5 ms·

I'm sure it's a win for Meta (less responsibility, less expense, potentially less criticism, potentially more ad dollars), but certainly a loss for users. More

I'm sure it's a win for Meta (less responsibility, less expense, potentially less criticism, potentially more ad dollars), but certainly a loss for users. More glad than ever that I deleted my FB account 10 years ago, and Twitter once it went X.

skillpass 2y ago
Why is it “certainly a loss for users”? Many are likely to enjoy the ability to post without censorship on topics they care about.
- insane_dreamer 2y ago
  Fact-checking and censorship are two very different things.
  - pessimizer 2y ago
    Deleting isn't fact-checking. Whereas "community noting" actually can make a case for being fact-checking.
    - insane_dreamer 2y ago
      Fact checkers weren't deleting posts and didn't even have the right to do so. They are separate journalistic orgs tagging posts. Deleting is done by Meta moderators, which is something else entirely. I think you also just proved my point that if HN users can't even get basic facts about an event right, how do you expect the average FB user to do so? Goes to show that even on HN "community noting" would be a disaster.
  - efdee 2y ago
    Indeed. This was more censorship than fact-checking.
  - quantadev 2y ago
    The problem with "fact-checking" is that if it's done by humans at all then it will be heavily biased. With Silicon-Valley people being in charge of "fact-checking" for the past decade there's been countless examples of them doing mass cancellations calling things lies that we all know ended up being true.
    - insane_dreamer 2y ago
      > countless examples of them doing mass cancellations calling things lies that we all know ended up being true really? like what, exactly? please give concrete examples or this is just hot air
      - oguz-ismail 2y ago
        peaceful protests?
        quantadev 2y ago
        [flagged]
      - wyager 2y ago
        https://www.reuters.com/world/us/republican-led-us-house-panel-probes-twitter-block-hunter-biden-story-2023-02-08/ https://www.reuters.com/world/us/republican-led-us-house-pan... There was a long period where people were getting banned from Twitter and Meta platforms for posting (true) claims about the Hunter Biden laptop story (which was, of course, extremely politically consequential)
        kiitos 2y ago
        https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/oct/12/x-twitter-jd-vance-leaked-file https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/oct/12/x-twitter-jd...
        insane_dreamer 2y ago
        Is that your example? It's not a very good one. If you read the article you linked to, you find that 1) Twitter blocked tweets about the WP story, not banned users, and 2) they reversed that decision and unblocked the tweets 24 hours later as they realized their mistake.
  - steveoscaro 2y ago
    That sounds like a line from the CCP.
- intended 2y ago
  I’ve seen this happen before. Back in the good ole days of the libertarian internet. You had subreddits which had zero moderation, because again “the best ideas succeed”. Those places got filled with the hate speech, vitriol, harassment, stalking and toxicity. Minorities and women left, because they were basically hunted. Logical arguments dont work, because hate, harassment and anger are emotionally driven behaviors. This creates the toxic water cooler effect. The fact that its ok to say horrible things, attracts more people who are happy to say those things. You lose diversity of arguments, view points and chances to challenge ideas. You increase radicalization, dramatically speed up the sharing and conversion of anger into action. Eventually, the subs brought in moderation. As did every social media platform in existence. The people who didn’t like it, created their own spaces. Which didn’t do well. Because those positions and spaces are NOT popular. Facing this fact, they are now turning to shut off opposition and moderation, because that is necessary to keep the ball going. This isn’t even opinion, this is the history of the past 30 years. It’s not even that old! I really do hope this time its different. Genuinely, I said it when the new communities were created. I meant it then, I mean it now. Moderation is fucking toxic and unhealthy. I rejoined moderation recently, and in the first 10 frikking items, I had to see a dead baby pic from an un covered ethnic war zone. I really want this to succeed, and want it to be good for users. I am hoping it is. But experience is clear - making space for hurtful speech, results in more hurtful speech and people just leaving to places where they dont have to be harassed. Blue sky should probably see a jump in users over time this year.
coffeemug 2y ago
My twitter account wasn't big, but it was non-trivial (~30K followers). A post could usually get me to experts on most topics, find people to hang out with in most countries, etc. There were many benefits, so deleting was very hard. But it was eating my brain. I found myself mostly having tweet-shaped thoughts, there was an irresistible compulsion to check mentions 100 times a day, I somehow felt excluded from all the "cool" parts which was making me miserable. But most importantly, I was completely audience captured. To continue growing the account I had to post more and more ridiculous things. Saying reasonable things doesn't get you anywhere on Twitter, so my brain was slowly trained to have, honestly, dumb thoughts to please the algorithm. It also did something to attention. Reading a book cover to cover became impossible. There came a point when I decided I just don't want this anymore, but signing out didn't work-- it would always pull me back in. So I deleted my account. I can read books again and think again; it's plainly obvious to me now that I was very, very addicted. Multiply this by millions of people, and it feels like a catastrophe. I think this stuff is probably very bad for the world, and it's almost certainly very bad for _you_. For anyone thinking about deleting social media accounts, I very strongly encourage you to do it. Have you been able to get consumed by a book in the past few years? And if not, is this _really_ the version of yourself you really want?
- HorseOfCourse 2y ago
  I have a policy of not following anyone with a large number of followers, as they are generally not worth listening to I've found. Anyway I'll probably delete my twitter, haven't used it in a long time.
- Karrot_Kream 2y ago
  Like alcohol and drugs, I think there's a certain kind of person that's susceptible to social media addiction. I don't think it's a large segment of the population but I also have no idea how big it is either. Plenty of people can drink or consume weed in moderation. Likewise I know a lot of people who mostly use socials in the bathroom or before bed but rarely elsewhere.
  - coffeemug 2y ago
avs733 2y ago
> More glad than ever that I deleted my FB account 10 years ago I hung on to facebook largely because marketplace makes parenting markedtly cheaper. I've used it less and less to the point I forget about it. This finally inspired me to full delete the account.

