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There are stories on this list that deserved to be seen, were popular, were important, and were not in fact dumpster fires in the comments - but a particular cr

There are stories on this list that deserved to be seen, were popular, were important, and were not in fact dumpster fires in the comments - but a particular crowd with a particular bias decided to flag them. Example 1: https://news.social-protocols.org/stats?id=39142094 https://news.social-protocols.org/stats?id=39142094 Example 2: https://news.social-protocols.org/stats?id=39130652 https://news.social-protocols.org/stats?id=39130652 Example 3: https://news.social-protocols.org/stats?id=39214844 https://news.social-protocols.org/stats?id=39214844 Does this crowd think it's cool and normal that all discussion of the ICJ's decision - truly momentous - were completely removed, based on the opinion of a dedicated minority? US tech giants are heavily implicated in this, so no one can seriously argue the topic isn't relevant. A World War could come from these "plausibly genocidal" actions, which are enabled in various ways by US tech giants.

fragmede 3y ago
There's a certain element that doesn't want to discuss politics at all, so I imagine these ran afoul of that crowd. This is a tech-oriented site, and we're not going to come up with a Middle East peace plan in the comments.
- mandmandam 3y ago
  > This is a tech-oriented site Exactly. Big tech has been staggeringly complicit in these oh-so documented war crimes. For example, AI is being used to 'target' people, even in refugee camps and residential areas; even when hundreds of civilian casualties are predicted. This has been admitted - even boasted about. As tech people, we can't just stick our heads in the sand and expect this not to come back on us. We're enabling this destruction in myriad ways, from funding to coercion to suppression of discussion [cough]. Genocide isn't just politics. We are legally bound as a nation, and morally obligated as humans, to prevent it. Instead, the US and many its tech companies are complicit. If we can't even discuss the ICJ ruling that this may well be in fact a genocide, even when people are behaving and upvoting without breaking guidelines, then imo something very important has been broken.
  - lukan 3y ago
    "We are legally bound as a nation" "We" ain't all americans. There are people here coming from opposing sides in various wars. And there are more wars and slaughtering going on, than in the middle east. And "we" are just tech people. Not better or worse by principle, which shows off very easily as there can be religious flame wars about software already. So it would be good, if we could debate all this in a nice way. But apparently we cannot. This is why many people want NO politics here at all. As there is usually nothing coming out of it, except more of the usual - and not interesting discussions.
    - mandmandam 3y ago
      > "We" ain't all americans. The vast majority of English speaking countries signed the Genocide Convention, if not all [0] > This is why many people want NO politics here at all. They're not a majority, far from it. And the rules don't say "NO politics"; that would be absurd. Tech and politics overlap often - as they do here. 0 - https://www.statista.com/chart/22194/countries-that-havent-ratified-the-genocide-convention/ https://www.statista.com/chart/22194/countries-that-havent-r...
      - lukan 3y ago
        The basic metric this site optimizes for is: "interesting discussion". So yes, sometimes there can be interesting discussion about political topics. But most of the times - not so much. And what you apparently want is activism, not discussion. Not to say your activism is bad - but this site is simply not made for activism of any kind. Activism is controversial. Which means flame war.
        mandmandam 3y ago
        > what you apparently want is activism, not discussion I'd call the flaggers colluding to spike stories with lively and non toxic discussions the 'activists'. > Activism is controversial. Which means flame war. So add a flame war tag, or a politics tag, and let people filter it. Filter it with AI. Grow a thicker skin, or expand your mind - there's a lot of options. Suppressing anything with a whiff of controversy doesn't result in positive outcomes. Besides; freedom of speech, and free exchange of ideas, are both decidedly in the "good hacker" wheelhouse.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
Symbiote 3y ago
None of the is on-topic for HN. The initial invasion was allowed due to the international significance, but to discuss subsequent events head to Reddit. This is in the FAQ linked in the footer. Something novel with drones or new medicine or similar will be on topic.
- mandmandam 3y ago
  The ICJ is the world's highest court, and genocide cases are very rare. Their verdict, without any question, has "international significance". It's by far the most significant development in months. From the submission guidelines: > On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. People here were clearly finding those stories interesting, as measured by upvotes and comments. > If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic. US mainstream TV mostly declined to air South Africa's side of the case, as well as the actual verdict; opting instead to only air Israel's defense. > Something novel with drones or new medicine or similar will be on topic. "Something with drones" = on topic, but a plausible genocide verdict from the ICJ is not of "international significance" and therefore off topic... This isn't computing for me, sorry.
  - boomboomsubban 3y ago
