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Ditto. On Reddit even a percieved differing opinion results in hate mail, insulting and shouting. It's one of the reasons I never signed up to Twitter.

by LeCow 6y ago

etripe 6y ago
I'm relatively new to HN but a reddit "senior", and one of the things I really appreciate about this place is the relative lack of toxicity. To me, it seems people really come here for civil discussion and default to asking questions instead of flaming. Well, that and more people source their claims.
- beagle3 6y ago
  From a 30 year view of communities, including Fido, Usenet, Reddit and many others, I’d attribute that to @dang’s and @pg’s benevolent dictatorship. Many communities start out nice and well meaning, but at some point devolve into a Wild West. HN did not, and I think that’s thanks to dang’s moderation (and pg’s at an earlier time) Also, “small” things like dropping the vote counts, and having canonical rules for titles (which are, as pg noted, a “commons” but treated in other platforms as a land grab) reduces competition and bragging rights. Doesn’t seem like much, but it’s part of what keeps the people looking for conversation here, and those looking mostly for signaling and gratification out.
  - Kaibeezy 6y ago
    As the great architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe famously said: “God is in the details.” Mies’ work wasn’t without flaws or detractors, but then compare one of his subtle, perfected masterworks to the infinite cheap and nasty boxes that leveraged only the sketch outline of his style. Now translate that into any field, absolutely including online community building. There’s no question where HN stands.
- Treegarden 6y ago
  Have been reading reddit since 5 or so years now, but pretty much only the frontpage. I like reddit but it has gotten so political and toxic. Many posts boil down to "haha look how stupid this person is". I sometimes skim the controversial comments to see what the hive mind disapproves of. Recently, on the mega threat of Trump being covid positive, the controversial comments were along the lines of "I don't like Trump but I hope he gets better, nobody deserves covid". So not wishing someone death is bad? Overall reddit is pretty toxic.
  - dash2 6y ago
    I think you absolutely must avoid the front page. Reddit seems to have a relatively young audience, and the front page just gets the guff that the average teenager likes (at best, puppies; at worst, self-righteous posturing and feeble jokes). If you look into the subforums, they can be very different. Something serious like r/statistics has little in common with a hilarious shitshow like r/wallstreetbets.
- parasubvert 6y ago
  TBH that’s good moderation (And scalable algorithms to delegate such privilege) at work. there are plenty of flames and toxicity here, they’re just suppressed. Also the really controversial topics tend to get flagged.
  - ntsplnkv2 6y ago
    Moderation is relatively easy with a community like HN. Facebook and Twitter desperately need moderation - but they're built completely differently and much larger. Moderation there will immediately be compared to censorship, which Twitter and FB are afraid of because it threatens their money. We're so afraid of one good idea being hidden by moderation that we allow thousands of bad ideas - which eventually create a hive-mind and drive out the good ideas anyway.
reallydontask 6y ago
I guess everybody has different experiences, but by and large, the subreddits I frequent are reasonable enough
cheschire 6y ago
Passively getting news that starts to include more political op-eds is a very different issue than actively participating in a toxic community though. Not saying either of you are wrong. Just saying they are different issues.
gherkinnn 6y ago
Twitter has to be the worst major platform. It is a rollercoaster of misery, disgust, and annoyance. And there isn’t even a proverbial nugget in the turd to make it worth it.
- DyslexicAtheist 6y ago
  I got rid of twitter for exactly the reasons you mentioned and the for what it did to my inner well-being. There are some accounts that I've enjoyed following and even after leaving the platform I still use the RSS feed of nitter.net for these to browse these posts. No doubt that if I'd sign up again even with an intention not to post myself and only to lurk, I'd get sucked into toxic discussions within less than a week. nitter gives me the distance I need to consume the content (on my terms) without risking addiction or potentially contributing to the toxicity myself.
- parasubvert 6y ago
  I prefer Twitter to Facebook. I still think there are threads on Twitter (daily!) where things can be learned in real time for later follow up/reflection. It isn’t a good medium for arguing though. This experience may be a reflection of my particular old school circle (I joined in 2006) Facebook unfortunately doesn’t have vibe where people You trust can jump in and provide an insightful thread. It’s just stacked piles of trolling and baiting. Its only saving grace is keeping in touch with family and friends who don’t use any other platforms.
  - mastazi 6y ago
    In my case, Facebook is for things like checking what my old aunt back in Italy is up to. Granted it’s not what I would describe as “insightful content” but at the same time, I’m never going to be upset for something my old aunt said. Twitter and Reddit on the other hand were having a really negative influence on my well-being. I’m sure you can use them in a “sanitised” way and avoid the trolling and hate, but it’s hard and requires a lot of self discipline. I’m not sure why I don’t get the “bad part” of Facebook, I’m starting to think that it’s cultural - Facebook is the only social network that I use, that still “thinks I’m Italian” and pushes me localised Italian content. On Twitter and Reddit on the other hand I exclusively follow content in English and/or related to Australia, the country where I now live.
raverbashing 6y ago
There are two/three groups of users on twitter: - the "celebs" (anyone which is moderately famous) - the "old school" (which usually forms tight groups and doesn't get as much hate mail) - the newcomers (anyone that joined, let's say < 5yr ago). Those are mostly wallowing in a pit of sadness
self_awareness 6y ago
TBH on Hacker News it's also a problem. If you have a point of view that is consistent with the majority of users (or with the users who write lots of comments), then everything is fine. But if your point of view differs, then you're often downvoted into oblivion. This is often not a good place for discussing things.
- Pick-A-Hill2019 6y ago
  Karma points are both a blessing and a curse. They are good as a form of gate-keeping but bad because I too have found myself deciding not to post a comment in case it got down-voted to oblivion. In fact I debated whether or not to post this comment for those same reasons. I try to take down voted comments on the chin (and one of mine at -4 was absolutely warranted) but at other times it can be dis-heartening to see a comment being down-voted for no apparent reason. I guess the answer is to not be too vain / overlly bothered about my Karma points but just as a highly upvoted comment feed the reward centres so do down votes in a whole different way. Oh, and responsible and thoughtful use of down-voting rights please.
  - Chris2048 6y ago
    I hate it when I get downvoted to for asking a question, usually when someone posts a vague or unsubstantiated comment. It's one thing to downvote an opinion, but downvoting anyone who questions an opinion, or clarification?!
  - hackerfromthefu 6y ago
    I kind of think about it like the karma attained buys you the ability to occasionally say something that wrests the narrative back from the crowdmind a bit .. at least until it disappears due to the downvote pileon ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
    - Pick-A-Hill2019 6y ago
      Here's Hoping ;->
goto11 6y ago
Reddit have different moderation policies for the different sub-reddits. For example r/AskHistorians have amazing quality content due to very strict moderation.
- corobo 6y ago
  Are there any other examples folks know about? This is the only subreddit I see suggested as being well moderated when this comes up, unfortunately I'm not into the subject
tupputuppu 6y ago
Twitter is driven by engagement, which in turn is driven by controversy.

