Slashdot Mirror
Please Die3: The Abuse of Freedom
Do hostile environments matter?
Sure. It makes no sense to construct and maintain commercial websites that exclude most of humanity, or punish them when they try to join communal discussions. Women have a right to speak publicly; so do older people, foreigners, newcomers, newbies. The Internet was never conceived as the sole preserve anyone as a the sole preserve of technologically skilled young white men.
But hostile environments will present a worsening problem for e-communities until the notion of taking responsibility for one's own words - even online - takes hold. So far, it hasn't.
Communities naturally tend to exclude some people and make others feel welcome. But the founders of this site never meant for Slashdot to be an exclusive club for programmers using a particular computer operating system.
In an age where technology is increasingly becoming the dominant social, economic, cultural and political reality of our time, inclusion does matter. In the 21st Century, human beings will have to make unimaginably complex decisions about research, privacy, artificial intelligence, intellectual property issues, and more. Technology, and the variety of concerns springing from it, constitute the most pressing issues of contemporary life.
But where can people go to form techno-centered communities, to gather information about technology and figure out what they think about it?
Sites like Slashdot are a natural place, but these kinds of conversations are impossible here, short-circuited by angry kids often with anonymous pseuds. The Web's failure to produce or maintain common discussion grounds is getting to be a serious problem with real consequences. Misinformation about genetic research, online safety - even the Y2K problems - spreads primarily because intelligent public discussion of these issues isn't possible, except in places where nobody knows much about them, like Congress or on TV talk shows.
In the off-line world, mutual benefit is the core of community. Real people provide help, entertainment, commerce, religion, companionship - the concrete benefits of which keep the community going and sustain its members. Online, especially on technical sites, the primary benefit is information - news, software, hardware, cultural trends and information. Since there is no physical proximity (although gatherings of members often do meet in different cities), it's possible for members to benefit from this information without reciprocating - or even communicating.
Most online hostility doesn't stem from an absence of community, but from a misunderstanding of what it is. As in real-world communities, veterans react fearfully to outsiders (You might call this the John Rocker Syndrome - he's the Atlanta Braves pitcher who recently complained about too many "foreigners" being permitted into New York City and the United States.
Communities are also greatly affected - and threatened by - the evolution of their common interests. Topics are the lifeblood of any digital community, the single most reliable indicator of a community's vitality and life-span.
Again, Slashdot is a relevant example, a new kind of website. Initially, its focus was the things that most interested Rob Malda, its creator - "Legos, Linux, Movies Hardware", is how he describes it. Recently, it's broadened to include those subjects and a growing focus on technology and culture. As it grows and broadens, some of its self-appointed border guards have become increasingly agitated and resentful. Sites are also affected by internal political divisions and factions which crop up wherever humans gather.
Online communications are fluid, continuously evolving. Mailing lists and messaging software make it easier than ever to form smaller, adaptive communities - buddy, family, friend and work lists. These almost function as private associations, attracting countless small communities of people with similar interests - college students or music lovers, for example - who know one another, either virtually or in the real world, and have a vested interest in avoiding cruelty and hostility. They have things to offer one another; besides, in environments like schools, there's always the likelihood of a face-to-face encounter. It's striking how timid the most fearsome flamers become face to face. Big open websites with anonymous postings foster no such restraint.
Are hostile environments simply a trade-off for freedom, then, one of the permanent legacies of the talented young men who helped build the Net and are building it still?
Do the people running websites have any responsibility for creating environments which are truly free, and not dominated by the most hostile members? Should we be concerned that entire social groups - women, newcomers - don't feel welcome here? Is there a responsibility to offer people a genuine forum to come and see some of the smartest people involved in technology talk about issues and problems that are becoming more urgent by the month?
Do members of these communities - that's us - have any responsibility to challenge people who assault others online, create environments in which some of the most urgent issues of our lifetimes can be discussed and debated in a coherent, civil and rational way?
And perhaps most importantly, are people responsible for what they say? Should they be held accountable online, as they are off, for assaultive, hostile communication and other behavior that restricts access, free speech and the free exchange of information and opinion?
The Net is the freest medium in the world. Almost everyone reading this probably hopes it will remain that way, even as it comes under growing pressure from encroaching greedy corporations and government regulators. People ought to be able to post anonymously if they want or need to, even to be hostile.
But ultimately, this is a community, one with important information and expertise the world needs to see, hear, consider and discuss. In this environment, there are conflicting values, and perhaps it's possible to start coming up with possible solutions:
- Innovate. Could sites have "free-fire" zones, areas designated for posters who want absolute freedom, but that others can avoid if they wish?
- Welcome. Sites might establish special areas for newcomers, where they could be welcomed and learn the rules, traditions and language of a community before they wade in as members.
- Establish qualifications for membership. Few freedoms are absolute, off-line or on. Even in the freest society, people don't ignore traffic lights or knock down traffic signs - if they did, others would get injured or killed. Should rights like anonymous postings be qualified, that is offered to preserve anonymous information about companies or government agencies but revoked when they are used as screens for personal or irrelevant attacks?
- More moderation. Require all members to moderate discussions. If members regularly behave abusively or in a hostile way, they can be warned, then suspended or expelled. The consequences for disrupting discussions and for repeated personal and hostile attacks can become more serious than losing posting rights for a few hours. Few functioning communities in the world don't set some conditions for members.
- Members can also moderate more aggressively; individuals can be chosen to lead and guide discussions. People can say whatever they wish as long as they stay on topic; when they veer off into unrelated subjects or personal attacks, they can be reminded, warned once or twice, then booted off. In other words, people can be held responsible for what they say and do.
- Mentor. If most hostile posts come from kids and their freedom to behave irresponsibly or cruelly online is guaranteed - (and it should be) it's the responsibility of the single biggest group of online users - the lurkers - to speak up.
Issues surrounding hostile environments demonstrate the notion of the social and technological trade-off. An entire generation has grown up learning how to communicate viscerally and impulsively, which is both exciting and creative. They also take no responsibility for what they say, and learn to think impulsively and instinctively. If flaming works to force some people to consider their words, it also almost institutionalizes the idea that others don't have to ever consider their words.
The truth is, technology is too important to be left to newspaper reporters, politicians, corporate lobbyists and government regulators. The Net is revolutionizing commerce, culture, education, and soon even politics.
The notion of individual liberty - taken for granted in certain quarters of the Net - is a relatively new idea in the world. Some Enlightenment philosophers and American patriots came up with it, but it's still very much a work-in-progress. The United States, which loves to describe itself as the birthplace of liberty, has lots of problems with the idea. America is one of the most censorious countries in the world, blocking open discussion of many religious and political issues and increasingly deploying a whole industry of censorship technologies - blocking and filtering programs, V-Chips, insanely quixotic and unworkable ratings systems - to try and curb the very freedom it celebrates.
The Net has raised issues relating to freedom to completely new and complex levels, since the Net is the freest medium in American life, and the freest in its history.
Freedom is great, and it's easy to be for it. Hostile environments aren't great. Increasingly, they do a lot of harm. The first website that figures out how to preserve the one while eliminating the other will shroud itself in glory.
Online games, such as Ultima Online, and Everquest, have this same sort of community problem, and in many ways, it is even worse. These sorts of games attract the sort of people that cause these problems, and even worse, tend to reward them for their actions.
The true growth of a more friendly community is what will eventually make these games great, and I can't help but think that there will be lessons learned there that can be applied to the rest of the Internet in general.
AR Schleicher (Jerrith)
ars@iag.net
The two concepts are incompatible. Deal with it.
You can't abuse freedom, if you are free.
Jon, the problem is not that people abuse their freedom with words. The problem is that idiots like you think the problem is theirs. You've just got to learn to ignore people (possibly using technological means) who do not stand behind their words with a reputation.
-russ
p.s. yes it hurts to find out in the concrete that someone doesn't like me; yet I already knew that in the abstract.
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
I agree. You can tighten slashdot down without sacrificing speech. We can do without the flames.
As somebody on Slashdot's sig says..."In any sufficiently large group of people, the vast majority of idiots."
/. manageable. Any lage group is going to be a pain - get used to it.r
Slashdot is a sufficently large group, as is Yahoo, Excite, and just about any other discussion site on the Web. It's human nature and its not going to change no matter how much Jon whines about it.
I think Rob and company are doing a good job of keeping
FWIW - I run a very small listserv for about 12 friends - by far the most interesting drbates I get involved with are in the very small group setting...
I am not sure if you have discovered the "Del" key (please, do not confuse it with the "Any" key yet, or if you think you are the sacred keeper of Delete and the poor unwashed masses cannot figure out how to filter their own content.
In either case, everybody that has the capability of viewing 'net material also has the capability of ignoring the bits they find offensive. No, the callous ones are not drowning out the "acceptable to syurupy sweet Jon" good guys.
We have filtering and all sorts of other tools too (maybe that can make the next topic, right after another story about the blind guy). Don't forget, some of us unwashed masses even have brains and we can choose to skip a post if we find it offensive. Jon, free choice does exist, even after AOL/Time, they did not take away my means to scroll or delete or anything else.
If you read something that makes you cry because it hurt your feelings, then too bad.
Hey, newsflash "The Sky is STILL not Falling!!!"
Eve Fairbanks says I drive a hybrid!LOL
The one thing that is happening is that people who usually can't be heard publicly, think that they can be the big man on cambus by flaming. I think that people who uncreativly flame, (IE: "Please Die") think that they are very important and are a mini internet god. I must admit there are some creative flames and trolls but the egotism of the internet has allowed Mr. Geek to feel like he is someone important.
This is what the KKK has been doing for years now, by saying "we can say what we damn please!" How many people belive that the KKK is rignt? I do
not know of anyone.
There are also lots of Wintel, Linux, Solaris, Mac... etc. zealots out there who belive that whatever they say is right. They like to post, Mac rules!, Linux is the only OS to use unless you have an IQ of 50. Why can't these people realize that if some one has a different opinion, they have the right to say it and not be flamed with, Shut up %@#^! You suck! Whoever does this is not really using free speach, they are trying to limit what other people say. Thatis not what the internet is for.
Most of the suggestions mentioned in Jon's article have been tried. Mostly the results have been, at best, mixed.
The worst kind of flamewar is the flamewar about who should be censored, ejected, etc. If you want to see exactly how bad that can be, check out the conferences (especially the meta conference) at utne.
If most hostile posts come from kids and their freedom to behave irresponsibly or cruelly online is guaranteed - (and it should be) it's the responsibility of the single biggest group of online users - the lurkers - to speak up.
This is the absolute worst thing you can do. When kids come trolling, yelling at them just encourages the behavior.
In any case, I really, honestly don't see what the problem is. I read at 1 and rarely see anything truly offensive. I hear people complain about offensive stuff, natalie portman posts and the like, but I rarely see them. (I've only seen the one petrified post that got +3 funny.)
More moderation scares me as there is already a problem of moderators voting their politics.
I suspect that part of the solution is not more moderation, but readers learning not to take offense at things that posted and then moderated down.
The cake is a pie
Yes! We get the message already. Free Speech CAN get out of hand. Katz is demonstrating how damaging it is to fill up an on-line forum with mind-numbing and inconsequential messages. This is certainly a danger to allowing someone like Katz the power of the free speech.
Can we please get back to News? You know, stuff that matters?
I know, I know, I should just set my preferences to not show articles by Katz. I'll go do that right away...
-Jordan Henderson
Way back in the days when you had dial up local bulletin boards to participate in discussions, there were always a few people who took the opportunity to be abusive and bombastic way beyond any sense of proportion.
There seems to be a certain personality type that "cuts loose" in an environment he thinks is anonymous. I run a web-based message board now with a few characters like this. Generally, all I have to do is to check their IP address in the log, do a reverse lookup, and send them a little note that I can contact their ISP and find out who they are if the abuse continues.
Young punks (M and F) don't know jack-sh*t about the world or how to live in it.
Deal with it or be culled in the revolution.
This post encoded with ROT26. If you can read it, you've violated the DMCA. Handcuffs please, sergeant.
What happened? I've always considered myself an individualistic iconoclast, someone who distrusts authority and has his own opinions about everything. Yet it seems my old-fashioned upbringing, at the hand of uneducated but polite old-world parents, has left me with an impatience and, even, disdain towards online flaming and rude language... and by "rude" I mean neither scatological nor profane, but simply disconsiderate of other's opinions and feelings.
Am I an obsolete voice in the wilderness, or what?
Kat Nagel (KatNagel@eznet.net) sent this
terrific piece to the EARLY-M mailing list in December 1994.
Every list seems to go through the same cycle:
how wonderful it is to find kindred souls).
and brainstorm recruitment strategies).
develop, occasional off-topic threads pop up).
information and advice is exchanged; experts help other experts as
well as less experienced colleagues; friendships develop; people tease
each other; newcomers are welcomed with generosity and patience;
everyone -- newbie and expert alike -- feels comfortable asking
questions, suggesting answers, and sharing opinions).
dramatically; not every thread is fascinating to every reader; people
start complaining about the signal-to-noise ratio; person 1 threatens
to quit if *other* people don't limit discussion to person 1's pet
topic; person 2 agrees with person 1; person 3 tells 1 & 2 to lighten
up; more bandwidth is wasted complaining about off-topic threads than
is used for the threads themselves; everyone gets annoyed).
an 'old' question or responds with humor to a serious post; newbies
are rebuffed; traffic drops to a doze-producing level of a few minor
issues; all interesting discussions happen by private email and are
limited to a few participants; the purists spend lots of time
self-righteously congratulating each other on keeping off-topic
threads off the list).
OR
stay near stage 4, with stage 5 popping up briefly every few weeks;
many people wear out their second or third 'delete' key, but the list
lives contentedly ever after).
LetterJ
The Glass is Too Big: My Take on Things
The raw fact is that this is what happens in the "real world." And the problem is that what is and is not appropriate is a function over time, and not a matter of common agreement. The end result is a band of self-named Morality Police that decide what is appropriate, and force their views on others, thus effectively creating a new criminal class out of people who don't share their views.
I've said it before, but I'll say it again... The First Amendment guarantees you the right to free speech. It in NO WAY guarantees you the right to be listened to! Taking a wild guess, 9 out of 10 kids that flame their peers are doing it entirely for the reason of gaining attention. If we ignore them, they'll go away. The other 1 out of 10 is a more serious problem, but the whole point of this, I believe, is to avoid letting the Internet go down the road that RL society did/is.
Face it, sad though it may be, we're never going to get rid of malice and hate. The question is, are we going to classify it and subject it to arbitrary penalization based on ever-changing standards, ignore it until it escalates under already-existing criminal behaviors, or take another approach.
Don't ask me what that approach is, I'm not a deity, but I can say that letting the Internet mirror society even closer than it already does, is probably not it.
Notice: Your mouse has been moved. Windows will now restart so this change can take effect.
Jon Katz, why do you keep on writing these articles about hostility on the Internet. They are NOT well received. I'd like to, if I may, point out some facts:
The Internet is in most respects genderless. I have no idea whether any of the posters on Slashdot are female, or if they are white or black or Asian. How can I discriminate when I don't have anything at all to go upon?
Hostility, as I pointed out in a previous comment, is found in the real world in the same proportions as it is on f.e. Slashdot. It's there, it's part of human life, and I don't want to miss it. I like hearing EVERYTHING that EVERYONE has to say about the topic at hand, not just someone like you, who posts goodie-goodie Mr. Niceguy articles.
Your suggestion that there should be an introduction area for new users is absolutely ridiculous. There IS nothing to learn. You read, you post or you don't. It is the job of the newcomer to adapt to his enviroment, not vice versa.
I was offended, and yes, I mean offended, by your suggestion that anonymous posts be restricted. Already, anonymous posts start with the rating 0, which I find bad enough. But banning people from posting anonymously will inevitably stifle freedom of speech and, as you so masterfully put it, prevent some people from posting, for fear of retribution (flame, hate mail) on hand of irate Slashdot readers.
Slashdot is a community, and all those within the community have rights, even the jerks. It's a fine line between freedom and law, but I find your ideas somewhat fascist.
Katz, please keep in mind that your fancy, overly dramatic phrases and your excellent use of the English language may earn you respect from some Slashdotters, but not from others. I hope there are enough people with sense here on
It seems abusrd at first, but if you think about it, it does start to make sense. Maybe the moderation threshold would have to be increased... but the moderators would need not spend their points on taking out the kiddies. The kiddies would stay there - but the overall average score of the articles would rise, and the kiddies' posts would be left below it.
Not only that, but no added moderation pounts would be needed if the amount of kids doubled overnight. Right now, if the number of kiddie posts doubles, there would either have to be more moderation points issued, or the StN ratio would fall significantly. But with the proposed system, if the amount of lame posts increases while the amount of good posts stays the same, very little would change.
Think about it... sounds good?
--
Slashdot has one of the highest signal to noise ratios of any discussion forum I have ever participated in. The moderation system has helped a great deal in that I can now screen out most of the idiots.
I don't see massive flame-wars on slashdot for the most part. People need not be afraid of posting their opinions to slashdot as long as they are well-considered and intelligent - such commentary is almost always well recieved.
Can someone give me an example of the problem here on slashdot? Jon?
-josh
I'm sorry, but Slashdot is not a Soapbox. 3 articles by Jon Katz, just because he got a "Please Die" email? Please, I get threats and abuse daily from my dealings on #linux on IRCnet. And I'm not even a channel operator.
/. is rather ironic - you're complaining that it's hard to state your views ... well, having /. articles that state your view rather shoves it down a lot of people's throats now, doesn't it?
One article is enough, and the discussion thereof should have been sufficient - true, there are many Loud Skript Kiddies who just shout abuse, however, actually having your own soapbox on
I know this detracts from the issue you're bringing up, but you are encouraging it by doing it this way.
.my 2p
.my 2p
Americans, and probably elsewhere, need, in the survival sense of the word "need", to be more thick-skinned. No insult or derogatory comment, no ethnic slur, should -ever- come to blows.
People sometimes hate each other -- THAT is the problem. Until that is fixed, these words we type are nothing but a symptom of the real problem.
Which is worse, violence in speech or violence in the heart? If the right one of these is fixed, the other will go away. We are trying to fix the wrong one. Nothing is happening. This is not surprising.
A political science prof I had once said "politics is good, if you think of it as an alternative to war." When the possiblity of swallowing a knuckle sandwich is taken away, people express themselves more honestly. Telephones, computers, cause a loss of civility, because they provide a forum for honesty.
The AC account should never go away, because slashdot would them be responsible for ratting out controversial posters to the authorities if the issue ever came up... Better not to store the info at all.
I would like to Take this moment, and Say that i will Be runniing for President (of the Jerk Brigade) of the united States of Americia. As Exutive Vise president of my cubicial i announce this action for the Year 2000 Elections (Gives the Peace sign in one hand, and Birdie in the other)
SHUDUP you PUNEY PEASENTS!!!! and Get on with life. YOu all SUCK!!! only the Linux OS Rulez.
I promise that if im elected, i will Make all of your lives a living Hell.!!!!
(BOWS)
To err is human, to really screw things up, you need a robot.
More moderation. Require all members to moderate discussions. If members regularly behave abusively or in a hostile way, they can be warned, then suspended or expelled. The consequences for disrupting discussions and for repeated personal and hostile attacks can become more serious than losing posting rights for a few hours. Few functioning communities in the world don't set some conditions for members.
Part of the allure of /. is that we are moderated by ourselves and although it is not a perfect system it allows the frredom to say what your opinion is, flames and all. If it's off-topic or flamebait it is moderated as such. If I wish not to see the lower end of the comments, I can choose to browse at +1. I think Jon has some good points but his attempt to re-difine the culture, success and the community of /. is IMO not warrented. I don't beleive he is qualified from a culture or a technical standpoint, and I sort of took offense to the comment that stated something along the lines of /. was never created to be. . .
More race stuff in one place,
than any one place on the net.
It would seem to me that you have a few issues to sort out in your economic model.
Even if a feasable economic model existed that catered solely to white men (of which I am a member), you can't hide your own ignorance behind that false belief.
Take your bigotry elsewhere.
Remove the NOSPAM to spam me...
Well, I DO heartily agree....the subject says it all. I never promised there'd be anything interesting about my reply? What did you expect? An essay? Well, I wrote a pretty long comment, its a bit below this one...
If AC's were banned then you would have to be more responsible on your postings. I don't care if you are offtopic sometimes if you aren't being an ass.
Yes, I agree that nasty things get said in online forums. Yes, I agree that it puts some people off participating. However, I am doubtful about whether their gender has much to do with it. Personally I never felt intimidated, or anything else: I look at the more unpleasant posts, and think "how silly" and get on with my life, irrespective of my extra X chromosome.
In fact, being online _removes_ the ExtraX factor which one has in real life, where the rude, psychotic or unpleasant people know who you are, and the physical differences between the genders become more relevant. If I meet a weirdo in a bar, I may take a taxi home rather than walking. If I meet a weirdo on Slashdot, I can ignore them completely.
Perhaps I am unusual - certainly as a programmer I am not a typical woman, and I would be really interested in anyone who _does_ feel that their gender affects their participation in online discussion forums like this. It would be nice to have some reliable data on the participation of women, whether they post, or lurk, more or less than men. They would have to be matched for their technical knowledge, since it seems quite likely that being less computer literate _would_ put you off posting for fear of looking like an idiot. Has anyone seen anything like this?
Another interesting thing would be to look at these sort of statistics for newsgroups on sewing or child-rearing or anywhere that one might expect women to have equal or better subject knowledge.
Hey fuck nut! You must have read at least
the index to decide to post. I got my flame
proof asbesto long johns, on so do your worst.
Wanna make something of it? I got tired of
you shits about two weeks ago.
I think everyone should be able to say their
piece but at least have enough guts to stand
by your words with your name.
You are probably the reason that your parents
should have used birth control or never have
met.
With fondest regards,
Nor will it Jon. The Internet is about free exchange of ideas - true information freedom. Along with this baby we got it's dirty diapers - this doesn't mean we throw the baby out with the bathwater.
Online, we lack several things that prevent us from being rude in person - accountability does not exist online. This allows us to be loose and free in what we say, more so than we would face to face with another human being. On a deep deep level, we're all afraid to insult someone like this face to face for one reason: FEAR. Fear of reprisal, fear of loss of credibility and respect, hell - fear of getting physically smacked for being an idiot in some cases! We don't have these fears online, and it shows in our missives! This is not indicative of some new culture of angry flamers, it's indicative of HUMAN NATURE when certain restraints on our behavior are lifted.
Hey Rob, Thanks for that tarball!
"Going to war without France is like going deer hunting without your accordion." - Jed Babbin
Katz seems to be in favour of political correctness for some, and inclusion for some, but not for all.
Katz mentions the exclusion of "women, older people, foreigners, newcomers, and newbies" in favour of "technologically skilled young white men," but he neglects to mention the one group most abused, most insulted, and most excluded on the sites he discusses: (non-liberal) Christians.
What he SHOULD have said, to be accurate, instead of "technologically skilled young white men," was "technologically skilled young white ATHEIST men," with the "atheist" attribute seeming to lead to MUCH more hatred, rudeness, and bigotry than all the "young" and "white" and "men" attributes combined.
It seems that Katz has an agenda here... inclusion for all, regardless of race, sex, or age... as long as their beliefs don't differ from his own. He's talking out one side of his mouth, trying to sound fair and inclusionary, but intentionally leaves out Christians, the most excluded and most persecuted group (other than perhaps MCSE's) on sites like this.
Katz has shown his anti-Christian leanings numerous times in the past. I've been forced several times to write letters to Christian groups and articles for Christian websites about some of Katz's more insulting, distasteful articles, and it looks like that time ago. Sorry, JonKatz, but there *ARE* reasons not to like you, and I've just exposed one of them.
Now this is exactly the sort of behavior Katz is complaining about. But, as you can see, the moderation system quickly took care of things. Anyone reading at 1 (Which is the default, isn't it?) would have to go out of their way to even know of such a post's existence. I know that I certainly never saw it, reading this topic around five minutes after it was posted.
So what's to complain about? Well, I suspect that the real complaint is that the post exists at all. This is natural. No one wants something like the above posted about them, even if no one sees it. But what really upsets us, even if we don't realize it, is not that it is posted, but that someone feels that way about us. But keeping it freeing being posted doesn't stop the poster from feeling the way they do, so why bother?
It is not like anyone is going to read that post, and say "Well, I used to like Katz a lot, but know that I see that some AC thinks his stuff is not worth reading, I won't bother to read the next Hellmouth essay". Not likely. More likely is that someone will read that and think "Another moron AC post".
Moderation does a damn good job of keeping us readers from having to see this stuff. As long as we readers don't need to be bothered with crap like that, I really don't think it matters. Going beyond that is just counterproductive.
The cake is a pie
Katz,
Ever heard the phrase "Sticks and Stones may break my bones, but words will never harm me?" To me, the idea that a flame is "fearsome" is outright laughable. Think about it.
For the very SAME reasons that you outline that allow someone to post stuff they wouldn't normally say in public are the EXACT same reasons that they are extremely easy to ignore. Fearsome? I think not. In order for someone to garner true fear, they need to have significant power over your life. Name one way that these ACs do this. Just one. You can't - because they have NO POWER over you - except that which you give them. It's that simple.
I think the real problem is that people give lip service to "free speech", but when they see something they don't like, their natural instinct is to silence the source. Instead, look at what the person has to say and judge that on its own merits. Soon, you don't even feel the need to silence idiotic speech.
Take Rocker, for example. He expressed his opinion. Everyone calls for his head, and perhaps baseball should fine him - but ONLY because they are in the entertainment business, and his comments could decrease BUSINESS. But look at what he said. What is so scary about those ideas? I look at that and say - hey, there's a guy expressing free speech, and look at how stupid and shallow his thoughts are. And I dismiss it, just like that.
That's free speech, not some touchy-feely PC world where speech is allowed as long as no one gets their feelings hurt.
Women have a right to speak publicly; so do older people, foreigners, newcomers, newbies.
Katz, look at the implications you make with this sentence and the ones following it. You make the presumption that these groups are inherently emotionally weaker than "technologically skilled young white men". You imply that they are so emotionally fragile that reading about Natalie Portman's petrified beowulf cluster will instill fear into them. That's just down right laughable, and I see it as such. But it's your opinion.
Linux - Because Mommy taught me to Share.
Jon Katz is a journalist, and regularly reminds us of the fact.
Rob Malda is not a journalist, and regularly reminds us of the fact.
Jon Katz wrote the above stream-of-consciousness screed, and its two predecessors.
Rob Malda wrote "Thoughts From the Furnace".
