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I guess it is a complete coincidence that popular "we are now hacker news" thread appeared on 4chan and four posts against real name policy on Youtube are now o

by vdaniuk 13y ago

I guess it is a complete coincidence that popular "we are now hacker news" thread appeared on 4chan and four posts against real name policy on Youtube are now on the front page of HN. All submitted within 24 hours. /s And now lets look at this article again. One of the worst pieces of journalism about the Google+ policy, written by a "outspoken and controversial author and journalist". Is the bit about 80 n-words in a comment relevant? Obviously not. Was it included in the article to argue that Google+ integration is bad and stir controversy? Certainly it was! The quality of the article is abysmal, offers no additional data or insights and is a linkbait bordering on spam. But fine, lets look at some numbers: 120000 users signed a petition? Is it a significant number? Yep. Out of a billion youtube users? So that's about 0.00012. Put in perspective, this is absolutely nothing.

tty 13y ago
>Put in perspective, this absolutely nothing. Put in perspective, it absolutely is something. It's the biggest public outcry Google's faced thus far.
- vdaniuk 13y ago
  "It's the biggest public outcry Google's faced thus far." Care to share what metrics are you using to define that? I just dont see this. Including that Google got under fire for closing Google reader, NSA leaks, Wi-Fi data gathering, circumventing safari protections to track users, privacy policy consolidation, etc.
  - abraxasz 13y ago
    If you look only at the latest youtube thing, it might not be the worst google's been through. But if you look back at all the examples you compiled, two of them happened in the last 6 months. I don't know how it's all perceived outside of the "tech community", and maybe people don't care after all. My impression of all this is that it's a lot of bad press, in a fairly short amount of time. It's definitely changed my view on google, and I guess the question that all articles / speculations / blogspams are trying to get at is: how many people's views of google changed as a result to the recent events. And is that number big enough to start worrying google? A common view, from what I gather, is that being a "data-driven" company, google has probably run the numbers and concluded that whatever "outcry" is going on, it is the result of a small group, and that it is not going to threaten their business. I am usually wary of such non-arguments. I really don't know what the short-term/long-term effects of all this are going to be (if any), but I don't think that any company can really predict the full extent of "bad press" either. So even if it's a relatively small percentage of the user base, writing off this movement as being "insignificant" seems a little unwise.
onli 13y ago
> I guess it is a complete coincidence that popular "we are now hacker news" thread appeared on 4chan and four posts against real name policy on Youtube are now on the front page of HN. All submitted within 24 hours. /s Possible. But on the other hand, that topic was a relevant topic here the last days anyway. > Is the bit about 80 n-words in a comment relevant? Yes, it is. Not alone, but given the argumentation that Youtube-comments did get even worse because of this change. Note, I can't judge that, Youtube isn't working for me atm. But she shows the argumenation and combines it with Youtubers leaving the plattform, at least for commenting. Failing even basic spamblock-checks is relevant and surprising (especially for Google, as Gmails spamfilter is great). > Put in perspective, this is absolutely nothing Wouldn't say that. Even if it's a small but vocal technically minded minority complaining: Ignoring those is not a good idea for a tech-company in for the long run. Look at Microsoft…
- vdaniuk 13y ago
  >Yes, it is. Not alone, but given the argumentation that Youtube-comments did get even worse because of this change. No, it is not. You cant cherry pick examples to prove your point. To argue that Youtube comments did get worse by supplying a single(10,100,10000) data point(s) is preposterous. One should do a comprehensive scraping of comments for many videos and many countries and many categories, analyze for quality and compare with previous data(without Google+ integration). Then you have a solid foundation for making conclusions. Anything else is just verturing into fantasy land.
  - onli 13y ago
    This is not a scientific journal… Sure, we could use those principles for everything, but I doubt it is necessary here. To look at the opinion of the people hosting those channels, who are directly in contact with those comments, and to observe their reaction and base a first conclusion on that, is perfectly fine for me.
    - vdaniuk 13y ago
      Well, obviously we have very different criteria for judging arguments and data.
corresation 13y ago