skillpass 2y ago

Why is it “certainly a loss for users”? Many are likely to enjoy the ability to post without censorship on topics they care about.

insane_dreamer 2y ago
Fact-checking and censorship are two very different things.
- pessimizer 2y ago
  Deleting isn't fact-checking. Whereas "community noting" actually can make a case for being fact-checking.
  - insane_dreamer 2y ago
    Fact checkers weren't deleting posts and didn't even have the right to do so. They are separate journalistic orgs tagging posts. Deleting is done by Meta moderators, which is something else entirely. I think you also just proved my point that if HN users can't even get basic facts about an event right, how do you expect the average FB user to do so? Goes to show that even on HN "community noting" would be a disaster.
- efdee 2y ago
  Indeed. This was more censorship than fact-checking.
- quantadev 2y ago
  The problem with "fact-checking" is that if it's done by humans at all then it will be heavily biased. With Silicon-Valley people being in charge of "fact-checking" for the past decade there's been countless examples of them doing mass cancellations calling things lies that we all know ended up being true.
  - insane_dreamer 2y ago
    > countless examples of them doing mass cancellations calling things lies that we all know ended up being true really? like what, exactly? please give concrete examples or this is just hot air
    - oguz-ismail 2y ago
      peaceful protests?
      - quantadev 2y ago
        [flagged]
    - wyager 2y ago
      https://www.reuters.com/world/us/republican-led-us-house-panel-probes-twitter-block-hunter-biden-story-2023-02-08/ https://www.reuters.com/world/us/republican-led-us-house-pan... There was a long period where people were getting banned from Twitter and Meta platforms for posting (true) claims about the Hunter Biden laptop story (which was, of course, extremely politically consequential)
      - kiitos 2y ago
        https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/oct/12/x-twitter-jd-vance-leaked-file https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/oct/12/x-twitter-jd...
      - insane_dreamer 2y ago
        Is that your example? It's not a very good one. If you read the article you linked to, you find that 1) Twitter blocked tweets about the WP story, not banned users, and 2) they reversed that decision and unblocked the tweets 24 hours later as they realized their mistake.
- steveoscaro 2y ago
  That sounds like a line from the CCP.
intended 2y ago
I’ve seen this happen before. Back in the good ole days of the libertarian internet. You had subreddits which had zero moderation, because again “the best ideas succeed”. Those places got filled with the hate speech, vitriol, harassment, stalking and toxicity. Minorities and women left, because they were basically hunted. Logical arguments dont work, because hate, harassment and anger are emotionally driven behaviors. This creates the toxic water cooler effect. The fact that its ok to say horrible things, attracts more people who are happy to say those things. You lose diversity of arguments, view points and chances to challenge ideas. You increase radicalization, dramatically speed up the sharing and conversion of anger into action. Eventually, the subs brought in moderation. As did every social media platform in existence. The people who didn’t like it, created their own spaces. Which didn’t do well. Because those positions and spaces are NOT popular. Facing this fact, they are now turning to shut off opposition and moderation, because that is necessary to keep the ball going. This isn’t even opinion, this is the history of the past 30 years. It’s not even that old! I really do hope this time its different. Genuinely, I said it when the new communities were created. I meant it then, I mean it now. Moderation is fucking toxic and unhealthy. I rejoined moderation recently, and in the first 10 frikking items, I had to see a dead baby pic from an un covered ethnic war zone. I really want this to succeed, and want it to be good for users. I am hoping it is. But experience is clear - making space for hurtful speech, results in more hurtful speech and people just leaving to places where they dont have to be harassed. Blue sky should probably see a jump in users over time this year.

coffeemug 2y ago

My twitter account wasn't big, but it was non-trivial (~30K followers). A post could usually get me to experts on most topics, find people to hang out with in most countries, etc. There were many benefits, so deleting was very hard. But it was eating my brain. I found myself mostly having tweet-shaped thoughts, there was an irresistible compulsion to check mentions 100 times a day, I somehow felt excluded from all the "cool" parts which was making me miserable. But most importantly, I was completely audience captured. To continue growing the account I had to post more and more ridiculous things. Saying reasonable things doesn't get you anywhere on Twitter, so my brain was slowly trained to have, honestly, dumb thoughts to please the algorithm. It also did something to attention. Reading a book cover to cover became impossible. There came a point when I decided I just don't want this anymore, but signing out didn't work-- it would always pull me back in. So I deleted my account. I can read books again and think again; it's plainly obvious to me now that I was very, very addicted. Multiply this by millions of people, and it feels like a catastrophe. I think this stuff is probably very bad for the world, and it's almost certainly very bad for _you_. For anyone thinking about deleting social media accounts, I very strongly encourage you to do it. Have you been able to get consumed by a book in the past few years? And if not, is this _really_ the version of yourself you really want?

HorseOfCourse 2y ago
I have a policy of not following anyone with a large number of followers, as they are generally not worth listening to I've found. Anyway I'll probably delete my twitter, haven't used it in a long time.
Karrot_Kream 2y ago
Like alcohol and drugs, I think there's a certain kind of person that's susceptible to social media addiction. I don't think it's a large segment of the population but I also have no idea how big it is either. Plenty of people can drink or consume weed in moderation. Likewise I know a lot of people who mostly use socials in the bathroom or before bed but rarely elsewhere.
- coffeemug 2y ago

avs733 2y ago

> More glad than ever that I deleted my FB account 10 years ago I hung on to facebook largely because marketplace makes parenting markedtly cheaper. I've used it less and less to the point I forget about it. This finally inspired me to full delete the account.