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I see a number of people here describing Parler as "unmoderated", but it turns out they do have extensive moderation [1] that they use to ensure ideological con
by liminal 6y ago
I see a number of people here describing Parler as "unmoderated", but it turns out they do have extensive moderation [1] that they use to ensure ideological conformity in their posts. Then the most active users were paid for their content too [2]. This really makes it more of a propaganda weapon than a free speech platform.
[1] https://twitter.com/donk_enby/status/1347939939120533506 https://twitter.com/donk_enby/status/1347939939120533506
[2] https://twitter.com/donk_enby/status/1346565749977051136 https://twitter.com/donk_enby/status/1346565749977051136
- whimsicalism 6y agoBy that standard, Instagram is a propaganda weapon. It both: a. pays popular users b. Puts warnings on political issues, like statements that Biden's crime bill contributed to mass incarceration [0] [0] https://twitter.com/ben_awareness/status/1339293381625864195 https://twitter.com/ben_awareness/status/1339293381625864195
- bzb6 6y agoThat’s true but Instagram doesn’t claim to be a free speech platform
- whimsicalism 6y agoSo that makes it permissible for private actors to publish 70TBs of private Parler users' messages?
- bzb6 6y agoI did not say anything like that
- whimsicalism 6y agoI guess I'm confused as to the relevance to this thread. This person claimed that two attributes made Parler a "propaganda weapon", I noted that other major platforms have those same properties, so you tacked on another condition. Presumably this was all in an effort to say something along the lines of - "because of the unique situation Parler is in, these actions were permissible." No?
- bzb6 6y agoI’m one of the most right wing and pro free speech humans to ever set foot on this site. You are beating up the wrong person. I was merely replying to you regardless of what your parent comment said.
- KnobbleMcKnees 6y agoThey're using this bad faith / fallacious argument all over the thread, so, at the least, it isn't personal.
- whimsicalism 6y agoI'm in perfectly fine faith, and I'd love for you to point out the fallacies.
- muyuu 6y agoit's a sensational title they are doing bulk scrapping of Parler and they do many other sites like Reddit too, and particularly stuff that is being taken down for archival purposes also there is nothing - and I mean nothing, but particularly threats of violence - in Parler you don't see in Twitter in more abundance, only it's more typically leftists on Twitter and rightists on Parler
- amanaplanacanal 6y agoI didn’t see anyone claim that.
- vegcel 6y agoYes
- crispywalrus 6y agoInstagram doesn't claim to be a "free speech" platform. You have to only be mildly interested in it to see that it's all about "engagement" Parler explicitly claimed "free speech" as a goal
- whimsicalism 6y agoSo because the owners claim the platform to be something other than it actually is, it is okay for this person to leak the Parler users' private images and videos?
- jabberwcky 6y agoUnfortunately you won't find much interesting commentary in a politically charged thread like this, best to just scan and pattern match the kind of exchanges occurring before moving swiftly along.
- julianmarq 6y ago> best to just scan and pattern match the kind of exchanges occurring before moving swiftly along. How do you do that? I've noticed lately that HN commentary (at least in threads like this) has trended increasingly pro-censorship[1] lately, and it's pretty disheartening to read. Would rather do something like what you say, but I'm not quite sure what you mean. [1]: Which is a bit ironic, thinking about it.
- awb 6y ago> increasingly pro-censorship[1] lately The US has always had limits on free speech. > Freedom of speech and expression, therefore, may not be recognized as being absolute, and common limitations or boundaries to freedom of speech relate to libel, slander, obscenity, pornography, sedition, incitement, fighting words, classified information, copyright violation, trade secrets, food labeling, non-disclosure agreements, the right to privacy, dignity, the right to be forgotten, public security, and perjury. Justifications for such include the harm principle, proposed by John Stuart Mill in On Liberty, which suggests that "the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others." https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_speech https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_speech Incitement, sedition, public security and harm to others seem to be relevant to this discussion.
