5 ms·

Yes, when I see articles I disagree with my first thought is that someone paid them to write it, and not that most people disagree with me and statistically mos

Yes, when I see articles I disagree with my first thought is that someone paid them to write it, and not that most people disagree with me and statistically most articles will be from that side.

sebzim4500 4y ago
Probably their thinking is that otherwise intelligent people are writing roughly the same complete nonsense all at roughly the same time. I'm a big believer in Hanlon's razor though.
throwaway0x7E6 4y ago
and you don't find it rather peculiar that the concentration of anti-crypto rhetoric has suddenly spiked about a year ago, and now there's a relentless assault from all opinion outlets? especially here on HN, where a few years ago it was all blockchain this, blockchain that, and you could have intelligent conversation about cryptocurrency without someone immediately clawing at your throat. and now we have bi-hourly 5-minute hate instead totally organic, yes?
- imustbeevil 4y ago
  > and you don't find it rather peculiar that the concentration of anti-crypto rhetoric has suddenly spiked about a year ago, and now there's a relentless assault from all opinion outlets? When the price goes up, people are happy and write happy articles. When the price goes down, people are sad and write sad articles. How that actually happens is that, the people writing the happy and sad articles are different groups of people who each wait for the price to do what they need it to justify their position. The price is down, so it justifies negative positions. When the price is up in ~3 years, there will be more people writing happy articles. When that happens I won't think they've all been paid to (even though it is obviously more likely that the group selling something has financial interest in promoting it).
  - throwaway0x7E6 4y ago
    when the price inevitably goes back up, the rhetoric will simply switch back to drug trade, child porn and climate change. the current state of the market contributes very little to the overall narrative. https://www.google.com/search?q=bitcoin+blockchain+child+porn https://www.google.com/search?q=bitcoin+blockchain+child+por...
    - imustbeevil 4y ago
      > the current state of the market contributes very little to the overall narrative. You're the one complaining about the last few months of increased negative articles. If you cannot see the connection between the frequency of negative articles and the price of Bitcoin, then I'm sorry but I don't know how to communicate in braille.
      - throwaway0x7E6 4y ago
        not a few months. a year or so, like I've explicitly said. the prices were past their mid-plague peak, but otherwise fine. and the dominating narrative up until the terra/luna/whatever crash a few months ago was climate change, not volatility. and besides, the OP blog post has nothing to do with the prices either.
        deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
- paulgb 4y ago
  The funny thing about media bias is that people assume it's dark forces conspiring about what information to feed the public, but the reality is that a stronger bias is simply “who is willing to show up to talk about it in an entertaining way”. There have traditionally been more of these on the pro-crypto side, because not many people devote time to talking about it unless they're getting paid, and there's not much money in being anti-crypto. There are some people (like me) who do it anyway, though, and TV bookers/publications have become better at finding us.

Yes, when I see articles I disagree with my first thought is that someone paid them to write it, and not that most people disagree with me and statistically most articles will be from that side.

sebzim4500 4y ago

Probably their thinking is that otherwise intelligent people are writing roughly the same complete nonsense all at roughly the same time. I'm a big believer in Hanlon's razor though.

throwaway0x7E6 4y ago

and you don't find it rather peculiar that the concentration of anti-crypto rhetoric has suddenly spiked about a year ago, and now there's a relentless assault from all opinion outlets? especially here on HN, where a few years ago it was all blockchain this, blockchain that, and you could have intelligent conversation about cryptocurrency without someone immediately clawing at your throat. and now we have bi-hourly 5-minute hate instead totally organic, yes?

imustbeevil 4y ago
> and you don't find it rather peculiar that the concentration of anti-crypto rhetoric has suddenly spiked about a year ago, and now there's a relentless assault from all opinion outlets? When the price goes up, people are happy and write happy articles. When the price goes down, people are sad and write sad articles. How that actually happens is that, the people writing the happy and sad articles are different groups of people who each wait for the price to do what they need it to justify their position. The price is down, so it justifies negative positions. When the price is up in ~3 years, there will be more people writing happy articles. When that happens I won't think they've all been paid to (even though it is obviously more likely that the group selling something has financial interest in promoting it).
- throwaway0x7E6 4y ago
  when the price inevitably goes back up, the rhetoric will simply switch back to drug trade, child porn and climate change. the current state of the market contributes very little to the overall narrative. https://www.google.com/search?q=bitcoin+blockchain+child+porn https://www.google.com/search?q=bitcoin+blockchain+child+por...
  - imustbeevil 4y ago
    > the current state of the market contributes very little to the overall narrative. You're the one complaining about the last few months of increased negative articles. If you cannot see the connection between the frequency of negative articles and the price of Bitcoin, then I'm sorry but I don't know how to communicate in braille.
    - throwaway0x7E6 4y ago
      not a few months. a year or so, like I've explicitly said. the prices were past their mid-plague peak, but otherwise fine. and the dominating narrative up until the terra/luna/whatever crash a few months ago was climate change, not volatility. and besides, the OP blog post has nothing to do with the prices either.
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
paulgb 4y ago
The funny thing about media bias is that people assume it's dark forces conspiring about what information to feed the public, but the reality is that a stronger bias is simply “who is willing to show up to talk about it in an entertaining way”. There have traditionally been more of these on the pro-crypto side, because not many people devote time to talking about it unless they're getting paid, and there's not much money in being anti-crypto. There are some people (like me) who do it anyway, though, and TV bookers/publications have become better at finding us.