I do not understand what drives this sort of activism that we're seeing regarding YouTube and G+ comments. Why it's suddenly such an issue on HN, worthy of such passion and fanaticism. For all that is happening in the world, and even just the tech world, whether you use one identity system or another to comment on someone's ripped from Vine video on YouTube sits pretty low on the importance scale. This is YouTube comments we're talking about. The rotting garbage dump of the internet. The notorious, worst-case example of what happens when everyone airs their thoughts. Now, apparently, we all are to remember as a system that worked? One that is so worthy of defense? Maybe I'll take a break from HN for a week while people wave their flags and battle in the open plains over something so utterly irrelevant.
- vdaniuk 13y ago
  People are claiming that is straight, undeniably evil of Google to merge identity systems. I say that those commenters don't really know what evil is and their priorities are way off.
  - michh 13y ago
    Easy to say if you're not in a vulnerable position where losing anonymity matters, a lot.
    - jfoster 13y ago
      If you are in that position, why not just have your entire Google account under a fake name?
      - vdaniuk 13y ago
        Or make a G+ page that allows pseudonymous comments for YT videos. Simple as that.
        graeme 13y ago
        I'm a Hacker News user with 2236 karma, and I can't figure out the Google+ Pages system. Where does that leave the average user? It seems very easy to make a permanent change you don't intend when you're using Google+.
ancarda 13y ago
No coincidence. 3 of the posts against Google were all #1, #2 and #3 before the HN thread was started on 4chan.
leoc 13y ago
The article mentions people who are (iirc) some of the largest Let's Play creators as among the people who are taking action. If enough of them permanently move to a different uploader or disable YouTube comments then that will be something nontrivial.
- Kylekramer 13y ago
  But there's the rub: comments aren't that valuable to anyone in the game but the commenters. No major YouTuber are moving off YouTube for a different uploader. Or even considering it. The biggest moves popular YouTubers have done are disabling comments. Google own the monetization of web video, so content providers won't leave. YouTube comments were already shit, so converting that shit into Google+ shit will at least help Google+. And if people disable comments, Google still get the views and gets to move the headache of dealing with YouTube comments to someone else (obviously if done in mass to a single discussion site this may be a problem for Google, but it is currently far too disjointed to matter much). From Google's perspective, the new comment system is a win-win situation.
r0h1n 13y ago
> One of the worst pieces of journalism about Google+... That's a nice opinion, and you're entitled to it. But please don't try to present it as a fact. > written by "a outspoken and controversial author and journalist"... I don't see anything wrong with that. Since when did HN veer towards safe and conservative journalists or authors? As for the straw man argument about the N-word, I don't think that was the gist of her article. For me, this is where she nailed it: Before anyone tells me I can't complain about "free" things, and starts to remind me that Google hasn't done anything directly to feed the U.S. Government's flagrant - and growing - surveillance law abuses enacted on civilians, consider this. No one likes being tricked by a company that leverages a monopoly to force unrelated services and nonconsensual exposure onto people's lives. Hundreds of thousands (actually, more) are being coerced, through threat of withholding essential utilities (email, work docs, etc.), to consolidate their online identities, tie it to real life and real names, reveal friends and family connections, have communications scanned, be put in advertisements, provide phone numbers and credit cards numbers, and more, while discovering that service settings and privacy defaults are being changed behind the curtain. And when they complain and demand privacy, the ability to give informed consent, and control over their personal information, they're told they're doing settings wrong, the policies are really for their own good, to send in their IDs for verification, that they agreed to all this in the beginning anyway, it's too late, that this is how everyone does it, and that wanting privacy really means something else because only good people don't have anything to hide.
- vdaniuk 13y ago
  Literally no one is being coerced. No one. And this redefinition of words is what makes the article really bad. If she is referring to holding the personal data hostage as coercion, user is always free to leave Google properties while retaining most of their data. Google has one of the best data export tools that include documents, email archives etc. So that's straight out misinformation. see: Google Takeout.
- dredmorbius 13y ago
  Blue's "free things" remarks are where her article absolutely nails it. I called that out specifically commenting on her G+ post of this.
jrs99 13y ago
Do you think there are only 120000 angry users?
mcphilip 13y ago
>One of the worst pieces of journalism about the Google+ policy, written by a "outspoken and controversial author and journalist". That's a straw man right there. The article is clearly marked as an opinion piece in its summary. The op ed sections of news contains activism, not journalism.

