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A big difference between Discord and almost everything else is that server admins aren't real admins and see no more account data than everyone else on the serv

A big difference between Discord and almost everything else is that server admins aren't real admins and see no more account data than everyone else on the server. This means people can freely join "hostile" servers and servers with untrusted admins, which is important for gaming, considering the toxicity of many communities.

josteink 6y ago
> A big difference between Discord and almost everything else is that server admins aren't real admins That’s because discord “servers” aren’t real servers and it’s all a whole big closed-source SaaS. “Server” is a clearly an intentionally misleading term and dark UX used to lure people into thinking they are have actual ownership and control of their fealty SaaS workspaces. Sadly, given the success of Discord, it seems this lie has paid off big-time though.
- mrkcsc 6y ago
  We called them servers because our early adopters were coming from Ventrillo and Teamspeak (eg: Vent server, Teamspeak server, etc) and we wanted to use familiar terminology.
- nvrspyx 6y ago
  I don't think it's intentionally misleading. Its roots are in gaming in which "server" is often the term used for an instance and no one misconstrues ownership in that context. Some games let you self-host a server, but it's increasingly rare. More commonly, you reserve/join an instance on the developer's servers and you tell your friend(s), "Come join my server". Whether that be a Minecraft Realm or a WoW shard. Or they could just be adopting the terminology of TeamSpeak and the like.
- jaywalk 6y ago
  I think it's more that gamers understand the concept of a "server" and not really anything to do with your evil theory.
- tester756 6y ago
  Assume good faith.
- brobinson 6y ago
  They were originally called "guilds", and they are still called "guilds" in the Discord API.
- viridian 6y ago
  This isn't true. They wanted a one-to-one language replacement for ventrilo/teamspeak/mumble. "Hey hop on my mumble server" "Hey hop on my vent server" "Hey hop on my teamspeak server" "Hey hop on my discord... guild?"
CoryAlexMartin 6y ago
On the flip side, it makes it difficult to spot dupe accounts or ban evasion attempts. I run a moderate-sized server and I have a suspicion that one of our members has weird conversations with himself across multiple accounts, but I have absolutely no way to verify that since I can't see any IPs or hostnames. One could argue that we need more insight for administrators because of how "toxic" gaming communities can be.
- Nuzzerino 6y ago
  FYI if you ban a user, it bans all users with that IP address.
  - CoryAlexMartin 6y ago
    Ah that's good to know. Thanks for the correction.
- Polylactic_acid 6y ago
  You can enable phone number verification which makes it massively harder to avoid bans. Its way easier to cycle IP addresses than phone numbers.
  - CoryAlexMartin 6y ago
    This is true, but having a phone number requirement lowers accessibility to the server for users who either don't have a phone or aren't comfortable providing their number.
    - Polylactic_acid 6y ago
      Catering to people who don't own a phone (Richard stallman and kids in Africa) is a lower priority to most mods than stopping waves of trolls and spammers.
nullc 6y ago
I dunno how much of a difference it makes... most people don't know that the admins of a slack can see everything, including the histories on unpaid slacks.
- astrostl 6y ago
  This is false. You can read about it at https://slack.com/help/articles/360002084807-View-Access-Logs-for-your-workspace https://slack.com/help/articles/360002084807-View-Access-Log... (which excludes free plans) and/or test it for yourself.
  - nullc 6y ago
    Perhaps it changed in the last year or so-- but I happily have complete history dumps from several slacks which never had anything except free plans.
    - astrostl 6y ago
      Compliance exports (inc. private channel and/or DM conversations in which the exporter was not participating) have never been a part of free plans, and that hasn't changed in the last year. Initially they had no export function at all. When they added it, they did so for paid plans only (and with an unpreventable notification to everyone on the workspace that an export was just triggered). They've evolved it since then for higher plans like Enterprise Grid w/o notifications and integration into Data Loss Prevention (DLP) tools, but it's still never touched free plans. You can read about the initial announcement at https://www.theverge.com/2014/11/24/7255199/slack-alters-privacy-policy-to-let-bosses-read-your-messages https://www.theverge.com/2014/11/24/7255199/slack-alters-pri... . I would suspect that what you're positing to be a "complete history dump" from free Slack workspaces are from archive bots, which don't have the ability to eavesdrop on conversations in which they weren't already present.
madeofpalk 6y ago
Kind of. Admins can see all channels, and can forcibly insert themselves into any voice channel (even if it's full). But you're right in that their domain only extends to the _server_ and not your user account which is not tied to the server and they have no ownership over.

