> HN doesn’t have an immune system against straight up misinformation.
It certainly doesn't! Misinformation and disinformation are terms du jour, but as far as I can tell they are indistinguishable from old-fashioned people-being-wrong-on-the-internet. If you expect an internet forum to be immune from that...well, that's too much to expect. As far as I can tell (and moderating HN for years has really hammered this home), nearly everyone is wrong about nearly everything.
Not only that, but no one (or perhaps we can say for decorum's sake, nearly no one) really cares about the truth. We care about what we like and we want it to win against what we dislike; all the rest is rationalization. Moderating HN has really hammered that one into me as well. Such is human nature, and trying to moderate against it would be futile, not to mention a fast track to burnout. I've tried, and have the scars.
And at the same time I completely sympathize with the frustration of watching discourse on a major topic being dominated by shallow, indignant repetition that isn't engaging with the specifics of a situation.
From a moderation point of view, when a tsunami of a story washes over HN for a week or more, there's not that much we can do about it. We can prevent it from completely dominating the site; we can ask a few people not to break the site guidelines when we see that happening; that's about it. Pretending we can do much more than that would be like Canute commanding the waves.
(Btw, maybe I'm mistaking you for someone else but I have the feeling that your comments have gone, over the years, from frequently breaking the site guidelines to doing a pretty good job of respecting them. If that's true, that's amazing and I appreciate it a ton.)
Edit: I could keep adding new paragraphs to this post for almost forever, but here's another factor that moderating HN has hammered into me. It's possible for people to be wrong on both the facts and the arguments and yet for there to be some deeper justice or truth in what they're saying. Oftentimes, conflicts play out like this: someone responds by correcting facts or pointing out flaws in arguments, but they only succeed in provoking an intensified fury and end up drawing it to themselves. That's because they're answering on the level of facts-and-arguments as a way of dismissing, rather than acknowledging, that deeper level of truth or justice that people have strong feelings about. Mostly all this does is increase the amplitude of the conflict. This is very much a co-creation between the conflicting parties—i.e. between the ones who are right (or feel they are) and the other ones who are right (or feel they are). This is the real answer to complaints about groupthink, in my opinion.
I may be the person you are thinking of. I don’t think I ever ‘frequently’ broke the site guidelines, but I definitely don’t do it much these days, and it’s always a mistake when I do.
With regard to the conflict dynamics - I agree, although the amplification isn’t necessarily bad.
Also I think with regard to the ‘deeper truth’, often it’s not so much ‘deeper’ as simpler.
In this case for example, people strongly dislike being distrusted - it might well be a genetic disposition since it is a crucial part of our social psychology, and Apple is making a mistake by ignoring that. This isn’t about people not trusting Apple. It’s about people not feeling trusted by Apple.
Perhaps that counts as deeper, but there isn’t much to say about it - it’s not a loud sounding insight, and so all of the other arguments get built up as a way of amplifying that signal.
Not only that, but no one (or perhaps we can say for decorum's sake, nearly no one) really cares about the truth. > We care about what we like and we want it to win against what we dislike; all the rest is rationalization.
This is a bleak, valueless and ascientific view of the world. It took a while for me to process it. It is consistent with the postmodern post-truth zeitgeist of tribalism and power being the only thing that matters.
> Moderating HN has really hammered that one into me as well. Such is human nature, and trying to moderate against it would be futile, not to mention a fast track to burnout. I've tried, and have the scars.
I can very clearly see why moderating HN would cause you to adopt this view. It’s interesting because it really doesn’t match the sense of who you are as you come across in your comments.
My own view is that we are not in such a bleak world. Meaning structures are shaped by media and we are only a decade or so into the era where media has become social. This is such a monumental and unprecedented change that it’s bound to appear that there is no up or down for a while.
I think it’s transient, and doesn’t reflect a universal truth about human nature.
For one obvious contradiction - can you think of anyone who actually prefers the idea of a valueless ascientific world? If so, who, and why?
Responding to your edit: I think Zepto understands that and tried to direct the conversation that way. For example:
https://qht.co/item?id=28120649
They even spent time engaging with someone who said CSAM shouldn’t matter by arguing that the fact that lots of the general population cares about it makes it a concern worth thinking about.
Perhaps our responses here are in frustration - that we weren’t able to engage with the matters at hand with people of similar skill and interests. I suppose one way to read your post is that HN isn’t suited for that level of discussion on breaking news with emotional resonance. Maybe another space.
> but as far as I can tell they are indistinguishable from old-fashioned people-being-wrong-on-the-internet. If you expect an internet forum to be immune from that...well, that's too much to expect.
Also, this is a little too glib. I’m not talking about people being wrong or misinformed. I am talking about people actively spreading misinformation. These are distinguishable although I accept that they may be impractical to moderate, hence my claim about no immune system.
It certainly doesn't! Misinformation and disinformation are terms du jour, but as far as I can tell they are indistinguishable from old-fashioned people-being-wrong-on-the-internet. If you expect an internet forum to be immune from that...well, that's too much to expect. As far as I can tell (and moderating HN for years has really hammered this home), nearly everyone is wrong about nearly everything.
Not only that, but no one (or perhaps we can say for decorum's sake, nearly no one) really cares about the truth. We care about what we like and we want it to win against what we dislike; all the rest is rationalization. Moderating HN has really hammered that one into me as well. Such is human nature, and trying to moderate against it would be futile, not to mention a fast track to burnout. I've tried, and have the scars.
And at the same time I completely sympathize with the frustration of watching discourse on a major topic being dominated by shallow, indignant repetition that isn't engaging with the specifics of a situation.
From a moderation point of view, when a tsunami of a story washes over HN for a week or more, there's not that much we can do about it. We can prevent it from completely dominating the site; we can ask a few people not to break the site guidelines when we see that happening; that's about it. Pretending we can do much more than that would be like Canute commanding the waves.
(Btw, maybe I'm mistaking you for someone else but I have the feeling that your comments have gone, over the years, from frequently breaking the site guidelines to doing a pretty good job of respecting them. If that's true, that's amazing and I appreciate it a ton.)
Edit: I could keep adding new paragraphs to this post for almost forever, but here's another factor that moderating HN has hammered into me. It's possible for people to be wrong on both the facts and the arguments and yet for there to be some deeper justice or truth in what they're saying. Oftentimes, conflicts play out like this: someone responds by correcting facts or pointing out flaws in arguments, but they only succeed in provoking an intensified fury and end up drawing it to themselves. That's because they're answering on the level of facts-and-arguments as a way of dismissing, rather than acknowledging, that deeper level of truth or justice that people have strong feelings about. Mostly all this does is increase the amplitude of the conflict. This is very much a co-creation between the conflicting parties—i.e. between the ones who are right (or feel they are) and the other ones who are right (or feel they are). This is the real answer to complaints about groupthink, in my opinion.