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Why does no social network try to take the HN route towards post ranking and moderation where bad posts simply get faded and eventually [dead] by user votes and

Why does no social network try to take the HN route towards post ranking and moderation where bad posts simply get faded and eventually [dead] by user votes and moderator flagging? HN's way of bestowing user privileges based on engagement and ensuring high quality of content is so awesome I earnestly wish all other social networks were like it. It incentivizes all the right things and prevents abuse so effortlessly with such a tiny team that it's remarkable.

sleepybrett 3y ago
because said social network would have 0 posts that are at all controversial.
organsnyder 3y ago
HN relies on a very engaged professional moderation team. I don't see how that could scale as large as the major social networks. Reddit has a similar approach, with varying degrees of success (often depending on the community and moderation team of the particular subreddit).
- wkat4242 3y ago
  It actually has only one: https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-silicon-valley/the-lonely-work-of-moderating-hacker-news https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-silicon-valley/th... Though one who does a stellar job and is amazingly helpful when you contact him. I think he's the main reason why this community still teaches me something new every day. I agree crowdsourcing reports like on HN won't work on more mainstream platforms though. Because it only works if the vast majority of the community is sane, helpful and caring. Unfortunately the cross-section of general society doesn't match that profile anymore. Speaking as a citizen of a country where 24% voted for right-wing extremists in the last election... :'( I'm pleasantly surprised HN is still so nice and inspiring to curiosity in this adverse societal climate.
  - dartharva 3y ago
    I don't understand how HN's community is distinct from the community on any other social network. This is a public site, and anyone can make an account and post whatever they want. You do see several attempted spam comments on many posts here, it's just that they rapidly get faded to obscurity.
    - wkat4242 3y ago
      > This is a public site, and anyone can make an account and post whatever they want. You do see several attempted spam comments on many posts here, it's just that they rapidly get faded to obscurity. Yes but in general it will attract the more thoughtful types especially because it doesn't have screaming in your face clickbait headlines and attention-seeking pictures. I think the format helps a lot. And also the policy: HN tends to favour uneditorialised headlines for example. The typical conspiracy theorist and anger adrenaline junkie will find nothing here to feed their desire to hate and even if they come across this site they'll roll their eyes at it and close it. They'll just go to fox news or gab. Even if that stuff wasn't downmodded here it would not incite them enough because it's not in big bold clickbaity headlines :)
soapdog 3y ago
Lemmy does it with ActivityPub. Reddit does it too.
threatofrain 3y ago
Stackoverflow does this and I imagine it’s why people don’t like being downvoted.
summerlight 3y ago
That needs colossal moderation efforts. Otherwise, trolls will simply game the system and eventually trump. And social networks usually have >1000x posts compared to HN with a considerably worse signal-to-noise ratio.
wang_li 3y ago
Because social media should support multiple points of view and not just a single aggregate pov. Why should a person who is interested in the political career of Gavin Newsom give a crap about the downvotes from Ben Shapiro listeners?

sleepybrett 3y ago

because said social network would have 0 posts that are at all controversial.

organsnyder 3y ago

HN relies on a very engaged professional moderation team. I don't see how that could scale as large as the major social networks. Reddit has a similar approach, with varying degrees of success (often depending on the community and moderation team of the particular subreddit).

wkat4242 3y ago
It actually has only one: https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-silicon-valley/the-lonely-work-of-moderating-hacker-news https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-silicon-valley/th... Though one who does a stellar job and is amazingly helpful when you contact him. I think he's the main reason why this community still teaches me something new every day. I agree crowdsourcing reports like on HN won't work on more mainstream platforms though. Because it only works if the vast majority of the community is sane, helpful and caring. Unfortunately the cross-section of general society doesn't match that profile anymore. Speaking as a citizen of a country where 24% voted for right-wing extremists in the last election... :'( I'm pleasantly surprised HN is still so nice and inspiring to curiosity in this adverse societal climate.
- dartharva 3y ago
  I don't understand how HN's community is distinct from the community on any other social network. This is a public site, and anyone can make an account and post whatever they want. You do see several attempted spam comments on many posts here, it's just that they rapidly get faded to obscurity.
  - wkat4242 3y ago
    > This is a public site, and anyone can make an account and post whatever they want. You do see several attempted spam comments on many posts here, it's just that they rapidly get faded to obscurity. Yes but in general it will attract the more thoughtful types especially because it doesn't have screaming in your face clickbait headlines and attention-seeking pictures. I think the format helps a lot. And also the policy: HN tends to favour uneditorialised headlines for example. The typical conspiracy theorist and anger adrenaline junkie will find nothing here to feed their desire to hate and even if they come across this site they'll roll their eyes at it and close it. They'll just go to fox news or gab. Even if that stuff wasn't downmodded here it would not incite them enough because it's not in big bold clickbaity headlines :)

soapdog 3y ago

Lemmy does it with ActivityPub. Reddit does it too.

threatofrain 3y ago

Stackoverflow does this and I imagine it’s why people don’t like being downvoted.

summerlight 3y ago

That needs colossal moderation efforts. Otherwise, trolls will simply game the system and eventually trump. And social networks usually have >1000x posts compared to HN with a considerably worse signal-to-noise ratio.

wang_li 3y ago

Because social media should support multiple points of view and not just a single aggregate pov. Why should a person who is interested in the political career of Gavin Newsom give a crap about the downvotes from Ben Shapiro listeners?