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The far more damaging part of HN IMHO is the silent banning. It's a very ugly sledgehammer which is routinely used to censor dissenting voices. Victims of it ha

The far more damaging part of HN IMHO is the silent banning. It's a very ugly sledgehammer which is routinely used to censor dissenting voices. Victims of it have no real recourse even if they do notice they've been censored. It doesn't make for an open relaxed environment where people can express their opinion. It's a lame, lazy and flawed system of moderation which ends up with a ton of false positives. I wouldn't be surprised if this comment gets me silent banned!

tptacek 13y ago
I would be surprised if the evidence showed that a comment like this ever got someone silent-banned. Usually, when you look at the comments of people who have gotten banned, there's a nasty tone to accompany the critical intent.
- hueving 13y ago
  >I would be surprised if the evidence showed Yet you argued in another comment that this evidence should be hidden from the community. If you have faith that the evidence would show that bans are always justified, why not argue for them to be public?
  - tptacek 13y ago
    The same comment you're referring to to make this argument answers it.
    - hueving 13y ago
      >A log of moderator actions seems like an invitation to many years of debate over the moderator's actions. The current system, of sporadic conspiracy theories regarding moderation, actually seems preferable to me. That's the one I was referring to. Can you point me to the one you are referring to that says why you prefer an opaque system?
- voicereasonish 13y ago
  Is "nasty tone" really the basis of silently banning people? Just because something offends a moderator, then all of their subsequent comments are censored? Being offended shouldn't offer anyone any special rights. If something "offends" you, ignore it and move on.
  - lutusp 13y ago
    > Being offended shouldn't offer anyone any special rights. Its a good think you said "shouldn't" rather than "can't", because any number of laws forbid various kinds of offensive behavior. > If something "offends" you, ignore it and move on. Not everyone can "move on", which is why we have the laws we do. This is only peripherally associated with the present topic, but no one should imagine that offensive behavior is absolutely tolerated, or that people can only relocate themselves to solve the problem.
    - voicereasonish 13y ago
      Just because a law exists, doesn't mean it should exist. For example, sending "offensive" tweets should not be illegal IMHO.
      - lutusp 13y ago
        > Just because a law exists, doesn't mean it should exist. Yes -- that's a point I made also.
  - jfoster 13y ago
    I think the problem with what you're suggesting is that it can rapidly devolve the forum into being uncivilized. I do think silent banning is a little bit mean, but if you tell people they've been banned, they just start a new account. Perhaps new accounts could start off dead until endorsed, and bans could be reversed. A bit like pending comments, but at an account level. It takes away "starting a new account" as a solution to being banned if both accounts have the same (100% dependent on content of posts) likelihood of coming back.
  - 13y ago
pg 13y ago
Is there a forum that doesn't ban people?
- krapp 13y ago
  On other forums, when you've been banned, you get an email or message telling you why and you no longer have access to that account. You also probably will have gotten a few warnings from moderators before that point.
  - sanswork 13y ago
    When the barrier to entry is 0 this is an ineffective strategy. From my experiences moderating a fairly large geographic area forum negative influences on the community do and will just recreate a new account immediately and resume when you do that. At least this way you delay that from happening for a while and force them to expel effort on nothing.
    - krapp 13y ago
      Maybe, but determined trolls will adapt to just about any environment - here, for instance, people just create sockpuppet accounts (HN doesn't track account IPs I guess) When it applies to the most egregious of problem users then it works as intended, but there have been cases where people have been, apparently, posting while banned for some slight, and providing reasonable content. That suggests to me that some banned users might be amenable to a warning or might well change their behavior if they were made aware that their actions were intolerable. Also, it makes no sense to me to continue using up the site's resources stringing people along who, by definition, the staff doesn't want there. Although I admit I have no idea how much of a problem that is with HN itself, since it doesn't use a database.
      - sanswork 13y ago
        Tracking IPs doesn't help that much. Even non-technical trolls discover proxies quickly. Because you cannot stop them so at this point it is less about saving resources and more about harm reduction. It's unfortunate some people who probably would change get caught up in it but it's really a small price to pay(their not having their comments public but still being able to use the site normally) for the greater enjoyment.
tvladeck 13y ago
Just an anecdote that may be relevant: I was banned at one point. I thought it was unfair, and emailed HN explaining why I made the comment that I did and that it wasn't meant as meanspirited or snarky as it may have come across. They re-instated me very quickly. My experience tells me that if you're trying to be a reasonable member of the community, you'll do fine.
sliverstorm 13y ago
It doesn't suppress dissenters. It suppresses people who contribute nothing.
- hueving 13y ago
  The difference between those two to a biased moderator (e.g. any human) is very blurry.

