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"Although you don't see those threads, search engines do. HN uniquely has a high page rank and low moderation, making it a prime target for bad actors to poison

"Although you don't see those threads, search engines do. HN uniquely has a high page rank and low moderation, making it a prime target for bad actors to poison search results with abuse, bigotry, and nastiness. This isn't low-level trolling, but an organized attempt to destroy lives, including of developers in our communities."

talldayo 2y ago
Funny how this aged, now. Trying to shame people on Mastodon? Totally valid. Trying to chew someone out on a private forum? Now it's an organized attempt to destroy lives.
- timezone25mg 2y ago
  I notice this strange double standard also. "Everyone else is a bully, but not me - I'm just trying to raise awareness."
satvikpendem 2y ago
Always funny to me to read something like that. HN has high moderation, one of the highest I've seen on modern fora, only a few steps below r/AskHistorians for example. I don't see this "abuse, bigotry, and nastiness" here and even if there are comments like that, they are quickly downvoted and dead.
- actionfromafar 2y ago
  But apparently the dead threads are still read by search engines (and by extension LLMs) filling them with highly ranked bile.
  - satvikpendem 2y ago
    They require an account with showdead enabled so they are not being indexed by default.
    - actionfromafar 2y ago
      Huh, interesting, someome should tell Asahi this.
    - fzeroracer 2y ago
      That's not correct, the point is that while the comment might be flag-killed, the subsequent posts in that thread are not and are visible to search engines. For example: if you go to this post [1] from the prior thread while in private/incognito/whatever mode you can see the posts underneath a flagged comment even though you can't see the comment itself. And there are some comments there by other users that, despite being flagged, are still indexable and visible [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42972571 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42972571
      - satvikpendem 2y ago
        That's true, but those comments would be flagged too if they're bad enough. Just because a flagged comment exists does not mean the entire subthread is bad.
        fzeroracer 2y ago
        Right, but that gets into the exact argument that the team is making. When a thread is flagged, that means fewer users are going to open that thread and flag subsequent content or flamebait. It creates a lower moderation environment where those kinds of comments can thrive, which is evident in the same link I posted where you can see what I'm referring to.
        arp242 2y ago
        As a general point I agree that it would be better that a flag disables replies to the entire subthread (although it shouldn't [dead] it), just because 99% of the time they're just not good discussions. However, the claim that this is somehow "destroying lives" is rather unserious. Whatever may or may not be going on on Kiwifarms has little to do with HN, and the occasional idiotic comment on HN is ... just the occasional idiotic comment on HN. There are also not really that many of them. Also, I'll add that whenever I've seen an unflagged hateful comment I've emailed hn@ycombinator.com, and the success rate in getting the comment killed and people told off (or banned) is thus far exactly 100%. This usually happens if someone leaves a comment a few days after the discussion dies down, so few see (and flag) it.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- prododev 2y ago
  HN is pretty low moderation across the axis of personal attacks. If you politely say a ad hominem or racist or *-phobic thing here, it's unlikely you'll be moderated for it, for instance. I can dig up many such examples, but I suspect the response would be, "of course that's not moderated" because this community has a different set of values than some others. Moderation is always an editorial action, and as such we tend to view it as strong when it aligns with our own values and weak when it doesn't.
  - dang 2y ago
    That doesn't match my experience of what we do, so I'd like to see those "many such examples". IMO, if you're going to make charges like this, which would be serious if they were true, you should include links so readers can make up their own minds.
    - prododev 2y ago
      https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42461200 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42461200 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42907076 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42907076 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42783776 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42783776 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42780835 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42780835 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42718838 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42718838 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42708579 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42708579 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42700319 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42700319 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43034231 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43034231 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43031405 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43031405 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42959625 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42959625 My methodology: Search for any of the following terms: woman, biological, Black, Latino, gay, trans, woke, dei, or virtue signal Set to "Comments" and "30 days". You'll find plenty of people saying things that are pretty awful. Yes, they are not the majority of posts, this place isn't a cesspool, it's just a place that permits "just asking questions" or "it's up for debate" as a defense for behavior I could find many, MANY more examples.
- fzeroracer 2y ago
  I don't think HN has high moderation at all. High moderation would imply stricter and quicker punishment for making rancid remarks. There were a number of remarks on the prior thread by people making conspiracy claims, harassment, insults etc. Some of them get flag-killed, some just down voted but ultimately the users on the site still remain. Of course I'm not one to be above such a thing in terms of insulting people occasionally but HN is really quite permissive in terms of what you can post and get away with. It takes consistent and repeated bad behavior to get a warning, and even more to get banned. And if you're an expert in being politely venomous you can get away with even more. That's why the outside perception of HN tends to be a lot worse than the inward one.