Jon Katz's best idea was "let's have designated free-for-all zones and flame-free zones".
Rob Malda implemented the Slashdot moderation system.
Jon Katz was brought in to help Rob Malda.
1) Posts material disguised as relevant
2) Evokes massive flames from the community
3) The more attention he gets, the more he seems to post (to the point of posting about the attention he gets)
As a fellow troll, Jon, I'd like to point out that you should expect "please die" messages. I get them all the time. It's not good form to post a troll about responses to your trolls. If you can't take the heat, stay out of the kitchen!
May I also make a suggestion: creative, amusing trolls are easier on the eyes than these long verbal defications.
As a troll, you should be more considerate of the rights of everyone else to flame, troll, or post legitimately. Not all of us have infinite karma.
I propose a karma tax. Where we skim percentages of karma off of the richest karma holders of slashdot and redistribute to the less wealthy. This will alleviate much frustration and curb the flames aimed at people like Jon Katz.
thank you.
posting with -7 karma, for your viewing pleasure!
Inane comments, posted by anonymous cowards, are just a demonstration of immaturity and an unwillingness to take reponsibility.
On the other hand, I don't think the system should be changed at all. Let it be. The AC's posting inane, pointless and offtopic messages are excercising their right to be heard in a free communications medium.
Some of us may not like it, but we aren't being asked to like it. We are just being asked to tolerate it. I've never posted anonymously here, never flamed, never posted offtopically, and I don't intend to. What I have to say is what I have to say. If someone decides I need to be flamed into a little hole in the ground, so be it. I can take it.
Jon, have you actually talked to a lot of women about this? Some leave because this level of immaturity turns them off something they might otherwise be interested in, but lots just stick it out. Don't underestimate the femme-geeks.
Sakhmet.
"When I want to do something mindless to relax, I reinstall Windows 95."
Ban the Nukes! Save the Whales! Screw it. Nuke the Whales!
On the one hand, the column suggests that the Internet can be a bastion of freedom; on the other hand, it implies that *something* needs to be done about limiting people's verbal viciousness. In particular, it implies that everybody should feel welcome.
Would you expect a fervent activist from Handgun Control, Inc. to be welcome at an NRA convention -- or the converse? Were one to be foolish enough to attend and think he could actually convince many of those die-hard enough to attend, one would suspect that he would be engaged in rather contentious debates. This would certainly be true the other way around, as well. Would anybody suggest that the hostility would be undeserved?
If somebody barges into a newsgroup, wastes everybody's time through posting a MIMEd document with a problem explicitly dealt with in FAQs and a 15-line signature, and insists on an instant solution despite the hundreds of hours obviously invested in preparing the existing body of literature -- as well as numerous pointers to such -- then should not such be discouraged, firmly? Random ad hominen attacks may be gratuitous, but it would not be dishonest to point out the violations of existing community standards regarding prior effort before demanding the assistance of strangers.
Would you have the 'welcome' concept be decided by the alleged victim, and only by that victim? When one has law based on 'feeling', we find absurdities like a UNM ex-medical student who sued under the ADA claiming that exams make him very anxious, and a D.C. official briefly resigning over people taking offense to his using the word "niggardly", which happens to be completely unrelated to the obvious racial slur, and a California physician who got some disability pay due to stress from being caught on fraud, grand theft and tax-evasion charges...
There are reasons why concepts such as 'obscenity' are left largely up to local judges to decide upon the basis of what they see as "community standards", and why most laws are left with more objective standards... and why the federal laws regarding speech and harrassment are among the most detested in the country.
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
I think one thing that needs to be notes is what is actually meant by freedom. Freedom is usually interpreted as peoples ability to do what they want and this has often formed the basis for proto-anarchistic groups and social reform movements. The internet is seen by many to be this kind of anarchistic community where people can do what they want regardless of consequences, national boundaries, etc. However freedom is intrisincly tied in with responsibility for ones actions. If one curtails anothers freedon you have in fact curtailed your own and those of the community. Flaming is an example of freedon being used to censor and control the content of an area. As newbie many years ago I learned the hard way that many flamers refuse to listen to arguement as they cling to their self reichousness under the banner of freedon, not allowing others to infringe on their superiority and teretory. I was fortunate in that I found groups of adults on the net who were mature enough to listen as much as they talked and I perservered and am still about. One of the consequences we are seeing of this flagrant abuse of the freedom given to users of the net is a movement to censor and curtail those rights. Oddly enough the people who dislike this the most are the ones who are on the whole creating the situation where this is necessary... All one can hope for is that these people grow up and become responsible nettizens, although it would lay money on the fact that there will be another batch who come through. The best hope we have is that there will eb a new generation of people coming through who have used the net since they could type and they will grow up realising the resource they have and be able to understand what it can be used for.
Working for the (other) man
Jon sayeth: "[Adolescent males] have plenty to contribute - brains, energy, information and technical skills. But they need mentoring. If their flames are met with a barrage of protest, criticism or ridicule, they'll take notice."
To be the bearer of bad news, the barrage of protest, criticism and ridicule is exactly what many flamers/trollers are looking for. Telling some kid he's being a jerk for posting such messages isn't gonna make h[im|er] think "Hmm... maybe I *have* been hurting other people's feelings or sense of (pick your favorite psychobabble term). I should step back and change my ways." The only thing it does is to encourage them to post more flames/trolls.
As many people have pointed out, the only way to make them go away is to ignore them. It may not work, but takes far less effort than reacting to it. (Read this as browse comments at threshhold of +1 or +2.)
Eric
Jon Katz has written the articles specifically on this topic in order to make everyone that usually points out the flaws in his articles seem "evil". I'm most certain that in any other articles he decides to do on this topic he will allude back to the comments made regarding this one. He will talk about how they were almost 75% negatively written, some even "Hostile". I must say, Mr. Katz, that you are a political genious. Perhaps you could give the presidency a try? Ignorancy is the only requirement to be president, and you sir fulfill that requirement to the ut-most.
I'm all for the ellimination of the AC account.
I've been giving this a lot of thought. Previously I was very pro-AC-- it sounded like a good idea, the op to speak without consequence. And I've seen some great AC posts, very informative, very well-researched and well written. But, those are the vast minority. We should probably collect some actual, hard data on this, but my current estimate is 1 out of every 30 AC posts is worth anything.
The abuse potential is too high, and the rewards too low. It's not as though we'll really lose anything by removing AC-- how many of us are really named "sq4tch" or "dev/nul/" or "Savage Henry Matisse"? There's plenty of safety/anonymity in our "handled" accounts. I feel like a tool saying this, but:
no more AC, please.
("S"HM exits, stage left, head hung in shame.)
Much Love,
"S"HM
*****
(I refuse to spellcheck out of contempt for your belief system)
Abuse of freedom is simply using that freedom to curtail somebody elses right to the same.
Working for the (other) man
This is true. I concur that many, many people do not take proper ownership of their own words on the Internet or in any electronic communication. However, this seems to be a problem with people adjusting to the idea of electronic communication in general (how many PHBs have sent morale-crushing e-mail because they didn't get it?), not with the structure of the Internet. The worst flamers (except on /.) That I have encountered on the net have real accounts, but just some kind of problem: kookism, juvenile boredom, desire to break up conversations on topics that they have strong and conflicting views, etc.
Katz is right that those who are creating on line communities need to be concerned about this, as the effort (and $$) being expended on the creation of on line communities is too great for them to be so easily disrupted by flame wars.
However, it is impossible for total openness and total amicability to co-exist in the Internet as currently constructed (just as it is currently impossible to have a perfectly secure and easily-usable computer system). Part of this is the human condition. Much of what makes life interesting IS conflict. Conflict is the crucible in which innovation is fired, where great new ideas are refined. If some cannot handle that conflict, their experience of the world is the worse for it.
What does this mean for Katz' communities? Well it means that, like any community, there will be good and bad aspect to it. In my real community, I love having my neighbor on the left as a neighbor, and I cannot stand my neighbor on the other side. However, just because I cannot stand my neighbor on the right, do I scream at him and his wife in the street? No, because it would jeopardize my standing in the community.
This, to me is the crux of the issue. It is possible to create standing in the e-community, just as one can in the meat space community. However, it takes effort, time, civility, and respect for others. Sometimes, it can be so hard to be heard on the net that one feels the need to scream or write in a hostile manner to get one's views heard. This is generally wrong. It easily destroys one's standing in the community. I tend to ignore anything that comes from a past flamer (pick the filtering capability of your choice). But I do this in the real world as well- I don't watch shows that I don't like on television. But not listening is not inhibiting commercial or political speech.
Perhaps if it were more difficult to so easily change one's identity on the net, this wouldn't be a problem. However, this is one of the things that is valuable. The AC posts are, occasionally, great. Since they need to be moderated up for me to read them, I generally only see good ones unless I am moderating or looking for moderation problems. Perhaps some sanction might be a good idea- maybe if people were required to log in before posting as AC, and their comment could be moderated down as a troll or flamebait, there could be karma sanctions or suspension (of course, it's easy to create new accounts).
I think that we may just have to live with it.
This is a private forum. Our purpose is to talk about things which interest each other. People who post things which do not interest us should be driven away by any convenient means which does not compromise the value of the forum. If people get their feelings hurt, tough. They were jerks to step in where they aren't wanted. And if people are offended by the normal level of hostility to competing arguments, that's just too damn bad for them. That's the nature of this community, and you can take it or leave it.
Slashdot is doing just fine the way it is (except for the top-level posts, which honestly seem to be becoming trolls for the purpose of generating ad revenue). We are dealing with trolls and offtopic posts in precisely the correct manner: ignoring them and helping each other to ignore them efficiently (while a significant minority checks for abuses of the mechanism for this).
Free, anonymous speech in the big picture is worthwhile. I hope there will always be public forums where anyone can speak their mind and never face consequences. But it is perfectly acceptable to have private forums with enforced topics and rules.
BTW, I find it very amusing to hear all this from the guy who said he'll never use "shut up software".
It seems to me that quite often we tend to confuse the ideas of freedom and anarchy. The freedom that we were given when our country was founded, was given through a set of rules. A constitution and a bill of rights (rules) defined the boundries of social interaction. This set of rules formed what we call freedom. By restricting ourselves from hostile and unfair behavior, we became the home of liberty. If there had been no system of law set up, and america had become a land of anarchy, we would definitely see one of the most hostile environments anywhere. It would be probably like those old road warrior movies. So what am I getting at? What am I trying to say? That if we want an online community that creates a non-hostile environment we must be willing to endure some form of regulation. There must be some basic rules, maybe even an internet bill of rights, that must be set up. Freedom only lives when it is protected by a fair system of rules. Without rules, anarchy lives and freedom disappears. So you must choose freedom or anarchy. Regulation or a hostile environment.
He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose -- Elliot
I have found that the signal to noise ratio has gotten so high that I only read slashdot at a level of 2 or higher. This means I miss out on the majority of posts.
When I moderate, this means that I never even see posts at a level of 1 or 0 that my deserve to be moderated up. It is just not worth plowing though all of the garbage.
Perhaps we could have a two tiered moderation system: posts can still be moderated up/down, but users should also have a built in moderation level. So if a user tends to make intelligent posts that get moderated up, start their new posts off at a higher moderation level. If a user tends to flame a lot, start them off at a lower level. This rewards intelligent, interesting discussion without putting too much of a burden on the moderators. Instead of constantly having to raise good posts, they just have to "adjust" the levels up or down of posts that are inappropriate.
This could also work for anonymous posts. If a user is logged in, but chooses to post anonymously, then their post can start off moderated up to the level of the user. If people don't like the content of the anonymous post (such as an inappropriate flame), then the user who posted it gets negative moderation points tacked onto their account. Either disallow anonymous posts from non-logged-in users, or start them off at such a low moderation level that they will be rarely used.
Is the current system broken? No. But there is definately room for improvement...
And second of all, where did you ever get the idea that Slashdot is a haven for programmers who use linux? Maybe for linux users, but the majority of slashdot users are not programmers. What dreamworld are you living in? Slashdot is certainly not home to the talented young men that built the net. Maybe at one time, but not any more. Now, the majority of posts are pathetically misinformed and ignorant.
I think slashdot was perfectly described by one comment I read a few weeks ago; a cistern of slander, innuendo, and outright lies.
You want an e-community (i hate that word) with anonimity(sp) fine go build one. If you want accountability for what people say. Fine to go build one. want something inbetween go ahead do that to. Katz seems to be making a black and white issue here. the fact is there is choice in this. If you dont like the idea of anonymity dont participate in forums which support/promote it. if you dont like the idea of being forced to divulge who you are then dont participate in those kind of groups. Its that simple. If /. or some other group is to hostile for your taste then dont participate. This everyone should be included and treated nicely is hogwash. The group/community sets the rules. whose allowed in. who is not. whats acceptable behavior and whats not. if hostility is acceptable then good of them. if not kudos to you too. the fact is that natural selection will decide what types of groups flourish on the net and which ones dont. No need to worry about trying to "Design" it. just let it be.
Well, I've read these articles and here is what I've gained:
1)Flamers are, by and large, adolescent white males in need of attention.
2)Women are delicate flowers. Treat them as such.
3)Hostility is a bad, bad thing. Like growing up in a burning house, without the trips to hospital.
4)The first friendly discussion website will 'shroud itself in glory'
4a)I must pause for a moment now, as I know of no websites that have ever shrouded themselves in glory. In point of fact, I can think of precious few things or people that have. Will there be angels involved in this enshrouding?
5)There are some things which could be done to stop flaming, but they might not work. Then again, they might. But, then again -- they might not.
Well, thanks!
-l
No matter what your religious views, you need to go to a place where truely hostile discussions occur; alt.atheism. The trolls there, unlike the "tastes great"/"less filling" arguments in OS *.advocacy groups are un yeilding and really can't help themselves.
/., the locals there have decided that aggressive use of kill files is the only way to have a conversation at all -- and this annoys the trolls to no end...and they hate to be ignored.
Unlike
Does it work? Barely. But it does make me wonder why kill files aren't supported here as well.
Note: moderated groups like alt.atheism.moderated are lightly traveled since it takes time for the moderators to look at the posts and weed out the chaff.
It has been my experience that flamers don't just choose to flame people at random. A person persitently inspiring large numbers of flames is probably saying something that is outside the boundaries of the community. Or at least what the flamers perceive the boundaries to be.
When a community is organized around a very specific theme or idea, and someone just barges in and tries to change the dialogue to something totally unrelated, people are likely to be dismissive. If the person persists, members of the community will probably get upset. And some people are likely to voice their discontent. Loudly. With expletives. The flamers just skip the dismissive part and go straight to the expletives.
The problem is knowing where the boundaries are and when they've changed. Flamers can actually help delineate boundaries. If the majority of the responses to a posting are flames, then you're out of bounds. There is probably a kinder, gentler way. But flaming is the longstanding tradition.
I'll do it for cheesy poofs.
The first article in this "series" contained a very enlightened post by someone (which was quickly moderated to the top) saying that the main reason Katz is flamed is because he preaches rather than takes part in the discussion, and that he never seems to notice the hundreds of insightful comments made after every one of his posts.
And, lo and behold, he has now gotten to the third installment of this pulpet marathon, and I have heard nothing from him about this. Katz doesn't even seem to acknowledge that although he loves to use himself and the Slashdot community as an example, he has never even made an effort (save one article about trying to install Linux) to be PART of the Slashdot community.
People do not flame because they are sexually understimulated or beat up in school or whatever theory I can't bring myself to care that Katz believes in, but they do so to get attention. If you behave like a higher power, never talking to, but rather at, others, of course you will flamed because you show that that is what is necessary to get your attention.
I have posted several hundred comments to this forum, and probably gotten as many replies and moderator points (for better or worse). Yet I cannot bring myself to recall EVER being flamed here. Not once. The only people who I see getting flamed here are the really dominant seminal posters like Signal11, but even then it is rather mild.
What makes you think, Jon Katz, that the "women and old people" that you prejudicely assume break down when insulted, are going to come into a community and start preaching at it from above, rather than starting by lurking, and then posting "from below" so to speak, as ten years of practice in netiquette have taught me is the right technique? Maybe you should look at yourself to see where the flaming problem begins, and not follow the philosophy of always blaming others so entrenched in the world about which you love to preach...
-
We cannot reason ourselves out of our basic irrationality. All we can do is learn the art of being irrational in a reasonable way.
I can't figure this one out. Can you?
/. It's that little dropdown box on each page that orders comments, and filters them.
The Internet was never conceived as the sole preserve anyone as a the sole preserve of technologically skilled young white men.
I'm not sure that it is actually a sentence by definition of grammar. Sure it has a subject and a verb, but I'm not sure about the object of this sentence. Please elaborate.
OTOH, I've read the past 3 days of articles by Mr. Katz, and I've determined that if he dares call himself a libertarian, then I've got issues with that. YES, there is a problem with ACs at times, and YES there are some people who abuse by flaming. More moderation is _not_ needed. The system is working fine. Esp. with the addition of Karma.
I learned long ago that you cannot set your standard of people too high, lest you wish to be constantly disappointed. You can however set what you will tolerate exposure to, especially at
Since it is user initiated, it is a wonderful system. So, if you are disappointed with the way things are going in a thread, and wish to increase your S/N ratio, use it! But as already mentioned, the S/N ratio is already high. I would almost stake all of my karma points on this one wager: Online or offline, the amount of crap you hear/take is equivalent. (One caveat, this equivalence relies on the fact that you will act the same online as offline and choose what you wish to actually listen to)
ALL HAIL BRAK!!!
<howl>Brains, BRAAAAAIIINS!</howl>
Just what exactly Jon would want the brains and energy of flamers for, I don't understand. Perhaps he has a good stew recipe that he plans to share with us in part 4 of this series?
I read and post to slashdot because its entire perview is anything but narrow or hostile. Options are present for me to filter out the information I regard as useless. Sometimes I post and get high karma. Sometimes I don't. It happens.
Time and time again I read about an issue on slashdot and find the User Comments more valuable than the post. An item on wearable computing might lead to a post by someone who actually makes them, and links to more information. My interest in technology and culture finds this site the perfect compliment to these curiosities, despite some people insisting that slashdot's focus should be more narrow.
However, I cannot help but feel Mr. Katz' recent articles are written only in reaction to the amount of negative posts he generates here. I do not understand this three part series' point whatsoever - the main criticism I find levelled at Katz by my friends who are literate, polite, non flaming linux users is that being a cultural person he is more interested in buzzwords than content - driving an issue based on its importance rather than providing any real insight - something I do not agree with completely but understand, and wish them to be able to express that opinion. I do not sit here flaming anonymously, but as myself.
I am a minority. I am non white. My mother was an immigrant from a low tech country to the U.S. I am not a coder. My expertise is in an analog tech format (filmmaking). I am everything that katz has suggested online communities are - but I am not a dangerous, hostile adolescent who uses the Net for juvenile vitriol.
I've found this community and many others on the net all the same - there are minorities and, yes, women present - as computing becomes more ubiquitious it will become even more diverse. There are flamers, and there are intelligent posters, and trolls. There is highly valuable news and some which is worthless to myself or others. At the end of the day, as the reader, I make slashdot to be my own - taking what I need and is important from it.
I don't see why this model is so deprecative to society, as Mr. Katz would have it. Anybody else feel like me despite the lunacy and annoyance that every Jeff K on the net generates, there is something more profound, just waiting for you to find it, instead of a hierarchy deciding it for us.
And just to keep it in one comment, I'd like to know what Mr. Katz would like to say to us slashdotters about the fact that he has sold his book to a company that will soon be owned (more than likely) by AOL - (Fine Line pictures is owned by Time Warner). Within his dealings of a traditional media hierarchy, does he not expect any influence from corporate control - as opposed to the freedom afforded us in this forum?
** http://www.nkhumanrights.or.kr/ ** Human rights in North Korea. 1 million estimated dead from starvation.
Jeez, how things change. When Katz first appeared on Slashdot, I was sure that his participation would be a Good Thing -- I used to like most of his HotWired columns, and he seemed like a decent enough guy with some interesting things to say. But like I said -- whoa, do things change.
This article has got to be one of the most self-absorbed things I've ever read. It is nothing but one long boo-hoo about how rough and tumble Slashdot is, and how hard it is for "outsiders" to participate. Now, Katz very PC-ly starts off identifying "outsiders" as women and people of color, but instead of addressing actual ways in which the Slashdot community marginalizes these folks (which would have been a valuable discussion to have), he quickly veers off instead into a discussion of how Slashdot marginalizes him! It's like Katz is that guy from Monty Python and the Holy Grail, screaming "'elp! 'elp! I'm being repressed!"
The whole article can be summarized as follows: "I like the idea of Slashdot, but it is too focused on this technology stuff instead of stuff I'm interested in. And whenever I try to make Slashdot into what I want it to be, rather than what the community wants it to be, people flame me. This community should be open to anyone, even people who have no interest in the subjects under discussion. Boo-hoo."
Jon, I have news for you. Slashdot works. I've been participating in online communities since 1985, and Slashdot is one of maybe three or four I've encountered that gets it right. Discussions too rowdy for you? Browse at +1 or +2 -- I do this and it's amazing how little junk you find at that setting. Don't like a topic area? Filter it out in your Preferences. And if you're a good citizen, your Karma goes up and you get recognition and responsibility. Slashdot works amazingly well given the constraints it operates under. (Not to mention that if you think this is a free-fire zone, you've clearly never spent any time on Usenet.) The cream rises to the top of the discussions, and the stupid juvenile stuff stays at the bottom, easily filtered out. This is how Things Should Be!
The biggest problem here isn't Slashdot, Jon -- it's your expectations of what Slashdot should be. Here's an idea -- rather than sitting on an ivory perch posting articles about how much Slashdot needs "fixing", why don't you swear off your columns for a month and come participate, by posting in the discussions. Build up your Karma, take a few hits, and be a part of the community for a change, rather than wagging your finger at us for not living up to what you think we should be. I think that if you actually used Slashdot rather than just philosophizing about it, you'd be pleasantly surprised. On the other hand, you could just dismiss my post as another useless rant from someone who is out to flame poor Katz. Anyone want to place bets on which option he'll take?
-- Jason A. Lefkowitz
Read my blog.
You can configure slashdot so you don't have to hear him. Just go to your "preferences" page and click next to his name under the "Exclude Stories from the Homepage" section. It's that simple. If everybody does it, I'm sure he'll stop posting, if not, then there are people who actually want to hear what he says, and don't want to read about how he shouldn't be allowed to post top-level stories.
Really, isn't it a total waste of your (and everybody else's) time to post a message complaining about him when you can just block him from your slashdot display?
I title my post this everytime I comment on a story and it's always true...
/. being for "young white male users of one operating system." First of all, not all of us are Linux fanatics. I happen to think Linux is a decent Unix implementation, but it's nothing special as OS's go.
/. demographic simply reflects the demographics of the tech community. The fact is that the high-tech community is dominated by young white males. Since /. is intended as an undiluted news source for the techno-savvy, it is not surprising that its readership reflects the demographics of its target audience.
/.'s great strength is that its readership is extremely bright and knowledgable. I have learned a great deal from reading arguments about the pros and cons of various products, techniques, and tools. This would be destroyed if Rob started focusing on less technical subjects to reach a wider audience.
Anyhow, I think people make way too big a deal of the occasional flame war. I am reminded of the kids' saying: sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.
If I post an opinion and someone makes a post degrading my intelligence and my parentage, so what? I'll ignore that post and concentrate on the constructive ones. It usually isn't that much of a time-waster. You can usually spot a troll-post by reading the first couple of sentences.
I also have to question the line about
More importantly, Katz seems to be forgetting that the
This is not to say that this is a good thing. But Rob is hardly in the position to change the makeup of an entire industry. And it would be a terrible thing for him to water down the site's content to attract non-technical users. One of
So, I think Jon Katz needs to keep in mind that what goes on here is only words, and that a mainly-white, mainly-male community isn't the end of the world.
The Web's failure to produce or maintain common discussion grounds is getting to be a serious problem with real consequences. Misinformation about genetic research, online safety - even the Y2K problems - spreads primarily because intelligent public discussion of these issues isn't possible, except in places where nobody knows much about them, like Congress or on TV talk shows.
Or, I might add, in a Jon Katz column on /.
Each of the burning topics that Katz mentions were "addressed" in a Katz column over the past few months. I read them all, and I thought that they all did a terrible job of dealing with the issues. There was robust (and sometimes heated discussion) in the discussion areas after each one.
Katz probably got some "this article sucks" e-mail after those articles because, well, they sucked. Sometimes people are just calling a rose a rose.
In response to the oft-written lament "why don't you kust turn him off on your preferences?" The answer is because I'm worried that if I don't pay attention to the FUD of the week from Katz, someone else will take him seriously, and I won't be prepared for their FUD parroting and it will be harder to debunk the FUD.
It's like Katz is /.'s own Good Times virus-- you've got to pay attention, even though the content is non-sensical.
Unfortunately, by reading and posting, I'm driving the page views for Katz's stories up too high-- so /. will never get get rid of such a popular author.
The probelm with this idea is that I could see it easily destroying the diversity of discussion. To explain : I notice on some of the more politically charged threads that there will often be a decidedly majority view and a well defended but less populous miority view. (not to imply that the majority view is badly defended, but I think when you are in the minority you are less likely to throw out an off the cuff comment, because there may not be anyone to fill out the details and do it better.) There's nothing wrong with this under the current moderation standard, because the unpopular opinions are not moderated down simply because the moderater doesn't agree with it. So cruising at 0 or even 1 will still give you an even view of the discussion while eliminating the worst of the trolls.
Now consider what happens if there is no moderating down. Moderaters on /. do sometimes moderate posts up based largely on agreement. (note, I'm not saying this is the only reason post gets moderated up, but it does happen.) The majority of the mods are likely to hold the same general opinion as the majority of the posters. So well written posts on the majority opinion are likely to be moderated up far more often than equally well written posts on the minority opinion. Its just the way human nature works. Moderation is bound to be part "that was very informative and helped define the discussion" and part "you said it man!"
Where does that leave us in a up only moderation? I suspect it would leave us with a largely homogeneous group of readable posts at the upper level, and a more full but also more troll infested debate at the bottom. I think the current system of up and down with the commonly accepted idea that you don't mod down on opinion gives us a much better discussion forum.
...will work for Chick tracts...
I used to wonder why some of my friends at RPI are so hostile to Jon Katz articles. I understand a little better now. For every good article he makes, he makes 3 bad ones. The AOL-Timewarner Merger article was good, the Hellmouth series was great, and I have a hard time remembering anything else of worth from Jon.