Ditto. On Reddit even a percieved differing opinion results in hate mail, insulting and shouting. It's one of the reasons I never signed up to Twitter.

by LeCow 6y ago

Ditto. On Reddit even a percieved differing opinion results in hate mail, insulting and shouting. It's one of the reasons I never signed up to Twitter.

etripe 6y ago

I'm relatively new to HN but a reddit "senior", and one of the things I really appreciate about this place is the relative lack of toxicity. To me, it seems people really come here for civil discussion and default to asking questions instead of flaming. Well, that and more people source their claims.

beagle3 6y ago
From a 30 year view of communities, including Fido, Usenet, Reddit and many others, I’d attribute that to @dang’s and @pg’s benevolent dictatorship. Many communities start out nice and well meaning, but at some point devolve into a Wild West. HN did not, and I think that’s thanks to dang’s moderation (and pg’s at an earlier time) Also, “small” things like dropping the vote counts, and having canonical rules for titles (which are, as pg noted, a “commons” but treated in other platforms as a land grab) reduces competition and bragging rights. Doesn’t seem like much, but it’s part of what keeps the people looking for conversation here, and those looking mostly for signaling and gratification out.
- Kaibeezy 6y ago
  As the great architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe famously said: “God is in the details.” Mies’ work wasn’t without flaws or detractors, but then compare one of his subtle, perfected masterworks to the infinite cheap and nasty boxes that leveraged only the sketch outline of his style. Now translate that into any field, absolutely including online community building. There’s no question where HN stands.
Treegarden 6y ago
Have been reading reddit since 5 or so years now, but pretty much only the frontpage. I like reddit but it has gotten so political and toxic. Many posts boil down to "haha look how stupid this person is". I sometimes skim the controversial comments to see what the hive mind disapproves of. Recently, on the mega threat of Trump being covid positive, the controversial comments were along the lines of "I don't like Trump but I hope he gets better, nobody deserves covid". So not wishing someone death is bad? Overall reddit is pretty toxic.
- dash2 6y ago
  I think you absolutely must avoid the front page. Reddit seems to have a relatively young audience, and the front page just gets the guff that the average teenager likes (at best, puppies; at worst, self-righteous posturing and feeble jokes). If you look into the subforums, they can be very different. Something serious like r/statistics has little in common with a hilarious shitshow like r/wallstreetbets.
parasubvert 6y ago
TBH that’s good moderation (And scalable algorithms to delegate such privilege) at work. there are plenty of flames and toxicity here, they’re just suppressed. Also the really controversial topics tend to get flagged.
- ntsplnkv2 6y ago
  Moderation is relatively easy with a community like HN. Facebook and Twitter desperately need moderation - but they're built completely differently and much larger. Moderation there will immediately be compared to censorship, which Twitter and FB are afraid of because it threatens their money. We're so afraid of one good idea being hidden by moderation that we allow thousands of bad ideas - which eventually create a hive-mind and drive out the good ideas anyway.

