without making that mechanism vulnerable to spoofed article cancellations is tricky. The simplest way to handle the issue was to use a public key crypto system to package moderation commands. Moderation commands to edit/delete articles are sent alongside an encrypted hash for the command. The command is only valid if the public key for the moderator decrypts the auth packet and the hash matches the command text. Crypto is also great for things like non-repudiation and reputation systems, both of which are important for a discussion system application. By the way, there IS a problem with HN... several, actually, depending on your view of what's desirable in a site like this. It's not terribly scalable, it's rather biased toward a particular locality's view of the world, and like many such sites everyone is effectively anonymous. The problem with HN that a distributed system is required to address is that HN belongs to a private company that has motivations based on its own interests instead of the good of the public or promotion of free speech. HN can be controlled, edited, is in a legal jurisdiction that allows a corrupt government to obtain control of it or otherwise interfere with it, and in general suffers from all the problems of a centralized discussion board.

saxonslav 7y ago

Experiments are nice, but the practical usually blows up for unknown reasons. There's no point to change the whole site when it would mean most readers getting lost or turned off.

d0ugr0ck 7y ago

You're describing stackoverflow answers

vtrips 7y ago

this can easily be abused for monetary advantage. Also, How do you determine who won the argument? How will the Jury decide the winner? this is all subjective Winner for traditional debates between two individuals can be decided on quite simply. Whereas, for this scenario, the person staking the argument will have to defend against the whole population trying to bring it down. It won't be a "healthy" competition by any means.

duxup 7y ago

Why would a place like HN where we exchange ideas and stories for free need to be walled off behind some crypto type system? I see no value in that.

krapp 7y ago

> - Challenge/wrestle the validity of post by staking some amount of token. > - Whoever wins the argument takes the opponents token. Hacker News isn't fight club, not all posts and comments are arguments seeking refutation, and there isn't a single objective "winner" or "loser" in every discussion, nor a means to judge which is which. The people who tend to see every comment as an opportunity to "score points" tend to be the worst sort for a community... attaching an economy and gamifying that would only incentivize point scoring, gambling and rules lawyering over healthy or insightful dialogue. > - There can be a karma component as well, where in the bad actors need to pay 1.5x amount of token if they did a bad karma last time. So I can get some bot accounts and just mass downvote or flag anyone I disagree with to make it all but impossible for them to participate in the future? Good to know, I guess.

gj0 7y ago
1. So lets say even if an actor is trying to bring down a 'normal/good' post by staking token against it, it is eventually the one staking the token who will loose. The jury members will be there to ensure that. 2. Karma component will only kick in, once the user has been identified as a bad actor by a jury. So you will never be able to bring bot accounts and just mass downvote. Good to know, I guess :)
- krapp 7y ago
  There's a "jury" too? A decentralized system that depends on a central source of authority? Who are the jury members? How are they selected, and by whom? How are they held accountable for their actions? How are their biases accounted for? How do we know they're not in collusion with the mods or other users? >Karma component will only kick in, once the user has been identified as a bad actor by a jury. So you will never be able to bring bot accounts and just mass downvote. So my downvotes don't count when the jury likes the person I'm voting against?
gj0 7y ago
Someone who disagrees with me, just downvoted one of my comments, decreased my karma without even giving a valid argument. I see more reason for a decentralized hacker news.

gj0 7y ago

Just realised someone downvoted my comment without any argument. Proves the point that we need a decentralized hacker news.

Bjartr 7y ago
Why couldn't such a system be implemented in a centralized manner?
- gj0 7y ago
  If a centralized token is added, then this central authority has incentives in increasing the amount of tokens for staking because ultimately the amount collected will be going into their pockets. Checkout what upwork is doing with paid tokens/connects. Additionally this can also favor certain thoughts/groups by the central authority. ( The jury itself will be selected/hired by the central authority. ). Large number of posts get removed from social networks, because they pertain to certain thought or are against some govt.
  - Bjartr 7y ago
    One of the things I value in HN today is the top-level moderation. Are you saying that wouldn't work anymore and this new community would operate purely on self-moderation instead?
    - gj0 7y ago
      Yeah, but that's just a thought. Have a look at Kleros https://blog.kleros.io/become-a-juror-blockchain-dispute-resolution-on-ethereum/ https://blog.kleros.io/become-a-juror-blockchain-dispute-res..., they are building a "Dispute Resolution Layer". Something on these lines should work, I think.

ps101 7y ago

I don't think that this is the problem that your solution is looking for.

rkeene2 7y ago

I think there are a few implicit assumptions in your post that could be examined for a better proposal. 1. Consensus of what is valid doesn't require a tradable and fungible token so adding that game element is not required for decentralization (and I suspect would decrease the value of the service to increase the value of the game, something people are increasingly complaining about) 2. Most posts on Hacker News are regarding trading information, which is a not a zero sum game, unlike the game mechanics you are proposing. Both sides can be right.