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I'm simply replying to their comments. Are you seriously going to side with the person claiming my 100% CCP related comments aren't related to the CCP? Please

by loceng 6y ago

I'm simply replying to their comments. Are you seriously going to side with the person claiming my 100% CCP related comments aren't related to the CCP? Please don't give into the gaslighting dang. Edit to add: actually, please point out where there's any anger in anything I said, or the other person said, flamewar - "angry or abusive messages." If you read the messages as perhaps intense, maybe you could define them as intense - as they are important topics. I'd really like clarification on how this qualifies as flamewars. Really curious who flagged this as well? Was the person involved in trying to suppress the conversation on the CCP one of them who flagged it?

dang 6y ago
When people start getting into meta-argument like "I never said $X" and "You're ignoring all my points", that's a clear marker of degeneration into flamewar, especially the tit-for-tat-spat variety. That, combined with the drift in the generic-nationalistic direction, is enough to count your comments as taking the thread further into flamewar. This is not a hard call. Just look at the number of generic hops it takes to get from "Apple redirects Google Safe Browsing traffic through proxy servers" all the way to "CCP doesn't allow United Nations inspectors". That is exactly how internet discussions become more repetitive, more predictable, and nastier. The basic principle of HN moderation is to try to nudge threads in the opposite direction to that. Lots more explanation about those things here if anyone cares: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=generic%20ideolog%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor... https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=generic%20discussion%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor... https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=curiosity%20repetition%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so... https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=curiosity%20optimiz%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor... "Gaslighting", "suppress the conversation", "CCP" are red herrings. We don't care which high-order bit you've got set on your views. We care about the conversation as a whole. It would be just the same if you were arguing the opposite side. Actually I don't even bother figuring out which side people are on any more—the flamewar comments are basically interchangeable either way.
- loceng 6y ago
  Thanks for the response. I agree it was leading into a potential flamewar, however no anger or harassment was said by either side. I'm not sure how the # of hops it takes matters if a conversation is still related, why there is gatekeeping - other than it makes it a quantitative decision for you vs. qualitative - cutting out moderation responsibility of actually determining if one party is speaking in good faith and the other is not, which it sounds like you admitted to not caring about. So if a pattern matches you flag/hide it. I can understand why a sole moderator may take that, however that's a terrible thing for holding space and helping people learn their behaviour isn't okay - in fact, you're teaching people to not hold the line for integrity. Do you not care for people to learn, for lines to be held in regards to integrity and good faith conversation - just like how you responded to me, and I'm responding to you? Also, those aren't red herrings at all from my understanding of that term; does me saying that mean this is degenerating into a flamewar and should be flagged/hidden too, or perhaps my previous paragraph is somehow considered a personal attack - when no malice was intended (and is valid conversation unless invalidating by gatekeeping to make moderation easier)? I'm curious too - how does my reply getting flagged/hidden to others nudge conversation rather than censor/suppress it to others who may then add to the replies - on either side of the discussion - or maybe upvote/downvote lazily?
  - dang 6y ago
    The more hops a thread takes in generic directions, the less related it becomes. Worse, the generic topics are predictable. They are like large planets that suck in all passing spacecraft. We want HN threads to meander in less predictable ways—this is literally the biggest issue with discussion quality on the forum, so it's a big deal. I'm not sure what else to tell you other than the links I mentioned above. I certainly didn't say we didn't care about good faith. I said we didn't care about the 'high-order bit', meaning whether you're battle for left vs. right, $country1 vs. $country2, and so on. I'm not saying that for theoretical reasons, just empirical ones: it doesn't make a difference for discussion quality, and actually the comments of people on either side of the hard divides resemble each other (e.g. in being rigid, predictable, adversarial) more than they resemble anyone else's. If there's still a question here that is super important to answer, I'm happy to try to answer it, but I need to know specifically what it is.

by loceng 6y ago

dang 6y ago

When people start getting into meta-argument like "I never said $X" and "You're ignoring all my points", that's a clear marker of degeneration into flamewar, especially the tit-for-tat-spat variety. That, combined with the drift in the generic-nationalistic direction, is enough to count your comments as taking the thread further into flamewar. This is not a hard call. Just look at the number of generic hops it takes to get from "Apple redirects Google Safe Browsing traffic through proxy servers" all the way to "CCP doesn't allow United Nations inspectors". That is exactly how internet discussions become more repetitive, more predictable, and nastier. The basic principle of HN moderation is to try to nudge threads in the opposite direction to that. Lots more explanation about those things here if anyone cares: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=generic%20ideolog%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor... https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=generic%20discussion%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor... https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=curiosity%20repetition%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so... https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=curiosity%20optimiz%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor... "Gaslighting", "suppress the conversation", "CCP" are red herrings. We don't care which high-order bit you've got set on your views. We care about the conversation as a whole. It would be just the same if you were arguing the opposite side. Actually I don't even bother figuring out which side people are on any more—the flamewar comments are basically interchangeable either way.

loceng 6y ago
Thanks for the response. I agree it was leading into a potential flamewar, however no anger or harassment was said by either side. I'm not sure how the # of hops it takes matters if a conversation is still related, why there is gatekeeping - other than it makes it a quantitative decision for you vs. qualitative - cutting out moderation responsibility of actually determining if one party is speaking in good faith and the other is not, which it sounds like you admitted to not caring about. So if a pattern matches you flag/hide it. I can understand why a sole moderator may take that, however that's a terrible thing for holding space and helping people learn their behaviour isn't okay - in fact, you're teaching people to not hold the line for integrity. Do you not care for people to learn, for lines to be held in regards to integrity and good faith conversation - just like how you responded to me, and I'm responding to you? Also, those aren't red herrings at all from my understanding of that term; does me saying that mean this is degenerating into a flamewar and should be flagged/hidden too, or perhaps my previous paragraph is somehow considered a personal attack - when no malice was intended (and is valid conversation unless invalidating by gatekeeping to make moderation easier)? I'm curious too - how does my reply getting flagged/hidden to others nudge conversation rather than censor/suppress it to others who may then add to the replies - on either side of the discussion - or maybe upvote/downvote lazily?
- dang 6y ago
  The more hops a thread takes in generic directions, the less related it becomes. Worse, the generic topics are predictable. They are like large planets that suck in all passing spacecraft. We want HN threads to meander in less predictable ways—this is literally the biggest issue with discussion quality on the forum, so it's a big deal. I'm not sure what else to tell you other than the links I mentioned above. I certainly didn't say we didn't care about good faith. I said we didn't care about the 'high-order bit', meaning whether you're battle for left vs. right, $country1 vs. $country2, and so on. I'm not saying that for theoretical reasons, just empirical ones: it doesn't make a difference for discussion quality, and actually the comments of people on either side of the hard divides resemble each other (e.g. in being rigid, predictable, adversarial) more than they resemble anyone else's. If there's still a question here that is super important to answer, I'm happy to try to answer it, but I need to know specifically what it is.