reallydontask 6y ago

I guess everybody has different experiences, but by and large, the subreddits I frequent are reasonable enough

cheschire 6y ago

Passively getting news that starts to include more political op-eds is a very different issue than actively participating in a toxic community though. Not saying either of you are wrong. Just saying they are different issues.

gherkinnn 6y ago

Twitter has to be the worst major platform. It is a rollercoaster of misery, disgust, and annoyance. And there isn’t even a proverbial nugget in the turd to make it worth it.

DyslexicAtheist 6y ago
I got rid of twitter for exactly the reasons you mentioned and the for what it did to my inner well-being. There are some accounts that I've enjoyed following and even after leaving the platform I still use the RSS feed of nitter.net for these to browse these posts. No doubt that if I'd sign up again even with an intention not to post myself and only to lurk, I'd get sucked into toxic discussions within less than a week. nitter gives me the distance I need to consume the content (on my terms) without risking addiction or potentially contributing to the toxicity myself.
parasubvert 6y ago
I prefer Twitter to Facebook. I still think there are threads on Twitter (daily!) where things can be learned in real time for later follow up/reflection. It isn’t a good medium for arguing though. This experience may be a reflection of my particular old school circle (I joined in 2006) Facebook unfortunately doesn’t have vibe where people You trust can jump in and provide an insightful thread. It’s just stacked piles of trolling and baiting. Its only saving grace is keeping in touch with family and friends who don’t use any other platforms.
- mastazi 6y ago
  In my case, Facebook is for things like checking what my old aunt back in Italy is up to. Granted it’s not what I would describe as “insightful content” but at the same time, I’m never going to be upset for something my old aunt said. Twitter and Reddit on the other hand were having a really negative influence on my well-being. I’m sure you can use them in a “sanitised” way and avoid the trolling and hate, but it’s hard and requires a lot of self discipline. I’m not sure why I don’t get the “bad part” of Facebook, I’m starting to think that it’s cultural - Facebook is the only social network that I use, that still “thinks I’m Italian” and pushes me localised Italian content. On Twitter and Reddit on the other hand I exclusively follow content in English and/or related to Australia, the country where I now live.

raverbashing 6y ago

There are two/three groups of users on twitter: - the "celebs" (anyone which is moderately famous) - the "old school" (which usually forms tight groups and doesn't get as much hate mail) - the newcomers (anyone that joined, let's say < 5yr ago). Those are mostly wallowing in a pit of sadness

self_awareness 6y ago

TBH on Hacker News it's also a problem. If you have a point of view that is consistent with the majority of users (or with the users who write lots of comments), then everything is fine. But if your point of view differs, then you're often downvoted into oblivion. This is often not a good place for discussing things.

Pick-A-Hill2019 6y ago
Karma points are both a blessing and a curse. They are good as a form of gate-keeping but bad because I too have found myself deciding not to post a comment in case it got down-voted to oblivion. In fact I debated whether or not to post this comment for those same reasons. I try to take down voted comments on the chin (and one of mine at -4 was absolutely warranted) but at other times it can be dis-heartening to see a comment being down-voted for no apparent reason. I guess the answer is to not be too vain / overlly bothered about my Karma points but just as a highly upvoted comment feed the reward centres so do down votes in a whole different way. Oh, and responsible and thoughtful use of down-voting rights please.
- Chris2048 6y ago
  I hate it when I get downvoted to for asking a question, usually when someone posts a vague or unsubstantiated comment. It's one thing to downvote an opinion, but downvoting anyone who questions an opinion, or clarification?!
- hackerfromthefu 6y ago
  I kind of think about it like the karma attained buys you the ability to occasionally say something that wrests the narrative back from the crowdmind a bit .. at least until it disappears due to the downvote pileon ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
  - Pick-A-Hill2019 6y ago
    Here's Hoping ;->

goto11 6y ago

Reddit have different moderation policies for the different sub-reddits. For example r/AskHistorians have amazing quality content due to very strict moderation.

corobo 6y ago
Are there any other examples folks know about? This is the only subreddit I see suggested as being well moderated when this comes up, unfortunately I'm not into the subject

tupputuppu 6y ago

Twitter is driven by engagement, which in turn is driven by controversy.