-Larry Lansing
+++
...These aren't the droids you're looking for....Move along....
I'm getting pretty sick and tired of these whines personally. The world is a harsh place. Humans are getting to the top of the heap because we brook no bullshit. If you're so frigging delicate that a few words will wilt you you shouldn't add to the gene pool IMHO. Go fucking politically correct someone else. Oh moderate me anyway you want, opinions are like assholes, everybody has one. He who judges others judges God. And another thing, I'll tell you like it is IRL too, I post anonymously for computer security reasons. I have a /. account, stopped using it when my IP stopped changing. The difference is, you can't DoS me IRL, and I can beat the shit out of you if it comes down to that.
People should learn to ignore violent comments?
If people ignore them, then the people making them to get attention will stop.
Why should the everyone else pay for the fact that socitity has tought women to be subordinate and submissive? Sure.. The flamers need to calm down, but also the others need to toughen up a bit (oh dear, an unpopular though, moderate away!).
I used to enjoy your articles, Jon.. However, you are getting repetitive. This series of articles in nothing more then the collection of articles posted a bit back showing that women are repressesed online almost as much as in life.
I dont mind rants, but please... Just cover it in one article!
(And how about getting a female writer for the frontpage)
...or at least what gets posted to his topics always is :) There's always guarenteed to be at least 50 amusing -1, Flamebait posts slagging off everyone and their mom, a few good flame wars about ACs / moderation on /. / Jon Katz himself - well the list goes on. And then there's always a lot of intellegent discussion as well just to top it off. Personally I think his essays are so much rubbish, but it wouldn't suprise me if he thought so too, and sits there laughing at the 600+ posts that his stories seem to get every time :)
Jon, we live in a culture that exalts irresponsibility and "do your own thing, screw everyone else." Why are you shocked that this carries over into online conversations?
if someone gives a performance and receives a warm round of applause, or a cheering standing ovation, that's great. If the audience starts booing and throwing vegatables, is that the audience's fault? Some audiences are well heeled, polite, high class and will charitably clap even for a performance that they didn't really enjoy. Others are rude, crude, spoiled, loud, down and dirty and tell it like they see it, no minced words. When people are gathered together in a crowd they are required under threat of being escorted out by security to maintain a civil demeanor - but it's almost axiomatic that when people can operate under cover of anonimity, like on a cb, or the highway, or a crowd in the street or a pseudonym on a bbs they become different people and pent up frustrations are vented if they feel there will be no repercussions. It's certainly an interesting experiment in crowd psychology for socialists to study. Just remember their bark is worse than their bite.
The Scarlet Pimpernel
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
The freedom to speak one's mind will be abused at every chance by those with weak minds.
It is this very freedom we must nourish and love.
Without such freedoms, new ideas will be beaten into oblivion and original thought will dissappear.
"I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to my death your right to say it."
Please read this and then ask yourself again if Christians are really being persecuted.
.. that ain't persecution.
You know, there are places where people really are being persecuted for their beliefs. There are places where people are thrown in jail or executed for not following the status quo. There are people who are sentenced to years of hard labor for not toeing the party line. And yet you have the sheer nerve to suggest that Christians (or anybody else) are being actively "persecuted" on Slashdot. Persecuted how? Please elaborate. Do you scream "PERSECUTION!!!" when some Anonymous Coward posts "Intolerant bigot!" in response to "God wants us to kill gays?"
Come on, grow up. Your worldview might not be appreciated or held by the majority of people who read Slashdot, and they might not agree with it, but that doesn't mean they're persecuting you. Claiming persecution is a slap in the face to the people around the world who really are being persecuted for their beliefs. Get real. If you want to self-righteously tell other people how they should live their lives, you should expect some negative reaction in response. And guess what
Or maybe this is all just a petrification lead-in?
We need to be reminded of the saying 'Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words may never hurt me'. Flaming and abuse goes on throughout Internet communication devices, mainly webposts, IRC, ICQ etc. It's something that the intelligent learn to ignore and get on with their business with, besides, it's very unlikely that any real harm will come from it. I personally thing the Slashdot moderation system is a tad confusing, but it appears to be working well. I think the articles such as these Please Die ones would be best left to a single posting, and not over three articles, which basically proclaims the same thing over and over.
If thats the proposed reaction, then aren't you giving them exactly what they want. Attention. (and incidentially peer approval as in "Nice trolling d00d".)
So how is "a barrage of protest, criticism or ridicule" different than flaming? In how articulate the speaker is? In how aggressive? Are the de-lurking lurkers supposed to be shouting down the flamers or merely role models on how to flame in a socially acceptable manner?
IMHO I also think it is a mistake to group trolls in with flamers. The former seek attention by disrupting discussion. The latter are expressing an opinion on the subject. Even if it expressed inarticulately, or agressively and provides little constructive input does that mean its invalid? Isn't just the fact that essay produces aggressive inarticulate unconstructive reactions in a segment of its audience a useful piece of information.
Is a badly expressed opinion necessarily invalid?
Ignoring such reactions may be a bad idea. Isn't "Agressive, inarticulate, unconstructive" a pretty good description of a mob or a riot. I should think its better to see that reaction in writing before one meets it on the streets.
-- 3 events that reshaped the world in the 20th century: WW1, WW2, and WWW
That's about all I have to say.
** http://www.nkhumanrights.or.kr/ ** Human rights in North Korea. 1 million estimated dead from starvation.
Well that's exactly it. I (usually) don't want to see stuff like that. You do. I set my preferences not to see it. You set your preferences to see it. We're both happy.
Do they have deeper thoughts that they're afraid or unwilling to share, or is this really all there is?
To continue the anthropological discussion, this has to do with the difference between the journalistic attitude and the attitude of the rest of us. Most of us would only think to put pen to paper if we thought of something interesting, informative or whatnot. (We could be wrong, of course, but that's the breaks.) Journalists are trained to write about something even when they don't necessarily have an interesting opinion, or something new to say. They've got to have something out regardless.
If you took most of us, sat us down once a week, and said "write an interesting essay by tomorrow", most of us would have a hard time doing much better than Katz. We'd tend to make mountains out of molehills, or overstate the obvious just to get something out. Fortunately, we have the choice to not write, so we don't do that. Someone who wants to be a "journalist" or an "essayist" doesn't have that choice. They've got to produce. And very, very few have the talent to produce something truly interesting day in, day out.
The cake is a pie
I don't care about flamers. Moderation works well enough that I can simply ignore them. What concerns me is that unless you start a thread in (approximately) the first hour of an article your voice and ideas will not be heard because they drowned out. Unless, of course, you post to high moderated threads that started early and ride up on their coat-tails. Its almost impossible for a great post to end up where it deserves if it starts late.
I usually read /. a few times a day, but not often enough to get into the forum early. Considering the number of articles/day, it works out to one article I can actually post on with a chance of being heard. Usually I don't post, its not worth the effort.
The problem with /. that I see is that it tends to exclude the casual infrequent users and benefits people with lots of time on their hands. (Notice the number of college students posting and think about their relative representation in the slashdot community as a whole.)
So far I've gotten all my Karma from telling people they are wrong... :)
The problem is that there are a minority of very vocal disruptive individuals who are just seeking attention. Their gender and skin colour is irrelevent.
What John fails to realise is that the only effective way to deal with these people is to deprive them of the attention they are seeking. Adding new ways of moderating them out of discussions or trying to exclude them from certain forums just presents them with another technical challenge which they will eventually find a way around. I have seen an attempted newsgroup invasion defeated with this approach. The newsgroup regulars set up a temporary mailing list and used it to recommend filtering software (such as nfilter for windows users with crappy newsreaders)and discuss the problem. Anyone who asked what was going on was invited by e-mail on to the list, but no mention of it was made on the newsgroup. Everyone made an effort to continue using the group as if there was nothing happening. For a while the disruption increased, but when the idiots discovered that they were not going to get much of a reaction they moved on.
The only problem is that people who are new to online discussions generally aren't aware of the effectiveness of this approach. The best thing that more experienced members can do is to e-mail them and encourage them to also ignore the idiots. It's surprising how grateful most new users are when someone bothers to give them some reassurance.
I think much of this is happening in the free speech world of the internet. Regard the internet as an immature thing right now, we're growing, we're fighting hacks, kiddy porn and racism, we're fighting it ourselves or via our gouvernment.
The attitude / subjects of speech are species on the internet, in the end, the unaccecpted will be eleminated to a safe level.
Bizar technology?
...there's no such thing.
/supposedly/ not get in trouble for it. Only problem: with freedom comes chaos. Kids in Colorado post their list of people they want to kill on their web site. Spammers flood e-mailboxes every day with useless plugs to buy things or visit porno sites. Anonymous Cowards fill the message boards with "FIRST POST" and other useless chatter.
The internet's such a wonderful idea in that it's anarchy. People can throw whatever they want on whatever web site they want and
With any course of action comes a consequence.
Do members of these communities - that's us - have any responsibility to challenge people who assault others online, create environments in which some of the most urgent issues of our lifetimes can be discussed and debated in a coherent, civil and rational way?
Not if we allow it to happen. Course, if we start saying "You can do this, you can't do this...," we loose the freedom of the net. Rationality and freedom clash.
I'm sure many people can relate when I go back to the time of BBSing. Sure, you hade message subs that many people wanted to carry on a "rational, intelligent conversation," but there was/were always some jerk/s who just tore up the subs with flames of hate and profanity. Of course, back then, if that user was enough of a jerk, the sysop could toss him out. We don't have that here. Anyone and everyone anonymous can talk away.
Slashdot posts urgent issues. That's the thing I like about it...rather than wading around through CNet, CNN, the New York Times, the Washington Post, Tom's Hardware, and numerous other sites to get my news quota of the day, I get it right here, and I can talk about it with others. But where can I find an intelligent conversation if at least half the posts are just useless yelling between the ACs?
America is one of the most censorious countries in the world, blocking open discussion of many religious and political issues and increasingly deploying a whole industry of censorship technologies - blocking and filtering programs, V-Chips, insanely quixotic and unworkable ratings systems - to try and curb the very freedom it celebrates.
What, if you call the TV ratings system unworkable, I'll call Slashdot's ratings system unworkable (mods, hold the - points until you finish reading this). Yes, I started out hating the TV ratings system. I hated President Clinton parading around the "V-Chip" as a way of saving kids from TV's violence. I still hate the idea of the V-Chip, but yet, I like the ratings system. Parents watching TV with their kids can keep them from watching a program if the little black box in the corner says something about the program (sexual content, violence, etc.) that they don't want their kids to see/hear. Slashdot's point system is the same thing! There are plenty of times where I don't have too much time to look through the entire mass of 400 or 500 comments on some hot topic, so I'll just find the posts with a 3+ rating. If I have the time and find the subject quite intreaging, I'll read many posts, no matter what they're rated.
Both ratings systems don't keep you from watching the program or reading the post, but it just informs you of what there is to see or read. And hey, if you don't want to read what the ACs have to say, just skip over them!
Case In Point: Katz is right in saying that America keeps trying to limit the freedoms that they "claim" to hold dear. The internet is the new gateway for us to express our freedoms without being punished for it. If you want to keep this freedom, you'll have to deal with what comes with it. By attempting to eliminate those people you don't "want around," you're doing your own practice of censorship.
This already happens, the problem is one person is throwing a barrage of ridicule out at another, and the other is responding in kind - a flame war in the truest sense.
Who decides who was right to flame the other, because basically a barrage of criticism is just group flamethrowing. What we've got is one idiot posting something abusive, then someone will reply with something suitably put-down-ish, and then all hell will break loose, with individuals complaining about their right to express whatever, and self-righteous flamers flaming the original poster and thinking that it's legit because they did something wrong first.
It'll all degenerate into a "but he started it" situation. Maybe A.C.s should start calling CmdrTaco "Mum" or something, at least it would give him the moral authority to send people to their rooms.
Salocin.com
Everybody is entitled to mistakes, but Jon Katz made another mistake dealing with discrimination when in his second part of this awful triptych (will this now make it to the homepage where the Hellmouth articles now are?) he said all geeks were white males.
On his subject, I feel he is forgetting a important item. Namely, that with freedom comes responsibility. Responsibility to reread your articles before you post. Responsibility to address readers concerns (he now just posts without reading people's reactions). Etc.
I claim that Jon Katz has been given his responsibility to post articles on SlashDot much too lightly, and that it should be revoked; not based on his race, his non-geekness or whatever but because of his opinions and thoughts, which basically suck and for which he takes no responsibility.
You keep making this assumption about who the majority of the posters are here - and I don't see how the hell you know. You DON'T know, you're just assuming.
Your assumptions say more about yourself than about the flamers.
I find your assumption that flamers must be white males to be both sexist and racist, and terribly offensive.
At first, it's about masses of people coming together in a great orgy of collectiveness, and then it jumps to kids posting flame-bait and how to react to this.
I dissagree with his first point--that people come together in large groups of people with different background and interests just because of the internet. It seems obvious to me that the internet has been the greatest tool to *seperate* groups of people. Democrats are now more able to read Democrat only news, Republicans-theirs, and those who were abducted and probed can now share their experiances with each other. There's been a great movement toword specialization, focus of content and market at a focused group, and nich communities. Any claim that the internet will cause us to abandon these niches and join some great internet collective are false.
The second point he makes, I agree with. There are flamers, they are often young, and they need some mentoring and responsibility. But it's not just about getting attention--it's about getting heard. They just don't have anything good to say.
As for them being a problem, I haven't found that to be true. It's fairly obvious who's flaming or spreading mis-information and it's easy to just ignore them.
These *fixes* he proposes are exactly the same techniques used by those censors he doesn't like. While the group can moderate flames out, it's actually censoring away what it doesn't find popular (and rightly so). But that is exactly the same process that prevented us from talking about sexuality for so long, or saying "communism" without being accused of collaborating with the devil.
Yeah, that's -so- what I was saying.
That's why I preface mine with "Blonde Chick".
Point being, someone shouldn't feel the need to omit anything -unless they want to-.
---------
---------
I'd kill for a Nobel Peace Prize.
Online games, such as Ultima Online, and Everquest, have this same sort of community problem, and in many ways, it is even worse. These sorts of games attract the sort of people that cause these problems, and even worse, tend to reward them for their actions.
I agree, but you forgot to mention Quake.
I played my first online Quake a few weeks ago in our Y2K bunker, awaiting an onslaught of calls that never came. Since we had idle time, my co-workers introduced me to Quake.
I thought it was a neat virtual environment, but as soon as I started to explore it, my co-workers started shooting at me! I thought we got along great, but they had no hesitation in launching rockets at me, and the big blue spiral thing was terrible!
Eventually I felt I had to respond in kind, to teach them a lesson, but it never worked out that way, and I ended up with 7 kills to their 30 or so.
So how do you make people act civilly and politely in Quake?
George
Knowing that such and such a post was by a 14 year old student would reduce the time it takes to hit the NEXT button to zero. Or knowing that a post was by a 35 year old Sys Admin would encourage me to read it.
What a load of crap. I know plenty of 35 year olds whose opinions are a bigoted loads of rubbish, and I know several 14 year olds who are extremeley sensible and serious. Of course I also know idiotic 14 year olds and clever 35 year olds, but assuming that anything posted by someone below a certain age or who doesn't have a "proper" job is not worth reading is being a bigot.
Having more information about the poster would help greatly.
No it wouldn't, it'd just make it easier for others to post personally offensive flames in reply. You sound like the kind of person who'd do that, to be honest. I'd dearly like to know what you do and how old you are, but I'm glad that this information is unavailable to others.
And then someone moderated this as "Insightful"? Come on...
That's the problem, not flame. In fact, I see very little flaming anywhere, certainly not much here. Maybe jon gets lots of flames; he certainly spread enough kindling. But I don't see many personal attacks at all, except perhaps towards the moderators. Slashdot's problem is, as mentioned above, it's just too big. Too many posts by too many posters. Too much chaff to sift throough to find a few grains of wheat. There's no difference between shouting in the wilderness or shouting in times square- no one will hear you either way. Perhaps that's why the flamers flame. it's the only way to get a reaction. But to say that the internet is full of vulgar male nerd John Rockers is absurd. My web pages (which range from an FPS page to a copy of the Bible) generate 300-500 hits/day and lots of mail- and no flame at all in three years. Most of the mail I get is "how do I get a silencer in Quake II", "Where can I get w4r3z", "I loved that article...", "ACCEPT CREDIT CARDS ON YOUR SIGHT!!!!!", and the all important "I found a typo on your humor page...". I have yet to get a single piece of mail that starts "Go to hell you stupid asshole". Maybe it's just you! -Steve mcgrew@famvid.com
Does it really hurt you so much to have to scroll by some obnoxious person's post? Does it really take that much longer to download the occasional piece of crap? (As for the really large "cut 'n paste" trolls, you might consider using the "penalty for obscenely large posts" option.)
Slashdot is now a commercial site and is more than capable of devoting the resources to manage the burden, and besides, the management probably likes the current system, since every crap post is an additional two ad impressions (composing the comment and verifying the submission).
There is no way to discourage those posts, so stop hoping. Censorship by content is never implementable without bias, and it's never desirable. There are idiots in this world, and it's often too hard to resist trying to silence others without realizing that one's own idiocy. Tempt not yourself into creating a system where "one more judgment, and I am undone".
"If one is really a superior person, the fact is likely to leak out without too much assistance" -- John Andrew Holmes
The idea of taking responsibility for one's words has not taken hold.
Real life isn't much different, and I think most people would agree. The anonymous factor drops it to another level, but being insulted online isn't *always* as bad as real life insults, arguments, etc. As we are all humans, flames, trolls, and irrational comments are going to be part of any "online community". Thats just the way it is. We simply need to learn how to deal with them, and not let them affect the good discussions that are going on.
It makes no sense to construct and maintain commercial websites that exclude most of humanity
I'd agree, but that is exactly the way things are. You mentioned commercial sites here, which I don't consider online communities. Most of the earth's population is excluded from internet use, most of the continent of Africa doesn't even have enough money for food, much less education, transporation, electricity, or computers. Why would web sites be targeted at people who don't even have computers? They don't have money to buy your products.
Don't get me wrong, the internet is great, but in the present it helps exasperates the have's and the have not's as far as education, which polarizes opportunity, and polarizes wealth concentration as well. There are plenty of other factors as well, the internet is a minor one.
In the off-line world, mutual benefit is the core of community. Real people provide help, entertainment, commerce, religion, companionship - the concrete benefits of which keep the community going and sustain its members. Online, especially on technical sites, the primary benefit is information - news, software, hardware, cultural trends and information. Since there is no physical proximity (although gatherings of members often do meet in different cities), it's possible for members to benefit from this information without reciprocating - or even communicating.
Again, I don't think real life is all that different. Simply extracting information from an online site without reciprocating doesn't harm the community. There are plenty of websites with people who help each other, and even if the communication is mostly one-way, at least the information can help those that need it. The internet is still new, people are still learning how to configure web sites for online communities. It takes time.
the John Rocker Syndrome
This is a cultural problem. It shows itself as it does any other place when working with a site such as slashdot. I'd have to say things have improved greatly in this country over the past 100 years. If "online communities" take the lead in this (tolerance/understanding) that would be great, but I don't expect it.
Do the people running websites have any responsibility for creating environments which are truly free, and not dominated by the most hostile members? Should we be concerned that entire social groups - women, newcomers - don't feel welcome here?
Most people on this site would call me a socialist (in favor of a welfare state) but I don't want to call for politically correct measures online, because that means regulation. I don't want the internet to be regulated unless people have a serious ability to impede my personal freedom, and I don't see the internet as much of a threat compared to "real life". The internet is too new for anyone to take control now.
If you don't want to look at anonymous posts you can always just set your score threshold at 1 and you wouldn't see any (unless the post was excellent and received points).
He talks about how online is so hostile and we're jerks. When you were in college, did you know any English major jerks or Aviation jerks? They're everywhere. It's not just technology. Ever have someone give you the finger while you were driving? Do you think they had a PhD (or a BS/BA for that matter)?
The other thing that bugs me about his article:
"You might call this the John Rocker Syndrome"
Yeah Katz, John Rocker invented the concept of hating people who are different. I've never seen anything like that before, so I refer to it as a Rockerism. (sarcasm)
Most of the complaints about Portman and pants and what-not are silly in most respects. If you don't want to read them, set your threshhold to 1. Or higher. I have never seen a troll post unless I was moderating and viewing at -1.
/. as a forum to vent their lonliness. They are rearely successful in disrupting actual conversation on /., and are more of a nuisance when meta-moderating than anything else.
/.'s stories. You can take Katz off your preferences if you don't like him. I'm sure he wishes he coud take you off of his.
I believe the theory that the trolls are just kids. They want attention (or like breaking windows and kicking cats, whatever) and use
The only thing that trolls really affect is moderation points, which is why a previos poster suggested that posts only be moderated up, and never down. That why the good stuff will rise, and no one wastes moderater points on lonely kids with nothing better to do. Or the first post weenies.
To test the lonely kids theory, let's try this: The last line of your post should be your age and what you do. You sacrifice some anonymity, but we will all see who the posers are.
To top all of this garbage off, why is it that Jon Katz' stories have the highest percentage of posts that don't make it to 1? I don't think he is so awful to deserve flaming every time he writes something. Occasionally, maybe, but every single time? Rarely (IIRC) does his threads have a higher than 3:1 signal/noise ratio, far below the average of the rest of
I'm 24. I am a web designer with coldfusion, java, and some perl. I also suffer through help desk.
Computers can only simulate determinism. ~Hermetic.
... don't say anything at all. This used to be a really good maxim for all of us to live by. However, limiting negative comments would defeat the whole principle of a discussion group. If you find yourself too offended to go on living because a comment you made got flamed then maybe you shouldn't post at all. Yes, people do tend to be more hostile in an anonymous environment, but hostility is a part of life. Comments need to be criticized; if someone posts something that is wrong, it is the duty of the more-informed to correct the error in order to help not only the original poster but also any less-informed readers. Now, admittedly, these criticisms can be constructive instead of derogatory. It's a lot more effective to tell someone that he/she is on the right track, but... than to tell that person that he/she is a moron who shouldn't even be here. The kiddies who flame do it for attention - isn't their behavior the main reason that we classify them as kiddies? Ignore them, and they'll get bored and either go away or grow up.
I do not feel that slashdot prevents anyone, regardless of gender/race/age from posting. Knowledge level would seem to be the most limiting factor here. Maybe in today's society, the old maxim should read "If you don't have something intelligent to say..." However, that determination should be made by the poster, not by slashdot. Free speech includes inane, off-topic comments, whether we like that or not, and the 'net is the one place where people can fully use free speech. I am certain that people say things here that they would never say in the "real world", but isn't that the whole point?
So what are you going to do? Bleed on me?
I find myself unwilling to admit how irritating I find Katz's paternalistic, touchy-feely, approach to group dynamics. I should be able to ignore this half-arsed pop psychology, and laughable desire to extrapolate "Norman Rockwell" caricatures of real-world social institutions into the digital medium.
/. are not "enviroments" which posess hostility or benevolence. They are simply collection of bits shuttling back and forth between computers. The experience of an individual user - the sequence of bits to which they are exposed - can only encompass a tiny percentage of the total mass of data in the system. No two people get quite the same experience, and technology is the very reason for that. Filtration, selection and peer-review allow for the creation of a unique information environment for every single person.
/. amount to an admission that the author does not know how to filter his experience. Or that he chooses not to, in the desire to share his pain with the rest of the world. Bugger off! I don't want a group hug. I don't care if you hated your school-days. Spare me your incessant whining. In fact, what am I saying? Uncheck the "JonKatz" box, add "JonKatz" to the killfile, "/ignore JonKatz". There, done! My sense of perspective returns, and the rights of all persons involved remain unviolated.
Congratulation, John - you have developed a new form of writing, transcending mere emotional connection to the reader, and actually inducing within them the desire to take a shower and scrub away the clinging, cloying sentiments that have engulfed them.
"Mutual benefit is the core of community" says Katz. Rubbish! Mutual protection is the core of physical community - the desire to group with those who are similar in opposition to those who are different, based on perceived threat. Mutual benefit is just a coincidence. Hostile environments form wherever there is fear of that which is different - fear manifest in rascism, nationalism, sectarianism (and all the other 'isms as well).
But Email, Usenet,
The suggested alterations to
In the cold war era the danger was from "Big Brother" shaping thought and controlling information. Now it seems we've got to deal with "Big Sister" covering our eyes and protecting us from the big, bad world which is really much too dangerous and scary for us. No, don't look! You won't like it! Trust me!
(yes I know there's a bit of stereotyping of female authority figures in that, but work with me here - I'm doing a soundbite.)
Does anyone have any news about Linux?
SlickJim
I couldn't agree more, and I don't think it's limited to Slashdot. I've been on the Internet for a decade now, and I don't see this growing problem. If anything, I think it already peaked and is getting better. I think the social "problems" that Jon points out are just characteristics of human nature that have been around for thousands of years. The net just made them much more visible. In fact, the problems will probably begin to go away, if they haven't already, because they're much more visible now.
What I am seeing is an increasingly well-informed general public as a result of the beautifully unrestricted nature of the net. I don't think it's an exageration to say that the Internet has had the most profound positive effect on the free exchange of information since the printing press. Of course there will be growing pains initially, but the future looks very bright to me. People want to exchange information freely and nothing is going to stifle that.
j
"It's not whether or not you're paranoid. It's whether or not you're paranoid enough."
j
"It's not whether or not you're paranoid. It's whether or not you're paranoid enough."
- anonymous
OK, I did it--I read the whole damned article, silly and verbose as it was.
/.), ignored, or eventually losing their access are appropriate.
:-) However, THIS SUPPOSED EXCLUSION IS NOT HAPPENING!
Let's start at the very beginning:
"The Internet has provided individuals with more freedom than they have ever had to express themselves.
Maybe so. I'm not sure it's a given, though.
"But not surprisingly, many people are abusing, thus endangering, their new power.
Many??! How about some, Jon? Or a very few?
Sure as hell aren't _many_ people abusing their power.
Besides, if this abuse is endangering their new power, then surely that implies that some sort of cause and effect is in place?
"The idea of taking responsibility for one's words has not taken hold."
Sure it has! The necessary responsibility online is less than in real life, because physical threats aren't an issue online. (NB: If a threat online implies physical violence, then it _leaves_ the exclusively online world and becomes a different issue) As a result, the consequences of responsibility are appropriately lessened. Jail is not appropriate for flamers and trolls. Being moderated down (on
"It makes no sense to construct and maintain commercial websites that exclude most of humanity, or punish them when they try to join communal discussions. Women have a right to speak publicly; so do older people, foreigners, newcomers, newbies."