josteink 6y ago

> A big difference between Discord and almost everything else is that server admins aren't real admins That’s because discord “servers” aren’t real servers and it’s all a whole big closed-source SaaS. “Server” is a clearly an intentionally misleading term and dark UX used to lure people into thinking they are have actual ownership and control of their fealty SaaS workspaces. Sadly, given the success of Discord, it seems this lie has paid off big-time though.

mrkcsc 6y ago
We called them servers because our early adopters were coming from Ventrillo and Teamspeak (eg: Vent server, Teamspeak server, etc) and we wanted to use familiar terminology.
nvrspyx 6y ago
I don't think it's intentionally misleading. Its roots are in gaming in which "server" is often the term used for an instance and no one misconstrues ownership in that context. Some games let you self-host a server, but it's increasingly rare. More commonly, you reserve/join an instance on the developer's servers and you tell your friend(s), "Come join my server". Whether that be a Minecraft Realm or a WoW shard. Or they could just be adopting the terminology of TeamSpeak and the like.
jaywalk 6y ago
I think it's more that gamers understand the concept of a "server" and not really anything to do with your evil theory.
tester756 6y ago
Assume good faith.
brobinson 6y ago
They were originally called "guilds", and they are still called "guilds" in the Discord API.
viridian 6y ago
This isn't true. They wanted a one-to-one language replacement for ventrilo/teamspeak/mumble. "Hey hop on my mumble server" "Hey hop on my vent server" "Hey hop on my teamspeak server" "Hey hop on my discord... guild?"

CoryAlexMartin 6y ago

On the flip side, it makes it difficult to spot dupe accounts or ban evasion attempts. I run a moderate-sized server and I have a suspicion that one of our members has weird conversations with himself across multiple accounts, but I have absolutely no way to verify that since I can't see any IPs or hostnames. One could argue that we need more insight for administrators because of how "toxic" gaming communities can be.

Nuzzerino 6y ago
FYI if you ban a user, it bans all users with that IP address.
- CoryAlexMartin 6y ago
  Ah that's good to know. Thanks for the correction.
Polylactic_acid 6y ago
You can enable phone number verification which makes it massively harder to avoid bans. Its way easier to cycle IP addresses than phone numbers.
- CoryAlexMartin 6y ago
  This is true, but having a phone number requirement lowers accessibility to the server for users who either don't have a phone or aren't comfortable providing their number.
  - Polylactic_acid 6y ago
    Catering to people who don't own a phone (Richard stallman and kids in Africa) is a lower priority to most mods than stopping waves of trolls and spammers.

nullc 6y ago

I dunno how much of a difference it makes... most people don't know that the admins of a slack can see everything, including the histories on unpaid slacks.

astrostl 6y ago
This is false. You can read about it at https://slack.com/help/articles/360002084807-View-Access-Logs-for-your-workspace https://slack.com/help/articles/360002084807-View-Access-Log... (which excludes free plans) and/or test it for yourself.
- nullc 6y ago
  Perhaps it changed in the last year or so-- but I happily have complete history dumps from several slacks which never had anything except free plans.
  - astrostl 6y ago
    Compliance exports (inc. private channel and/or DM conversations in which the exporter was not participating) have never been a part of free plans, and that hasn't changed in the last year. Initially they had no export function at all. When they added it, they did so for paid plans only (and with an unpreventable notification to everyone on the workspace that an export was just triggered). They've evolved it since then for higher plans like Enterprise Grid w/o notifications and integration into Data Loss Prevention (DLP) tools, but it's still never touched free plans. You can read about the initial announcement at https://www.theverge.com/2014/11/24/7255199/slack-alters-privacy-policy-to-let-bosses-read-your-messages https://www.theverge.com/2014/11/24/7255199/slack-alters-pri... . I would suspect that what you're positing to be a "complete history dump" from free Slack workspaces are from archive bots, which don't have the ability to eavesdrop on conversations in which they weren't already present.

madeofpalk 6y ago

Kind of. Admins can see all channels, and can forcibly insert themselves into any voice channel (even if it's full). But you're right in that their domain only extends to the _server_ and not your user account which is not tied to the server and they have no ownership over.