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Idiots rule our countries. Why would online be any different? (Not being snide - wherever you look, politicians seem to unfailingly be raping and making a mock
by johnyzee 17y ago
Idiots rule our countries. Why would online be any different?
(Not being snide - wherever you look, politicians seem to unfailingly be raping and making a mockery of the democratic system. I may be slightly more cynical than usual as we discussed Berlusconi at lunch today, though).
Does anyone have good real-world examples of the the kind of communities we would like to see online? I'd like to hope that degeneration into idiocracy as communities grow is not some kind of natural law.
- jnorthrop 17y agoHere is a good one: http://news.ycombinator.com http://news.ycombinator.com
- pmorici 17y agoI've always thought the degradation into idiocracy happened when people felt like they were anonymous which often times is correlated to the size of the community.
- froo 17y agoDoes anyone have good real-world examples of the the kind of communities we would like to see online? Well, I'll give a fairly decent example. I occasionally played tabletop wargames in the past locally and we have a statewide forum dedicated to it. http://www.westgamer.com http://www.westgamer.com I've seen disagreements before on the forum, but have never seen anything that would constitute trolling or abusive behaviour. I think this stems from the fact that everyone pretty much knows everyone outside of the forums and so idiotic behaviour can have real-world consequences (eg, not being able to set up games with others) There is little to no anonymity on those forums and so everyone is quite civil. I suspect that if you make people responsible for their actions that they end up being quite responsible on the forums. That's not to say there hasn't been the occasional piece of drama, it's just normally localised and doesn't make its way to the forums for everyone to read.
- ThomPete 17y agoThe Well is fantastic