- syops 6y agoYou've made an argument that Instagram engages in some form of advancing certain viewpoints. You have not demonstrated that this is extensive and that Instagram enforces ideological conformity or that Instagram actively pays people to engage in said advancement of political agendas. There appears to be quite a difference between what Instagram does and what Parler does. The two do not appear to be comparable.
- bzb6 6y agoGet an Instagram account and say something against feminism, diversity, fat people, etc and see what happens.
- beepboopbeep 6y agoIt's not unreasonable for a person instigating something through negative posts to receive negative reactions in return. That seems self evident.
- dd36 6y agoConsequence free speech seems to be what is desired on these platforms. This was inevitable. You can’t monetize consequence free speech. It has to be in dark places like 4chan.
- Wintamute 6y agoI think the point is that you don't need to make "negative posts" about those topics, rather discussing them from any angle that isn't the accepted progressive orthodoxy results in the ban hammer.
- lghh 6y agoThat claim about the Crime Bill is mostly accurate. The vast, vast, vast, majority of incarceration is the fault of states and not done at a federal level. While the bill was deplorable, it didn't really contribute all that much. https://twitter.com/johnfpfaff/status/1128369019164200960?lang=en https://twitter.com/johnfpfaff/status/1128369019164200960?la...
- leereeves 6y agoThe 1994 crime bill included a number of provisions that increased incarceration at the state level, such as: > $9.7 billion in funding for prisons, [including] incentive grants to ... qualifying states that enforced mandatory sentencing of 85% of a person's sentence conviction, > [eliminating federal grants for] lower-income prison inmates to receive college educations during their term of imprisonment, and funding for 100,000 more police officers. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-strikes_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-strikes_law
- whimsicalism 6y agoI think this is a contested claim and you can find prominent academics on the other side talking about a. how federal action modeled action for states, including substantial incentive schemes for incarceration (indeed that is how almost every Federal bill works) b. how the rate of incarceration given the crime being committed increased post-crime bill. I think it is a discussion to be had, not something to be a priori fact-checked as "False."
- hnuser847 6y agoThere's a legitimate debate to be had over the consequences of the 1994 crime bill and whether or not is was a good policy. The point is that Instagram (and every other social media platform that puts these disclaimers on their posts) is not merely moderating content any more. They're actively participating in politics and trying to persuade their users to feel a certain way about controversial topics. Which is to say, they're really no different than Parler or any of the big box media outlets.
- chrononaut 6y ago> b. Puts warnings on political issues, like statements that Biden's crime bill contributed to mass incarceration I assume that point was an extension of OP's comment of: "that they use to ensure ideological conformity in their posts." For those interested, here is a link to the USA Today article from the screenshot evaluating whether "the crime bill brought mass incarceration to Black Americans": https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2020/07/03/fact-check-1994-crime-bill-didnt-bring-mass-incarceration-black-people/3250210001/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2020/07/03/fac... > Stephen Ross Johnson, of Knoxville, Tennessee, a board member of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and past president of the Tennessee Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, told USA TODAY that it is "over simplistic" to say the 1994 crime bill led to mass incarceration. > Asked if the bill caused or largely contributed to it, Johnson says: “The bottom line answer to that is no. Was it a link in the chain? Yes. Is it the beginning of the chain? No.” > Johnson argues that the roots of mass incarceration can be found in the late 1960s and early 1970s, with legislation that created, among other things, the RICO statute, which broadened the scope of federal law as the war on drugs began to take shape. I'd say I agree with the points in the article over the non-contextual, anonyomous, blanket statement that the crime bill brought ("caused") mass incarceration of Black Americans.
- whimsicalism 6y ago> I'd say I agree with the points in the article over the non-contextual, anonyomous, blanket statement that the crime bill brought ("caused") mass incarceration of Black Americans. Perhaps it is not an appropriately nuanced claim - I would be curious if there is equal enforcement of the "contextual" clarity of claims made in all political memes though. My guess is no, and it is also a quite common view among academics that the crime bill is a large link in the story behind mass incarceration. I haven't, for instance, seen fact-checking of memes about Russia "stealing" the election or Donald Trump being a servant of Putin, despite those claims being potentially "non-contextual." You may agree with the points. But does that make it beyond the pale of discussion and must be "fact-checked" away? e: Rather than downvotes, I would be curious what others' thoughts are here.
