<story><title>The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News</title><url>https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-silicon-valley/the-lonely-work-of-moderating-hacker-news</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>astine</author><text>I think that people tend to perceive HN as overwhelmingly believing whatever the opposite of their opinion is any time there is a significant debate on something. Unless there is overwhelming support for our own position, we feel that we are in a hostile environment.</text></item><item><author>SolaceQuantum</author><text>Yes, I agree with what you&amp;#x27;re saying. But I&amp;#x27;m asking why the person posting believes that the HN community overwhelmingly believes X and their evidence for that. I presume they do have evidence and conclusions and I&amp;#x27;d like to know about it.</text></item><item><author>jameshart</author><text>It’s a persistent Misreading of Internet forums as a mode of discourse, both in how people consume them and how people participate in them, that we tend to regard their discussion threads as a mechanism for determining group consensus on a topic. Cloudflare is dropping 8chan? Let’s get together and decide whether we collectively think that is a good thing or a bad thing. Once we’ve established that fact, we can move on and refer back to that decision in future discussions, like a mathematical lemma.&lt;p&gt;If you instead think of a forum thread as an airing of opinions - a chance to find out what is the range of perspectives on the topic that exist in the community, and be exposed to nuances you wouldn’t have thought of on your own, the exercise takes on a different tone. People who came to that thread thinking that it’s obviously a good thing are exposed to arguments that disagree, and vice versa; maybe some people are persuaded to shift their viewpoint, or maybe not, but everybody learns that a topic that they might have assumed was uncontroversial is &lt;i&gt;actually&lt;/i&gt; one on which reasonable people might disagree.&lt;p&gt;It can be jarring for the nerd-inclined to accept that just because they have arrived at their opinions through, obviously, clear rational analysis of facts, that does not mean that everybody else, when presented with the same facts, will necessarily reach the same opinion. The illusion that you can read an HN thread and say ‘well, the pro arguments seemed more coherent and got more upvotes than the anti ones, so presumably the community consensus is pro’ ignores the fact that the anti arguments were also made by members of the HN community, and we’re not bound by collective decision making. You are allowed to read the thread and adjust your own priors and come to your own conclusions, having hopefully been exposed to some perspectives you might otherwise have missed.</text></item><item><author>SolaceQuantum</author><text>Could you clarify why you thought this? What evidence do you have that supports this? The big thread shows that the top comment agrees that 8chan should be left alone. [0] and the comment chain shows that there seems to be something like a significant minority against 8chan, but it doesn’t appear to be a prevailing majority.&lt;p&gt;0. &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&amp;#x2F;item?id=20610395&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&amp;#x2F;item?id=20610395&lt;/a&gt;</text></item><item><author>azangru</author><text>&amp;gt; HN&amp;#x27;s prevailing attitude (e.g. cloudflare-shouldnt-ban-&amp;lt;x&amp;gt;).&lt;p&gt;Funny, I thought HN&amp;#x27;s prevailing attitude in the case of the recent ban of 8chan was, hell yeah, good riddance to those reprehensible twats. (Which, personally, annoyed me, because I believe that even the deplored should have a space for communication.)</text></item><item><author>IfOnlyYouKnew</author><text>This article does seem to get at the essence of HN, appreciative of dang and sctb&amp;#x27;s humanity while not ignoring the problems. Personally, I would actually consider it an excellent demonstration of the fallibility of one of HN&amp;#x27;s favourite tropes, Gell-Mann amnesia.&lt;p&gt;If there&amp;#x27;s one critique that I believe is paramount it&amp;#x27;s that HN has, due to its readership, an ethical obligation that goes beyond making discussions all nice and civil.&lt;p&gt;Political issues are obviously divisive and it&amp;#x27;s perfectly fine to keep stuff like the El Paso massacre of the front page. But when hot-button issues intersect with technology, the HN readership is in a position of power, and shouldn&amp;#x27;t routinely be spared the anguish of being reminded of their responsibility.&lt;p&gt;Yes, articles about, for example, discriminatory ML do often make it to the front page. But in my impression, that topic (as well as employment discrimination, culture-wars-adjacent scandals in tech academia etc) are far more likely to be quickly flagged into oblivion than similarly political takes that just happen to be in line with HN&amp;#x27;s prevailing attitude (e.g. cloudflare-shouldnt-ban-&amp;lt;x&amp;gt;).&lt;p&gt;The article impressively articulates what toll divisiveness takes on the moderators: Even if I read the same ugly comments, I am unlikely to experience the sharpness of emotion that apparently comes with considering the community one&amp;#x27;s baby, and making it&amp;#x27;s failures one&amp;#x27;s own. When such divisiveness is then reflected in the &amp;quot;real world&amp;quot; of mass media, the pressure only increases.&lt;p&gt;But as this article shows, abdicating the responsibility by keeping the topics sterile is similarly suspect, in the sense of fiddling while Rome burns. I believe a willingness to confront the ugly sides of technology with some courage of conviction would eventually be recognised, even if it may occasionally involve a bit of a mess.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>hestipod</author><text>It&amp;#x27;s interesting how one or two dissenting views amongst a majority neutral or even supportive results in &amp;quot;This place is &amp;lt;insert bias&amp;gt; now!&amp;quot; I wonder why absolute agreement is required for some people to not feel attacked or marginalized.</text></comment>
