5 ms·

Why is this on Hacker News?

blunte 5y ago
If I were a conspiracy theorist, and if I had read many times about how troll farms worked (and where they originated, and about their goals to destabilize regions and create divides amongst the people), I might guess that this story was posted and promoted by such people.
- cryptoz 5y ago
  For years at least, perhaps a decade or more, there has been a decent-size far-right crowd on HN that subscribes to conspiracy theories themselves. Perhaps this post is a troll farm's doing, perhaps it is organic behavior on HN. From my perspective, HN is very conservative/right leaning at least, and large numbers of voters and commenters are on here and support far-right-wing views. There is a lot of racism, white supremacy, misogyny, and anti-LGBT sentiment here. I have been called more hateful slurs on HN than I have anywhere else online or IRL. shrug. Hard to say about how organic this story is.
- dang 5y ago
  It's against the site rules to post such insinuations without evidence. Please read and stick to them: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. I've explained hundreds of times why we have that rule. Many of the explanations are reachable by scrolling back through https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comment&storyText=false&prefix=true&page=0&query=by:dang%20astroturf https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme... for the longer comments.
  - lvs 5y ago
    Isn't the entire post an insinuation without evidence?
dang 5y ago
HN has always had space for some political stories—the ones that overlap with intellectual interest. This one arguably does. Whether HN is capable of discussing it substantively is a separate issue. Many past explanations here: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=political%20overlap%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...
- onetrueliberal 5y ago
  Is disinformation fractal in nature? Is there ever a purpose to discussing it, or is the discussion the purpose?
  - IAmGraydon 5y ago
    Pretty sure you’re thinking way too hard.
- lvs 5y ago
  "Intellectual interest" is a new one. You are once again letting too much snake oil promulgate through this service. You have a responsibility here to do a better job that you're shirking on the thinnest of excuses.
  - dang 5y ago
    Intellectual interest is, far from being a "new one", literally the thing this site was created for 15 years ago.
    - lvs 5y ago
      All snake oil is intellectually interesting in some way. If you're entirely agnostic to it, then why do you even have a moderator? Just sit back, relax, and let these people continue their relentless slide into the absurd depths of navel-gazing political conflict found everywhere else.
  - Uhhrrr 5y ago

If I were a conspiracy theorist, and if I had read many times about how troll farms worked (and where they originated, and about their goals to destabilize regions and create divides amongst the people), I might guess that this story was posted and promoted by such people.

cryptoz 5y ago
For years at least, perhaps a decade or more, there has been a decent-size far-right crowd on HN that subscribes to conspiracy theories themselves. Perhaps this post is a troll farm's doing, perhaps it is organic behavior on HN. From my perspective, HN is very conservative/right leaning at least, and large numbers of voters and commenters are on here and support far-right-wing views. There is a lot of racism, white supremacy, misogyny, and anti-LGBT sentiment here. I have been called more hateful slurs on HN than I have anywhere else online or IRL. shrug. Hard to say about how organic this story is.
dang 5y ago
It's against the site rules to post such insinuations without evidence. Please read and stick to them: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. I've explained hundreds of times why we have that rule. Many of the explanations are reachable by scrolling back through https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comment&storyText=false&prefix=true&page=0&query=by:dang%20astroturf https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme... for the longer comments.
- lvs 5y ago
  Isn't the entire post an insinuation without evidence?

dang 5y ago

HN has always had space for some political stories—the ones that overlap with intellectual interest. This one arguably does. Whether HN is capable of discussing it substantively is a separate issue. Many past explanations here: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=political%20overlap%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...

onetrueliberal 5y ago
Is disinformation fractal in nature? Is there ever a purpose to discussing it, or is the discussion the purpose?
- IAmGraydon 5y ago
  Pretty sure you’re thinking way too hard.
lvs 5y ago
"Intellectual interest" is a new one. You are once again letting too much snake oil promulgate through this service. You have a responsibility here to do a better job that you're shirking on the thinnest of excuses.
- dang 5y ago
  Intellectual interest is, far from being a "new one", literally the thing this site was created for 15 years ago.
  - lvs 5y ago
    All snake oil is intellectually interesting in some way. If you're entirely agnostic to it, then why do you even have a moderator? Just sit back, relax, and let these people continue their relentless slide into the absurd depths of navel-gazing political conflict found everywhere else.
- Uhhrrr 5y ago