- 6y ago
- debt 6y ago"a. pays popular users" Source?
- ErikVandeWater 6y agoI don't see in either of those threads evidence that the moderation is one-sided. And a social media company paying the users that create the most content? Dastardly!
- trianglem 6y agoThe most murderous content, yay!
- Barrin92 6y agoit's not surprising given that it's Mercer funded who basically make the Koch's look harmless. People shouldn't be fooled and take this notion of 'free-speech' that is being advocated by these platforms at face value. They're not about genuine free exchange, they're funded by and organised by very well networked organisations who use them to further extremist political causes.
- specialist 6y agoLibertarian vs neoreactionary. Whereas the Kochs want to be in charge of government, the Mercers want to eliminate government.
- ncmncm 6y agoEliminating government will favor whoever is best equipped to become one. Similar, generic libertarian: means handing over all power to the biggest corporation. Big corporations exercise so much power already that it is only where they disagree that any civil governance is even possible. Principle is that a power vacuum is always immediately filled by the strongest party.
- specialist 6y agoUtopian thinking is the great irony, isn't it? Your utopia is someone else's dystopia? TBH, I have a really hard time wrapping my head around these philosophical paradoxes.
- tomp 6y agoBased on the screenshot you linked to, their "moderation" categories are "spam", "ads", "impersonation", "defamation", "nudity", "pornography", "illegal", "terrorism", "trademark" and "threat". Can you please explain how they use that to "ensure ideological conformity in their posts"?
- liminal 6y agoIn the tweet text it says "all new users start out shadowbanned until enough of their post get approved for rightthink by their user moderators"
- notJim 6y agoDid they provide any evidence of that, or was it just editorializing? It's not uncommon for new users to start out with limited privileges on some platforms for spam and fraud prevention reasons.
- liminal 6y agoIt might just be editorializing. Perhaps the community is self-selecting enough that censorship isn't needed. Regardless, it's not "moderation-free"
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- hertzrat 6y agoHackernews starts you off shadowbanned too. It’s a way to ward off spammers and bots. I know because this account started off shadow banned for 1-2 weeks until I had made 5-10 posts. Edit: Why in earth is this getting downvoted so heavily? Every new account everyone I know ever made was shadow banned at first
- mkl 6y agoHN doesn't start users shadow banned - just look for the green new-account usernames. Your account didn't start shadow banned either. Here's your first comment, visible to all: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25410162 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25410162 New accounts are more likely to get shadow banned, especially if they post many comments with links or post inflammatory remarks.
- sdenton4 6y agoThis really is the rule, not the exception. Every time I've deigned to wade into conservative "free-speech" zones I've been booted out for ideological nonconformity. Tolerance is a peace treaty: https://extranewsfeed.com/tolerance-is-not-a-moral-precept-1af7007d6376 https://extranewsfeed.com/tolerance-is-not-a-moral-precept-1...
- berryjerry 6y agoYou still cannot threaten physical violence. This imaginary prospect that 'free speech' includes threats is stupid. And of course any individual still can block you. It is literally the same as Twitter.
- balls187 6y ago> It is literally the same as Twitter. Pretty much. What I find troubling is that despite containing the same cesspool of vile content, Twitter never got booted from Google and Apple App stores, and AWS.
- franklampard 6y ago> The same cesspool of vile content You are troubling if you really find that
- balls187 6y agoTook me less than 30 seconds to type in a racial slur into Twitter's search bar and find it. And I don't even have a twitter account.
- franklampard 6y agoIf you report them they don’t get removed on Twitter? Without a Twitter account you claim that Twitter has the same vile content?