Of course not! (Actually it occasionally does--looked at any porn sites lately?
Remember, "On the internet, nobody knows you're a dog." Or a woman. Or an old person. Or a foreigner (unless their command of the language in use is bad, and there seems to be a fairly high degree of tolerance for that). Or a newcomer.
But, if someone comes into a generic discussion and tries to remake it into their own by saying, "I am a woman, we will now discuss how this pertains to women;" or, "I am a senior, why aren't you talking about how this related to seniors?;" then they get what they deserve. Similarly for newbies. Remember the term originated as meaning a newcomer who didn't bother to read the ground rules or find out how things actually worked.
"Should we be concerned that entire social groups - women, newcomers - don't feel welcome here?"
Well of course, if that were the case. I don't see it, though. I regularly find that women consider the 'net to be far more liberating and welcoming than the old boys clubs of real life.
"And perhaps most importantly, are people responsible for what they say? Should they be held accountable online, as they are off, for assaultive, hostile communication and other behavior that restricts access, free speech and the free exchange of information and opinion?"
In order; Yes, they are, yes they should, and assaultive [sic] communication doesn't restrict any freedoms except for those of the assaulter.
Let's go through this in detail. Someone, let's call her Jane, posts something indicating her gender. Someone else, John, calls her a snivelling feminist bitch. Jane gets upset and contacts John's service provider. Now the questions for the reader are:
1) Who has lost any freedoms?
2) Who is being held responsible for their actions?
Bonus) Essay question: Why is there any assumed implication of freedom for anyone online?
The point is: LIFE IS HOSTILE! People are hostile! Life online may be _slightly_ more verbally hostile than real life, but this is a result of people not being able to threaten physical harm. Without that threat, people can more easily ignore flames and 'abuse.'
Finally, two minor points:
"America is one of the most censorious countries in the world, blocking open discussion of many religious and political issues and increasingly deploying a whole industry of censorship technologies - blocking and filtering programs, V-Chips, insanely quixotic and unworkable ratings systems - to try and curb the very freedom it celebrates."
This is just so much bullshit. It's a sign of freedom that whenever the state suggests curbing that freedom, people jump up and down about censorship, etc. If they were REALLY censorious, then you wouldn't be able to complain about it. You'd either not know that the censorship existed, or you'd be dead.
Also...
"the Net is the freest medium in American life, and the freest in its history."
I got to this point of the article, and suddenly realised that as a Canadian, this article wasn't written about me. How exclusive! How appalling to cut out the entire population of the world, except for one moderately sized (population-wise)country!
Oh, isn't that what we were doing to women, old people, newbies, and foreigners a few paragraphs ago?
Sheesh Jon, get a grip. Better yet, get a backbone. If you're going to get PAID to write dreck like this, expect people to take issue with you. Especially, people who have far more intelligent things to say, but aren't being paid for it.
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
It's truly surreal to hear you say Slashdot isn't meant to be elitist as voting is underway for "Most Improved Kernel Module" and "Best Open Source Advocate" What percentage of the articles here are comprehensible/useful to people that aren't Linux/Open Source geeks? A pretty good number, I admit. But how about people that aren't particularly computer literate? How about the average Joe off the street? The tagline of the site is "News for Nerds" for a reason- ninety percent of the information here is geared to people that have a background in the sciences, are relatively intelligent and computer literate, and are interested in technical minutiae that would put Joe Public to sleep faster than a poetry reading. What you've said might be relevant to other places in the net, or even the net as a whole- but turning Slashdot into some all inclusive global community is to fly in the face of reality.
...and thought I'd post expressing support.
The "cue the foo posts in 3, 2, 1..." posts will commence with no subsequent foo posts in 3, 2, 1...
At first glance, Jon appears to have some good points here. Flames *do* create a certain degree of "hostile environment", and many people who might otherwise contribute to the discussion at hand *do* indeed take their ideas elsewhere rather than deal with the flamers.
That's at first glance. On further reflection, however, Slashdot already provides a way to deal with the problem, and it seems to work pretty well. I don't often have the time to read all of the comments about any particular article, no matter how interesting. Therefore, I "default" to a threshold of 4 (3 if there aren't many comments.) I tend to get about 10-15 comments this way, with a VERY high signal-to-noise ratio.
I realize that 4 might seem a bit extreme, and if my only intent were to avoid the trolls, "First Posts", and flames, I could probably use 2 or 3 just as well. But the point is, the current system works. A few tweaks might make it work BETTER, but there really is no need for major "solutions".
There's nothing hypocritical about cherishing free speech while refusing to listen to others' speech. The two are entirely independent. Free speech is about the absence of being silenced. Refusing to listen to speech does not silence it but merely ignore it.
And there's also nothing absolutely wrong with mere arrogance and insult -- they often provide some of the best entertainment in some views. What too many posters here forget is that different people interact in this forum with different purposes. Some are here for the news (although I can't imagine why, since most of these stories come over the AP bulletins days in advance). Some come for the insightful rantings of others. Some come for the humorous rantings of others. Some come to blow off steam with other nerds. It is not your prerogative to declare some of these motives orthodox and others verboten. Just be grateful that Rob and friends have set up a system that enforces the general orthodox views of the populace at large (which seem to agree with your own views).
"If one is really a superior person, the fact is likely to leak out without too much assistance" -- John Andrew Holmes
I like jon katz's proposal. It neither is very
restrictive nor particulary difficult to enforce.
And if it works, it would make for better quality.
The AC's anonymity need not be compromised. At
present, it is limited anyway, because the IP
adresses are kept. A way of keeping the AC's
security is to delete all references to the real
poster after a day, so that some moderation could
hapen. One could organize things in a way that the
moderator doesn't know who's post it is.
But personally I agree that the quality of a forum
like slashdot should be preserved, and eventualy
measures have to be taken in order to achieve
that.
rmstar
Hey, guess what? I can ignore this ranting if I want. Isn't it wonderful? There is nothing at all that Feral Wylde I can do to force me to read, take seriously, or believe his diatribe, no matter how he rants!
Amazing! He was rude, and didn't take away any of my freedoms at all! Remarkable! Astounding!
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
A few weeks back, I got curious about something: what was the total karma of the AC? I asked Rob. It was, on December 17th, 1999, 1972 points. (Obviously, since the AC doesn't moderate, this is just a sum of moderation.) This means that overall, we've considered ACs to be posting some pretty useful stuff.
When that number goes negative, then it might be time to think about changing the AC system.
Alik
Even with the raw statistics it would not reflect weather women were "scared to post".
Are we sure that they "want to post"? Even with out gender differences (i.e. do women talk more/less than men),tf someone wants to post but is not willing to risk getting flamed, then they did not really want to post that much.
...and some very good points. Please keep moderating that post (the one I'm replying to) up so that everybody sees it.
j
"It's not whether or not you're paranoid. It's whether or not you're paranoid enough."
j
"It's not whether or not you're paranoid. It's whether or not you're paranoid enough."
- anonymous
I include the standard disclaimer: If you don't like this post, reply with a list of reasons you don't like it. Don't moderate it down or flame, please. (Up moderation is acceptable.)
Visit
It seems that you managed to enjoy the game without grasping the entire point :-) :-)
Do hostile environments matter? Sure.
I disagree, mostly because what one person finds hostile another will find invigorating. While any individual site may not be able to accomodate both points of view, the web is far larger than any one site! Your "all one way or all the other" arguments are ignoring the reality that on the web, unlike in real life, radicially different "communities" are just a click away.
It makes no sense to construct and maintain commercial websites that exclude most of humanity, or punish them when they try to join communal discussions. Women have a right to speak publicly; so do older people, foreigners, newcomers, newbies.
If you are discussing commercial websites that are essentially setting up "communities" in order to profit from discussions, then your point is correct. However, many "communities" are NOT profit oriented, and IMHO can seek to exclude whosoever they see fit. There are many discussion boards devoted to women's interests where men are not exactly invited to join in -- and there's nothing wrong with that.
Inclusion of everyone helps to maximize profits for commerical "communities", but there are plenty of places on the web that don't give a crap about profit. Trying to impose your personal ideas of what rules of non-hostile discussion should be on ALL of these communities seems to me to be completely absurd.
The Internet was never conceived as the sole preserve anyone as a the sole preserve of technologically skilled young white men.
Was it? Wasn't it? Even if it was or wasn't, who cares? I don't. I'm amazed that you, Mr. Katz, can not see the connection between this issue and your wonderful Hellmouth series of discussions.
To spell it out: I'm a technologically skilled white man. Young is a relative term; I'm 34, to some that will be young, to most (including me) it's incredibly old. I was a sterotypically geeky kid, and paid for it. Growing up, I fit in nowhere. In college -- before the net was everywhere, mind you -- I fit in only with fellow geeks, and was shunned by everyone else. I don't fit in really at the job I'm at, since I amazingly care more about the actual work than going out and getting drunk with the others night after night. On the net, though, I can find places where -- unlike almost all of the rest of my lifetime -- I can pretty much fit in.
And now you come along and say I have to let the clueless millions play in the sandbox -- the same ones that have shunned and abused me throughout my life, the ones that have unjustly accused me of being all kinds of things simply because I have pale skin and a penis -- I have to adjust what I do HERE because they want to play too? SCREW THAT. No. I don't agree with you that this is a "white males only" club, but even if it is, I don't care. Everywhere else I've had to give way, to knuckle under, to be suppressed -- here I don't have to be and I WILL NOT BE. I don't care if you, or anyone else, doesn't like it. If you don't like it you're free to go create your own sites and run them as you see fit. If you take this one over, *I'm* free to go create another one and run it as *I* see fit. With all this incredible freedom available to everyone on the net, I don't understand why you're whining instead of going to go build something else yourself.
If we want to be hostile here, we're going to be hostile here. Like it? Fine. Don't? Begone with ye to a place more to your liking. If you fight to change this place to one where bunnies run free and butterflies flitter and everyone is nice and sings songs and hold hands -- I'm outta here, and your real goal of changing my mind and my behavior will have failed.
You remark that in real life, people who are hostile on the net are surprisingly timid. I'm not surprised a bit. In real life, a lot of geeks have been taught that if they speak up they run a real chance of getting the crap beat out of them. Or of their school punishing them. Here they FINALLY have freedom to say what they want -- and you want to take it away from them, AGAIN?
Go to hell, Mr. Katz.
Err, I'd never considered annonymity to be what freedom of speech is "all about" myself. In fact, I generally assume that annonymous speech is less deserving of protection than a person standing behind their own words.
OT perhaps, but I believe the US high court agrees with me on this subject. New York (sucessfully I think) said that while the KKK must be allowed to hold their rally, they didn't have to let them do it if they wore masks meant to hide their identity. If you want to stand up and be counted, why hide yourself?
Bearing in mind that many people have choosen to tell their stories from annonymity, but this usually has required a outspoken channel to transmit their story to the rest of the world. There is a distinction there I think between letting the rest of the world know the facts of your life and shouting "hey look at me" but not wanting the attention to come with any responsibility.
...will work for Chick tracts...
I must respond to this, and i don't mean to be a nasty type. But hey... if you want to explore a game like quake then buy a copy, sit down in single player mode and explore away!
:) jeez... People are going to be better than you. It's no fun for anyone if someone doesn't play to their fullest. That's what it's about!
I am a former quake junkie, and here's what it comes down to: Multi player quake is a contact sport! It's not meant to be touchy feely. I mean, look at the blood man!
Explore, learn, offline... do some serious gibbing online! In my opinion, you're just whining here. You get your butt kicked? When you're a newbie, you're supposed to!
os.system("perl -e 'print \"My first Python Script.\"'")
I just thought I should point out how on the one hand, you claim to be for "freedom", yet you're calling for the censoring of people who you deem to be troublemakers, flamers and generally difficult and annoying people. You talk and talk about freedom, yet you wish it to be selective.
I've seen some women come out of the woodwork to respond to your previous articles stating the exact OPPOSITE of what you have been - they've decided that if they come across something they don't like, they can either pass it by and keep looking for soemthing useful, or leave if they feel offended. I don't want or expect anyone to leave, but for freedom to work, EVERYONE must be free, not just those you deem "worthy" of freedom. (Yes, as the saying goes, my freedom ends at the tip of your nose, but eliminating the freedom of one group to increase the freedom of another won't solve anything.)
Also, you continue to point to the young white male as the primary aggressor in all this, the main "asshole". I don't like to think of myself as that sort of person, but you certainly make it plain that you think I should. There're assholes in every group - it doesn't end at any particular group boundary (be it gender, skin color, class, age, whatever).
Please end this. I've been patient, hoping you'd wind this series of articles together into some useful point. However, you continue to insist the same thing - young white males (which I am one of) are inherently evil, and their freedom must be restricted to increase the freedom of the other groups who you deem to be oppressed by the young white male contingent.
Sam: "That was needlessly cryptic."
Max: "I'd be peeing my pants if I wore any!"
The somebody is Kaa and the sig is Kaa's Law: In any sufficiently large group of people most are idiots. For all I know, it might not be original, but a good rule is to cite what you have so that the original source might eventually if not immediately be found.
A good corrolary to Kaa's law would be this:
/'s corrolary to Kaa's law: Since the majority are idiots, a preponderance of the evidence says you're one of them.
"If one is really a superior person, the fact is likely to leak out without too much assistance" -- John Andrew Holmes
Yes, the subject line is sincere, the Katz stories are the "new" capitalism.
/.
In the same tradition as Howard Stern, Steve Dahl, and every other media act that builds it's audience upon disagreeing with the sensable world (yes, even satirically), Katz has driven the audience into a frenzy of interest.
Those of us in the audience, you see, are not the "customers" we are the product. Our "eyeballs" are delivered to the advertisers and Jon's posts delever more of that than any other poster on
Just look at the Katz threads, they quickly go over 200 posts and I bet that the logs show a huge amount of repeat visits, all very valuable to the advertisers.
What is funny, really ROFLMAO funny, is that this is exactly what Jon pretends to preach against! There is nothing wrong with running a successful business, having a large market share, having a big influence on society, or anything else that Jon sees as a threat. All the while, he is doing exactly what he preaches against.
Hyprocracy? No. It is just good performing art and I applaude him.
Eve Fairbanks says I drive a hybrid!LOL
You about someone's right to do this or that.
I believe there is no such things as rights. Except in the sense that " a right" is something that a person is willing to fight for.
IMO when the The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America says 'unalienable rights", it really meant issues the signers were willing to die for.
So in the context of discussion groups, your "right to free speech" is the same as your willingness to risk being flamed.
A community's "right to be flame free" is equal to its willingness to fight flamers.
A right is not something that is magically guaranteed or universally constant.
Furthermore are you sure you are willing for the countermeasures you describing to be applied to you.
Around here I have no idea what constitutes an "old fogey" ;-)
To me politeness stems from respect. As a part of that respect I have come to recognize that, yes I am an idiot in areas where I have no experience. Not only that, but I recognize that the stuff I know does not constitute the body of meaningful knowledge. As a result, I have had a wonderful time learning from the experience of others that don't come from my background. (WASP, Eagle Scout, Father, Yankee, ADD, Molecular Biologist -> Software Engineer, Nerd) At the base of respect/politeness comes the opportunity of working with others to make things happen that might never happen otherwise.
Lack of politeness just closes off opportunities and raises bile.
There are no requirements to join in discussion. There is, as the site owners have shown, no single topic of conversation. Why should people be banned for disagreeing with you? That is the single best way to remove every semblance of intelligent conversation from these forums.
quote, "Women have a right to speak publicly; so do older people, foreigners, newcomers, newbies."
I can get the part about discussion groups being a breeding ground for flames, but discrimination?
One of the great things about the internet is that you can't see who you're arguing with. Face to face people tend to fall back onto old meat based prejudice, but when the other guy is just a stream of text that's hard to do.
Newbies are usually pretty easy to pick out as are people for who english is not a first language, but if I don't see how you can accuse anyone of flaming someone based on age, gender, race or religion unless the originator has announced it.
I know that most people will probably say "oh, but I already knew that!", but I've found a general rule that works very well for me:
Don't write anything that you couldn't say to the recipient while looking them straight in the eye.
For obvious reasons we use this rule in real life, but most people seem to forget it when then go online for the first time, and many never relearn it.
It seems that you managed to enjoy the game without grasping the entire point :-) :-)
Wha-a-a-a-a-t?
You mean the point of the game is to kill people?
The point of online deathamtch Quake is to kill your buds?
Does Katz know about this?
I can see the next Slashdot article:
"Rampart aggression and violence in Deathmatch Quake and how to stop it"
George
A couple gripes: you say "we" when you mean to say "we Americans". Not everyone in this forum (or on the internet in general) is American.
Your proposal of yet another Bill of Rights is stupid for several reasons
It undermines the common respect for the actual (American) Bill of Rights. The whole point of such bills is that they outline fundamental and inviolable rights, and they cannot be simply legislated or dismantled under any conditions other than constitutional crises.
What, pray tell, would you enshrine in such a bill? The right not to be offended? The right not to be exposed to profanity? It is insane to try to guarantee these things for the reasons cited above and for others. If you want a good read, try Cohen v. California (1971), where the US Supreme Court pointedly noted that it is "often true that one man's vulgarity is another's lyric".
Your fetish with hostile environment threatens to undermine many other cherished freedoms. The suppression of mere hostility is a poor prize to be purchased with the coin of libery.
"If one is really a superior person, the fact is likely to leak out without too much assistance" -- John Andrew Holmes
Being neither young nor particularly adept with computer technology and knowing 'only what I read' about Linux, my rare comments sometimes get flamed.
Of course I don't like being flamed but it usualyy would be when my ignorance was showing, even more than it usually does.
Three points:
I think "can't stand the heat - stay out of the kitchen" applies here, as far as indiviuals go.
/. via moderation makes it easy to avoid petrified firtposted grits if you want; I find those boring unending off-topic things far more annoying than comments about my IQ.
Finally I am stunned that you can talk about fredom and the rights of "groups" such as women in the same breath. Groups don't have rights, people do.
where do i get my ranting and raving, careless disregard for facts, and sloppy style? i get it from you, roblimo, cmdrtaco, and all the other weirdos who have been 'freed' by the internet and wouldnt have had a damn chance in hell of publishing in the old world of magazines and newspapers. of course now that you have gotten in you want to shut everyone else out, just like always happens in every revolution in history. congrats piggies, you have become the farm owners.
Not to mention the volume of intelligent discussion that results from his posts. I'm all for the open exchange of ideas and a JonKatz post is an incredibly effective catalyst for that, whether or not you agree with what he says. In fact, it's probably because so many people disagree, myself included.
j
"It's not whether or not you're paranoid. It's whether or not you're paranoid enough."
j
"It's not whether or not you're paranoid. It's whether or not you're paranoid enough."
- anonymous
Look I'm being oppressed! Help, Help! He's oppressing me! ~a few choice lines from M.Python's, Holy Grail Sorry AC, but the truely oppressed don't get net access.
For the most part, I think that people should stand up and be counted. But there comes a time when, on occasion, people choose, for whatever reason, that they do not want themselves associated with their words. Authors have pen names, for instance.
There are a lot of stories that cite annonymous sources in publications such as Business Week, the Wall Street Journal, and the New York Times that would have never seen the light of day if the correspondents were forced to reveal themselves.
Yes, AC's around here seem to be usually obnoxious, but obviously you've never made a comment around here that you thought was an insiteful bit and woke up the next day to find your mailbox stuffed with 50 messages all calling you a dipshit, or what not.
Freedom is a responsibility. I hope that we can be responsible enough that our right or ability to speak anonymously, without fear of retribution, is never taken away.
- "True" AC's defined as ACs without an account, or with an account with a karma less than 1 (yes, I know, but Karma is already there, and is easier to check)
- Accounts starting with a Karma of 0, and automatically gaining a karma of 1 after one week AND four posts
- No "True" ACs allowed to make a root post for the first half hour of a new topic's existance
- No "True" ACs allowed to reply to a post within five minutes of it's posting time
I don't expect this to be a universal bandaid, but I *do* expect it to cut down on the number of "first post" and "petrified $GIRL" posts that you get in the first few minutes of a new topic - unless the posters want to spend the time and trouble of making enough legitimate posts to gain Karma enough to post the annoying ones..I *do* see however how this will discourage a few of the newbies - but if the refusal was well-enough formatted (explaining why their root post wasn't accepted, and suggesting they register for an account and/or reply to an existing root post) this should be minimal...
--
-=DaveHowe=-
What movie was that, anyways? Some Night o' th' Living Dead spinoff, but I can't remember which...
**>>BELCH
When people aren't communicating with a face/voice things get dehumanized. People don't feel personally accountable and they often get beligerent. The basic respect most people treat other humans with in person often doesn't apply. It's nothing new - the internet has just opened up more outlets for it.
I agree whole heartedly. Your words are truly what people see here
I read one of the replies to your post who happened to be female, and had been on the receiving end of some crap behind it and I'm shocked....
I'm female, which I don't hide EVER, and I'm only half white (another fact that I haven't felt the need to keep secret) and I have NEVER EVER been treated as second class. And if comes the day that I do, so be it. I'm sure I'd get a kick out of what the cretin has to say.
Your right about that dream though, and it is sad but I think the only place we'll ever even come close to realizing that dream is right here in good ol cyberspace....
"Most of my heros won't appear on no stamps..." Chuck D from Fight the Power
I don't think that free-fire zones will work, for the same reason they failed to work on Usenet newsgroups long ago. Newsgroup people thought that it would be great to segregate the flamers and extremely argumentative types in subgroups with "flame" in their names (or "advocacy", or even just .d for discussion), but the discussion in the real groups turned out to be more interesting even for the flamers, and the flame groups generally withered on the vine. Decreeing that certain playspaces are safe and others are dangerous is meaningless without some kind of enforcement. I don't think all this is as huge a problem as Katz does (but then Katz really needs to believe in the Voiceless Oppressed to give his voice a reason for existing). I think that /.-style moderation solves much of it, and self-selection takes care of much of the rest (people who find /. too harsh will just go somewhere else, which is fine). If it were really true that women and minorities were all much tenderer plants than the mean young white males Katz wants to protect them from, this could be a big problem, but fortunately that's not the case. (Hi Troutgirl!)
Methinks you have been trolled...Not a hostile, angry young white kid lashing out at society, but someone who just *knew* at least one person would respond that way. In response to the first poster, if you really don't want them shooting at you then set up a server without any weapons...go to planetquake.com and look it up, just remember that they may come looking for you with very not-virtual fists if you do this...
It's like Katz is /.'s own Good Times virus-- you've got to pay attention, even though the content is non-sensical.
/. will never get get rid of such a popular author.
Exactly.
Unfortunately, by reading and posting, I'm driving the page views for Katz's stories up too high-- so
Too true. While the traffic accident appeal of his 'controversial' articles keeps me coming back for more, I'd be the first to loudly cheer his leaving or being relieved of duty. I'm sure Andover is pleased with the response he generates, and Hemos et al probably just throw up their hands and say "Hey! He can write whatever he wants! Don't look at us!". It lowers the quality of Slashdot but makes for a wider appeal, which makes for steadier paychecks for all involved. More power to 'em, I guess.
**>>BELCH
The second article, I thought "Well... responses to the responses to the first article. I can understand that."
Now we have the third article in what looks to be an interminable series of hopelessly bloated commentary on a subject that's so brain-dead common that it literally defies comprehension why someone would go to all this trouble. Even Katz.
Enough already! This puerile whining and bloated, rambling commentary on the blindingly-obvious is excessive even for Katz.
And the fact that /.'s iditors (misspelling intentional--figure it out) have the lack of good sense to actually publish this clap-trap says a lot to why the average "quality" of /. readership comments is sliding as it is.
Stop it! Save yourself, /., before it's too late!
Oh, and while you're at it: do you suppose you could manage to keep the site up for more than a few hours running? And maybe fix that damn default flat mode? What kind of genius thinking went into that idea, anyway? As if you don't have enough performance problems: you purposefully do something to exacerbate your performance and bandwidth limitations? Hello?
Geez this site is going to Hell fast.
they are purposely trying to create some kind of 'utopia' ... but the people whose idea of 'utopia' gets used are the ones who run it, and anyone who deviates is abused .. because there is no democracy.. there is no way to work out problems between people.. the whole attitude of this sort of utopia place is that 'you do it like this or you are a worthless slime' and that is just crap compared to a democracy where people work out disputes amongst themselves without some kind of petty power trip having op/moderator/whatever playing political games so he/she can get netsex/brownie points/karma/whatever.
...why don't flamers? Particularly female flamers?
Fact is Jon, outside trendy lefty dogma, no-one has a right to speak publically. Freedom of speech means that the government can't stop you from speaking, it doesn't mean that everyone has a right to post any old crap on any web site, nor that anyone has to listen to them.
Also, freedom of speech requires freedom to flame, otherwise it's not freedom. This trendy lefty argument that we have freedom of speech but to ensure we keep freedom of speech we have to be responsible and not 'abuse' that freedom by actually exercising it to speak in unpopular ways is getting real old.
If Slashdot doesn't want flamers, then increase the moderation to block them out; as a non-government site it has every right to choose who can and can't post here. But that's no reason for calling for restrictions on freedom of speech on the rest of the Net where people aren't thin-skinned wusses who can't deal with flames.
Let Slashdot worry about theirs.
If you choose to scroll down to the bottom of every page and get red around the ears at a few NP/grits posts, then you have gone out of your way to spend your own resources (time and attention), and that is YOUR responsibility.
**>>BELCH
I'm not complaining. I'm just pointing out what a hypocrite Katz is being.
Take a deep breath, and read his article again.
You'll see that he's in favour of "including" people based on:
1. Age
2. Gender
3. Nationality
But where is
4. Religion???
IF Katz cared about free speech, he would want ALL people to be "included", regardless of belifs.
Katz's thinking goes like this:
"Women are okay, I guess... as long as they don't disagree with me. So let's include them. Old people are okay... as long as they don't disagree with me. They're in. 'Foreigners' are fine, also, as long as they don't disagree with me. So they get an invitation also. But religious people DON'T agree with me, so I won't mention them. Christians disagree with me... so they don't belong here. Muslims disagree with me... so who cares if they're excluded! Jews tend to disagree with me also... so they're out of luck also. They don't get the benefit from the wonderfully intelligent and influential articles that I spam Slashdot with. *cough*"
So, WHY did Katz include gender, nationality, and age, but not religion?
That's easy. All we have to do is look at a previous article he's written. Remember his terribly insulting "Onward Christian Geeks" piece? I think that's proof enough of his anti-religion bias.
