6 ms·

> Most of the time, and only if you have show dead enabled, you will see that dead comments are that way for a reason. They are low quality, nonsense bots, etc.

> Most of the time, and only if you have show dead enabled, you will see that dead comments are that way for a reason. They are low quality, nonsense bots, etc. Very, very rarely do I see a dead comment that represents some well thought counter argument. Unless, of course, the topic at hand happens to be a hot issue in the US. At which point anything outside the established narratives (the propaganda) bites the dust almost immediately.

throwawaylinux 4y ago
Yeah this is true. Your comment is probably upsetting to people so it can be said in a more feelings-friendly way - "controversy" is mostly frowned upon here, but with more leeway for hard science and technology. For example I have posted and debated a little about my counter-narrative opinions on "the covid response" here before and had them stay and even gather the occasional upvote, to their credit. But it is also extremely easy to get moderated when walking that line, and likely highly dependent on whether or not the users participating or reading the comments become upset by what they see. This is not just a case of covid in general being an off topic or controversial issue, because you could post until the cows come home about the Covid response if you were cheerleading and parroting the schizophrenic and ever-changing position of western governments and media. I give them credit at least, I think what they have is better than a lot of places for such debate. You just have to know your place and be extremely careful and polite and factual when you deviate, and you have to be prepared at some point the conversation will be shut down if it is upsetting and angering other users. I also like that deleted comments can be made visible, another really good transparent part about the moderation. I do agree there is a lot of junk, but it's nice to see what's verboten. I assume posts can be nuked entirely with no trace , I give the benefit of the doubt and hope that's used sparingly.
- beebeepka 4y ago
  Oh, the site is much better than anything else I am aware of. I spent years looking for something like it before joining. My biggest issue is the unavoidable US centrism. Again, much better than what's out there, but it's absolutely real. Real talk gets stuck down immediately for being inflammatory
  - telis 4y ago
    I came from Digg…
  - tptacek 4y ago
    The site is roughly 50% not-American.
  - lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
    > Real talk gets stuck down immediately for being inflammatory I've noticed that I have to shy away from certain ways of expression when I say things critical of a US-positive narrative. I have to avoid "real talk" as it were. It's kinda frustrating because that's how I prefer to speak but I can also see a difference in the discussion that ensues. I feel you though. It can be pretty tough when you say something genuinely concerning, which people don't like thinking about, only to have it dismissed with the downvote button. Still, oftentimes such things gain more points while I'm sleeping and seemingly people in other parts of the world view my comments (which I think is kinda telling; it's what it is).
    - smoyer 4y ago
      I'm a US American ... If we deserve your criticism I'm probably going to agree with you (though I might not like it). At this point, we (the US) need to step up our game in a lot of ways.
      - lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
        I've seen strong counter-arguments to the things I bring up, for what it's worth. The kind of thing which I might disagree with but understand. If nothing else, it helps me remember that it's worth looking for the nuance on controversial topics and that many points of view often make a lot of assumptions. It's common that such topics are controversial for a reason. (For context, I am a born US citizen.)
      - xupybd 4y ago
        My main gripe with the US it the abuse of the word football. The ball is no longer a ball shape and you no longer move it around with your feet.