    >ICJ is the world's highest court, and genocide cases are very rare. Their verdict, without any question, has "international significance". It's by far the most significant development in months The verdict had a thread with over fifteen hundred comments and was on the front page most of the day. Others were presumably down ranked as they were dupes. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39143043 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39143043
    - mandmandam 3y ago
      The linked deleted thread was 90 minutes older than the thread that 'survived'. Also, it was removed within a minute of hitting the front page (if I'm reading the graphs right). Doesn't quite line up with your presumption. Any theories on why the Guardian's visual exploration of Gaza's destruction was flagged, despite positive upvotes and comments? Besides - the point is this: Not all the stories that are in OP's list are spam, or unsuitable. Some topics hit a third rail. They are easily removed by a small group of users, and then Daniel can come by months later and say, well, users flagged it [ie, 0]. It even happens to PG [1]. This isn't ideal, and pretending it isn't happening is uncool. I'm not saying Dang doesn't do a great job. But there are some topics that are verboten, despite their impact/relevance on the tech community and our general interest. And this particular topic is too important to allow for such narrative control by a tiny group of flaggers. 0 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38311933 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38311933 1 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38144931 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38144931
LordDragonfang 3y ago
While those stories may be important, they are all off-topic for Hacker News. This is not a general news/discussion site, and there are other places on the internet to discuss those things. HN is explicitly set up to discourage stories which would incur flame-war-like political arguments. Per the guidelines: >What to Submit >On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity. >Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, or celebrities, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon [...] If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic. The latter two stories are not new phenomenon (the war has been ongoing), and the former, literally being a decision by a political body, falls squarely under "politics", and is highly likely to lead to nonproductive flamewars.
bell-cot 3y ago
There are important differences between (1) These stories feel incredibly important to me now! -and- (2) Complete strangers, all over the internet, and with no official duties or obligations regarding the subjects of these stories, should be required to pay attention to them! The first one is fine. The second one suggests a somewhat immature worldview, or limited social skills.
- dang 3y ago
  Your comment was fine until the end, but that last sentence crosses into personal attack. Please don't do that—it just makes everything worse, and you can make your substantive points without it. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
devjab 3y ago
I don’t think these things, or even a lot or the other political topics are uninteresting. I’ll often still flag them, however, since I’m really very uninterested in what the HN crowd who responds to these sort of things have to say about it. Part of this is because I’m European, and the whole “red vs blue” team sort or politics a lot of Americans seem to do these days is just silly, and often hateful. But part of it is also that we’re a bunch of people who know tech and business, but not international politics. I guess I could just ignore them, but I’d frankly rather they were kept to other places on the internet.
dang 3y ago
> all discussion of the ICJ's decision - truly momentous - were completely removed HN had an enormous thread about the ICJ decision: ICJ orders Israel to prevent genocide in Gaza, stops short of ordering ceasefire - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39143043 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39143043 - Jan 2024 (1397 comments) The question here isn't whether the topic has been suppressed; it's how much of it HN can handle. We're willing to turn off flags from time to time, but HN is not designed for frequent repetition, especially of flamewar topics—it's designed for the opposite. That makes the question of how to handle a Major Ongoing Topic (MOT) a tricky one. HN has a reasonably well-defined approach to this, which has been stable for many years: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20major%20ongoing%20topic&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que... https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=%22significant%20new%20information%22%20by%3Adang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...
- mandmandam 3y ago
  I addressed the big ICJ thread below. The suppressed threads were posted much earlier, and showed clear signs of being flagged as soon as they were visible. Which is the point - a small crowd of partisans can flag third rail topics here, no matter how much interest or how much positive discussion is happening. I remember, in particular, the time all the posts about a lead torturer from Abu Ghraib were suppressed. Although she destroyed Congressional evidence, she was promoted to a top position at at a top tech hirer. We should be able to talk about things like that. Your response then was the same as now; to deflect responsibility to 'users'. I don't buy it. The same happened with Annie Altman's claims about her brother. The same has happened with quite a few Zionism related threads, recently and historically. For example: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37953737 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37953737, which clearly is squarely in our domain. There is room for improvement here. A minority of strongly biased participants, on any issue, shouldn't be able to completely disappear whole sides of the story, as has been happening.