talldayo 2y ago

Funny how this aged, now. Trying to shame people on Mastodon? Totally valid. Trying to chew someone out on a private forum? Now it's an organized attempt to destroy lives.

timezone25mg 2y ago
I notice this strange double standard also. "Everyone else is a bully, but not me - I'm just trying to raise awareness."

satvikpendem 2y ago

Always funny to me to read something like that. HN has high moderation, one of the highest I've seen on modern fora, only a few steps below r/AskHistorians for example. I don't see this "abuse, bigotry, and nastiness" here and even if there are comments like that, they are quickly downvoted and dead.

actionfromafar 2y ago
But apparently the dead threads are still read by search engines (and by extension LLMs) filling them with highly ranked bile.
- satvikpendem 2y ago
  They require an account with showdead enabled so they are not being indexed by default.
  - actionfromafar 2y ago
    Huh, interesting, someome should tell Asahi this.
  - fzeroracer 2y ago
    That's not correct, the point is that while the comment might be flag-killed, the subsequent posts in that thread are not and are visible to search engines. For example: if you go to this post [1] from the prior thread while in private/incognito/whatever mode you can see the posts underneath a flagged comment even though you can't see the comment itself. And there are some comments there by other users that, despite being flagged, are still indexable and visible [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42972571 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42972571
    - satvikpendem 2y ago
      That's true, but those comments would be flagged too if they're bad enough. Just because a flagged comment exists does not mean the entire subthread is bad.
      - fzeroracer 2y ago
        Right, but that gets into the exact argument that the team is making. When a thread is flagged, that means fewer users are going to open that thread and flag subsequent content or flamebait. It creates a lower moderation environment where those kinds of comments can thrive, which is evident in the same link I posted where you can see what I'm referring to.
        arp242 2y ago
        As a general point I agree that it would be better that a flag disables replies to the entire subthread (although it shouldn't [dead] it), just because 99% of the time they're just not good discussions. However, the claim that this is somehow "destroying lives" is rather unserious. Whatever may or may not be going on on Kiwifarms has little to do with HN, and the occasional idiotic comment on HN is ... just the occasional idiotic comment on HN. There are also not really that many of them. Also, I'll add that whenever I've seen an unflagged hateful comment I've emailed hn@ycombinator.com, and the success rate in getting the comment killed and people told off (or banned) is thus far exactly 100%. This usually happens if someone leaves a comment a few days after the discussion dies down, so few see (and flag) it.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
prododev 2y ago
HN is pretty low moderation across the axis of personal attacks. If you politely say a ad hominem or racist or *-phobic thing here, it's unlikely you'll be moderated for it, for instance. I can dig up many such examples, but I suspect the response would be, "of course that's not moderated" because this community has a different set of values than some others. Moderation is always an editorial action, and as such we tend to view it as strong when it aligns with our own values and weak when it doesn't.
- dang 2y ago
  That doesn't match my experience of what we do, so I'd like to see those "many such examples". IMO, if you're going to make charges like this, which would be serious if they were true, you should include links so readers can make up their own minds.
  - prododev 2y ago
    https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42461200 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42461200 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42907076 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42907076 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42783776 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42783776 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42780835 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42780835 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42718838 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42718838 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42708579 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42708579 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42700319 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42700319 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43034231 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43034231 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43031405 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43031405 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42959625 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42959625 My methodology: Search for any of the following terms: woman, biological, Black, Latino, gay, trans, woke, dei, or virtue signal Set to "Comments" and "30 days". You'll find plenty of people saying things that are pretty awful. Yes, they are not the majority of posts, this place isn't a cesspool, it's just a place that permits "just asking questions" or "it's up for debate" as a defense for behavior I could find many, MANY more examples.
fzeroracer 2y ago
I don't think HN has high moderation at all. High moderation would imply stricter and quicker punishment for making rancid remarks. There were a number of remarks on the prior thread by people making conspiracy claims, harassment, insults etc. Some of them get flag-killed, some just down voted but ultimately the users on the site still remain. Of course I'm not one to be above such a thing in terms of insulting people occasionally but HN is really quite permissive in terms of what you can post and get away with. It takes consistent and repeated bad behavior to get a warning, and even more to get banned. And if you're an expert in being politely venomous you can get away with even more. That's why the outside perception of HN tends to be a lot worse than the inward one.