4 ms·

For those of us unaware, what is a hellban?

krapp 5y ago
It's a ban designed to make it appear to the banned user that they aren't banned. The intent is to allow them to continue to post (so they don't make a new account and avoid the ban) unaware that their posts are unreadable by the rest of the community. It works, but it's extremely controversial. It used to be the case that talking about it (and making banned users aware of their status) could get you banned here, and vouching for banned users wasn't available until relatively recently. Some users have only discovered they were banned years after the fact.
- dang 5y ago
  For many years now, we tell users that we're banning them when they have an established history on the site: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20banned&sort=byDate&type=story&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que.... Shadowbanning is mostly for spammers and serial trolls. There's lots of past explanation at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23686672 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23686672 and https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20shadowban&sort=byDate&type=story&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que.... I think vouching dates from 2015. If anyone sees a banned account that's posting good comments, they're welcome to email us at hn@ycombinator.com. If the account has really corrected its ways, we're happy to unban it. Occasionally we notice one of these ourselves and unban it. It's on my list to look at the oldest banned accounts that are still posting; I just haven't gotten to it yet.
  - krapp 5y ago
    Things have been a lot more equitable since pg was running the show. Although to be fair sometimes you come along a bit late and people don't actually see your comment. If it's not still on the first page of their threads list they're probably never going to notice it. Maybe there should be a message when someone logs in to let them know what flags are against their account.
    - dang 5y ago
      Yeah, that's a problem. I'm often as much as a couple days behind in looking through flagged comments. I think if we build any more software around banning/penalties, it might be some kind of probation system, i.e. a series of temporary bans, maybe with exponential backoff, and with permanent bannage only as an end state. I can think of reasons why it might work better, including: (1) humans tend to do well with feedback loops; (2) it might feel less personal (in the bad sense of the word); (3) it would be easier for moderators to do a lot more of it. In the optimistic scenario, we'd get a better community and less ill feeling about getting moderated, which would be great. The current path is psychologically too hard and leads to burnout.
      - krapp 5y ago
        The ability to ban people from specific threads might be a good idea.
        tptacek 5y ago
        The reason you'd create the ability to ban someone from a thread is so you can more freely apply feedback --- ie, soft ban more people. Which would probably just lead to a lot of litigation on threads about whether people should or shouldn't be banned from them. A virtue of the current system is that it's very rare to come across a comment that suggests someone should be banned instantly --- so nobody has that expectation.
        dang 5y ago
        I reflected on this a bit after seeing your and tptacek's comments. It's an interesting idea but I think it would land too personally again, because it's so specific. When moderators make a specific judgment like "you can post in other threads but not this one", people feel singled out, and that's really what stings. Also it would leave a lot of surface area for objections, and any changes we make will need to reduce the amount of argument moderators have to get into —it's both time-consuming and psychologically difficult. I think it would probably be cleaner and simpler to say "you've been breaking the site guidelines so you're temporarily banned". The innovation would be the "temporarily" part.
- disgrunt 5y ago
  > It's a ban designed to make it appear to the banned user that they aren't banned. The intent is to allow them to continue to post (so they don't make a new account and avoid the ban) unaware that their posts are unreadable by the rest of the community. How is that distinct from a shadowban? Or is it the same thing?
  - krapp 5y ago
    It's the same thing. Hellban is just a less polite term for it.
    - disgrunt 5y ago
      I've experienced a similar thing on HN. I'm calling it the "insta throttle". I've been met with a "You're posting too fast. Please slow down. Thanks." message after posting just once.
      - krapp 5y ago
        I have that too. After four or five posts I have to wait an hour. They'd probably remove it if I asked them, but I find it helps me choose my comments more wisely, or at least make certain the ones I know will be downvoted will be worth it. And being forced to take a break now and then isn't so bad.

It's a ban designed to make it appear to the banned user that they aren't banned. The intent is to allow them to continue to post (so they don't make a new account and avoid the ban) unaware that their posts are unreadable by the rest of the community. It works, but it's extremely controversial. It used to be the case that talking about it (and making banned users aware of their status) could get you banned here, and vouching for banned users wasn't available until relatively recently. Some users have only discovered they were banned years after the fact.

dang 5y ago
For many years now, we tell users that we're banning them when they have an established history on the site: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20banned&sort=byDate&type=story&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que.... Shadowbanning is mostly for spammers and serial trolls. There's lots of past explanation at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23686672 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23686672 and https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20shadowban&sort=byDate&type=story&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que.... I think vouching dates from 2015. If anyone sees a banned account that's posting good comments, they're welcome to email us at hn@ycombinator.com. If the account has really corrected its ways, we're happy to unban it. Occasionally we notice one of these ourselves and unban it. It's on my list to look at the oldest banned accounts that are still posting; I just haven't gotten to it yet.
- krapp 5y ago
  Things have been a lot more equitable since pg was running the show. Although to be fair sometimes you come along a bit late and people don't actually see your comment. If it's not still on the first page of their threads list they're probably never going to notice it. Maybe there should be a message when someone logs in to let them know what flags are against their account.
  - dang 5y ago
    Yeah, that's a problem. I'm often as much as a couple days behind in looking through flagged comments. I think if we build any more software around banning/penalties, it might be some kind of probation system, i.e. a series of temporary bans, maybe with exponential backoff, and with permanent bannage only as an end state. I can think of reasons why it might work better, including: (1) humans tend to do well with feedback loops; (2) it might feel less personal (in the bad sense of the word); (3) it would be easier for moderators to do a lot more of it. In the optimistic scenario, we'd get a better community and less ill feeling about getting moderated, which would be great. The current path is psychologically too hard and leads to burnout.
    - krapp 5y ago
      The ability to ban people from specific threads might be a good idea.
      - tptacek 5y ago
        The reason you'd create the ability to ban someone from a thread is so you can more freely apply feedback --- ie, soft ban more people. Which would probably just lead to a lot of litigation on threads about whether people should or shouldn't be banned from them. A virtue of the current system is that it's very rare to come across a comment that suggests someone should be banned instantly --- so nobody has that expectation.
      - dang 5y ago
        I reflected on this a bit after seeing your and tptacek's comments. It's an interesting idea but I think it would land too personally again, because it's so specific. When moderators make a specific judgment like "you can post in other threads but not this one", people feel singled out, and that's really what stings. Also it would leave a lot of surface area for objections, and any changes we make will need to reduce the amount of argument moderators have to get into —it's both time-consuming and psychologically difficult. I think it would probably be cleaner and simpler to say "you've been breaking the site guidelines so you're temporarily banned". The innovation would be the "temporarily" part.
disgrunt 5y ago
> It's a ban designed to make it appear to the banned user that they aren't banned. The intent is to allow them to continue to post (so they don't make a new account and avoid the ban) unaware that their posts are unreadable by the rest of the community. How is that distinct from a shadowban? Or is it the same thing?
- krapp 5y ago
  It's the same thing. Hellban is just a less polite term for it.
  - disgrunt 5y ago
    I've experienced a similar thing on HN. I'm calling it the "insta throttle". I've been met with a "You're posting too fast. Please slow down. Thanks." message after posting just once.
    - krapp 5y ago
      I have that too. After four or five posts I have to wait an hour. They'd probably remove it if I asked them, but I find it helps me choose my comments more wisely, or at least make certain the ones I know will be downvoted will be worth it. And being forced to take a break now and then isn't so bad.