3 ms·

You're certainly entitled to your own opinion, but other people can absolutely call out what that opinion stems from: Narcissism. You claim to be entitled to f

You're certainly entitled to your own opinion, but other people can absolutely call out what that opinion stems from: Narcissism. You claim to be entitled to free speech and your own opinion, yet claim most people cannot use those entitlements responsibly. Who decides what is and isn't responsible use of free speech? You? People who think like you?

baq 4y ago
that's a good question. how do i know who speaks the truth? should i believe everything? should i believe nothing? should i vet everything i read on the internet myself? i have to delegate trust and if everyone can and will speak whatever they want - or worse, there are FSB troll farms purposefully injecting noise into any public free speech forum, i can't do that. noise floor raises so high the signal can't be filtered out anymore. what then? we declare 'free speech won' and go home victorious, but without a public forum like HN?
- TobyTheDog123 4y ago
  At the end of the day, it's your choice how you determine what's true, but I don't believe anyone has the right to tell you how to do that -- that the screening should happen between you and the content, not between the submitter and the platform -- kind of like XSS prevention (you must assume anything can get into the database, but all that matters is how it's executed by the end user). I'll give my personal opinion, which you may want to treat as one of many possible viewpoints: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWdD206eSv0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWdD206eSv0 https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/just-go-on-the-internet-and-tell-lies https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/just-go-on-the-internet-and-t... The internet has run on the concept of trust and reputation for a while now, but IMO, if you want anything close to the full story, you have to put in the work yourself: Compile your sources, evaluate your and their biases, and come to a conclusion. Ground News is a pretty neat tool to help me with this if it's a widely-reported story. Some examples: - Something from a reputable news source? Probably true, but not always. I try to wait for a decent handful of other, diverse outlets to report on it before believing it, sharing it, etc. - Something from a single account on Twitter on Hacker News? Probably not, but not always. I try to wait for other confirmations before believing it, sharing it, etc. I personally believe it to be a case where free speech wins, people raise the bar for what's worth their trust, and fake news begins to decline as a result -- the opposite being one where people lower their guard due to blind trust in other entities, and fake news can therefore take advantage of that and flourish.

baq 4y ago

that's a good question. how do i know who speaks the truth? should i believe everything? should i believe nothing? should i vet everything i read on the internet myself? i have to delegate trust and if everyone can and will speak whatever they want - or worse, there are FSB troll farms purposefully injecting noise into any public free speech forum, i can't do that. noise floor raises so high the signal can't be filtered out anymore. what then? we declare 'free speech won' and go home victorious, but without a public forum like HN?

TobyTheDog123 4y ago
At the end of the day, it's your choice how you determine what's true, but I don't believe anyone has the right to tell you how to do that -- that the screening should happen between you and the content, not between the submitter and the platform -- kind of like XSS prevention (you must assume anything can get into the database, but all that matters is how it's executed by the end user). I'll give my personal opinion, which you may want to treat as one of many possible viewpoints: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWdD206eSv0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWdD206eSv0 https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/just-go-on-the-internet-and-tell-lies https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/just-go-on-the-internet-and-t... The internet has run on the concept of trust and reputation for a while now, but IMO, if you want anything close to the full story, you have to put in the work yourself: Compile your sources, evaluate your and their biases, and come to a conclusion. Ground News is a pretty neat tool to help me with this if it's a widely-reported story. Some examples: - Something from a reputable news source? Probably true, but not always. I try to wait for a decent handful of other, diverse outlets to report on it before believing it, sharing it, etc. - Something from a single account on Twitter on Hacker News? Probably not, but not always. I try to wait for other confirmations before believing it, sharing it, etc. I personally believe it to be a case where free speech wins, people raise the bar for what's worth their trust, and fake news begins to decline as a result -- the opposite being one where people lower their guard due to blind trust in other entities, and fake news can therefore take advantage of that and flourish.