Where are his articles that insult OTHER groups like that. Where is his "Onward Female Geeks" article in which he insults the efforts of women to move into more "geek" areas of interest. Where is his "Onward Jewish Geeks" rant, where he mocks and ridicules the activity of Jews on the Internet? Where is, "Onward, Elderly Geeks", in which he described how old people are the bane of the Internet?
The answer? NOWHERE. That's because it's only "fashionable" and "in-style" on Slashdot to insult Christians and Microsoft employees, i.e. those people who don't agree with the dominant atheist paradigm of Slashdot.
I've read Katz's articles. They're cute. I've read what he said about accountability.
Well, Katz, you'll see my name and e-mail on this post. I am taking accountability for what I say, and what I am saying is "YOU ARE A HYPOCRITE."
I AM CALLING YOU OUT, JON KATZ. I am calling you out. What are you going to do? Write another inane article about it?
It's Jon Katz who's too cowardly to take responsibility to what he writes.
And to whomever moderated my post down as a "troll", I assure you it was not. It came from the heart. I propose two new down-moderation categories to satisfy the atheists on Slashdot:
-1, contains the truth
-1, disagrees with the dominant atheistic paradigm
I hope you get busted up in meta-moderation.
Peace out. Have a great day everyone. (Yes, even Katz.)
martin luther king jr, nelson mandela, lech walesa, harry wu, how many others do i have to name who scream "we have the right to say anything we want to"? in germany they ban all swastikas... on the other hand the corporations that colluded with the nazi party have had to pay almost no price and no apology for what they did... including volkswagen, mercedes-benz, and countless others. congratulations, you have kept some piece of poor white trash from being racist on the street, meanwhile the real racists are running the world with multinational corporations and you havent done a damn thing to stop them.
I'm a 'lurker' as the author calls me, and I would like to take this opportunity to speak up. I am deeply troubled by the kinds of comments I see being made on the internet and in public discourse generally with regard to this issue of 'responsibility' and free speech. I am repeatedly seeing attempts, by this author as well as others, to confuse the ever basic notion of tangible vs. abstract reality. "knocking over stop signs" is physical behavior; sharing ideas is an abstract one. What these authors seem to be advocating is some back door through which an 'authority' can assert his/her 'right' to levy behavioral (a.k.a physical) punishments on readers and writers on the internet...solely as a consequence of an IDEA espoused by said author. Concomitantly and with great shock to me is their desire then to DENY the author that same 'right' possessed by authorities (a 'right' which these authors never pursued in the first place). If this is not true (please ask yourself) then why seek the identity (or the ability to ascertain the identity) of an anonymous poster when that poster can, by PHYSICAL DEFINITION, do nothing more than share IDEAS? On the internet I can say a lot of really mean things, but I CAN'T TOUCH YOU. And I can be held INTELLECTUALLY, and SOCIALLY accountable right here on the internet, as it should be, but why be held physically accountable? I may not like those ideas, those ideas may inspire others to do terrible things, etc. but one should never try to silence ideas, however lame, superficial or evil they may be. When you speak of angry 'teens' who say rude things, did it not occur to you that maybe the reason for their anger is precisely the kind of inflammatory, frightening suggestions you are making; made without regard to the IDEAS many people in society who have no voice otherwise would like to share? With all due respect, I see these kinds of suggestions as being the work of control freaks bent on egoism and elitism. When I speak freely on the 'net I am not laying a finger on you, but how dare you then suggest that YOU need some means to do that to me. My name and other such details are simply none of your business, nor is that information remotely germane to the ideas I seek to share. That is why anonymity is a basic human right, whether you like it or not. I think most of the 'lurkers' here at Slashdot and elsewhere basically agree and I have just grown weary of seeing this propaganda go unchecked and unanswered. I never as much as touched you (and I am physically unable to do that on the internet anyway) and you have no right to know anything about me. PERIOD. Peace
Perhaps through great foresight or just order from chaos. The free fire zones are accessed by reading at threshold -1. Milder forms can be seen at 0 or even 1. By the time one gets to 2, the offtopic, trolls, and flamebait are mostly gone.
Lurking serves as a sort of introduction to the site (as it has since the BBS days). Karma is a sort of membership based on merit. Meta moderation keeps the moderation system honest.
As with anything, the system is not perfect, but it beats required logins, banning members, and deleting messages. Until some sort of AI comes along that can accuratly categorize comments, it's probably the best compromise possable.
Well, that's the first time I've heard "newcomers" described as a "social group". Secondly, is Slashdot a site designed to attract women? No, its a site for people interested in things like Operating System releases, chip design, crypto, browser comparisons, etc. People who are interested in that sort of stuff come here, and most stay and put up with the flak.
When my mum's out driving, and someone tries to aggressively overtake, does she get intimidated and pull over to let them past? No! She puts her foot down and leaves them behind! (Powerful car. And yes, journeys to school used to sometimes be, er, worrying. But over quickly).
When people get aggressive with each other, some people will back down, and some people will rise. The people you notice, rise. Slashdot isn't about people rising. You can get past them by surfing at 3 or 4, for example.
The only people who make social groups feel unwelcome are people like yourself who persist in telling us that Slashdot is all full of hot-blooded adolescent white males and going on about how women/etc aren't welcome here. And the odd fascist who usually gets swiftly moderated to -1.
Would it make a difference to you if one group welcome here were literary critics? No, because you'd dismiss them out of hand as flamers.
Anyway, what are your qualifications in the sociology / anthropology area? About the same as any intelligent observer here, I'd suspect. But your opinion counts so much much more than the rest of ours. If you didn't dismiss other people's (different) opinions out of hand, or write balanced articles, maybe you wouldn't generate so many flames. How many geeks have you heard from upset because "noone listens to me"? Well, start listening (this may require you to also deflate your ego. And empathy is a valuable tool).
Everyone who whines about Katz this and Katz that - they all read him. His mission is accomplished.
His 'mission' being, always and ever, a childish plea for attention and approval. He has been given the honorable position of having whatever he chooses to write posted as a headline for all to see on Slashdot, and yet he refuses to show any respect whatsoever for that honor, instead using it as a pulpit from which he attempts to passive-aggressively bully others into supporting him so he can look good in front of his editorial peers.
There is no obligation to provide a soapbox for whoever happens to be passing through.
True enough. Let's chuck JKatz's soapbox right now and let him duke it out on the same level as everyone else.
The internet can promote that kind of hostility the same way a mob does: by breaking the link between act and its consequences.
I think an earlier reference to car drivers is much better than a mob. A mob galvanizes itself around a single idea against a single focus, kind of like how JKatz wants people to mob together against 'people who say mean things about him'. Phaagh.
Katz's ideas are nowhere near fascist. He's not even on the right, much less the far right.
'Political' opposition has always consisted in large part of catcalls and badmouthing. Jon seems to wish to have this 'rabble' done away with, because it offends his sensibilities. Point is, it's supposed to.
resorting to a base epithet out of ignorance is unforgivable...probably doesn't have the same knee-jerk sting
Base epithets are a fact of life, and sometimes, when one feels one has been truly offended, a little knee-jerk sting is called for. During the American Revolution, people were tarred and feathered for having dissenting opinions. Base epithets? Bring 'em on!
**>>BELCH
On the Internet, at least.
It's pretty lame, actually.
I am a longtime reader of Slashdot, however I have never before felt the need to create a user and post. However, Mr. Katz, and yes that is an assumption, i'm sorry if that assumption is in error, Mr. Katz has moved me to post on this and for that I thank him. However, my thanks stops there. I, along with my co-workers and friends who read slashdot, come here for technical and industry news and rumors. We come to dwell in a comunity that is, for lack of a better term "Like us". When Mr Katz wrote his first post, I didn't agree with it, but took it in stride. We are now up to the 3rd or 4th post on this subject, and quite frankly, i am sick of it. Discussing the methods that Slashdot moderates it's forum is one thing, on topic, but by a small margin. Discussion of harassment and mistreatment of women is quite another, and this is most decidedly off topic. Now don't get me wrong, I have the utmost respect for those on the front lines of those issues. However, this is a site that flies, as it's motto, News for geeks, news that matters. Not only are these issues not news for geeks, they really aren't NEWS at all! I come to slashdot to read what is happening in the linux world, what Microsoft screwed up today, and general humor that anyone who dosn't spend hours in front of a computer wouldn't get. You seem to feel that this is a spot to post on these issues, and while i can only speak for myself, the rest of the posts seem to support me when i say that I don't appreciate it. You say that this is the perfect spot to develop a "tech community", However, you yourself are contributing to destry that. If you have a political issue to or agenda to foward, Please do it in the appropriate spaces. Just as it's not appropriate to flame here, it is also not appropriate to go completely off topic, Be it to discuss recipies or Women's rights, They are BOTH off topic here.
Where are we going, and why am I in this handbasket?
The only reason I went to post anything was to say "By definition, freedom has no abuses."
(big high five and butt slap here)
and
"Fuck you, Jon. You are a pundit of the mediocre" I'll call him voice and tell him that if he really believes in the "abuse of freedom". Then I think he can perhaps rethink his theory on people fleeing when confronted.
Yes, I read it. Yes, perhaps atheists are persecuted more than Christians in meatspace, but we're not talking about meatspace, we're talking about the Internet, and on the Internet, situations are clearly reversed.
But there's no such thing as "reverse discrimination", discrimination is ALWAYS discrimination even if it runs counter to "traditional" discrimination.
The article you linked to has no merit in this situation, because it refers to people and events in meatspace, rather than on the Internet, specifically on technology sites like Slashdot, and as should be obvious the cultures and demographics are almost polar opposites.
Katz is using Slashdot as a soapbox to promote a hypocritical views. He writes an article and makes it a "feature" everytime he's ever offended by anything.
Well, JonKatz, life is offensive. Do something more productive with your time, maybe?
Great comment! The topic says it all
You may not know the race, sex, or creed of the other readers of a forum you participate in, but the readers themselves certainly know, and if a large enough fraction of the posts in the forum are posts bashing a particular reader's sex, race, or whatever, that reader will simply leave. Nobody likes to be insulted, even if the insults are directed at a class, rather than a specific individual. So, you see, you do not need to know who is or is not an X in order to exclude all Xes from a forum; you just need to be loudly and pervasively offensive to Xes, and they will oblige you by removing themselves.
Now, you say that you want to hear "EVERYTHING that EVERYONE has to say" about a topic (a dubious sentiment in light of Sturgeon's Law, but certainly your privilege), so I put it to you: is it right for a minority of the participants in a forum to use persistent insults and offensive remarks to drive away a segment of the readers of the forum, and so to deny the rest of us the opportunity to hear their viewpoints? This is the topic Katz is trying to address. Whether he does so effectively is open to debate; his article is certainly noticably short on practicable solutions. However, burying your head in the sand isn't going to make the problem go away.
I would be remiss if I didn't point out that one of the things I like about slashdot is that its moderation system does a pretty good job (most of the time) at filtering out the flamage and hostility. That's a rarity among internet fora (at least among those that allow open participation), however, and it's the thing that keeps me coming back here long after I've discarded most other similar fora as useless. It's kind of interesting to note that apparently when you remove the moderation (as would be the case, for instance, in email feedback to slashdot columnists), a lot of the civility is lost.
-r
I've read Katz all along on SlashDot, and I still don't think he "gets it".
Most of his style is still more suited to a magazine article than a more bare-bones, technologically-oriented community like SlashDot. I feel like he's not talking *to* us, he's talking *at* us.
Only occasionally does the pretense falter, when he switches from "them" to "us", from "at SlashDot" to "here".
One of the conclusions I've drawn is that he's more interested in retaining the ability to reproduce his articles in a book or magazine than really becoming "one of us". He's already produced a book, right? With content from SlashDot?
And now it seems like he's intent on changing SlashDot into his vision of an online community. Except he doesn't come out straight and say, "Hey, let's try this?" He writes a whole column that sounds like a generic opinion column, but really is a dig at SlashDot's current procedures.
Come out and *say* it. Stop being the magazine columnist.
Well, there are always stated purposes and covert purposes in any public forum. I for one don't read /. primarily to be entertained, although there certainly are humourous people here posting funny things... but reading "arrogance and insult"-type stuff gets boring very quickly. Yes, it may be an art - but there are very few artists.
It is not your prerogative to declare some of these motives orthodox and others verboten.
Far from me to declare that kind of thing; although I'm not a knee-jerk "freedom of speech" advocate, I agree that it is an important freedom to preserve - as long as my freedom to vote with my feet (or URL, in these cases) is considered more important.
My point was, rather, that polite people generally are more likely to be heard or read... and that I, particularly, tend to look down on whoever thinks being obnoxious is a virtue per se. And that is a prerogative of mine... just a matter of taste.
By possibly the best troll we have on Slashdot, Jon Katz himself. Apparently his "Angry white boy" comments did a pretty good job of stirring up the flames yesterday, not to mention he got a good religious (not religious-issues but having to do with actual religions) flame war started as well (IIRC every article thus far has been followed up by some bizarre flamewars). I've seen more people who normally post rationally bust out the flamethrowers like it was 1992 all over again. Think of Gritsboy and Natalie Man as comic releif for the moment. They are not trolls, inasmuch as their comments really have no bite when it comes to suckering in newbies or disrupting the conversation. Now this 5 part assault on /.'s readers (IMO at least) has done wonders for building brotherly love and a sense of community, no? Maybe Katz doesn't realize what he's even doing here, or doesn't get the point of why people (and not just *adolescent*white*males*) are flaming him and each other, but he has managed to become a rallying point for most all the trolls who haven't blocked his articles yet.
:)
Let me break it down like this- If you want to disrupt a discussion pick a tired old stereotype or religous issue (such as angry white boys or choice of OS). Make a very long winded post about it (if it's long it must be well thought, right?) Pick one side, but don't really come out and say what you mean, beat around the bush some. Back up your anecdotal evidence with...nothing. No facts, conclusions, etc. Just ask lots of questions, with answers that you know already your audience will not agree on (see the middle of his article, right before the bullets.) Now the only thing to do is sit back and let the flames roll in.
Jon, if you are serious then maybe you need to rethink this whole "Internet" thing. The only thing I see you accomplishing is the alienation of your readers, both to you and each other. People have, do, and will always feel the need to take out their agressions. Online is the perfect place to do this, due to the anonyminity that you are so quick to and by now most people have either either developed a defense mechanism for it or left for kinder, gentler pasteurs.
I said it in another post that was probably too nested for anyone to see but here it is again, when someone flames you it means one of three things.
1. They have a point, consider that for a second.
2. They have no point. Ignore them or flame back if you are so inclined.
3. Everyone is flaming you. Draw your own conclusions.
Notice there is nothing in there about whining about the flaming, as whining is simply asking for more fire.
There, now I've been trolled by Jon Katz too
mcrandello@my-deja.com
rschaar{at}pegasus.cc.ucf.edu if it's important.
I think that folks should be protected from moderation of any sort unless they choose to use the moderation system. Moderation is too free. Its much more dangerous to classify a piece of information incorrectly than it is to allow a potentially offensive or incorrect piece of information to recieve the same regard as one which might generally be regarded to be less so. And further the minority must be protected from the majority at all costs. Let people adopt their own moderation systems, but don't force it down their throats.
I can't tell if Katz is serious here. I seriously hope not. It's a really sad statement on the narcissism of those who prefer restriction through archtitecture. As many have pointed out many, many, many, many times, flames are sometimes a way of enforcing useful and civil discussions through social norms, as opposed to eliminating freedom through re-coding slashdot.
That being said, a prime reason for the adolescent variety of flames is a sense of power - one that only comes from the constrast with restrictive and repressive environments found elsewhere. Should Slashdot ever choose to eliminate AC posting, it will become one of those environments and direct the Molotov postings somewhere else. And I will never visit Slashdot again.
I post both as AC and under my username, and I have some pretty good reasons (not petrified portmans) for doing each. Sometimes I read the -1's, sometimes I read the 3's and better. The system works just fine, so those who can't take the so-called hostility must be rather masochistically reading the lower-ranked posts; "Ow, that hurt. Please, sir, can I have another?"
Frankly, if you let that sort of "pain" restrict your freedoms, then you don't deserve any.
Expanding a vast wasteland since 1996.
The Internet is more atheist-friendly because person-for-person, the Internet is populated by a more intelligent breed of person than "meatspace", as you call it. The average fundy who drives around with a bumper sticker that reads "ACCEPT JESUS OR DIE" is often too dumb to *spell* Internet, let along use it. Therefore it should come as no surprise that there appear to be more atheists online than there are in the general population. It's just the cream rising to the top, that's all.
There is no god. The entity that the christians worship has roots than can be traced back to the early, nomadic Hebrews. They were polytheistic, and one of the "gods" that they worshipped was Yahweh, who they portrayed as a wind demon. Over time, the stories that they told about Yahweh frightened children so much that the children ended up telling *their* children only Yahweh stories (i.e., don't piss Yahweh off, because it is vengeful, etc.) And so it goes, on and on, and on. The roots of the christian god are no different than the roots of any other "gods" that men have invented over the years (Zeus, Baal, Shiva, etc.) And it is not surprising since the christian god is no more real than any of the other mentioned "gods." None of them are real.
Now, do you consider the above paragraph persecution? If you do, then you're completely clueless, and you're spitting in the face of every victim of real persecution around the world. Just because somebody disagrees with you and voices a disagreement doesn't mean you're being persecuted. Just because somebody stands up for themself when they're labeled evil or immoral doesn't mean you're being persecuted. And on and on and on. Believe all the fairy tales you want; doesn't matter to me. But stop crying wolf.
Here's the gist of what the good Lord Byron was saying:
"I will not reason" --> BIGOT
"I can't reason!" --> FOOL
"I...don't dare to reason. Someone might not like me!" --> SLAVE
Slave to who or what you ask? A slave to his or her own Fear. Does that sound...reasonable? Hope this clarifies things!
**>>BELCH
Flames are really just an alternate moderation system operating on another level. Who's to say that posting "Katz sux" isn't the same as moderating the article down -1? If you want to get rid of the majority of the hostility on Slashdot, you should get rid of the moderation system.
Stupid
Person
Leaving
Our
Newsgroup
Killfiled
:^)
I remember "plonk" being described as the sound of a luser hitting the bottom of your bit-bucket.
mcrandello@my-deja.com
rschaar{at}pegasus.cc.ucf.edu if it's important.
but those who approach english as a second language DO tend to be discriminated against online -
This is true. The simple reason, of course, is that it can be hard to tell the difference between awkward use of a language that one doesn't know very well from someone who isn't thinking straight. IF I have to write a message in german (which I half know) it's going to be 1/2 kindergarten language and 1/2 babelfish. Someone reading it that doesn't know that would assume I'm a moron. So, yes, I would add a footnote asking to pardon my pidheon.
The english-language centric nature of the net is something that we (/.)can't change. It will probably only increase despite the growing influx of non-native speakers. Most of them leared some english in school and english has the odd distinction of being the language that can be most horribly mangled and still be understood. If anyone remembers the PBS documentary "The Story of English" this was one of its key insights.
-- your Web browser is Ronald Reagan
Uh-huh. Now you're being REALLY cool. Saying that religious people are less intelligent? OOoooh, your friends must be *REALLY* impressed. Keep it up..... maybe you'll find fulfillment in your life someday. I doubt it.
Perhaps you aren't aware that your beloved SCIENCE was created BY Christians and FOR Christians. Almost all of the greatest scientists of history have been Christians. Even today, the founders of almost all branches of science are Christian.
Perhaps you believe in "evolution", or that life came into existence on its own. Well, you should be aware that prominent atheists CALCULATED the probability that life could come into existence without intelligent intervention, and concluded that it was BEYOND IMPOSSIBLE.
Atheism has been disproven over and over again with hard science. All true, unbiased scientists are Christian. So who's the one believing in fairy tales?
Atheists are stupid.
People, this guy is trolling.
This Craig guy is the same guy who originated the "naked and petrified" offtopic barrages that now infest Slashdot. He owned up to it on the TrollTalk forum. Don't waste your time by feeding the trolls. This one was actually pretty funny, but was probably too subtle for public consumption.
Here are my thoughts. Unless you are an early poster, your chances of being moderated up (or down) are slim -- even with the 'wasted' replies begging 'Please moderate this up'.
What if *everybody* (except ACs) was a moderator (even on topics you posted to).
Just like now, some small fraction gets moderation points and for everyone else we add a radio-box:
<O> <*> <O>
-10+1
to every post, and a [RATE] submit button at the bottom of the page.
And these scores are tabulated and used to
This way really good, but not yet moderated-up, and really bad, but not yet moderated-down posts come quickly to the attention of the moderators.
Thoughts?
Shut up, be happy. The conveniences you demanded are now mandatory. -- Jello Biafra
I agree with your POV...just one minor nit;
"There is no god. The entity that the christians worship has roots than can be traced back to the early, nomadic Hebrews."
While there isn't any god (I can't even get an honest definition out of the superstitious Ogs), the Christian variant seems to have come through the Hebrews who got most of it from the Zorastrians. The Zorastrians are still around and worship thier variant of the god-beast. On a side note, they were the ones who set the "Dark" and "Light" metaphor for good and evil. Kinda handy, but it might also explain some of the bigotry that light-skinned Europeans have against thier African cousins.
It's amazing to me how many Christians don't even read thier own book. Just as a side example, try and get them to tell you which version of Genisis (there are _2_ and they contradict each other) they think is correct. You'll get blank stares, but no substantative answer. Ask another Christian, and you'll get a different answer.
--Usenet is like a herd of performing elephants with diarrhea --
massive, difficult to redirect, awe inspiring, entertaining, and a
source of mind boggling amounts of excrement when you least expect it.--
--Gene Spafford--
I'd like to say quickly that I rarely read posts by Mr. Katz but I had to read this one as it is such an important issue. So instead of beating up on Jon (and taking neg. karma for it by his faithful minions) I'll just get to the point. *slow grin*
It is my belief that society, regardless of the 'Net, is evolving in this direction. People have less forgiveness, less civility, and more frustration and hostility. The 'Net is merely following suit, albeit in an accelerated fashion of sorts.
Think about it. So you are aware of my perspective - I'm in the US, early thirties, and remember when driving was much less hazardous. I remember when high school students merely beat each other up as opposed to projectile-induced homicide. I remember when rough-looking kids standing around on street corners were just trying to look bad - and now they are packing some heat, and no longer just _look_ bad.
We are teaching the younger generations that they need not bother themselves with accountability, and that achieving respect from others is not important at all. We teach them in how we deal with others, business, mass media, everything we do. They certainly are not just making this stuff up; and we are responsible for setting the tone.
The 'Net is following this path at a much faster pace, with a few examples... You spew a bunch of vulgarities in someone's face, you risk a bloody lip - but not on the 'Net. You break into someone's house, you'll probably go to jail - the 'Net is a safer place to commit vandalism and 'digital burglary'. You can gang up with your friends and harass someone, but chances are you'll have to answer for it to the authorities - but on the 'Net, it can be considered a 'service' (e.g., RBL, ORBS).
There are some issues here that seem 'Net specific, but are really just digital manifestations of our real society's shortcomings. Until we start taking ourselves seriously and emphasize accountability and responsibility, these problems will continue to fester.
Man, I've waited _forever_ to use the word 'fester'. That really felt good.
For me the Slashdot issue that Katz writes about actually goes far beyond the scope of the 'Net. The million dollar question is this: Can sociological change on the 'Net influence the real world? Or are we faced with a change that must begin in the real world, and hope it propogates online? I know that some things have changed society - terminology/slang, for instance - but how about how people treat each other? How about how we view ourselves?
"The mind is a terrible thing to, um, uh, oh bollocks." -- Me
It often puzzles me why there have been so many "Please Die" postings on Slashdot. You would think that someone that views some of the people who post on Slashdot as "adolescents who are looking for acceptance" as someone valid enough to write about. Perhaps it is because they want to reply to their comments, but want to look mature about it. That could be why there are these innane articles about how if we are rude, or obnoxious, our rights will be taken away..
News Flash: They won't.
We have the right to boo people off stages, to say when something totally sucks. It's not our fault if someone doesn't get this fact. I imagine that the user who wrote "Please Die" actually was just sick of hearing the incessant whining and Wired-esque writing that occurs so often on Slashdot.
So, if we lose the right to say "Please Shut the hell up", then what is the point. If you didn't want to hear feedback, don't read the Slashdot postings, but saying comments like "Please Die" is NOT an abuse of freedom.
jonkatz is the most exclusive and divisive person here. he assumes we are all american and male. woops!
Generally I like Katz's writing. But there are too many sentences here that end in question marks. It makes me think of nature shows where the commentators intone things like "do whale songs have meaning." A question which is never answered in the program. And as an old white guy, there are far worse forms of violence than name-calling. I'll take the name calling.
A logic requirement. You know: if...then and facts. No more "if Apache offers better web hosting then patents suck"
Flamers can be annoying.
People who whine incessantly everytime someone says something non-positive can also be annoying.
"Freedom of speech" loses all meaning if we start attaching "but only if you're nice to everyone" to it.
Hostility is always going to present on the internet. It's a sink or swim situation. Everyone has the right to have a say, but if you choose to forfeit that right because you're a wimp, then don't complain about it.
Think of it as a sport... it's a bit rough, people get overly competitive, sometimes someone loses a tooth. But if we try to tame it by making more and more rules so everyone can play without getting bumped around a bit, all the fun is lost.
Nobody is going to start playing baseball with Nerf bats in order to be "inclusive."
If you want to play the game, stop being a wimp and get in there. Ignore the flames and enjoy the discussions.
"On the other hand, the early worm gets eaten."
You have hit the nail on the head. I don't read all the comments that are attached to all the slashdot articles -- I have enough stuff to deal with in meatspace without wading through 400 "1st Post", "Natalie Portman", "Katz Sux", "Where's The /. Source", or other useless posts.
One poster indicates that hostility is just as previlent in real life as it is in cyberspace. While this may be true, it ignores the fact that meatspace has a veil of civility over that hostility. I may wail on for lines and lines in cyberspace about how so and so is such a anal loser, but if I was in a room of people (including so and so) then I would probably be more diplomatic.
I think that those who claim their right to add their two cents should feel it more of an obligation to be inteligent, coherent, and interesting. You should add to a conversation, and me too is not an addition. (I would, however, count a well said type comment as an addition.)
Slashdot, like usenet and BBSing before it, is a victim of its own success. The lesson we learned with massive BBS networks, re-proved with usnet, and are well on the way to proving with Slashdot, is that direct participatory democracy doesn't scale.
