6 ms·

I find it pretty interesting that Martin does not mention the kind of community member-driven up/downvote mechanism found on this site (and elsewhere) as an ex

I find it pretty interesting that Martin does not mention the kind of community member-driven up/downvote mechanism found on this site (and elsewhere) as an example of decentralised content moderation. Edit: now I see Slashdot and Reddit mentioned at the end in the updates section (I don't remember seeing them on my first read, but that might just be me).

meheleventyone 6y ago
Isn't it just an example of democratic content moderation? We up vote, down vote and flag content. We don't get the ability to do so unless we are a community member of some tenure. It's augmented by centralized moderation by a handful of moderators. How well it works is always a topic here.
- freeqaz 6y ago
  We don't see all of the countless hours spent by mods like dang to keep the quality high. It's a thankless job most of the time!
  - meheleventyone 6y ago
    Having moderated some large forums in the past I know!
- randompwd 6y ago
  > Isn't it just an example of democratic content moderation A democracy makes great efforts to ensure 1 person = 1 vote. Online platforms do not.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
commandlinefan 6y ago
FTA: "even though such filtering saves you from having to see things you don’t like, it doesn’t stop the objectionable content from existing". He doesn't want upvoting/downvoting, he wants complete eradication (of whatever the majority happens to objects to right now).
- throwaway2245 6y ago
  > of whatever the majority happens to objects to right now I don't see that Martin Kleppmann is using 'democracy' to mean 'majoritarianism' here. He makes considered points about how to form and implement policies against harmful content, and appears to talk about agreement by consensus. Democracy and majoritarianism are (in general) quite different things. This might be more apparent in European democracies.
  - Viliam1234 6y ago
    He plays a little trick by saying "ultimately it should be the users themselves who decide what is acceptable or not". This has two meanings, somewhat contradictory. The straightforward meaning is that ultimately I decide what is acceptable or not for me, and you decide what is acceptable or not for you. We can, and likely will, have a different opinion on different things. But the following talk of "governance" and "democratic control" suggest that the one who ultimately decides are not users as individuals, but rather some kind of process that would be called democratic in some sense. Ultimately, someone else will make the decision for you... but you can participate in the process, if you wish... but if your opinions are too unusual, you will probably lose anyway... and then the rest of us will smugly congratulate ourselves for giving you the chance. > Democracy and majoritarianism are (in general) quite different things. Sure, a minority can have rights as long as it is popular, rich, well organized, able to make coalitions with other minorities, or too unimportant to attract anyone's attention. But that still means living under the potential threat. I don't see a reason why online communities would have to be built like this, if instead you could create a separate little virtual universe for everyone who wished to be left alone... and then invent good tools for navigating these universes, to make it convenient, from user perspective, to create their places, to invite and be invited, and to exlude those who don't follow the local rules (who in turn can create their own places and compete for popularity).
maurys 6y ago
He mentions Reddit at the end of the article, which is close enough in mechanism to Hackernews.
Steltek 6y ago
How would up/down votes work on a decentralized platform? Wouldn't it be easy to game by standing up your own server and wishing up a legion of sockpuppets? There's a whole Moonshot of spam resistance that's going to need to happen in Mastodon/Matrix/Whatever.
- nine_k 6y ago
  Decentralized networks need trust, and trust is not a Boolean value. With a centralized service, trust is simple: how much you trust the single entity that represents the service. In a distributed network, nodes need to build trust to each other. In the best-known federated network, email, domain reputation is a thing. Various blacklists and graylists pass around trust values in bulk. So a node with a ton of sock puppets trying to spam votes (or content) is going to lose the trust of its peers fast, so the spam from it will end up marked as such. A well-run node will gain considerable trust with time. This, of course, while helpful, does not guarantee "fairness" of any kind. If technology and people's values clash, the values prevail. You cannot alter values with technology alone (even weapon technology).
- dboreham 6y ago
  The problem you describe is called Sybil resistance and is known to be hard, but there are some example working systems such as Bitcoin.
mytailorisrich 6y ago
Up/downvote mechanisms always end up as agree/disagree votes. Moderation is not the same. It is not about agreeing but curating content that is not acceptable (off-topic, illegal, insulting). Article quote: "In decentralised social media, I believe that ultimately it should be the users themselves who decide what is acceptable or not" In my view that is only workable if that means users define the rules because, as said above, I think 'voting' on individual piece of content always leads to echo chambers and to censoring dissenting views. Of course this may be fine if within an online community focus on one topic or interest, but probably not if you want to foster open discussions and a plurality of views and opinions. We can observe this right here on HN. On submissions that are prone to trigger strong opinions downvotes and flagging explode.
totemandtoken 6y ago
"We vote on values, we bet on beliefs" - Robin Hanson. Voting tells us what we value but that doesn't mean what is good for us. It also treats all content as somewhat equivalent, which isn't true. A call to (maybe violent) action isn't the same thing as sharing a cute cat video.