fragmede 3y ago

There's a certain element that doesn't want to discuss politics at all, so I imagine these ran afoul of that crowd. This is a tech-oriented site, and we're not going to come up with a Middle East peace plan in the comments.

mandmandam 3y ago
> This is a tech-oriented site Exactly. Big tech has been staggeringly complicit in these oh-so documented war crimes. For example, AI is being used to 'target' people, even in refugee camps and residential areas; even when hundreds of civilian casualties are predicted. This has been admitted - even boasted about. As tech people, we can't just stick our heads in the sand and expect this not to come back on us. We're enabling this destruction in myriad ways, from funding to coercion to suppression of discussion [cough]. Genocide isn't just politics. We are legally bound as a nation, and morally obligated as humans, to prevent it. Instead, the US and many its tech companies are complicit. If we can't even discuss the ICJ ruling that this may well be in fact a genocide, even when people are behaving and upvoting without breaking guidelines, then imo something very important has been broken.
- lukan 3y ago
  "We are legally bound as a nation" "We" ain't all americans. There are people here coming from opposing sides in various wars. And there are more wars and slaughtering going on, than in the middle east. And "we" are just tech people. Not better or worse by principle, which shows off very easily as there can be religious flame wars about software already. So it would be good, if we could debate all this in a nice way. But apparently we cannot. This is why many people want NO politics here at all. As there is usually nothing coming out of it, except more of the usual - and not interesting discussions.
  - mandmandam 3y ago
    > "We" ain't all americans. The vast majority of English speaking countries signed the Genocide Convention, if not all [0] > This is why many people want NO politics here at all. They're not a majority, far from it. And the rules don't say "NO politics"; that would be absurd. Tech and politics overlap often - as they do here. 0 - https://www.statista.com/chart/22194/countries-that-havent-ratified-the-genocide-convention/ https://www.statista.com/chart/22194/countries-that-havent-r...
    - lukan 3y ago
      The basic metric this site optimizes for is: "interesting discussion". So yes, sometimes there can be interesting discussion about political topics. But most of the times - not so much. And what you apparently want is activism, not discussion. Not to say your activism is bad - but this site is simply not made for activism of any kind. Activism is controversial. Which means flame war.
      - mandmandam 3y ago
        > what you apparently want is activism, not discussion I'd call the flaggers colluding to spike stories with lively and non toxic discussions the 'activists'. > Activism is controversial. Which means flame war. So add a flame war tag, or a politics tag, and let people filter it. Filter it with AI. Grow a thicker skin, or expand your mind - there's a lot of options. Suppressing anything with a whiff of controversy doesn't result in positive outcomes. Besides; freedom of speech, and free exchange of ideas, are both decidedly in the "good hacker" wheelhouse.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

Symbiote 3y ago

None of the is on-topic for HN. The initial invasion was allowed due to the international significance, but to discuss subsequent events head to Reddit. This is in the FAQ linked in the footer. Something novel with drones or new medicine or similar will be on topic.