canjobear 4y ago
Can you be more specific about the views that are buried? My experience is that HN has a wider range of views than any other forum I go to regularly.
- beebeepka 4y ago
  Criticism of US "foreign policy", for example. Fair whatabotism is not allowed to breathe at all.
  - dang 4y ago
    If it helps at all, "whataboutism" is of the epithets we ask people not to throw at each other here. https://hn.algolia.com/?query=whataboutism%20by:dang&dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?query=whataboutism%20by:dang&dateRan...
    - beebeepka 4y ago
      It doesn't. I am aware it's undesired. Very convenient
      - dang 4y ago
        It looks like both you and implements took my comment as the opposite of what I actually meant, which must mean I didn't express it very clearly (although it should be clear from the past explanations I linked to). What I'm saying is that accusations of "whataboutism" are the sort of canned argument we want to avoid on HN, as well as an internet trope (which we also want to avoid), a shallow dismissal (which the site guidelines ask to avoid) and a form of name-calling (ditto). It's also a logical fallacy, since pointing out a contradiction via a comparable situation is a reasonable thing to do. No doubt people do sometimes bring up comparable situations in unhelpful, irrelevant ways, but if so, it needs to be explained how—not met with a lazy label like "whataboutism", which is a blanket that smothers a good argument just as well as a bad one.
        4y ago
dang 4y ago
It might be interesting to see some examples of dead comments that are thoughtful, substantive, and within the site guidelines. Usually when people post things that they know are against the majority view, they compensate by adding extra invective or vitriol into their post. Then the post gets flagged or moderated, but because of the invective/vitriol, not because it's a minority/contrarian view. It's not easy to find a way out of this dynamic but I think it's the most common case. Past explanations about this: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=by%3Adang%20contrarian%20view&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
- tinus_hn 4y ago
  Most of the time an opinion contradicting the hive mind will end up at 0, -1, -2, for instance controversies as ‘Elon Musk is just a businessman trying to run businesses’ or ‘Not all inconveniences in tech can directly be blamed on Steve Jobs’. But with topics where there is a media and government wide push against ‘desinformation’ like during COVID, a statement like ‘two weeks to stop the spread doesn’t work’ or ‘the vaccines will not end the pandemic’ the hivemind medical science parrots will very swiftly act to kill and bury this dissent under the proscribed talking points. And yes, that is frustrating and causes crass reactions. Especially the pandemic really has opened my eyes to a very significant weakness in our society, media, governance and scientific institutions and in the general common sense of the population and its willingness to be manipulated. And it reflects in this site. And it’s not limited to COVID, there are many topics that are just untouchable like most of Woke. That is not a criticism of the moderation team, it’s on the people who vote on comments and I don’t have a solution either. Personally I just don’t care about the points and try to remain reasonably distant to avoid becoming toxic.
- zamadatix 4y ago
  In the same vein it'd be interesting to see examples of extremely unpopular viewpoints that were well upvoted because of the same reasons. I don't know which of the two I'd expect to be rarer, and I suppose that's probably part of why things fall into that end state dynamic so easily. Just like the dynamic I'm not sure there is an easy way out.
- 4y ago
trasz3 4y ago
Remember that HN is first of all a marketing tool for YC. It would be silly for them to allow views that are too inconvenient to their (actual and potential) business partners. And those partners are predominantly from USA.