by vdaniuk 13y ago

tty 13y ago

>Put in perspective, this absolutely nothing. Put in perspective, it absolutely is something. It's the biggest public outcry Google's faced thus far.

vdaniuk 13y ago
"It's the biggest public outcry Google's faced thus far." Care to share what metrics are you using to define that? I just dont see this. Including that Google got under fire for closing Google reader, NSA leaks, Wi-Fi data gathering, circumventing safari protections to track users, privacy policy consolidation, etc.
- abraxasz 13y ago
  If you look only at the latest youtube thing, it might not be the worst google's been through. But if you look back at all the examples you compiled, two of them happened in the last 6 months. I don't know how it's all perceived outside of the "tech community", and maybe people don't care after all. My impression of all this is that it's a lot of bad press, in a fairly short amount of time. It's definitely changed my view on google, and I guess the question that all articles / speculations / blogspams are trying to get at is: how many people's views of google changed as a result to the recent events. And is that number big enough to start worrying google? A common view, from what I gather, is that being a "data-driven" company, google has probably run the numbers and concluded that whatever "outcry" is going on, it is the result of a small group, and that it is not going to threaten their business. I am usually wary of such non-arguments. I really don't know what the short-term/long-term effects of all this are going to be (if any), but I don't think that any company can really predict the full extent of "bad press" either. So even if it's a relatively small percentage of the user base, writing off this movement as being "insignificant" seems a little unwise.

onli 13y ago

> I guess it is a complete coincidence that popular "we are now hacker news" thread appeared on 4chan and four posts against real name policy on Youtube are now on the front page of HN. All submitted within 24 hours. /s Possible. But on the other hand, that topic was a relevant topic here the last days anyway. > Is the bit about 80 n-words in a comment relevant? Yes, it is. Not alone, but given the argumentation that Youtube-comments did get even worse because of this change. Note, I can't judge that, Youtube isn't working for me atm. But she shows the argumenation and combines it with Youtubers leaving the plattform, at least for commenting. Failing even basic spamblock-checks is relevant and surprising (especially for Google, as Gmails spamfilter is great). > Put in perspective, this is absolutely nothing Wouldn't say that. Even if it's a small but vocal technically minded minority complaining: Ignoring those is not a good idea for a tech-company in for the long run. Look at Microsoft…

vdaniuk 13y ago
>Yes, it is. Not alone, but given the argumentation that Youtube-comments did get even worse because of this change. No, it is not. You cant cherry pick examples to prove your point. To argue that Youtube comments did get worse by supplying a single(10,100,10000) data point(s) is preposterous. One should do a comprehensive scraping of comments for many videos and many countries and many categories, analyze for quality and compare with previous data(without Google+ integration). Then you have a solid foundation for making conclusions. Anything else is just verturing into fantasy land.
- onli 13y ago
  This is not a scientific journal… Sure, we could use those principles for everything, but I doubt it is necessary here. To look at the opinion of the people hosting those channels, who are directly in contact with those comments, and to observe their reaction and base a first conclusion on that, is perfectly fine for me.
  - vdaniuk 13y ago
    Well, obviously we have very different criteria for judging arguments and data.

corresation 13y ago

I do not understand what drives this sort of activism that we're seeing regarding YouTube and G+ comments. Why it's suddenly such an issue on HN, worthy of such passion and fanaticism. For all that is happening in the world, and even just the tech world, whether you use one identity system or another to comment on someone's ripped from Vine video on YouTube sits pretty low on the importance scale. This is YouTube comments we're talking about. The rotting garbage dump of the internet. The notorious, worst-case example of what happens when everyone airs their thoughts. Now, apparently, we all are to remember as a system that worked? One that is so worthy of defense? Maybe I'll take a break from HN for a week while people wave their flags and battle in the open plains over something so utterly irrelevant.