Although I post occasionally, I count myself as a lurker. And this lurker reads far more articles with no comments added than with comments. When I do read, it's with the filter set to 3 or higher. Do I miss the gems of wisdom put into the lower rated posts? Of course. But I also miss the bucketfuls of ranting and abuse and general stupidity that is the hallmark of far too many cyberspace "conversations".
Personally, I agree with the call for accountability. If you can't put your name next to it, then you shouldn't say it. There are exceptions, of course -- but completely open forums like this are the best argument against themselves.
Perhaps the wisdom to be gained from these experiments in community (for that is what they really are) is that a community is only as authoritative as its loudest, crassest members. Something to think about as we barrel into the 21st century.
Oh gosh, just shoot me for using "the 21st century" in that way...
--
you should read everything on the internet as if it had "but I'm probably talking out of my ass" appended to it.
Never before has a journalist been so publicly and quickly denounced for mis conceptions, and skewed observations. Of course he hates hostile environments, because as his writings show, he attracts hostile comments.
Now, a truly unbiased writer would view this as an assest. So what if every reader doesnt prepare a long eloquent and witty retort to your content. Perhaps they prefer the raw and cutting distilation of pure feeling they feel when reading (what they perceive to be) trash or worthless ramble? It is none the less feedback, which is obviously ignored by Katz.
Katz has grown old and inflexible in his years. No longer is he willing to take a variety of view points at a subject, or consider the feedback he gets with an unbiased eye. If they are angry about his work, then, by god, they are WRONG. Let me write an article about how these angry young punks are ruining the net.
Well Katz, its only going to get worse. The march of technological progess will only continue to make communication easier, and much more pervasive. However, this is a good thing. The very fact that there is so much anger on the net is because such wide and varying groups of people are coming head to head in discussion. Sure, there are more effective ways to express a point or feeling, but violent flame is still an expression of views. Perhaps even an indicator as to the level of feeling involved with such a topic.
If you want sane, calm discussion, go round up a group of fellow journalists Katz, make sure they fit the mental profile of the views you hold, and I promise you, all you will get is pleasant, agreeable conversation.. And worthless conversation devoid of all but one viewpoint.
Think of all the wide array of feedback you receive as different angles on the same subject. It is all benificial to some degree or another, so make use of it, and quit trying to preach to the young punks about manners with your ears closed.
WOW, you guys and gals may be missing something wonderful and important. I have been here lurking for years, posting for a couple, and I have YET to see it. This is without a doubt the best slashdot thread in terms of the excellence of the posts, the forethought displayed by the posters, and the POLITENESS of the posts. I am reading at -1, and there is almost NO flame...tho' I am sure some tempers are high right now. I just wanted to congratulate JK and /. on a very well done job. We are actually discussing speech, rights, race, gender, tech and socialization in a mature and responsible way. Makes me feel a little better about being part of this community.
After reading several dozen posts, I noticed a trend...
Anyone who agreed that there should be further restriction on ACs was immediately countered with the fallacious argument that removal of anonymity also removes free speech.
Since when did "free speech" get extended to mean "anonymous speech"?
Don't misunderstand me. I'm not saying I agree with JK about ACs. I'm just saying that the counter-argument about "free" somehow equating to "right to anonymity" is bogus.
I do not wish to lose the ability to post anonymously, but I am not so naive as to presume I have some inalienable right to do so.
This applies not only to Slashdot, but to anywhere I want the right to speak my mind. Free speech has nothing, what-so-ever, to do with identity/anonymity.
~~~~~~~~
Signature illegible, could be somebody else.
The name of the BBS was Stuart ][. (The name "Stuart" was chosen, nearly at random, by the author; as far as I know, it has no deeper meaning. The "][" was because it was a second impmentation; "Stuart I", the older one, wasn't tree-structured.) The tree structure was inspired by Dave Winer's outline-structured BBS, which he called LBBS (the "Living BBS").
It was, perhaps, the expense of long distance calls (almost no users were local) and the fact that it could take only one call at a time that kept the population of the system from exploding. (One advantage of this was that it really was possible to keep up with every message.) There was no private e-mail (due, probably, to laziness; the owner said that he had planned to write code for it but never got around to it), so all conversations were out in the open. And the tree-structured nature of the system required a certain amount of abstract thinking to sort out. (You really had to read a tutorial -- not a long one, but it did consist of several screens of material -- to get going.)
The board was, until it fell apart due to some unwise (and, some would say, perfidious) actions on the part of the owner, unlike any other. The level of discourse was light years ahead of what one saw on other systems at the time. Many people who are now rich, famous, or both -- names you'd likely know, at least if you work with computers -- stopped in, often under pseudonyms. (I won't name names, since I'm not sure that all of them want to be identified or want this little bit of history to be dredged up.) My name on the system was "Rogue."
Other BBSes began to copy the system's tree structure. XBBS and Pyrzqxgl, two BBSes in the Santa Cruz, CA area, used a nearly identical interface. Steve Manes' Magpie HQ, in New York, was also a derivative. (This was the BBS on which Rahul Dhesi, Thom Henderson, and Phil Katz debated compression software. Soon after, Thom sued Katz for writing PKARC, a program compatible with Thom's ARC. The lawsuit, in turn, caused the hacker community to shun Thom and his products. Soon after, ARC was a distant memory and PKPAK -- later renamed PKZIP -- was the de facto standard compressor for Microsoft platforms.) The WELL, the famous conferencing system run by The Point Foundation/Whole Earth Catalog people, likewise drew some inspiration from the Stuart ][ community, though it was not a tree-structured system.
Years after Stuart ][ fell apart, former users had such fond memories that they took an old snapshot of the tree-structured database and converted it to a tree of Web pages. It can be viewed at http://www.ccil.org:6502/0.html.
--Brett Glass
Massively Endowed Geezer Writes: Yeah I totally agree. Btw whats your number?
Why don't we just ignore him from now on? Don't read his contributions to /., don't respond to them, nothing.
I would rather read a post by a 14 year old Stephen Hawking or a 12 year old Albert Einstein than by a 40 year old George Bush or a 35 year old mouth breathing drooler. -Steve "There ought to be limits to freedom" -George "Uh, Dad, how come everybody's saying it's the new mellineum? Shouldn't that be next year?" -my 12 year old daughter
if I were you (which I'm not) I would be pouring hot grits down my pants right now.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
Right over there, did you see him oppressing me?
That mean Jon Katz, going and righting his article and not explicitly including me and my group. What a religous bigot! There can only be one answer:
The Spanish Inquisition!!
Well, I guess my post is exactly what the article was about, but sometimes you just vent a little. Anyway, one more Pythonism and I will be on my way.
Come see the violence inherent in the system! Come see the violence inherent in the system!
Yeah, but on EverQuest, you don't get to choose when someone steals a kill from you because they happen to be a blaster. Or when the GM decides to cheat for his buddies, you don't get to choose if that happens. Or, when someone steals the monster you've been camping for, you really don't get to choose that. Plus, the assholes usually hide behind the no-PK switch when they do that. In short, there will always be assholes abusing the system. AC too lazy to log on. PS I develop online games professionally.
Shera, bring me the lard, too! Don't forget the lard!
Do the people running websites have any responsibility for creating environments
which are truly free, and not dominated by the most hostile members?
I don't think Jon understands the meaning of the word "freedom." Having a "truly free" environment means there are no restrictions; anyone can post about anything. Hostile members, by definition, will be able to try to dominate a discussion if they want. Slashdot lets each reader control the viewing of his/her own content, without regulating content themselves. This is true freedom - you can flame, but others are equally free - to ignore you or flame you back.
It is just as ridiculous to claim that mere words literally prevent certain groups of people from posting their own words. You can say what you want about cultural differences, but in a truly free forum like this one, NOT having to "take responsibility" for your own words actually encourages people who would otherwise not post at all, because the social pressures are not there - it is precisely because people do NOT know if I am black, male, female, or what have you, that I can post without worrying what anyone thinks about it - whether someone will lob a racist or sexist remark at me, or devalue my opinion because of my genetic makeup. And ultimately it is still my choice to read or not, to post or not.
Even in the freest society, people don't ignore traffic lights or knock
down traffic signs - if they did, others would get injured or killed.
This is the most naive thing I've read in a while. Do you even drive? People ignore traffic lights and knock down signs all the time. MOST people obey the law because it is far more convenient (and less expensive) and, get this, because if they did, THEY would most likely be injured or killed. The people who run traffic lights and knock over signs do it mostly because they think they can get away with it (both legally and physically). So what "freest" society are you talking about?
So, the nice thing about a "free" society is that if I can't take the heat, I'm "free" to avoid the group entirely and form my own little fascist, private, speech-controlled community. In fact, this already happens.
Love, Squeedle
What a clot! If you don't like what you read or hear, don't read or listen to it. There have always been blowhards and assholes. Look at the historys of music, art, or printing for parallels. The internet is only making this point clear to the masses. Welcome to true freedom. Peter W
The Internet was never conceived as a the sole preserve of technologically skilled young white men.
Actually, the protocols were conceived for military preparedness during the 1960s and 1970s, and the designers, developers and maintainers of that military technology were?
Technologically skilled young white men.
I know this is the Internet, but as a 'public figure' (particularly writing about flames!) I'd proofread a bit more...
And this is not to say, obviously, that the Internet should go back to those days. Sheesh, many of our jobs rely on the tech-civilians and their ignorance of the net and its related hardware and software.. Just know where you're coming from...
Your Working Boy,
Sure. It makes no sense to construct and maintain commercial websites that exclude most of humanity, or punish them when they try to join communal discussions.
Here I assume that you're talking about slashdot, though I wasn't aware that slashdot was a commercial website (the implication being that the sole purpose of a commerical website is the generation of capital, where
But hostile environments will present a worsening problem for e-communities
e-communities? Why do you feel the need to stick a label on something in this manner? Labelling all online discussion forums, online special interest groups, mailing lists under such a general name goes a long way towards ignoring the vast differences between each group. Everytime you use the word e-communities I don't know if you're talking about mailing lists, web forums or what. This makes it very hard to have a precise debate/conversation/essay when you're using generalities like this.
Communities naturally tend to exclude some people and make others feel welcome. But the founders of this site never meant for Slashdot to be an exclusive club for programmers using a particular computer operating system.
Maybe you've got a much better handle on the demographics of slashdot readers than I, but this is definitely not an exclusive club for programmers and users of Linux. Check the web logs, I bet less than half the readers here use Linux to read the site. As for programmers, you'd best inform the people that I work with, my friends, and my girlfriend that they can all gets jobs in the computer industry now, as they read slashdot and thus must be programmers. Unless of course you meant to end that paragraph with "and it hasn't become one."
Sites like Slashdot are a natural place, but these kinds of conversations are impossible here, short-circuited by angry kids often with anonymous pseuds.
By this comment I get the impression that you either don't read the comments that get posted to slashdot, or that you're incredibly sensitive and get offended by argument quite easily. Slashdot is a very civil forum and much good/interesting information is exchanged daily. Perhaps you should start reading at the comments moderated up to 5, and stop around 2 or so. If you don't read the -1s (I do, some of them are funny as hell), you stand a very good chance of not getting offended at all, unless you're simply offended by someone with an alternate viewpoint to your own.
The Web's failure to produce or maintain common discussion grounds is getting to be a serious problem with real consequences. Misinformation about genetic research, online safety - even the Y2K problems - spreads primarily because intelligent public discussion of these issues isn't possible, except in places where nobody knows much about them, like Congress or on TV talk shows.
If you want intelligent and accurate discussion about a specific topic, you probably shouldn't be looking at a web forum that deals with a wide variety of topics. If you want good advice about the law, don't want Geraldo, or even Larry King live. Intelligent discussion takes place (more or less) on these sites and shows, but they're not experts. Just like watching politically correct, it's interesting, but the people on the show are generally fairly basic when it comes to philosophy and politics. It seems the biggest problem here is that you simply don't know where to look when you want to inform yourself on a specific topic. If I want to find something about about the movie industry, IPv6 or about 18th century litterature, I don't head to slashdot, or any other general discussion group. I get my ass on some mailing lists, read FAQs and talk to the people who inhabit these specific forum(s?). Intelligent discussion goes on here on a daily basis, without all the "terrible" flamage that you seem to perceive on the web. I've been on some mailing lists for over a year without encountering a single flame. I see no reason to complain that you can't talk truly in depth about technology in a broad forum.
(You might call this the John Rocker Syndrome - he's the Atlanta Braves pitcher who recently complained about too many "foreigners" being permitted into New York City and the United States.
Again with the labels. Why do you insist on labeling things like this. All it does is take away from the actual point you were trying to make. Gratuitous labeling weakens the discussion.
Again, Slashdot is a relevant example, a new kind of website. Initially, its focus was the things that most interested Rob Malda, its creator - "Legos, Linux, Movies Hardware", is how he describes it. Recently, it's broadened to include those subjects and a growing focus on technology and culture. As it grows and broadens, some of its self-appointed border guards have become increasingly agitated and resentful.
By "self appointed border guards", do you mean anyone who complains about the amount of political, legal and financially spun articals we've been seeing so much of lately on slashdot? Here again you're labeling, and by labeling the people who complain, you divert the attention away from why they might be complaining. This is akin to branding feminists "feminazis". These words are emotionally charged and do nothing to further discussion. This has the same result as being aggressive/hostile, and is simply more subtle.
It's striking how timid the most fearsome flamers become face to face.
Apparently this is very easy to say, but what experience do you have with this? The people I've met that have flamed me, and those who I've flamed at the university I attend, were in no way timid or anything aside from their usual selves.
Are hostile environments simply a trade-off for freedom, then, one of the permanent legacies of the talented young men who helped build the Net and are building it still? Not at all. The reason I say this is because I do not believe that the hostile environments you speak of exist. There are hostilities in some environments, but it's not this terrible epidemic you make it out to be.
Do members of these communities - that's us - have any responsibility to challenge people who assault others online, create environments in which some of the most urgent issues of our lifetimes can be discussed and debated in a coherent, civil and rational way?
Goodness, calm down a bit there. These debates that occur online are in no way more hostile or uncivil as those that occur in Real Life(tm). Attend a political debate or party election. Stand at the back. Listen to the ACs that grumble and hold strong, unmitigated opinions. In RL people just ignore the crackpots and flamers. Online that's all people should be doing anyways. WRT Slashdot, up your threshold, don't read the -1s, and just calm down. The only time that a hostile environment can exist in a place like slashdot is if you allow it to exist in your mind. If you are personally offended by flames or trolls, that's your own problem. If you're not strong enough to have the confidence in yourself to shrug off baseless insults, no one has the responsibilty to hold your hand and provide a "safe" forum for you in which to air your own particular set of views.
And perhaps most importantly, are people responsible for what they say? Should they be held accountable online, as they are off, for assaultive, hostile communication and other behavior that restricts access, free speech and the free exchange of information and opinion?
Again, your free speech is only curtailed by flames and hotility if you allow it to be. If I say something nasty about your mother, how am I forcing you to react to that? If I question your lineage, does that somehow limit your ability to post coherent and rational discussion to the forum? If so, please explain to me exactly how so.
Adolescent males are hungry for attention and peer approval. Why else flame at all?
Well, since the last two people to flame me were over the age of 30, I can't rightly tell you. Maybe the problem is your assumption about the demographics of flamers. Do you happen to have any figures at all to back up your assumption?
The Net has raised issues relating to freedom to completely new and complex levels, since the Net is the freest medium in American life, and the freest in its history. Your US-centric approach probably only irritates me because I'm Canadian. Slashdot is hosted in the US, but topics such as these concern everyone. Why alienate such a large section of your readership by looking at everything through US-coloured glasses?
Freedom is great, and it's easy to be for it. Hostile environments aren't great. Increasingly, they do a lot of harm.
I'm sorry, but Slashdot just isn't a hostile environment. Croatia, that's a hostile environment. Even Seattle during the WTO talks, that's a hostile environment. A web forum, where the worst thing that can happen is you can read a comment that's baselessly offensive, that's not a hostile environment unless you let it be. The same goes for any soical grouping of people, be it a chruch group, a party, grade school, etc.
All of that for a lame suggestion to have a "free fire zone." Wow! What a revelation! I never would have that of that.
Moderating posts? Whew, no wonder Katz makes the big money. No webmaster would have ever thought of that.
In fact, despite Katz's declarations, most of my female friends dig communications mediums such as IRC because of the anonymity it affords. I'm not too into my gender studies, being a small town boy and all that, but I find that in essence, the current text based medium that comprises most of the web is democratic to all races and genders because when you're just text it's the content of what you say more than anything else.
And I say this as someone who had to go to court on assault charges several years back after I got into a fight with someone who called me an Irish slur. That was a waste of three years of my life and money, and if I met the same punk in IRC and were allowed to vent my hostility with just wit and words it would've been better for both of us - I wouldn't have had to get stitches, and he wouldn't have had to been found guilty...
Though I suppose fifteen minutes in my infinitely juvenile presence on IRC is enough to assume I'm one of those dorkass twenty five year old boys who spends way too much money on Japanese import Gundam model kits.
** http://www.nkhumanrights.or.kr/ ** Human rights in North Korea. 1 million estimated dead from starvation.
Did you play George McFly? Just wondering.
> In short, there will always be assholes abusing the system.
Agreed. I mentioned this in another post: People can be jerks within ANY set of game rules, which I think is part of the problem. :-(
Is there a solution? I don't think so. Whatever rules you do provide, someone, somewhere, WILL exploit it, or figure out a way to annoy other players with it.
> P.S. I develop online games professionally.
Small world. I'm a 3d game programmer at www.cyberlore.com
Designer Dragon has some interesting articles on online games:
http://www.legendmud.org/raph/g aming/lawsindex.htmlhttp://www.legendmud.org/raph/gaming
Cheers
Should we be concerned that entire social groups - women, newcomers - don't feel welcome here?
Sorry to contradict, Jon, but I don't feel unwelcome 'here', not sure what definition of here you were using right then. Neither on Slashdot in particular or on the Internet in general have I felt unwelcome.
Having lived in a cooperative, I have some experience with arbitration methods similar to some you discuss. Trust me - they don't work. Sooner or later, they always spiral out of control. The only solution is to IGNORE 'EM!
First, I'd like to point out that the discussions here seem to be precisely what these articles talk about. I've seen a lot of 'Jon Katz this' and 'Jon Katz that' posts, for or against, doesn't matter. I've seen a lot of opinions voiced in very forceful manners, usually on one extreme or the other, frequently angry at whoever-posted-the-opposite-viewpoint.
:) ). But it would give people a choice - moderated and relatively safe, or completely free. It may be too difficult to be a permanent solution, but it would be an interesting experiment. It would give newbies - and women, and anyone else who wasn't white/male/young technocrat a chance to speak and to learn. The free-fire section appeals to me, mostly because I think it would be easier to do.
I am female. I am white, blonde, and short. I have posted a few times to slashdot, voicing my opinions. In some cases, it has turned into highly intelligent discussions, via email at least once. I like this, it's what I look for when I go to forums like this one. People with whom to discuss opinions, form opinions, people who have more information than I do about any particular subject.
In other cases, however, it has gotten me such marvelous messages as "oddly-shaped - she must be fat!" I don't come here for that. For one thing, I'm hardly fat, and for another, being female makes it difficult (in the US) to NOT be sensitive about weight. Having had a baby within the last three months, I find that my skin is wearing a bit thin about that particular subject. It's hard to read a forum in which people don't think twice before tossing out hurtful comments.
My husband reads the headlines, but doesn't generally bother with the discussion anymore, because it's too full of flamers and children in adult clothing.
In essence, I agree that the net is a hostile environment. Even though noone forces me to read these comments, when they are replies to my own, I read them. Because you never know when you'll get into a real discussion. Because if someone has something intelligent to say to me, I want to hear it. Someone posted a comment earlier that rang true for me... if I see a lot of woman-bashing posts, I'm not likely to want to post in that discussion unless I'm looking for a fight. It's not worth the effort of dealing with all the insults and derision. There have been a number of such things.
For example, the Playboy posting. I found that interesting. I've never read Playboy, but I do know a few women who do. But the comments were full of chauvanistic jerks. Comments that, if said to my face, would have caused me to go into a redfaced rage, were all over the page. I couldn't stomach it. Is this freedom of speech? Yes. Is it civil, or conducive to varied opinions being voiced? Hell no.
Something not many seem to have noticed:
((Innovate. Could sites have "free-fire" zones, areas designated for posters who want absolute freedom, but that others can avoid if they wish?
Welcome. Sites might establish special areas for newcomers, where they could be welcomed and learn the rules, traditions and language of a community before they wade in as members.))
I've been thinking about this for a little while, actually, even before these articles came out. I was thinking along the lines of a separate comment board, with specified moderators. Yes, this _would_ raise flames about moderation being corrupted, moderators being jerks, etc. But if the moderators were intelligent and reasonable people, they could keep the flamers out. This would mean extra work for those who run slashdot (sorry, Rob
Just my thoughts on the matter.
-Elthia
The value of Slashdot, to me, is that it not only serves to locate news stories I might miss at other venues, but that it demonstrates that a collaboration of people working together can actually do useful things...like find those stories in the first place.
Further, moderation actually seems to more-or-less work in a more-or-less fair way. I usually completely disagree with stereotypical Slashdot groupthink ("Corporations/closed source/money Bad!"), but I've never seen any post I've made, even very critical ones where I get flamed in reply, moderated down. I have to assume that on the balance people who actually take the time to moderate take the whole thing seriously and try to be fair. Further, when I meta-moderate, I rarely find myself having to pooh-pooh the moderations shown to me.
As for Jon Katz, well, his articles are well-meaning but not terribly deeply thought through. Yes, a lot of rudeness occurs, but it can be ignored, just as is real life. Ignore obnoxious folk, and they lose any power over your life.
And if any of this is a little disjointed, please blame a minor head wound. :)
Are hostile environments simply a trade-off for freedom, then, one of the permanent legacies of the talented young men who helped build the Net and are building it still?
Probably. There is really no way to come up with a single right answer to the question of how much freedom is enough. Nearly everyone will agree that an individual's freedom includes everything that doesn't infringe on the rights of another. But that raises obvious questions when multiple parties interact. For example, I am an advocate of nearly unlimited freedom of speech. With that freedom comes the responsibility for what I say. I can make damaging claims about someone, but if they are not true, I have done him harm unjustly. And I am responsible for that. Fine.
Now does the moderator of a web site have the right to restrict my access because of what I say? If that web site is treated like a broadcaster or a publisher, yes. But is a web site more like a public forum? It is hard to say. The analogies break down somewhat. I would lean towards saying that the owner of the site has the right to determine how it is used. Does that come with responsibility for that use? That could depend in complex ways on the moderation policy.
Do the people running websites have any responsibility for creating environments which are truly free, and not dominated by the most hostile members?
I would say no. The responsibility is to have a clear policy posted about the rules, if any, for use of the site. And while that policy will necessarily be rather general, it should be applied as consistently as possible. That will allow free for all environments to compete for mind share with heavily moderated environments. Each community can define its own standards, but should publish them.
Do members of these communities - that's us - have any responsibility to challenge people who assault others online, create environments in which some of the most urgent issues of our lifetimes can be discussed and debated in a coherent, civil and rational way?
No. And I'll happily shout down anyone who says that I do. I'm responsible for my own actions, not those of others. I rarely respond to abusive people. First of all, they are not worth the effort in most cases. Yes, I am saying that they are beneath my contempt. But more importantly, they are often acting abusive to attract attention. They get some amusement out of the annoyance they cause. I don't bother. Short of being able to permanently pull the plug on their net access, we can't get rid of them. The only other option is to ignore them, perhaps by actively filtering them out. Yes, I do maintain a killfill for my newsreader.
And perhaps most importantly, are people responsible for what they say?
Yes. That does not differ from speech in the physical world. The medium does not alter responsibility for the content. What it does change is the range of options available to us. It is possible to create anonymous, persistent, verifiable identities on a network. Most web browsers, web sites, newsreaders, mail clients, etc. don't take advantage of these technologies. That would allow us to maintain anonymity along with all of its advantages along with the ability to attach a reputation and a history to an identity. Just as Karma points on Slashdot link a logged in user to a history of activity, so could a more pervasive technology.
Certainly, there would be people who would create new identities frequently and use them abusively. And the reputation of each one would fall from zero downward. They would be of little use. Identities for which a person had developed a positive reputation would be worth keeping. Just as here on Slashdot, I am motivated to post intelligent comments. People obviously read what I say because my comments are moderated favorably and people reply to my comments.
I value the availability to post as an Anonymous Coward. I value it because it gives people posting subjects that are too hot to handle personally a chance to let us know about them. But perhaps even more valuable, it makes Slashdot accessible to anyone who drops in. It lowers the barriers to posting comments. That encourages new blood and new ideas. The guys at Slashdot have deliberately restricted their own control over the site. They post the articles. They guide the site towards the topics they consider to be the focus of the site. And then the option to comment is not restricted.
Had they stopped there, Slashdot would be very much like Usenet in some ways. The articles posted each day would act as newsgroups with people free to start any threads they wanted, but unable to create their on groups. The additional step of moderation, performed by a large pool of interested users effective means that we are using the abilities and interests of the users of the site to help focus it. It is an extremely powerful mechanism. Without relegating any person or idea completely to the bit bucket, we still have a mechanism that promotes what we, the community of Slashdot, deem to be most worthy of the attention of our fellow users to the front of the queue.
The net will not be what we demand, but what we make it. Build it well.
Actually, it was more of a comment than a question. Yes, you are right. It is their own fear that enslaves them. The points I would make are:
... "intensity" of the opinions of those who express themselves through hostility?
1) Do we really have so little consideration for other people that we value our freedom to express our own hostility so highly that we'll push them into slavery (sure, it's to themselves, but it's still slavery, and the hostility still helps contribute to it). Wouldn't it be better to contribute to an environment where such people can test the outside of their comfort zones a little, and perhaps overcome their fear?
If Slashdot is so much about freedom, it would be ironic if that meant only "freedom for ME", without caring about helping others to become more free also.
2) If (okay, I'm making an assumption that may not be true for some people) our goal is to have a stimulating discussion, would the discussion not be more enhanced by the inclusion of a wider variety of opinions than it is by the
There's a term called "poisoning the well", which means shutting out differing opinions by expressing one opinion in a way that attempts to make anyone who disagrees look like a fool. While that doesn't actually take away someone's freedom to disagree, in reality, it is clearly the case that it reduces the number of differing opinions that are expressed.