<story><title>The Lonely Work of Moderating Hacker News</title><url>https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-silicon-valley/the-lonely-work-of-moderating-hacker-news</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>astine</author><text>I think that people tend to perceive HN as overwhelmingly believing whatever the opposite of their opinion is any time there is a significant debate on something. Unless there is overwhelming support for our own position, we feel that we are in a hostile environment.</text></item><item><author>SolaceQuantum</author><text>Yes, I agree with what you&amp;#x27;re saying. But I&amp;#x27;m asking why the person posting believes that the HN community overwhelmingly believes X and their evidence for that. I presume they do have evidence and conclusions and I&amp;#x27;d like to know about it.</text></item><item><author>jameshart</author><text>It’s a persistent Misreading of Internet forums as a mode of discourse, both in how people consume them and how people participate in them, that we tend to regard their discussion threads as a mechanism for determining group consensus on a topic. Cloudflare is dropping 8chan? Let’s get together and decide whether we collectively think that is a good thing or a bad thing. Once we’ve established that fact, we can move on and refer back to that decision in future discussions, like a mathematical lemma.&lt;p&gt;If you instead think of a forum thread as an airing of opinions - a chance to find out what is the range of perspectives on the topic that exist in the community, and be exposed to nuances you wouldn’t have thought of on your own, the exercise takes on a different tone. People who came to that thread thinking that it’s obviously a good thing are exposed to arguments that disagree, and vice versa; maybe some people are persuaded to shift their viewpoint, or maybe not, but everybody learns that a topic that they might have assumed was uncontroversial is &lt;i&gt;actually&lt;/i&gt; one on which reasonable people might disagree.&lt;p&gt;It can be jarring for the nerd-inclined to accept that just because they have arrived at their opinions through, obviously, clear rational analysis of facts, that does not mean that everybody else, when presented with the same facts, will necessarily reach the same opinion. The illusion that you can read an HN thread and say ‘well, the pro arguments seemed more coherent and got more upvotes than the anti ones, so presumably the community consensus is pro’ ignores the fact that the anti arguments were also made by members of the HN community, and we’re not bound by collective decision making. You are allowed to read the thread and adjust your own priors and come to your own conclusions, having hopefully been exposed to some perspectives you might otherwise have missed.</text></item><item><author>SolaceQuantum</author><text>Could you clarify why you thought this? What evidence do you have that supports this? The big thread shows that the top comment agrees that 8chan should be left alone. [0] and the comment chain shows that there seems to be something like a significant minority against 8chan, but it doesn’t appear to be a prevailing majority.&lt;p&gt;0. &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&amp;#x2F;item?id=20610395&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&amp;#x2F;item?id=20610395&lt;/a&gt;</text></item><item><author>azangru</author><text>&amp;gt; HN&amp;#x27;s prevailing attitude (e.g. cloudflare-shouldnt-ban-&amp;lt;x&amp;gt;).&lt;p&gt;Funny, I thought HN&amp;#x27;s prevailing attitude in the case of the recent ban of 8chan was, hell yeah, good riddance to those reprehensible twats. (Which, personally, annoyed me, because I believe that even the deplored should have a space for communication.)</text></item><item><author>IfOnlyYouKnew</author><text>This article does seem to get at the essence of HN, appreciative of dang and sctb&amp;#x27;s humanity while not ignoring the problems. Personally, I would actually consider it an excellent demonstration of the fallibility of one of HN&amp;#x27;s favourite tropes, Gell-Mann amnesia.&lt;p&gt;If there&amp;#x27;s one critique that I believe is paramount it&amp;#x27;s that HN has, due to its readership, an ethical obligation that goes beyond making discussions all nice and civil.&lt;p&gt;Political issues are obviously divisive and it&amp;#x27;s perfectly fine to keep stuff like the El Paso massacre of the front page. But when hot-button issues intersect with technology, the HN readership is in a position of power, and shouldn&amp;#x27;t routinely be spared the anguish of being reminded of their responsibility.&lt;p&gt;Yes, articles about, for example, discriminatory ML do often make it to the front page. But in my impression, that topic (as well as employment discrimination, culture-wars-adjacent scandals in tech academia etc) are far more likely to be quickly flagged into oblivion than similarly political takes that just happen to be in line with HN&amp;#x27;s prevailing attitude (e.g. cloudflare-shouldnt-ban-&amp;lt;x&amp;gt;).&lt;p&gt;The article impressively articulates what toll divisiveness takes on the moderators: Even if I read the same ugly comments, I am unlikely to experience the sharpness of emotion that apparently comes with considering the community one&amp;#x27;s baby, and making it&amp;#x27;s failures one&amp;#x27;s own. When such divisiveness is then reflected in the &amp;quot;real world&amp;quot; of mass media, the pressure only increases.&lt;p&gt;But as this article shows, abdicating the responsibility by keeping the topics sterile is similarly suspect, in the sense of fiddling while Rome burns. I believe a willingness to confront the ugly sides of technology with some courage of conviction would eventually be recognised, even if it may occasionally involve a bit of a mess.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>SolaceQuantum</author><text>Part of helping to work against this is to challenge and ask for genuine evidence with an open heart. I don&amp;#x27;t want to assume that that is what the poster is believing, but it also clashes with my understanding of reality.</text></comment>