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I've been taking a deeper look at reddit in the last couple of weeks and I'd say real-name social networks decay in a different direction. My Facebook wall is a

by rgbrgb 13y ago

I've been taking a deeper look at reddit in the last couple of weeks and I'd say real-name social networks decay in a different direction. My Facebook wall is an extremely shallow stream self-promotion, one-liners, and food pics -- very little actual discussion. As the OP notes, it is very rare that anyone says anything remotely controversial (or interesting). Reddit, on the other hand feels very much alive. People talk about their feelings, confide in each other, ask interesting questions. Not sure if it's just the anonymity, it also has to do with the fact that the community is much bigger so you can ask anything and someone will have an answer. However, the anonymity certainly allows for that large group to come together for (often) coherent conversations.

anologwintermut 13y ago
Do you think the difference in reddit anonymity, or that your Facebook feed is composed of people from your geographically limited social circle?
- AnthonyMouse 13y ago
  > Do you think the difference in reddit anonymity, or that your Facebook feed is composed of people from your geographically limited social circle? In other words, would it work if you used your real name but the set of people who receive your messages and the set of people who can associate your real name with your in-person identity are non-overlapping. You're essentially asking if strict anonymity is necessary or if pseudonyms would be sufficient.
saraid216 13y ago
This difference has nothing to do with real names or anonymity. It has to do with the fact that your FB friends have something to lose in that context: namely, their personal connections to mutual friends.
- ameister14 13y ago
  So, do you think they would have anything to lose by posting the same comments elsewhere using their real names? Personally, I am less likely to comment if my real name (coupled with a real-life social profile) is attached to the comment, whether or not I am posting directly on the social network my name is attached to.
  - steveklabnik 13y ago
    I've seen people send rape and death threats to people _from their work email account_, so yes, often anonymity isn't strictly needed for people to be terrible.
  - scott_s 13y ago
    I think there is a difference, yes. The Facebook status stream is very in-your-face. When you say something on Facebook, you're pushing it to the eyeballs of many people in your actual social circle. If you say something on a forum where, say, you are linked to your Facebook profile, you're not pushing that comment to the eyeballs of everyone you know. My online social network is now essentially the same as my offline social network, and there's not too much that I'm okay pushing to the eyeballs of everyone I know. Not because I'm ashamed, but out of general courtesy.
  - at-fates-hands 13y ago
    >>>> Personally, I am less likely to comment if my real name (coupled with a real-life social profile) is attached to the comment. This is the very reason I have no social media accounts that use my real name. And many people on my FB feed, have no idea what my Twitter handle is and vice versa. It's a great feeling to have a completely unencumbered sounding board where you can spew whatever you want (within reason of course) and your friends, co-workers, current or future company employing you will never know. Recruiters and companies always ask for my social media user names and I never tell them. It's nice to know with great certainty they won't ever find them unless I give them up willing.
  - saraid216 13y ago
    It's certainly not universal. But the effect on Facebook is generally to imagine this: all of your contacts are in a room, and every time you comment, you're getting up on stage and saying something. No catcalling from the audience. You're walking all the way to the raised floor and taking the mike and looking out into that sea of people like James who saw you naked in high school during that pool party and Gina who still believes that we should have committed more troops to Iraq and Joe who doesn't really care about anything other than free beer, though if you ever bring up the mutual coworker he dated, he'll rip you a new one. It's this complete cacophony of context--context that matters, that's important to you--and it's not actually possible to manage it as is. Do people post about Important Issues and Discuss Things Maturely and Deeply on Facebook? Of course they do. They do it everywhere. They do it face to face. They do it on the phone. They do it on national TV. They do it over email. They do it on Twitter. They probably do it on Snapchat, but I don't pay enough attention to notice. What's the trick to getting that kind of conversation on Facebook? Same as any other place. Would you talk about your intimacy with James while Joe's around? Unlikely. But if you went and got a coffee. Or if you started a Facebook Group of some kind, or a private message, or whatever: anything to limit the contexts that invade into a conversation. (Alternately, there are actually super-public spaces on Facebook that get into reddit-style arguments.) Anonymity, of course, does this automatically, because context is attached to some identity. But that doesn't mean anonymity is the actual mechanism. It's the hand holding the hammer, not the hammer itself. At the end of the day, anonymity doesn't actually do anything.
001sky 13y ago
Not sure if it's just the anonymity, it also has to do with the fact that the community is much bigger Without anonymity, the larger the social-surface area, the greater the attack surface is. This is why as facebook grows, it becomes less useful. And why, when it was started, it was successful based on its "exclusiveness" (.edu), and not the other way around. The "real reason" people wan't to eliminante online anonymity are two fold: (1) money; and (2) power. Advertising and fascism both require manipulative social leverage, and having data-sets with non-anonymous correlations provides the tools to fight the old wars of the 20th century. The forces at work are dark and powerful and likely to win. They run through Silicon Valley and its establishment just like they do the east coast. Becuase at this stage, the one is just spending the money of the other...deep symbiotic linkages mean the one cannot do without the other.
- avn2109 13y ago
  What did you read that gave you these ideas? It seems like a genuinely interesting hypothesis and I'd like to find out more.
  - lovemenot 13y ago
    First of all, I apologise in advance if this comment does not actually apply to you. Obviously I don't know what you were really thinking, but I see a lot of comments here with the form: xyz seems genuinely interesting, please elaborate. I often surmise that the poster really disagrees and just intends to set up a line of attack using a disingenuous first approach. Especially where, as in this case, the parent seems unreasoning. Whether or not that was your intent, at least some people might read comments of this form as being disingenuous.
    - avn2109 13y ago
      Nope not being pedantic. Actually interested.
blah32497 13y ago
"Reddit, on the other hand feels very much alive." To me is always feels like the Borg. It's like a group think hellhole of masturbatory pleasure. One single mega entity. Take any "hot" topic floating around on the web right now and you can fill in the sentence "Reddit thinks [X] about [topic]". Facebook on the other hand is sort of the opposite and identical at the same time. Everyone, including me, are afraid and reluctant to express our views. But there are some people that don't care and they skew the discussion.

by rgbrgb 13y ago

anologwintermut 13y ago

Do you think the difference in reddit anonymity, or that your Facebook feed is composed of people from your geographically limited social circle?