vdaniuk 13y ago
People are claiming that is straight, undeniably evil of Google to merge identity systems. I say that those commenters don't really know what evil is and their priorities are way off.
- michh 13y ago
  Easy to say if you're not in a vulnerable position where losing anonymity matters, a lot.
  - jfoster 13y ago
    If you are in that position, why not just have your entire Google account under a fake name?
    - vdaniuk 13y ago
      Or make a G+ page that allows pseudonymous comments for YT videos. Simple as that.
      - graeme 13y ago
        I'm a Hacker News user with 2236 karma, and I can't figure out the Google+ Pages system. Where does that leave the average user? It seems very easy to make a permanent change you don't intend when you're using Google+.

ancarda 13y ago

No coincidence. 3 of the posts against Google were all #1, #2 and #3 before the HN thread was started on 4chan.

leoc 13y ago

The article mentions people who are (iirc) some of the largest Let's Play creators as among the people who are taking action. If enough of them permanently move to a different uploader or disable YouTube comments then that will be something nontrivial.

Kylekramer 13y ago
But there's the rub: comments aren't that valuable to anyone in the game but the commenters. No major YouTuber are moving off YouTube for a different uploader. Or even considering it. The biggest moves popular YouTubers have done are disabling comments. Google own the monetization of web video, so content providers won't leave. YouTube comments were already shit, so converting that shit into Google+ shit will at least help Google+. And if people disable comments, Google still get the views and gets to move the headache of dealing with YouTube comments to someone else (obviously if done in mass to a single discussion site this may be a problem for Google, but it is currently far too disjointed to matter much). From Google's perspective, the new comment system is a win-win situation.

r0h1n 13y ago

> One of the worst pieces of journalism about Google+... That's a nice opinion, and you're entitled to it. But please don't try to present it as a fact. > written by "a outspoken and controversial author and journalist"... I don't see anything wrong with that. Since when did HN veer towards safe and conservative journalists or authors? As for the straw man argument about the N-word, I don't think that was the gist of her article. For me, this is where she nailed it: Before anyone tells me I can't complain about "free" things, and starts to remind me that Google hasn't done anything directly to feed the U.S. Government's flagrant - and growing - surveillance law abuses enacted on civilians, consider this. No one likes being tricked by a company that leverages a monopoly to force unrelated services and nonconsensual exposure onto people's lives. Hundreds of thousands (actually, more) are being coerced, through threat of withholding essential utilities (email, work docs, etc.), to consolidate their online identities, tie it to real life and real names, reveal friends and family connections, have communications scanned, be put in advertisements, provide phone numbers and credit cards numbers, and more, while discovering that service settings and privacy defaults are being changed behind the curtain. And when they complain and demand privacy, the ability to give informed consent, and control over their personal information, they're told they're doing settings wrong, the policies are really for their own good, to send in their IDs for verification, that they agreed to all this in the beginning anyway, it's too late, that this is how everyone does it, and that wanting privacy really means something else because only good people don't have anything to hide.

vdaniuk 13y ago
Literally no one is being coerced. No one. And this redefinition of words is what makes the article really bad. If she is referring to holding the personal data hostage as coercion, user is always free to leave Google properties while retaining most of their data. Google has one of the best data export tools that include documents, email archives etc. So that's straight out misinformation. see: Google Takeout.
dredmorbius 13y ago
Blue's "free things" remarks are where her article absolutely nails it. I called that out specifically commenting on her G+ post of this.

jrs99 13y ago

Do you think there are only 120000 angry users?

mcphilip 13y ago

>One of the worst pieces of journalism about the Google+ policy, written by a "outspoken and controversial author and journalist". That's a straw man right there. The article is clearly marked as an opinion piece in its summary. The op ed sections of news contains activism, not journalism.