- pelasaco 6y agoI didn't know Parler before. I'm not American, and I'm definitely not a right-wing supporter. But that's not the same as Youtube/Facebook/Spotify tries to do? Good for ads and supporting their political agenda? References: - https://medium.com/swlh/youtube-algorithm-rigged-breadtube-e18961348854 https://medium.com/swlh/youtube-algorithm-rigged-breadtube-e... - https://theindustryobserver.thebrag.com/spotify-joe-rogan/ https://theindustryobserver.thebrag.com/spotify-joe-rogan/ EDIT: Wow: So many down-votes in less than a minute, without any comment. interesting opinion from Glenn Greenwald: "Do you know how many of the people arrested in connection with the Capitol invasion were active users of Parler? Zero. The planning was largely done on Facebook. This is all a bullshit pretext for silencing competitors on ideological grounds: just the start." https://twitter.com/ggreenwald/status/1348619731734028293 https://twitter.com/ggreenwald/status/1348619731734028293
- tda 6y agoHis statements are not backed by any evidence, so I don't know what to make of them. Nonetheless an interesting opinion by someone that has done some great things that certainly tickeled my curiosity, +1
- KingOfCoders 6y agoMr Greenwald is an activist.
- pelasaco 6y agoeveryone in some level is an activist. I don't agree with everything that he does or says. However I'm sure he would be the last one to take the side of Parler or any other similar project.
- pelasaco 6y agoI'm not really following the issue, but there is any evidence of the people involved in the Capitol invasion being active users on Parler?
- jeromegv 6y agoCEO mentioned on Kara Swisher podcast that he felt he had zero responsibility for the content on this platform. So this moderation is mostly a PR point.
- boringg 6y agoI wonder how he would feel about Sect 230 getting rolled back. Parler would be down and out (that said it's down and out right now). For clarity I don't support changing 230.
- wnevets 6y agoProbably the same support had he for allowing companies to discriminate against gay couples. Its great until its used against him.
- jandrese 6y agoThere is a difference between being deplatformed by AWS and being served thousands of lawsuits at once.
- AniseAbyss 6y agoMaybe AWS wants to preempt those lawsuits by just ridding themselves of the headache? Don't blame them. Amazon is not in the "hosting controversial content for shits and giggles" business.
- jandrese 6y agoRight now Section 230 means that Parler end users would be sued, not Amazon or even Parler. If Section 230 were repealed then Amazon would be open for lawsuits. Lawyers usually aren't going to go too hard after Parler end users, most of them don't have much money. Amazon however is a different story.
- ardy42 6y ago> This really makes it more of a propaganda weapon than a free speech platform. Which is not surprising, given how the term free speech is getting twisted these days. It seems the term is now used more often to whine about others who don't want to disseminate a faction's lies (without comment!) than to actually argue for the free exchange of ideas in good faith.
- herdcall 6y agoI doubt this. I'm on Parler and frequently see posts (I presume from left leaning folks) trashing the right side (e.g., Trump). Those posts are allowed with no issues. It is true that most opinions are right leaning (some viciously so), but that IMO reflects more on the members than on the moderation policy. Discussions on Twitter have a similar mix (left leaning to rabid Trump bashing), and I honestly don't find any difference in the fervor, except that Parler is right leaning and Twitter is left leaning. The general tendency these days, fed by narratives from interested parties like the media, is to mash all right leaners (pretty much any one supporting the conservative ideas and opposing the Democrats) as clueless, racist, redneck, neo-Nazis (a bit of hyperbole here, but you see what I mean). Once you think that way (that "they're all nub jobs"), pretty much anything from leaking their user info to shutting them down to throwing them in jail would seem OK. Please, please don't fall into the trap and accept the "all right is nuts" narrative and decide for yourself.