throwawaylinux 4y ago

Yeah this is true. Your comment is probably upsetting to people so it can be said in a more feelings-friendly way - "controversy" is mostly frowned upon here, but with more leeway for hard science and technology. For example I have posted and debated a little about my counter-narrative opinions on "the covid response" here before and had them stay and even gather the occasional upvote, to their credit. But it is also extremely easy to get moderated when walking that line, and likely highly dependent on whether or not the users participating or reading the comments become upset by what they see. This is not just a case of covid in general being an off topic or controversial issue, because you could post until the cows come home about the Covid response if you were cheerleading and parroting the schizophrenic and ever-changing position of western governments and media. I give them credit at least, I think what they have is better than a lot of places for such debate. You just have to know your place and be extremely careful and polite and factual when you deviate, and you have to be prepared at some point the conversation will be shut down if it is upsetting and angering other users. I also like that deleted comments can be made visible, another really good transparent part about the moderation. I do agree there is a lot of junk, but it's nice to see what's verboten. I assume posts can be nuked entirely with no trace , I give the benefit of the doubt and hope that's used sparingly.

beebeepka 4y ago
Oh, the site is much better than anything else I am aware of. I spent years looking for something like it before joining. My biggest issue is the unavoidable US centrism. Again, much better than what's out there, but it's absolutely real. Real talk gets stuck down immediately for being inflammatory
- telis 4y ago
  I came from Digg…
- tptacek 4y ago
  The site is roughly 50% not-American.
- lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
  > Real talk gets stuck down immediately for being inflammatory I've noticed that I have to shy away from certain ways of expression when I say things critical of a US-positive narrative. I have to avoid "real talk" as it were. It's kinda frustrating because that's how I prefer to speak but I can also see a difference in the discussion that ensues. I feel you though. It can be pretty tough when you say something genuinely concerning, which people don't like thinking about, only to have it dismissed with the downvote button. Still, oftentimes such things gain more points while I'm sleeping and seemingly people in other parts of the world view my comments (which I think is kinda telling; it's what it is).
  - smoyer 4y ago
    I'm a US American ... If we deserve your criticism I'm probably going to agree with you (though I might not like it). At this point, we (the US) need to step up our game in a lot of ways.
    - lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
      I've seen strong counter-arguments to the things I bring up, for what it's worth. The kind of thing which I might disagree with but understand. If nothing else, it helps me remember that it's worth looking for the nuance on controversial topics and that many points of view often make a lot of assumptions. It's common that such topics are controversial for a reason. (For context, I am a born US citizen.)
    - xupybd 4y ago
      My main gripe with the US it the abuse of the word football. The ball is no longer a ball shape and you no longer move it around with your feet.

canjobear 4y ago

Can you be more specific about the views that are buried? My experience is that HN has a wider range of views than any other forum I go to regularly.

beebeepka 4y ago
Criticism of US "foreign policy", for example. Fair whatabotism is not allowed to breathe at all.
- dang 4y ago
  If it helps at all, "whataboutism" is of the epithets we ask people not to throw at each other here. https://hn.algolia.com/?query=whataboutism%20by:dang&dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?query=whataboutism%20by:dang&dateRan...
  - beebeepka 4y ago
    It doesn't. I am aware it's undesired. Very convenient
    - dang 4y ago
      It looks like both you and implements took my comment as the opposite of what I actually meant, which must mean I didn't express it very clearly (although it should be clear from the past explanations I linked to). What I'm saying is that accusations of "whataboutism" are the sort of canned argument we want to avoid on HN, as well as an internet trope (which we also want to avoid), a shallow dismissal (which the site guidelines ask to avoid) and a form of name-calling (ditto). It's also a logical fallacy, since pointing out a contradiction via a comparable situation is a reasonable thing to do. No doubt people do sometimes bring up comparable situations in unhelpful, irrelevant ways, but if so, it needs to be explained how—not met with a lazy label like "whataboutism", which is a blanket that smothers a good argument just as well as a bad one.
      - 4y ago

dang 4y ago

It might be interesting to see some examples of dead comments that are thoughtful, substantive, and within the site guidelines. Usually when people post things that they know are against the majority view, they compensate by adding extra invective or vitriol into their post. Then the post gets flagged or moderated, but because of the invective/vitriol, not because it's a minority/contrarian view. It's not easy to find a way out of this dynamic but I think it's the most common case. Past explanations about this: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=by%3Adang%20contrarian%20view&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...

tinus_hn 4y ago
Most of the time an opinion contradicting the hive mind will end up at 0, -1, -2, for instance controversies as ‘Elon Musk is just a businessman trying to run businesses’ or ‘Not all inconveniences in tech can directly be blamed on Steve Jobs’. But with topics where there is a media and government wide push against ‘desinformation’ like during COVID, a statement like ‘two weeks to stop the spread doesn’t work’ or ‘the vaccines will not end the pandemic’ the hivemind medical science parrots will very swiftly act to kill and bury this dissent under the proscribed talking points. And yes, that is frustrating and causes crass reactions. Especially the pandemic really has opened my eyes to a very significant weakness in our society, media, governance and scientific institutions and in the general common sense of the population and its willingness to be manipulated. And it reflects in this site. And it’s not limited to COVID, there are many topics that are just untouchable like most of Woke. That is not a criticism of the moderation team, it’s on the people who vote on comments and I don’t have a solution either. Personally I just don’t care about the points and try to remain reasonably distant to avoid becoming toxic.
zamadatix 4y ago
In the same vein it'd be interesting to see examples of extremely unpopular viewpoints that were well upvoted because of the same reasons. I don't know which of the two I'd expect to be rarer, and I suppose that's probably part of why things fall into that end state dynamic so easily. Just like the dynamic I'm not sure there is an easy way out.
4y ago

trasz3 4y ago

Remember that HN is first of all a marketing tool for YC. It would be silly for them to allow views that are too inconvenient to their (actual and potential) business partners. And those partners are predominantly from USA.