meheleventyone 6y ago

Isn't it just an example of democratic content moderation? We up vote, down vote and flag content. We don't get the ability to do so unless we are a community member of some tenure. It's augmented by centralized moderation by a handful of moderators. How well it works is always a topic here.

freeqaz 6y ago
We don't see all of the countless hours spent by mods like dang to keep the quality high. It's a thankless job most of the time!
- meheleventyone 6y ago
  Having moderated some large forums in the past I know!
randompwd 6y ago
> Isn't it just an example of democratic content moderation A democracy makes great efforts to ensure 1 person = 1 vote. Online platforms do not.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]

commandlinefan 6y ago

FTA: "even though such filtering saves you from having to see things you don’t like, it doesn’t stop the objectionable content from existing". He doesn't want upvoting/downvoting, he wants complete eradication (of whatever the majority happens to objects to right now).

throwaway2245 6y ago
> of whatever the majority happens to objects to right now I don't see that Martin Kleppmann is using 'democracy' to mean 'majoritarianism' here. He makes considered points about how to form and implement policies against harmful content, and appears to talk about agreement by consensus. Democracy and majoritarianism are (in general) quite different things. This might be more apparent in European democracies.
- Viliam1234 6y ago
  He plays a little trick by saying "ultimately it should be the users themselves who decide what is acceptable or not". This has two meanings, somewhat contradictory. The straightforward meaning is that ultimately I decide what is acceptable or not for me, and you decide what is acceptable or not for you. We can, and likely will, have a different opinion on different things. But the following talk of "governance" and "democratic control" suggest that the one who ultimately decides are not users as individuals, but rather some kind of process that would be called democratic in some sense. Ultimately, someone else will make the decision for you... but you can participate in the process, if you wish... but if your opinions are too unusual, you will probably lose anyway... and then the rest of us will smugly congratulate ourselves for giving you the chance. > Democracy and majoritarianism are (in general) quite different things. Sure, a minority can have rights as long as it is popular, rich, well organized, able to make coalitions with other minorities, or too unimportant to attract anyone's attention. But that still means living under the potential threat. I don't see a reason why online communities would have to be built like this, if instead you could create a separate little virtual universe for everyone who wished to be left alone... and then invent good tools for navigating these universes, to make it convenient, from user perspective, to create their places, to invite and be invited, and to exlude those who don't follow the local rules (who in turn can create their own places and compete for popularity).

maurys 6y ago

He mentions Reddit at the end of the article, which is close enough in mechanism to Hackernews.

Steltek 6y ago

How would up/down votes work on a decentralized platform? Wouldn't it be easy to game by standing up your own server and wishing up a legion of sockpuppets? There's a whole Moonshot of spam resistance that's going to need to happen in Mastodon/Matrix/Whatever.

nine_k 6y ago
Decentralized networks need trust, and trust is not a Boolean value. With a centralized service, trust is simple: how much you trust the single entity that represents the service. In a distributed network, nodes need to build trust to each other. In the best-known federated network, email, domain reputation is a thing. Various blacklists and graylists pass around trust values in bulk. So a node with a ton of sock puppets trying to spam votes (or content) is going to lose the trust of its peers fast, so the spam from it will end up marked as such. A well-run node will gain considerable trust with time. This, of course, while helpful, does not guarantee "fairness" of any kind. If technology and people's values clash, the values prevail. You cannot alter values with technology alone (even weapon technology).
dboreham 6y ago
The problem you describe is called Sybil resistance and is known to be hard, but there are some example working systems such as Bitcoin.

mytailorisrich 6y ago

Up/downvote mechanisms always end up as agree/disagree votes. Moderation is not the same. It is not about agreeing but curating content that is not acceptable (off-topic, illegal, insulting). Article quote: "In decentralised social media, I believe that ultimately it should be the users themselves who decide what is acceptable or not" In my view that is only workable if that means users define the rules because, as said above, I think 'voting' on individual piece of content always leads to echo chambers and to censoring dissenting views. Of course this may be fine if within an online community focus on one topic or interest, but probably not if you want to foster open discussions and a plurality of views and opinions. We can observe this right here on HN. On submissions that are prone to trigger strong opinions downvotes and flagging explode.

totemandtoken 6y ago

"We vote on values, we bet on beliefs" - Robin Hanson. Voting tells us what we value but that doesn't mean what is good for us. It also treats all content as somewhat equivalent, which isn't true. A call to (maybe violent) action isn't the same thing as sharing a cute cat video.