mandmandam 3y ago
The ICJ is the world's highest court, and genocide cases are very rare. Their verdict, without any question, has "international significance". It's by far the most significant development in months. From the submission guidelines: > On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. People here were clearly finding those stories interesting, as measured by upvotes and comments. > If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic. US mainstream TV mostly declined to air South Africa's side of the case, as well as the actual verdict; opting instead to only air Israel's defense. > Something novel with drones or new medicine or similar will be on topic. "Something with drones" = on topic, but a plausible genocide verdict from the ICJ is not of "international significance" and therefore off topic... This isn't computing for me, sorry.
- boomboomsubban 3y ago
  >ICJ is the world's highest court, and genocide cases are very rare. Their verdict, without any question, has "international significance". It's by far the most significant development in months The verdict had a thread with over fifteen hundred comments and was on the front page most of the day. Others were presumably down ranked as they were dupes. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39143043 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39143043
  - mandmandam 3y ago
    The linked deleted thread was 90 minutes older than the thread that 'survived'. Also, it was removed within a minute of hitting the front page (if I'm reading the graphs right). Doesn't quite line up with your presumption. Any theories on why the Guardian's visual exploration of Gaza's destruction was flagged, despite positive upvotes and comments? Besides - the point is this: Not all the stories that are in OP's list are spam, or unsuitable. Some topics hit a third rail. They are easily removed by a small group of users, and then Daniel can come by months later and say, well, users flagged it [ie, 0]. It even happens to PG [1]. This isn't ideal, and pretending it isn't happening is uncool. I'm not saying Dang doesn't do a great job. But there are some topics that are verboten, despite their impact/relevance on the tech community and our general interest. And this particular topic is too important to allow for such narrative control by a tiny group of flaggers. 0 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38311933 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38311933 1 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38144931 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38144931

LordDragonfang 3y ago

While those stories may be important, they are all off-topic for Hacker News. This is not a general news/discussion site, and there are other places on the internet to discuss those things. HN is explicitly set up to discourage stories which would incur flame-war-like political arguments. Per the guidelines: >What to Submit >On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity. >Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, or celebrities, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon [...] If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic. The latter two stories are not new phenomenon (the war has been ongoing), and the former, literally being a decision by a political body, falls squarely under "politics", and is highly likely to lead to nonproductive flamewars.

bell-cot 3y ago

There are important differences between (1) These stories feel incredibly important to me now! -and- (2) Complete strangers, all over the internet, and with no official duties or obligations regarding the subjects of these stories, should be required to pay attention to them! The first one is fine. The second one suggests a somewhat immature worldview, or limited social skills.

dang 3y ago
Your comment was fine until the end, but that last sentence crosses into personal attack. Please don't do that—it just makes everything worse, and you can make your substantive points without it. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

devjab 3y ago

I don’t think these things, or even a lot or the other political topics are uninteresting. I’ll often still flag them, however, since I’m really very uninterested in what the HN crowd who responds to these sort of things have to say about it. Part of this is because I’m European, and the whole “red vs blue” team sort or politics a lot of Americans seem to do these days is just silly, and often hateful. But part of it is also that we’re a bunch of people who know tech and business, but not international politics. I guess I could just ignore them, but I’d frankly rather they were kept to other places on the internet.

dang 3y ago

> all discussion of the ICJ's decision - truly momentous - were completely removed HN had an enormous thread about the ICJ decision: ICJ orders Israel to prevent genocide in Gaza, stops short of ordering ceasefire - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39143043 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39143043 - Jan 2024 (1397 comments) The question here isn't whether the topic has been suppressed; it's how much of it HN can handle. We're willing to turn off flags from time to time, but HN is not designed for frequent repetition, especially of flamewar topics—it's designed for the opposite. That makes the question of how to handle a Major Ongoing Topic (MOT) a tricky one. HN has a reasonably well-defined approach to this, which has been stable for many years: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20major%20ongoing%20topic&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que... https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=%22significant%20new%20information%22%20by%3Adang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...

mandmandam 3y ago
I addressed the big ICJ thread below. The suppressed threads were posted much earlier, and showed clear signs of being flagged as soon as they were visible. Which is the point - a small crowd of partisans can flag third rail topics here, no matter how much interest or how much positive discussion is happening. I remember, in particular, the time all the posts about a lead torturer from Abu Ghraib were suppressed. Although she destroyed Congressional evidence, she was promoted to a top position at at a top tech hirer. We should be able to talk about things like that. Your response then was the same as now; to deflect responsibility to 'users'. I don't buy it. The same happened with Annie Altman's claims about her brother. The same has happened with quite a few Zionism related threads, recently and historically. For example: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37953737 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37953737, which clearly is squarely in our domain. There is room for improvement here. A minority of strongly biased participants, on any issue, shouldn't be able to completely disappear whole sides of the story, as has been happening.