- freeone3000 6y agoActions speak for themselves. The right isn't a unified block. There are traditonal conservatives: god, guns, limited government. Mitch McConnell, David French, Mitt Romney, Charlotte Lawson. I fundamentally have different values from these people, but their perspectives are useful, enlightening, and reading their viewpoints causes me to better defend my own, or even occasionally change. They are staunch defenders of individual rights and traditional liberty. There are libertarians on the right. Rand Paul, Spike Cohen, Justin Amash. These people I share a surprising number of values with, but fundamentally disagree with on the conclusion. Due to an inherent argumentativeness, it's hard to get a good faith debate, but I acknowledge their opinions that the government uses its power poorly, that both political parties are primarily concerned with remaining in power, and so on. And then there's the group who wear t-shirts with "Camp Auschwitz 2021", "6 million wasn't enough". Signs that say "Q Sent Me". Hats with "Make America Great Again". These people are absolutely racist neo-nazis. These people are pretending to believe that Italians stole the election. There's no true belief here, no fundamentally held tenant other than "my side is better". This is not a small group - a YouGov poll puts it at 18% of Republicans. And this is Parler's user base, self-selected. The reasonable ones are still on Twitter.
- Reedx 6y ago> but it turns out they do have extensive moderation [1] that they use to ensure ideological conformity Am I missing something? What are you referring to exactly? The mod tools screenshot doesn't support that assertion.
- hertzrat 6y agoAgreed. Maybe the problem is that everyone uses badly organized and ambiguous Twitter threads as citation sources lately. It’s not a good platform for that, you literally don’t have the character counts to explain something
- satysin 6y agoIt makes so much sense when you think of Parler as a propaganda network and recruitment tool and not a "free speech" social network which is exactly how I described my experience with it in the mega thread yesterday https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25712762 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25712762
- nicwolff 6y agoA propaganda weapon whose founder was just back from a trip to Russia with his Russian wife and whose parent company was incorporated by Giuliani's firm while he was traveling in Russia... https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1327253991936454663.html https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1327253991936454663.html
- sillycon-valley 6y agoHow dare he have a Russian wife or travel. This is a perfect example of the conspiracies of the left. edit: downvote/flag all you want, the article he linked to is terribly written and makes giant leaps in logic. edit: dang shadowbanned me and not the conspiracy post above me. dang you are a 50cent super solider aren't you. how are we supposed to not talk about politics in a political post? half of the frontpage are political articles. 99% of the comments are political, what's wrong with mine? DONT ALLOW POLITICAL ARTICLES IF YOU DON'T WANT POLITICAL DISCUSSION
- dang 6y agoIt's against the rules to use this site primarily for ideological battle, and we ban accounts that do it, regardless of which ideology they're battling for. We have to, because it's the primary thing that destroys the curious conversation this site exists for. I've therefore banned this account. Please don't create accounts to break HN's rules with. Yes, the rules are just the same for the opposite ideological side. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- sillycon-valley 6y agoYou banned the account I replied to right? I was pointing out the conspiracy post... EDIT - because of rate limiting: I've posted in both technical articles and political articles. There have been a lot of political articles recently with the tech bans. I cannot help that. Most of my comments are about freedom of speech, not really a political ideology. I did not create an account to feed hellfire, I created an account to voice my opinion and debate from the other side because I see such one-sided arguments. This is why you have an echo-chamber.
- hertzrat 6y agoIt’s not that what you said is untrue, but those posts are just screenshots of moderation and reward tools, not necessarily ideological conformity tools. It reminds me of quora [1] and some other sites that used to pay too posters as a way of driving site-wide engagement (sort of a way to buy users to get network effects going, like Uber eats offering free deliveries during Covid to get more users) [1]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18742484 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18742484
- jhowell 6y ago> It’s not that what you said is untrue, but those posts are just screenshots of moderation and reward tools, not necessarily ideological conformity tools. What do ideological conformity tools look like to you?
- JBSay 6y agoAs opposed to what? Twitter? All social media platforms are ideologically moderated.
- specialist 6y agoFreedom Speeches™ is only for the in-group.
- SergeAx 6y agoHow did you get from knowing about existing of moderation system to conclusion about using it to ensure ideological conformity? I don't see a "Wrong ideology" button on screenshot you've linked to.
- nabla9 6y agoOne of the founders (with big money) was Rebekah Mercer, owner of the Breitbart News.