AnthonyMouse 13y ago
> Do you think the difference in reddit anonymity, or that your Facebook feed is composed of people from your geographically limited social circle? In other words, would it work if you used your real name but the set of people who receive your messages and the set of people who can associate your real name with your in-person identity are non-overlapping. You're essentially asking if strict anonymity is necessary or if pseudonyms would be sufficient.

saraid216 13y ago

This difference has nothing to do with real names or anonymity. It has to do with the fact that your FB friends have something to lose in that context: namely, their personal connections to mutual friends.

ameister14 13y ago
So, do you think they would have anything to lose by posting the same comments elsewhere using their real names? Personally, I am less likely to comment if my real name (coupled with a real-life social profile) is attached to the comment, whether or not I am posting directly on the social network my name is attached to.
- steveklabnik 13y ago
  I've seen people send rape and death threats to people _from their work email account_, so yes, often anonymity isn't strictly needed for people to be terrible.
- scott_s 13y ago
  I think there is a difference, yes. The Facebook status stream is very in-your-face. When you say something on Facebook, you're pushing it to the eyeballs of many people in your actual social circle. If you say something on a forum where, say, you are linked to your Facebook profile, you're not pushing that comment to the eyeballs of everyone you know. My online social network is now essentially the same as my offline social network, and there's not too much that I'm okay pushing to the eyeballs of everyone I know. Not because I'm ashamed, but out of general courtesy.
- at-fates-hands 13y ago
  >>>> Personally, I am less likely to comment if my real name (coupled with a real-life social profile) is attached to the comment. This is the very reason I have no social media accounts that use my real name. And many people on my FB feed, have no idea what my Twitter handle is and vice versa. It's a great feeling to have a completely unencumbered sounding board where you can spew whatever you want (within reason of course) and your friends, co-workers, current or future company employing you will never know. Recruiters and companies always ask for my social media user names and I never tell them. It's nice to know with great certainty they won't ever find them unless I give them up willing.
- saraid216 13y ago
  It's certainly not universal. But the effect on Facebook is generally to imagine this: all of your contacts are in a room, and every time you comment, you're getting up on stage and saying something. No catcalling from the audience. You're walking all the way to the raised floor and taking the mike and looking out into that sea of people like James who saw you naked in high school during that pool party and Gina who still believes that we should have committed more troops to Iraq and Joe who doesn't really care about anything other than free beer, though if you ever bring up the mutual coworker he dated, he'll rip you a new one. It's this complete cacophony of context--context that matters, that's important to you--and it's not actually possible to manage it as is. Do people post about Important Issues and Discuss Things Maturely and Deeply on Facebook? Of course they do. They do it everywhere. They do it face to face. They do it on the phone. They do it on national TV. They do it over email. They do it on Twitter. They probably do it on Snapchat, but I don't pay enough attention to notice. What's the trick to getting that kind of conversation on Facebook? Same as any other place. Would you talk about your intimacy with James while Joe's around? Unlikely. But if you went and got a coffee. Or if you started a Facebook Group of some kind, or a private message, or whatever: anything to limit the contexts that invade into a conversation. (Alternately, there are actually super-public spaces on Facebook that get into reddit-style arguments.) Anonymity, of course, does this automatically, because context is attached to some identity. But that doesn't mean anonymity is the actual mechanism. It's the hand holding the hammer, not the hammer itself. At the end of the day, anonymity doesn't actually do anything.

001sky 13y ago

Not sure if it's just the anonymity, it also has to do with the fact that the community is much bigger Without anonymity, the larger the social-surface area, the greater the attack surface is. This is why as facebook grows, it becomes less useful. And why, when it was started, it was successful based on its "exclusiveness" (.edu), and not the other way around. The "real reason" people wan't to eliminante online anonymity are two fold: (1) money; and (2) power. Advertising and fascism both require manipulative social leverage, and having data-sets with non-anonymous correlations provides the tools to fight the old wars of the 20th century. The forces at work are dark and powerful and likely to win. They run through Silicon Valley and its establishment just like they do the east coast. Becuase at this stage, the one is just spending the money of the other...deep symbiotic linkages mean the one cannot do without the other.

avn2109 13y ago
What did you read that gave you these ideas? It seems like a genuinely interesting hypothesis and I'd like to find out more.
- lovemenot 13y ago
  First of all, I apologise in advance if this comment does not actually apply to you. Obviously I don't know what you were really thinking, but I see a lot of comments here with the form: xyz seems genuinely interesting, please elaborate. I often surmise that the poster really disagrees and just intends to set up a line of attack using a disingenuous first approach. Especially where, as in this case, the parent seems unreasoning. Whether or not that was your intent, at least some people might read comments of this form as being disingenuous.
  - avn2109 13y ago
    Nope not being pedantic. Actually interested.

blah32497 13y ago

"Reddit, on the other hand feels very much alive." To me is always feels like the Borg. It's like a group think hellhole of masturbatory pleasure. One single mega entity. Take any "hot" topic floating around on the web right now and you can fill in the sentence "Reddit thinks [X] about [topic]". Facebook on the other hand is sort of the opposite and identical at the same time. Everyone, including me, are afraid and reluctant to express our views. But there are some people that don't care and they skew the discussion.