tptacek 13y ago

I would be surprised if the evidence showed that a comment like this ever got someone silent-banned. Usually, when you look at the comments of people who have gotten banned, there's a nasty tone to accompany the critical intent.

hueving 13y ago
>I would be surprised if the evidence showed Yet you argued in another comment that this evidence should be hidden from the community. If you have faith that the evidence would show that bans are always justified, why not argue for them to be public?
- tptacek 13y ago
  The same comment you're referring to to make this argument answers it.
  - hueving 13y ago
    >A log of moderator actions seems like an invitation to many years of debate over the moderator's actions. The current system, of sporadic conspiracy theories regarding moderation, actually seems preferable to me. That's the one I was referring to. Can you point me to the one you are referring to that says why you prefer an opaque system?
voicereasonish 13y ago
Is "nasty tone" really the basis of silently banning people? Just because something offends a moderator, then all of their subsequent comments are censored? Being offended shouldn't offer anyone any special rights. If something "offends" you, ignore it and move on.
- lutusp 13y ago
  > Being offended shouldn't offer anyone any special rights. Its a good think you said "shouldn't" rather than "can't", because any number of laws forbid various kinds of offensive behavior. > If something "offends" you, ignore it and move on. Not everyone can "move on", which is why we have the laws we do. This is only peripherally associated with the present topic, but no one should imagine that offensive behavior is absolutely tolerated, or that people can only relocate themselves to solve the problem.
  - voicereasonish 13y ago
    Just because a law exists, doesn't mean it should exist. For example, sending "offensive" tweets should not be illegal IMHO.
    - lutusp 13y ago
      > Just because a law exists, doesn't mean it should exist. Yes -- that's a point I made also.
- jfoster 13y ago
  I think the problem with what you're suggesting is that it can rapidly devolve the forum into being uncivilized. I do think silent banning is a little bit mean, but if you tell people they've been banned, they just start a new account. Perhaps new accounts could start off dead until endorsed, and bans could be reversed. A bit like pending comments, but at an account level. It takes away "starting a new account" as a solution to being banned if both accounts have the same (100% dependent on content of posts) likelihood of coming back.
- 13y ago

pg 13y ago

Is there a forum that doesn't ban people?

krapp 13y ago
On other forums, when you've been banned, you get an email or message telling you why and you no longer have access to that account. You also probably will have gotten a few warnings from moderators before that point.
- sanswork 13y ago
  When the barrier to entry is 0 this is an ineffective strategy. From my experiences moderating a fairly large geographic area forum negative influences on the community do and will just recreate a new account immediately and resume when you do that. At least this way you delay that from happening for a while and force them to expel effort on nothing.
  - krapp 13y ago
    Maybe, but determined trolls will adapt to just about any environment - here, for instance, people just create sockpuppet accounts (HN doesn't track account IPs I guess) When it applies to the most egregious of problem users then it works as intended, but there have been cases where people have been, apparently, posting while banned for some slight, and providing reasonable content. That suggests to me that some banned users might be amenable to a warning or might well change their behavior if they were made aware that their actions were intolerable. Also, it makes no sense to me to continue using up the site's resources stringing people along who, by definition, the staff doesn't want there. Although I admit I have no idea how much of a problem that is with HN itself, since it doesn't use a database.
    - sanswork 13y ago
      Tracking IPs doesn't help that much. Even non-technical trolls discover proxies quickly. Because you cannot stop them so at this point it is less about saving resources and more about harm reduction. It's unfortunate some people who probably would change get caught up in it but it's really a small price to pay(their not having their comments public but still being able to use the site normally) for the greater enjoyment.

tvladeck 13y ago

Just an anecdote that may be relevant: I was banned at one point. I thought it was unfair, and emailed HN explaining why I made the comment that I did and that it wasn't meant as meanspirited or snarky as it may have come across. They re-instated me very quickly. My experience tells me that if you're trying to be a reasonable member of the community, you'll do fine.

sliverstorm 13y ago

It doesn't suppress dissenters. It suppresses people who contribute nothing.

hueving 13y ago
The difference between those two to a biased moderator (e.g. any human) is very blurry.