Convert RSS to HTML - integrate webfeeds into your website
Prior to these anonymous posts concerning Natalie Portman and grits, I as a 38 year old Canadian had never heard of either. Well, I tried grits when I was last in the Sunbelt, and thanks anyway. But as for Natalie Portman, whom I'd not heard of before, I went on to rent "The Professional", "Beautiful Girls", saw "Anywhere but here" and was impressed as anything by her acting. I would have seen her in "The Phantom Menace" when taking the kids there, but it's unlikely I would have ever seen the other films otherwise. So, there's something to be said for the occasional off-topic non sequitur: sometimes the best things in life come from serendipity. I will continue to read posts even at 0 rating because I'm willing to admit even now that it can be difficult to be certain which is the signal and which the noise.
I wish these article series would Please Die.
I want news for nerds...not ramblings (3 articles no less!) about flamings on sites for news for nerds.
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
- I've never seen a reply from Katz in any of his threads
Please correct me if i'm wrongThe only kind of reply i've seen are new articles, but no comments from Katz himself.
To me, and comming from someone who so dramaticaly defends the Net as a new media this seems to be a behaviour in the old journalistic tradition:
Katz, from his allmighty position as an originator of articles, throws at us, mere mortals, pieces of his unbounded wisdom.
He is not participating in the discussions - one could almost say that everything that is said by the ones that post the comments is mere gravel in which he walks
Does any one out there also thinks that this is not the way to BE on the Net???
He clealy choses not to participate in the forum and clearly a whole lot of folks have questions they want him to ask. So why not use the community based interview system to interview the pundit geeks love to hate?
It's not just this article. This article just PROVES that JonKatz can't keep his prejudices from getting in the way of rational judgement and sanity.
He's ALREADY implied, over and over, that he doesn't think Christians and members of other religions are welcome on Slashdot. But by deliberately excluded "religion" from his list of people who should be included, his "gender, age, nationality" list, he's clearly showing that his prejudices are keeping him for speaking fairly in this (he thinks) very important issue.
It's not that JonKatz didn't include Christians in his list of people who should be "included", it's that he WOULDN'T. I know JonKatz would never say that. Because he wants to look "cool," he'd never be caught dead saying anything remotely pro-religion or pro-religious-tolerance in an atheistic society like Slashdot where dangerous ideas like religious tolerance are taboo.
Jon Katz, the young rich white technically-saavy (cough) atheist, who's willing to accept the non-young, the non-rich, the non-white, the non-technically-saavy, but not the non-atheist.
What are you afraid of, Jon Katz? I'm calling you out. Are you a coward, or aren't you?
Jon Katz is the spotlight darling. Lacking any ability to make comprehensive articles, he does posses and incredible ability to bullshit and push buttons. Jon is SlashDot's answer to "The National Enquirer". Lots of sham and flim-flam but nothing of substance.
"Are hostile environments simply a trade-off for freedom, then, one of the permanent legacies of the talented young men who helped build the Net and are building it still?"
Throughout the articles he attributes everything to males. Hostility and internet creation. Although Katz might only be able to deal in such simplistic concepts of male/female, white/black, I have to break it to the people fooled by his pathetic article. Men aren't all hostile, women aren't all non-hostile, and saying men are the only ones who create the net we see today is on the list of stupidest things I've ever heard... a list on which Katz has more than his share of space.
If Katz had spent the 5 minutes on this article on all the different social interactions on the net and how they work and don't work, instead of this fetid pile of dung, he might have actually contributed. Instead he makes the sexist claims of males are hostile and disruptive, females aren't, males made the net, females have to suffer it.
I've seen male only forums dominated by women, and men pretending to be women to sneak into female forums. I've seen groups of women in flamewars that would make those hostile young males run for their momma. Katz offers some suggestions for how to make the net a less hostile place, but the only thing I've seen work has been this... the more polarized and uni-dimensional the forum, the less flames, male or female, young or old. And as for women not contributing to the internet, open your eyes you smegging idiot.
Now, I'm off to hampsterdance. Peace.
If you want to foster intelligent discussion, reduce the number of trolls, stupid posts, and the like on /., just ban anonymous posting.
There are flame-free zones on the net- I've seen one. It was and is a Usenet newsgroup, co-hosted on a private news network dedicated to that group and others like it, and it was created as refuge from a flame-saturated situation which showed no signs of ever easing up, i.e. the group alt.fan.furry. (If you want to see what real flames look like, go look at that- even so, there is some normal dialogue there).
A subgroup was tired of being flamed and left to create this new group, and in the charter specified that it was orthoganal to AFF interests and also specified that flaming and argument was offtopic, that nobody's opinions were to be denigrated but also that you weren't to denigrate anybody or anything. THIS WORKED. It continues to work and has worked even in the face of the occasional attack from flamers or 'meowers' or whoever. But it asks a lot- more, I think, than you, Jon, can give.
How often, Jon, do you refrain from denigrating people or things? It appears to me that you wish to have flames against you outlawed by rule or peer pressure, but you still want to flame hotheaded adolescents, corporations, movie theaters, you name it. This is unfair- and you don't deserve peace unless you are willing to start extending it.
As for myself, I've spent a lot of effort mediating and protecting this mysterious non-flame newsgroup I speak of (in which everyone has every freedom except the freedom to denigrate which must be exercised elsewhere). I compare it to Slashdot and I think it would be vastly inappropriate to subject Slashdot to such conditions. Never mind that it can't happen because it'd have to be written into the charter and have all slashdotters agree on it- even so, Slashdot is simply too feisty and controversial to function under such a system. Its primary value is that of a crucible in which the newest tech and the most bitterly contested issues are brought to light and argued about by the readership until a reader can see all the points of view and find a personal viewpoint on the matter. Even in your own articles the most important work is done by the readership, not you. Far from 'self-appointed border guards', a deeply derogatory description, these people are Slashdot.org, something you seem to not understand in your desire to be superior to them and control or silence them.
And on a personal note, I'm becoming increasingly frustrated with your characterisations of your enemies. Am I the 'Invisible Katz-Critic'? To read your take on the matter, I am an illiterate, adolescent, cowardly hothead primarily motivated by jealousy and spite, with nothing to say. I just want to take a minute to rebut this, knowing that you are not even deigning to read this, but that others are, and can form their own opinions on my character.
- I am not illiterate. I've been a writer for years, and have written for the international audio journal "The Absolute Sound" (v18, issues 87 and 88). I have fiction writing up on the web, including my first novel, "The Kings of Rainmoor".
- I am not adolescent. I was born in '68 and am 31 years old. Maybe this is not the ravages of old age, but it is certainly not adolescence, and I prefer it that way. I hated my adolescence and prefer being an adult.
- I am not a coward. It particularly rankles after I've constantly put myself out there, willingly risking 'dekarmaization' from what fans of yours remain, to criticise your failings publically, under my own name. My email is available- you certainly have not used it. I'll make a special one, just for you: IKatz@airwindows.com to make replying as easy as a single click on a word in the middle of the text you're (not) reading. I don't believe for a second this will work, but what more can I do? I honestly considered posting my full address and telephone number, might still do so someday in a fit of bravado, but this would fall more accurately under 'I am not stupid'
;) - I am not motivated by jealousy. Jon, I've had a feature all to myself on Slashdot too. I can have another one any time I want, under two conditions- one, that I come up with a topic that is genuinely interesting and worthy of Slashdot and the attention of its readers, and two, that I put enough effort into writing it to justify its massive virtual publication. You seem to be free of either of these restrictions- am I jealous of that? No, because they are self-imposed restrictions reinforced by the necessity of going through Slashdot editorial circles. If I had story posting access like you, I can only say that I would be a great deal more sensitive to the responsibility of it.
- I am not motivated by spite. Jon, you abuse your position. You come out with the damndest notions and use your access to media to dump them on the world without a thought to your responsibility.
I just replied to a poster on your last story- who thought I was making a straw man argument about your advocating (in the Ticket Booth Tyranny articles) that Slashdotters should go sneak children into dirty movies without consulting the childrens' parents. My reply was to _quote_ you directly, and you advocated just this. Can't you see this is wrong? Can't you see that you have responsibilities that come with access to media that reaches large numbers of people? You have been misbehaving, and continue to do so- now you are mounting a little crusade all your own, and can anyone guess the purpose? It's not landing that big movie deal, or sneaking kids into cinemas- no, what you are doing now is making a concerted effort to damage the reputation, the validity of Slashdot discussion forums, just because they criticise you!Rob Malda, do you really want this guy publically denigrating _your_ _creation_?? That's crazy! It's also harmful- if self-moderating discussion boards develop the public image of mere usenet groups (and who is to say even these are valueless? Russ Albery's Rant) then a major and novel mechanism for social equality is cut off at the knees. It is _important_ that people learn to respect the value, and tolerate the jarring nature, of an 'unfiltered feed' of opinion and information. It will be a tremendous victory if people can learn to coexist and thrive in an environment which contains both approval and bitter disapproval, and allow the full range of opinion to get out there, allow the public to get the whole story (including rants and even nonsense and spite) and make up their minds about it.
Except, Jon Katz does not _trust_ the new media. That which he likes, such as R-rated movies, he considers a freedom, and overrides anyone else's opinion thereof. That which he doesn't like, such as detailed, bitter criticism of himself and his whole ethic? Well, we'll assume that he does not try to have it silenced outright. (Only CmdrTaco and other Slashdot staffers can answer this, as they are the only ones who'd hear if Jon had been steadily canvassing for the banning of ACs, his pet peeve.) Assuming that he has not been surreptitiously trying to get ACs shut off, his reaction is instead to attack their reputation! It's been posted in this very thread that the overall karma value for the AC is 1975- that's a very positive moderation total! Yet to listen to Jon, they are all hothead adolescents- and the unstated implication here is that such people should not be listened to, do not have a right to an opinion. One wonders if Jon felt the same way about adolescents in the 60s when he was one...
Summary? Jon Katz abuses his position, and has increasingly been trying to discredit the very publically-moderated system that makes Slashdot what it is. He needs to be dropped. Period.
I am serious about all of this. Now, I'm all for trolling, but it's a SAD DAY when trolling has become so common when people can't even tell the difference between a troll, and a well-reasoned plea for sanity. This is the latter.
NOW it seems that anyone who has a minority viewpoint is accused of trolling.
Well, I'm really fed up with all of you. As far as I'm concerned, Slashdot can go straight to hell.... which I'm sure it will.
Craig McPherson
Think of the good things flamers bring!
If there was no flames or flame wars there would be no 'alt.humor.best-of-usenet'
I bet you didn't think about that did you?
Little Sister
"The future masters of technology must be light-hearted and intelligent. The machine easily masters the grim and the
"What do you want, you insignifigant heap of parrot droppings? Your kind makes me puke, you malodorous, perverted..." "But I just came in for an argument" "Oh, this is abuse. You want down the hall, third door to the right" "Thank you" "Don't mention it." "(stupid git)" -Monty Python
A role-playing manual with different "honor codes" went through a typical description of chivalry and all the rules and responsibilities and then added something along the lines of - these codes were only meaningful amoung equals, of course. An insult from a peasant called for a whipping, not a duel.
Politeness lives as much as it ever has. we just glorify the good old days too much.
...will work for Chick tracts...
I'd like to quote Lois McMaster Bujold:
On to JonKatz
Actually, it has. JonKatz presumes that since he doesn't apply remediation to flamers, that they're receiving none.
There is a cycling of newbies as their experience level increases. So that someone who posts flames as AC, after a while, will tend to stop bothering because they have better things to do. *Especially* as they don't get any responses. The frequency of newbie flames drops, the longer they're present in any given forum.
But JonKatz won't be able to detect that, since the newbie churn seems to be fairly constant, if not increasing as the population of
Here, I think that JonKatz is presuming that there is no comeback for being a jerk. Being ignored -- or even just moderated "below the fold" -- is *very* distressing to many flamers. And, I suspect, it would be to JonKatz.
It's sad that he doesn't look for patterns in the criticism he receives; he would likely become a better commentator on technology if he stopped allowing his preconceptions to overrule his observations
Women once more:
Do the people running websites have any responsibility for creating environments which are truly free, and not dominated by the most hostile members? Should we be concerned that entire social groups - women, newcomers - don't feel welcome here?
But as a woman, I feel perfectly welcome here. And the few times I've had something to *say*, I've done so.
JonKatz presumes that because women don't make 50% of the posts, that somehow we're not present, or not active, or intimidated.
That presumption could not be further from the truth.
My experience (I've been online since the year nod, and at my current ISP since '94) is that every unmoderated list/site/group has its own noise ratio;
Angry young men, redux
Adolescent males are hungry for attention and peer approval.
Huh? Get real. They'll bask in the attention.
They might slightly *prefer* peer approval; but they don't consider JonKatz their peer. *Who* configured his Linux box, after all?
That might be what he's finding most offensive -- that offline, people are required to be marginally courteous to someone who emits really dumb ideas. If a friend of mine spouted some of JonKatz's loonier premises in person, I'd laugh them out of the room; a stranger I'd just politely nod and then vamoose *before* I fell over laughing.
Three installments
I'm rather disappointed in the third piece; it doesn't look as if JonKatz thought that any of the previous articles' responses were worthy of consideration. At this point, I enjoy the discussion *far* more than the original pieces; perhaps some of his more persistent critics should spend their time reading the discussion rather than wasting their time trying to "improve" Katz.
Well, time to shovel! (Snow, that is)
I generally appreciate Jon Katz's articles because, to me, he seems willing to paint a picture of technology as it relates to those around us. Laws and the outside world effect all of us, and we deserve to hear and respond to them where they do.
That's not to say that Jon, as a regular "columnist" on Slashdot, doesn't commit egregious errors in language that would get his editor, if not himself, out of a job in the print world. And to continue to submit his posts to Slashdot without the same degree of care he would exercise in Wired or his books is disrespectful, and it smacks of a double standard, like we don't deserve his best shot. But that's only part of the whole picture.
A for content and topic, C- for execution. You can do better, Jon.
That being said, [FLAME ON]
As far as this article is concerned, Jon Katz could not be more wrong about his premises about a "solution" for his "problem" on Slashdot, much less his ideas for possible solutions.
[Be sure to tighten that bun in your hair, Jon, lest any oxygen seep into your brain.]
First of all, Jon's wrong about freedom of expression being a relatively new idea. The concept has existed at least since the time of the Ancient Greeks, if not since the time of language; it's just that many governments weren't sufficiently enlighted until after that time to see such freedom as an asset to progress and their ability to govern.
But the United States is one such government, and has been ever since they framed it into the 1st Amendment as a trade-off for the "consent of the governed." And any constitutional scholar will tell you that that ironclad assertion was meant to cover situations that even the framers couldn't imagine, INCLUDING Slashdot. That rules all and trumps all in terms of this discussion.
America DOES have its prudities, and is too censorious, but that in itself is an injustice, not a premise for change on this forum. Racism's a fact, too, Jon: should we change Slashdot to be more inclusive of racism? Of course not. So why then must we increase Slashdot's propensity toward censorship even more than it is?
None of the rest of it matters, even for such ambiguous, vapid, high-school ideals as "inclusion," "a more accepting community," or even "more filthy lucre." Slashdot is what it is, warts and all, but I promise you we're not having this 'conversation' on Slashdot if it were more accessible to and accepting of newbies, or were interested any more than it is now (moderation, meta-mod, et. al.) in whether or not someone's feelings were hurt. That model is better served by other big-money, sanitized-for-your-protection fora such as cnn.com, ZDNet, and the AOL chat rooms. In other words, if it wasn't hard, fast, and scientifically intolerant of non-factual content, people wouldn't come here to form the community.
Slashdot's members don't deserve to have to F up their system just because Andover went public, or you got your feelings hurt.
No, Jon, Slashdot's value to this community is measured one person at a time, up or down, like it or lump it. Each member has different criteria for that decision, and your criteria aren't any better than theirs just because your prose appears in the balcony of the page, and not in the orchestra pit with ours.
However, the optimal response to this, if you still have a problem, is to appropriate the code (or write some yourself), install a server, hook it up, and set up a Slashdot forum in YOUR OWN image, the way YOU'D like it.
I wish you the best of luck if that's what you decide you'd like to do. Hell, I'll even stop by once in a while to see how it's going.
[FLAME OFF]
(Maybe I should leave my [FLAME] tag open in case I'm not done yet.)
_____
_____
The antidote to bad speech is not censorship, but more speech.
I do remember the natalie portman petrified moments, they also occured the week segfault finally shut down their comments section. The kiddies that put forth all that lovely garbage there screaming into slashdot but they got bored when they realized they weren't really getting through and making the incredible mess that destroyed segfault.
I browse at 1, I rarely see first post anymore. I always read John Katz not because he's the brightest bulb in the tech journalism world, but because he tends to reach out into subjects that are less dry and when he says something extremely clueless it's amusing to watch it get torn apart. He's a brave man, he's being peer reviewed by some of the brightest, bigest egos on the planet who enjoy nothing more than dissecting and tearing apart flawed arguments.
Actually I wouldn't mind seeing obvious abuse ip blocked. Everytime that comes up I wonder just what slashdotter is that clueless they couldn't work around that. I could do it with shell accounts 3 times a day for a month before I had even had to get tricky. If a host deny is keeping you out your really in the wrong place here anyway.
I do remember the natalie portman petrified moments, they also occured the week segfault finally shut down their comments section. The kiddies that put forth all that lovely garbage there screaming into slashdot but they got bored when they realized they weren't really getting through and making the incredible mess that destroyed segfault.
I browse at 1, I rarely see first post anymore. I always read John Katz not because he's the brightest bulb in the tech journalism world, but because he tends to reach out into subjects that are less dry and when he says something extremely clueless it's amusing to watch it get torn apart. He's a brave man, he's being peer reviewed by some of the brightest, bigest egos on the planet who enjoy nothing more than dissecting and tearing apart flawed arguments.
Actually I wouldn't mind seeing obvious abuse ip blocked. Everytime that comes up I wonder just what slashdotter is that clueless they couldn't work around that. I could do it with shell accounts 3 times a day for a month before I had to even had to get tricky. If a host deny is keeping you out your really in the wrong place here anyway.
I am serious about all of this.
Oh, come on. You are not. You're trolling. You said that "Christians are the only real, unbiased scientists." So I guess all of those Indian, Chinese, Japanese and Arabian scientists are not true scientists, then, huh? What about what the other guy said about the ancient Chinese and Greeks? They weren't Christians. So by your logic they weren't scientists.
No, my friend, whether you know it or not, you are trolling.
NOW it seems that anyone who has a minority viewpoint is accused of trolling.
No. When you make claims as ridiculous as you did in your above post, claims that are so ridiculous that no thinking person could possibly have seriously made them, the troll assumption is a safe bet. And if I write a troll where I claim, for example, that OpenGL is a liberal conspiracy, that does not mean that I really believe it. I'm just writing it down to try to lure a few suckers in. That's what your posts read like to me. You're trying to see who you can hook.
And when you claim that science was invented "by" Christians, "for" Christians, you might catch a few. But it's still a pretty obvious troll, despite your objections to the label.
if the signal to noise ratio becomes unbearably low, another slashdot-like place will appear.
natural selection will take over. hostility is to be expected in any environment and i think the 'net is one of the most rapidly evolving systems in the world today. i don't think there's any reason to have worries of 'if we don't do something now, we'll have missed our chance'. mostly because that's simply a constant, and secondly because, i think, it's just a reaction to how quickly the world is evolving without 'you'.
only thing i regret is that i should have been born hawaiian.
Frankly, it doesn't matter the forum I'm reading. On /. Generica White might seem like the Prototype Geek, but it really doesn't fit so well on rec.arts.metalworking, or lurking in hobo forums, where, if nothing else, the posters make clear that they are much older than my prototype.
But the comment, "I'm an elderly black woman" fades very quickly in reading, so unless a poster over a long series of posts make several relevatory comments, i.e. tells stories about husbands or discrimination in the 1940s, every fades to Generica White.
And maybe theat comments on some interior racism of my own: I know I don't discount the comments of those people who have developed unique images for themselves, but it seems odd that I'd resolve details without data. To put it another way, it seems odd that I would have such a rigorous set of factory defaults in that image.
Where am I going with this? Well, I'm wondering if other /.rs also do this is any way. And how their Generica Poster image relates to their own cultural identity. I know mine has different color eyes, short hair, and isn't nearly as good looking as I am :)
IP is just rude.
Is there any torture so subl
If I had to register, then everyone would know what a fool I was with my HoTMaiL account and all.
Exactly the sort of fatuous nonsense that causes me to ignore most Katz pieces.
Hiawatha Bray
Tech Reporter
Boston Globe
Quite simply, the internet is an adult tool. Adults in society should already be able to make critical judgments and to check sources on information before believing anything they read. The point about freedom, simple as it may be, seems often missed. To be free we must be responsible for our own success or failure. You cannot save people from themselves without doing the unethical task of pilfering thier freedom of choice or someone elses. The internet is about moving data back and forth, An adult must be his own filter or else those that control the information will control understanding. I dont have to reiterate how dangerous that path of thinking can be. Re-read 1984. As for children. I say again that the internet is an adult tool. It requires adult guidence and supervision. That is a parents RESPONSIBILITY. Its not a matter of how to make people accountable but CAN we make people accountable. Quite simlply, anyone who knows anything about internet security knows that this is an impossibility to achieve due to the mechanics of the internet itself. Sure, you can catch some people, but that really isnt the point. The easy fix is to allow people to learn from thier mistakes or teach them about the dangers of the internet. it used to be called "streetwise" I suggest we call it "webwise" for our purposes. If you allow people to be idiots, idiots they will be. Caveat Emptor, Rich Suchy
I'm sure Jon has participated in many other online discussion systems besides this one, as have most of its readers and posters, but I think that when we get to discussing online forums here, our minds may be subconsciously defaulting to considering the Slashdot system. Slashdot's comment system is far from perfect, as is every online forum. But I think the specific problems it experiences are very related to its specific shortcomings. These may have arisen through conscious choices on the part of the system's designers, or they may be accidental. Here they are:
- Comments are always attached to stories. Because it's impossible to just go into a generic forum and start up a discussion about the topic of one's choice, some posters feel the need to post offtopic messages or even attempt to "hijack" a thread or whole discussion. My own pet topic is libertarian politics, but hours, days, weeks can go by without an appropriate story to post my thoughts to (though for that particular topic, I usually have quite a few opportunities). On the other hand, I've never seen a system where comments could be attached to stories OR seperate. At the Shugashack, they're attached to stories. At ArsTechnica, they're totally seperate. Many times at Ars, a story will say "take your thoughts to the forum!" or whatever, but it's often left up to the readers to start a new thread, and rarely is a link provided to it. The mythical "ideal" discussion system probably would exist as a mix of these two, with comments about stories, and a seperate space for standalone discussion.
- Threading, and the other default comment options. Though Slashdot provides very robust functionality for custom comment viewing, the default is still threaded, oldest first. Since this is the format used by all non-logged-in users and anyone who hasn't changed it, it's what shapes the discussions. At the Shugashack, where there is no customization, and comments are always displayed flat, newest first, the flow of discussion is very different. First posts, while still an issue, are eclipsed very quickly, and on stories with a large number of comments (100+), many posters and readers will never see them at all. But a larger issue than "first posters" is the amount of attention a comment receives as it relates to when it's posted. At the Shugashack, those most likely to see your comment are those reading the comments immediately after you post it. But at Slashdot, there is an opposing and very complex system at work. First, the default viewing parameters mean that the first few posts will get the most eyeballs. Moderation is also very influential since its effects are enabled by default. Probably the worst factor though, is the difference in attention between new threads and replies. Since the display defaults to threaded, the first post in a thread is far more prominently displayed, and naturally gets the bulk of the attention. Threads are important to organized discussion of a sub-topic, but I cannot excuse the way they short-shrift replies. I voice my favor for the UBB style, where messages are divided into threads, but displayed "flat" within them. Again, I must emphasize that it's the DEFAULT system that shapes the flow of the discussions. Related to the fact that the first posts get more eyeballs is a problem wherein after a certain number of posts, new posts become essentially invisible. Depending on interest in the story, this number ranges from about 100 to 300. In fact, this post itself is hardly worth making, as the front page comment meter is showing 383 comments already posted, thus reducing the likelihood of this message being seen to near nil. I do really think that if nothing else ever changes, the default display method should become NEWEST messages first, so that new opinions are not drowned out an hour or two after a story goes up. I can't count the number of stories that I've felt a burning need to comment on but not bothered since there were already a couple of hundred posts.
- Unwillingness to nuke abuses. I'm a very outspoken proponent of free speech, but only insofar as we're talking about the *government* regulating speech. As a private organization (of sorts), Slashdot, or any other site, is perfectly within everyone's rights to decide what is and is not appropriate. There's free speech, and then there's bullshit. I mean really, if some AC (or registered user, for that matter) posted a message that looked, in it's entirety, about like this:
FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK
I mean, what use is that? That's not productive discussion, it's a waste of bandwidth. What's more, if that were a reply, the subject line could be used to disguise it as a real post, so that the hapless reader this moron is abusing didn't know it until the time and bandwidth had already been wasted. As it is, the default threshold is 0, and most worthless posts get taken down to -1 pretty quickly. But oftimes, since I browse at 2 for a quick "Reader's Digest" version of the comments, I'll want to get into more detail and click the "XX replies below your current threshold" link. Unfortunately, when I do so, I get all the -1 "you suck", "get out, Katz!", and "first post!" BS right alongside the worthwhile 0's and 1's. I really think there is a case for just outright nuking some of the really abusive and pointless posts, but I think the priveledge to do it should be very restricted. Say, all those with story posting priveledges and 50 or so of those they trust. A log of nuked posts could be generated and examined by Rob and Jeff to look for abuses of nuking. Anyway, just a suggestion.
And now for some thoughts on flame itself. When I had an article of mine published on OS Opinion, I was prepared to be disagreed with (it was a very controversial view). But I was not prepared for the medium-well roasting I received. It truly laid heavy on my soul, making me feel as stupid as the flamers truly were. But the encouraging words of a few intelligent respondents were, as Katz has repeatedly related, enough to keep me going and convince me I wasn't horribly in the wrong. This experience taught me the same fear and respect for flame as one should have for power tools and firearms: it can kill you, but not if you treat it correctly. But I digress. My real view is that flame is important to our evolution as people who interact with others. From everywhere I am bombarded by images and stories of people who are far far far too sensitive, and the U.S.'s illness of rampant litigation can turn a petty insult or spot of poor service into a multi-million dollar issue. People really need to realize that they don't have the right to not be offended. That's what free speech is all about, being able to say whatever you want as long as it does not endanger anyone. If I say "fuck" aloud out on the street, there's no way anyone, not even a parent with a small child, can reasonably claim that I've done them any harm. Anyone who says otherwise really doesn't have their priorities straight. But I'm somewhat afraid to do just that, for fear that some numbnuts with a lawyer will accuse me of violating their personal linguistic space or whatever and sue me for a million or ten. In short, it is the right of any online community to moderate and/or nuke flames, but the users and proprietors of any such system should think it over carefully, because flame is not 100% without value (if nothing else, it's often funny).
MoNsTeR
Moderating sucks. I don't like to do it and certainly don't want to do more of it.
I think the problem is that too many people post. I like to read offtopic, rude posts from time to time and sometimes I like to read every comment. But not when there's 300. Basically, I hope /. slows down. I think it will.
Sometimes I wonder if journalists who comment on the sociology of the Internet realize that nearly everything they are saying has already been written about. Perhaps in the future tech journalism classes will require students to read textfiles, just as English curriculums usually require students to read the classics. I like to think of BBS and early Internet users as the "Ancient Greeks" of the electronic civilization.
First of all, let's first state exactly what we want. There's very little chance of us ever achieving a goal if we never clearly set it, now is there? The goal I see Jon aiming for is the following: a 100% open flameless discussion group, being maintained flameless by the choice of each poster, rather than moderators (may they be few or many).
Let's say a short-minded flamer, whom we'll simply call "FOOL", posts a message on a random slashdot tech piece saying, "That's crap. You're stupid. Natalie Portman sits on my face." This is the sort of thing that I will be considering a flame. The key feature being that it lacks any wit or perceivable intelligence. Extreme opposing rebuttals that are explained and semi-logically worked out need not apply here.
What, exactly, are we, the timid yet ever-important under-appreciated lurkers, supposed to do about it?
it's the responsibility of the single biggest group of online users - the lurkers - to speak up.
Very well, then. Then we, the lurkers, can do three things to make our opinions known or "speak up":
1) We can flame back in mass quantities. However, this sort of thing is completely contrary to the logic of our goals. [Let's flame those who flame to show that flaming people is wrong.]
2) We can use slashdot's nifty moderating system to add or take away a particular user's discussion brownie points. This may be a little off of our goal, but seems like a reasonable enough way of doing things. The problem I see with this system is that one assumes that these moderator points will be used for good and not evil. If you give everyone moderator rights, then you may get malicious users taking away brownie points from good messages simply to be disruptive. You may say, "Oh, your average flamer doesn't have the gall to do such a thing!", but I should direct you to a fellow by the online name of "Random" (sphynx@crl.com, look him up on deja.com if you like). This guy seems to delight in feeding flamewars. I won't say for sure, because I have not read every one of his messages, nor have I never met him or so much as exchanged email with him. But I think, if you'll have a look at his types of posts, it's the folks like him (or how I assume he is) who make discussion forums such nasty places. He appears to have both the time and the energy to devote to making discussions hectic and feeding the flames.
3) For every person that flames, we write an original, articulate rebuttal as to why FOOL shouldn't flame. The problem with this is obvious. It's taken me around 20 minutes to write this post so far. How long and how much mental effort does it take to respond with "HAHA YOU MISSPELLED DISRUPTIVE - YOU ARE DUMB!" Most lurkers are lurkers because they simply don't have the time or the energy to be involved in online discussions. The time that I spend reading slashdot is time that I'm taking away from doing something else; like most people, I don't have time to sit and respond to flames. Not even just one or two. I've got better things to do, and I do resent anyone who would call me lazy or irresponsible with regards to the budding issues of 21st century free speech. (If you're not calling lurkers that, don't worry about it, I still love you.)
So Jon, or anybody else for that matter, tell us what we are supposed to do?
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The other day someone criticized the use of one sentence paragraphs. In my local paper today (Arizona Republic - Phoenix, AZ) there was an article written by a "professional" journalist that began with seven (yes, 7) one sentence paragraphs. In fact, out of 25 total paragraphs, the article contained 17 one sentence paragraphs (You may have noted that this message is all one paragraph - whether it needs to be or not!).
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As a matter of fact, I am a lawyer. But I play an actor on TV.
The inherent problem with trying to moderate in any way what happens in an online forum is that it is impossible to keep people out without using the same measures required in the physical world: positive identification through photos or fingerprints or something else that is not easily manipulated or exchanged. Bouncers can patrol a bar effectively because when someone causes a problem they are identified by a whole host of physical characteristics and can then be prevented from returning. One can not dial up to a different ISP and sign up for a new free account with a different name to get back into a bar.
In my opinion, there is no way to maintain the integrity of an online forum. Without a fundamental change in how the Internet works, it will remain that way. It is not possible to positively identify someone, and without that ability anyone can do whatever they want any time. Assuming the action is legal, there can be no penalty - not even exclusion.
This is the reason that the only people in positions of power (real power, not l33t haxors) who take the Internet seriously are ones who seek to make money off it or who are simply using it as an additional means of getting information out. It is by no means the best medium for intelligent discussion by intelligent people. Typing, even with a variety of colors, fonts, sizes, and smilies (please note the sarcasm), is not a replacement for speech and gesture from an identifiable person. People who wish to put forth ideas and comments are taken seriously only when they stand up and take credit for them. As long as people using Internet forums can avoid doing so, all these problems will continue and the Internet will remain, for purposes of serious discussion, a joke.
As a final buttress to my argument: does anyone really think that the lousy AOL chatrooms so many net-heads make fun of are any different than, say, the comment threads here on Slashdot? It's all online, and it's all the same.
implied, over and over, that he doesn't think Christians and members of other religions are welcome on Slashdot
:-)
No you misunderstand, it's just you he doesn't like.
young rich white technically-saavy (cough) atheist
Um, fyi I think Jon's a bit north of 50 (editors?), not exactly one of your younger SlashDot guys. And I'm not saying about me.
What are you afraid of, Jon Katz? I'm calling you out. Are you a coward, or aren't you?
You want to meet him at the water tower or something? Please tell us where, I'd love to see you and Katz in a real duel. You could hit him with a Bible and he could counter with Ayn Rand.
All that Christian love just warms my heart.
The revolution will NOT be televised.
The niche you are talking about is deftly not the Same as the statment is Genrerless. It is going to a plase to parsipate with People with a simular intrest. that is regardless wether the are Black, White or Purple with pink pokadots. or Male or Female. you sill can't tell hense discramted bassed on that info
--Rogue, who's existance has yet to be disproved
A lot of people have made comments that are specific to Slashot, or to the Net. But I think that what really needs to be pointed out, that this idea of inclusion does not just affect online activities. It's out in the real world as well. The comment about the Braves pitcher not wanting as many "foreigners" in NYC or the States.. It's beng said in Australia and New Zealand as well. I think we really need to open up to all walks of life... I like to think of that old motto "live and let live". (there are exceptions, please don't get pedantic, but don't say stuff like gay people should be jailed or something dumb) Now, as from my own perspective... I've been on the net since the early nineties 91 or 92, I forget. "As a woman" I have found many interesting attitudes. The weirdest one to me, is when I talk to other women, and they try to tell me that there is nothing out there that needs to be worked on. But depsite that, the representation of women within Online communities or within the industry remains low. Personally, I think this comes down to the way our society as a whole is dealing with women gaining equality. In a lot of ways, we are almost there. But sadly, we continue to think of this as womens' rights. When it is really human rights we need to think of - as I said before, opening up to all walks of life, despite gender, race, religion. Faced with a group of the same type of people, anyone is going to feel that it is daunting - this is my first post to Slashdot, and I've been reading for a year! I do have some practical suggestions: Have a newbie area You know how the newspapers in the person columns (no, I haven't been looking!!) say reply to box 333, and then they keep the replies for the person who placed the ad? Maybe that is how Slashdot could do it. That is, make the person known and traceable to Slashdot only, and if anyone wants to get in touch with a person who posted, Slashdot can forward on the mail. This would acheive two things: 1. People can remain anonymous enough. i.e. the general public won't know who a poster is, but the poster is traceable by slashdot (thereofre meaning they can revoke rights... maybe make it so the person only has read access, no write access) 2. Oh, and I said it in 1 already - can crack down on flamers.. Well, sorry that I rambled, I better go work now. Michelle Peglar
Michelle
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Be true, regret not, and let your star shine forth!
Let's do what he said--eliminate posts that are flames or are flaim bait. Delete his articles.
After all, we all (99.9% of us) disagree with him and expect loads of "Katz sucks" posts. He's again and again posted articles that seem rushed or not well thought out. If I didn't know better, I'd say he's some trouble-making kid with a good vocabulary.
Don't let him every post. He's just making flames that degrade our community and interfere with our right to speak.
;->
Let's do what he said--eliminate posts that are flames or are flaim bait. Delete his articles.
After all, we all (99.9% of us) disagree with him and expect loads of "Katz sucks" posts. He's again and again posted articles that seem rushed or not well thought out. If I didn't know better, I'd say he's some trouble-making kid with a good vocabulary.
Don't let him every post. He's just making flames that degrade our community and interfere with our freedom to speak.
;->
OK, you could prove him wrong on every single thing he says but that's just more trouble than its worth. He sucks!
Changing your threshold only helps when you're reading slashdot articles. It doesn't help with, for instance, the email Katz received that said "Please die". The article was not about how to fix Slashdot, it was about online behaviour and taking responsibility for it which covers a lot more ground than one website. Slashdot is just one example.
Sponge
I believe you've missed the whole point of the article, which is to contrast peoples' behaviour in offline communities and their behaviour in online communities.
;) Rather, the point is, WHY should we have to do this when in offline communities this problem not nearly as prevalent? Why do some people discard all pretense of polite conversation when they are writing on a web page, but these same people will hold the door for me and say "have a nice day" when my hands are full of groceries?
When I walk down the street, or go to work, or go shopping, I typically don't have to deal with people insulting me (or other passersby) because of the shirt I wear, the way I walk, or whatever. But venture online, and all of a sudden I'm forced to devote a portion of my valuable thinking to filtering out this crud.
The point is not that it's possible to do so - obviously Katz is capable of dealing with flames, or he would have retired from writing for Slashdot long ago
It's an interesting question, and that's why Katz wrote about it.
Sponge
Okay, I waited most all day to see what recurring themes in this discussion I may have a comment about...So,my little part is this: Slashdot is not " free internet " . It -IS- a business. Maybe it was not to start, but it is now.Yes, it is a community as well, but not exclusively. Slashdot -IS- Famous. It is a widely quoted, oft linked news and discussion source. Maybe it started as a little home project, but now it's not. It is held to international examination, like it or not. Like the commercials used to say " When Slashdot talks...people listen " ... remember the Janes research ? Food fights don't make it anymore. Whether you like Katz or not..he is here by invitation. His name goes on the front page,because the owners of this site put it there. And last, yes, there is more garbage posts then thre used to be. ( hostile, lame, etc.) but only because there are more readers/posters than there used to be. Give Rob some credit, eh? Maybe running this discussion is his way of easing Slashdot into a more mature stance. After all..How would you like to build a world class, often imitated, never duplicated information source..only to have people stop coming because of a _small_ percentage of people like to food fight and ceate the impression that Slashdot is a one dimensional "O/S" only niche board? Thank you... I feel better now. And Sony is still gonna kick everybody's butt.
This phenomenon, very similar to grouping of individuals in order to exclude/denote/defile, is common wherever different views are expressed.
As the old proverb says, there are bad ones in every lot.
The truth is that any issue which cannot be in the real world where differing opinions cause incoherent outbursts and outlandish claims will not be solved on slashdot or any other internet medium.
In the real world, being polite to another person is governed by a community whether it is a sated doctrine or just implied.
On the internet, people who express a dissenting opinion already know that they are targets for such aggression and therefore feel no obligation to conduct thier business with any degree of politenes.
There is a growing sense of intolerance where an unfavorable viewpoint is hostily shunned rather than discussed in a positive fashion.
People feel as though thier voice outweighs any others including those of the masses.
people have learned to fight against any idea that is not immediately palatable. There is often a huge majority whos responses mirror this sentiment.
I find that on occasion, I do not agree with the reasonings or rantings of the author of an article ( or a post for that matter ). Being the selfish person that I am, I find that responding with my own views in a logical and explanatory way, tends to get more favorable responses as well as more respect from my peers.
My final and most important point is this..
Opinion articles are always up for debate. But there is no reason to flame an opinion holder for his/her opinions. They are just that. The retaliation I see to this article is from people who feel like they were targetted by jon after making comments on his previously posted articles. But this is only my opinion
LW
If my rant is unclear, you know where to go :)
Oh, that one's not fair at all.
If people are intimidated by flamers; that means only that. They are intimidated. Not that they don't want to do something.
I think it's quite likely that women are more intimidated by flamers than men - on the whole girls are brought up to be less self-confident and to seek external validation more than boys.
And also women are rightly worried by random flamage in Real Life. In RL someone yelling harrassing comments at you may well follow it up with aggressive behaviour. Especially if you're alone and vulnerable. Sexual comments are the worst & most dangerous.
I also think this is dumb and it sucks, but there it is. It took me about 10 seconds to figure out that on usenet a flamer isn't about to come over and point a gun at me and grab my arse. But I'm not inclined to blame others for not losing their defensive reflexes.
No matter how cynical you become, it's never enough to keep up.
But then when I saw this series entering its third installment, I lost the faith. This doesn't read link an article anymore, it reads like a whinge (whinge n. Incessant or repetitive complaint)
This would have been better handled with a page on a private Katz webpage with a story something like:
My advice to the newbie in the furnace - Your critics are not your peers. They are far more likely to be pimply-faced fifteen-year-olds, with more testosterone than they know what to do with and either an exagerated sense of their own importance or full-scale pubescent insecurity. Leave them be, ignore their comments (especially "please die"s) and continue with your life. Flamers (and trollers) are addicted to attention: once they get it, they look for more. Ignore them or killfile them - that's what killfiles are for.Short point about filtering: Filters (sufficiently powerful ones, and definitely not ones where the list of filtered content is not available to you) let YOU decide what you want the net to contain. YOU are the ultimate censor, YOU can deny anyone access to your screenspace. YOU are in control. The internet can be whatever YOU want it to be, and if that means all references to the word FUCK are replaced with ":)", or if you don't want Microsoft to exist on the net (as far as you can tell) then that's YOUR choice, YOU can do it!
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more, Or close the wall up with our American dead!
I mean, Katz didn't say one damned word about your theological razzmatazz or any of you wonderful, wacky folks who subscribe to it, not one single solitary word, and yet here you are get up on tiptoe yowling about it.
I can understand complaining when somebody kicks you in the ass. But you're complaining because Katz somehow neglected to kiss your ass.
There are millions, no billions of us, who not only do not keep you and your fellow theophiles and your deep'n'meaningful personal relationships with the Nazarene at the very forefront of their consciousnesses, but who just don't care one bit about those relationships, or any of you. Not at all. Get used to it.
Yours WDK - WKiernan@concentric.net
ps: by the way, and I quote, "Take heed that ye do not your alms before men, to be seen of them: otherwise ye have no reward of your Father which is in heaven. Therefore when thou doest thine alms, do not sound a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward. But when thou doest alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth, that thine alms may be in secret: and thy Father which seeth in secret himself shall reward thee openly. And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward."
Come to think of it, some years before that I was involved in a couple APA's and, in a similar manner, I lost interest in the stuffy ones and devoted my efforts to one that spent as much time laughing at itself as others... Hmmm, maybe I'm just conflict-aversive.
"I'm a scientist! I don't think, I observe!" - Dr. Clayton Forrester
Sounds fair to me...
The females didnt choose to be female. the Christians chose to be Christian, despite the fact that it is illogical, unsupported, irrational and unjustified; it is irrelevant, outdated; irresponsible, idiotic; offensive, damaging, restrictive, opressive and hypocritical... I could continue.
In the face of this, people choose this as their so called "faith" (will all the "moral high ground"..."you arent allowed to criticise this because its not just a belief its a faith" strings attached), and whats more, morons like the original poster of this thread, go out of their way to shove it down the throats of those who have more sense than believe in evil bullshit.
Get out of here, you're brainwashed. Christianity is no different to any other Koresh-style cult, I've yet to meet anyone who can argue otherwise.
I was a fan of Katz until he started this "please die" tirade. But now, this pithy collection of platitudes just disgusts me.
The single greatest barrier to free speech in the united states is THE LAW. Finally we get a medium where we can actually express ourselves without fear of frivolous lawsuits from megacorps from which the individual has no hope of defense, and Katz wants to shut it down. Gag orders have become the mode of life for the physical world, free speach is dead. The net is the one place where one can have at least some semblance of anonymity (even if it can be traced through copious effort) and speak our minds. Of course, this puts a lot of responsibility in the mind of the reader, which, of course, we can't have in America, the land of free and the home of the blame.
Katz has a few good points with respect to the welcoming of newbies - newbies should be welcomed and encouraged. But there are only so many times you can tell a person not to post microsoft word documents with MISPRINTED SPECIAL CHARACTERS to a forum if they insist on doing it. It's about free speech, and following the convention of courtesy so that EVERYONE can read what you write. It's a lot like posting to a gardening forum talking about how you use kilos of rock salt as fertilizer, yet still complain because your garden won't grow.
If you have a better idea of how to run a technology forum, why don't you start one? You can set it up all Nazi-like as you like, with everyone on your list so best to single them out for the firing squad, and see what kind of response you get.
How many times must it be said? Stop taking the bait.
Mr. Katz-
In today's installment of your continuing saga, you said:
>Women have a right to speak publicly; so do older people, foreigners, >newcomers, newbies.
This indicates a gross misunderstanding of free speech in America. The First Amendment guarantees only that the government cannot intervene in matters of speech or of the press. Whether we let them continue with intervention in broadcast (via the FCC) remains up to us.
Online, no one, not even the sysop, has a _right_ to speak publicly. The networks are privately owned and operated, with the owners setting the rules. Even public universities can (legally) set codes of use and behavior, limiting the "right" to free speech. When prudes get scared out of a shopping mall by a sex store, their right to peaceable assembly and free association has not been violated. The government has not prevented their movement or meeting.
When frangible users get scared away from their favorite chat rooms, no rights have been violated. The government has not acted to sever their connection, put them in jail, etc.
You also said:
>In the off-line world, mutual benefit is the core of community. Real >people provide help, entertainment, commerce, religion, companionship >- the concrete benefits of which keep the community going and sustain >its members. Online, especially on technical sites, the primary >benefit is information - news, software, hardware, cultural trends >and information.
You drew a line that does not exist. Technical sites, cultural sites, etc. are all built for mutual benefit. If the users did not feel they benefited, they would not participate. Online, real people provide help, entertainment, commerce, religion, companionship, and so on. The rest of the characteristics you ascirbe to online communities are true of physical ones, and vice versa. This includes often dogmatic territoriality (visit a college town), politics (visit any town), failure to reciprocate (visit any town with a population > 10,000, you will find rude people).
Real communities are also fluid and dynamic, though seldom on the same timescale as their online counterparts.
I think you miss three separate issues in your continuing analysis: taggers, bullies, and execs. In real life, vandals spray their initials or defamatory statements on the wall. Online, they post flames and act as trolls. In real life, you have the local bully. Online, you have the local bully.
In real life, too, you have the experts, leaders, and know-it-alls, thankfully very few. Online, every community is a _collection of experts_, and the turf wars that result are, predictably, often very hostile. Everyone wants to be alpha hen.
To answer your questions:
1. Do the people running websites have any responsibility for creating environments which are truly free, and not dominated by the most hostile members?
No. Beyond the walls of the legislature, freedom is irrelevant. If people want a forum free of hostility it will be built and used, you can be sure. If you feel the demand is so high, you could start katz.com and build it yourself.
2. Should we be concerned that entire social groups - women, newcomers - don't feel welcome here?
Do they feel that way? I don't know. Assuming that they do, the answer is still No. As you said, the internet is a flexible, dynamic place. If there is a demand, the supply will be forthcoming. There are no trade or technological barriers, and the marginal cost of setting such a place up is negligible. Even if it were impossible to build an online community where such folk could feel happy, there would be no obligation to tone down the present forums. Only the most egregious of meddlers could hope to effect change, and you would be "violating" the "rights" of the rest of us, by infringing on our "right" to speak freely.
This is a fundamental contradiction in your essays: To make others "free," you must curtail the "freedom" of everyone else. Who appointed you?
3. Is there a responsibility to offer people a genuine forum to come and see some of the smartest people involved in technology talk about issues and problems that are becoming more urgent by the month?
No. There is no more responsibility for this than there is for Newsweek to report on the war in Chechnya. Media is a manufacturer, selling a product to a market. They make what sells. If you can't sell it, it won't be made. When you understand this, you understand why CNN et al. report as they do.
4. Do members of these communities - that's us - have any responsibility to challenge people who assault others online, create environments in which some of the most urgent issues of our lifetimes can be discussed and debated in a coherent, civil and rational way?
No. I am not my borther's keeper, and if you try to be mine, you'll get just the sort of challenge you are asking for. Despite this lack of responsibility, you can bet that most will respond to trolls, flame makers, etc. If only for fun. But they will get chastised. Look at any online forum, you will find the challengers.
5. And perhaps most importantly, are people responsible for what they say?
Yes. The person who said it, said it.
6. Should they be held accountable online, as they are off, for assaultive, hostile communication and other behavior that restricts access, free speech and the free exchange of information and opinion?
No. If I yell at a waiter in a restaurant, whose rights are violated? Hostile communication does not and cannot restrict access. Only ISP policies can restrict access. Verbal or written abuse is poor behavior, but cannot be sanctioned, unless you own or operate the online forum in question. If I were a sysop, and you came to me aruging about a user, I would consider the details (from both sides). If I found that you were putting your nose in other people's business, I'd be just as liable to toss you off as the alleged abuser. My right as the owner (in the true sense of the word "right"), and my decision. If users disagreed with my decision, my server would soon be a lot lower in traffic.
If you're not the owner, what sanctions would you propose? If we can't be hostile, nor convince the sysop to change policies, would we gently persuade the flamer to stop? Would we send large masses of e-mail or spam? Would we enact a law, and punish thought crimes on the internet?
In fact, all the methods you have proposed have been enacted on the internet, and also on Usenet.
That's my $0.02, anyway.
hydrolyx@mailexcite.com
In my opinion, a flamewar serves a similar purpose, that is, that neither party expects to actaully accomplish anything, other than to preserve her good name, by demonstrating her willingness to fight for it.
This sort of behavior undoubtedly magnifies any insult anyone has recieved, by causing a simple you're stupid to escalate into a back-and-forth exchange of heated comemnts.
So that's perhaps half of why the net seems so much more hostile than "real life". What remains is, are people more likely to insult each other online?
IMNSHO, no What is different about the net is it is, at least in such forums as slashdot, usenet, and mailing lists, a many-to-many forum of communication. Thus, if person A tells person B they're stupid, there's several hundred, to several thousand witnesses. If, on the other hand, person A tells person B they're stupid on the street corner there's more likely a dozen witnesses. Thus, on the net, each incidence of hostility is witnessed by far more people.
Certainly there are many-to-many communication forums in "real life", and many are often *more* acrimonious than life on the net (where the regulars are better adjusted). Try a talk show, or a PTA or zoning board meeting.
People just don't always get along. Just on the net, you get to watch, and they don't take their argument to a more private venue...
Bite me, you blanket-conclusion drawing asshole.
Lord only knows where this foolishness about the Net being a community started, but it just ain't so. The Net may enable a sense of community between people with like interests and it may enable communication between members of that community of people with like interests, but the Net in no way is a community on it's own. The Net is not a location where people live, it is not the people who communicate nor is it the similarities which bring people together. I would suggest that John Katz purchase a dictionary.
John Katz asked us "Are hostile environments simply a trade-off for freedom, then, one of the permanent legacies of the talented young men who helped build the Net and are building it still?" I hardly think that hostile environments are a legacy of those who built the Net. Hostile environments have always existed and probably always will in one form or another. To go a bit further, the hostility which exists on the Net is far less severe than that which occurs in the physical world.
So what if someone sent you mail saying "Please die"? That is alot different from the more tradtional methods of attempting to suppress an offensive opinion (blunt instrument, sharp stick, knife, gun, etc). Grow up and get over it.
It think perhaps I'll just stop reading Katz for a while. Maybe I'll check back in a few months and see if I find that his writing is more firmly grounded in reality.
Just out of interest, how old would Al Gore have to be before you would listen to hime ?
THis piece seemd to be about hate speech but actually discusses a lot of different things in a bit of a ramble.
Online communities tend to become what they are fairly organically. When they do not meet some heartfelt needs of some of the participants those participants often start other forums and communities more oriented around the things perceived as missing. This is as it should be.
The WEB does not have any special failure to produce discussion groups that work well. I can points you to a dozen or two communities specializing in particular areas where discussions that are farily deep, involved and involving happen regularly. Is the technology for supporting discusion as good as it could be? No, of course not. But I don't think the medium itself is antithetical to meaningful interaction.
Misinformation is not exactly the special creation or result of the WEB. The WEB simply enables faster and broader creation and dissemination of information. This has both good and bad consequences. Personally I think it should be felonious for a professional to willingly float disinformation that s/he knows is incorrect in public forums. In an information culture this is fraud.
If an environment on the WEB becomes hostile exactly how can I be actively hurt? I have the ability to stay as anonymous and relatively safe as my persecuter. I have the ability to leave the environment. I can thumb my nose at his antics with impunity or simply consign him to the oblivion he deserves.
I've joined, spoke my mind and walked away from many e-groups that had nasty internal environments. I've also walked away from some that were so over-conscious of never offending anyone at all that no one could oppose any idea or speak freely without being seen as "attacking" some person. Many seem to have great trouble separating ideas and an attack on or attempted repudiation or disvaluing of an idea from people and an actual attack on a person.
I repudiate the notion that I have a responsibility to appoint myself the creator of environments for discussing and debating the urgent issues of our time on each and every list I am on. Many of these lists were simply not designed or chartered for any such agenda and their owners and clients would rightly highly resent any such effort on my part. It is difficult to set up a space to talk about some of the things I think are vitally important. Certainly I would like to see such spaces and wouldn't mind setting some up if I had the time energy and creative ability to do so effectively.
I believe people are accountable online the same way as offline to some extent. Which is that I will not deal with people who show themselves to be jerks. But I question whether the virtual world should have all or close to exactly the same rules, ethics and standards as the real-time world. The environments are too dissimilar to assume without some thought that they should bave the same governing principles across the board.
Personally I would much rather see some bigot blowing off steam online where s/he might get useful enough feedback to reconsider than having no outlet until they create real mayhem and harm in the RT world.
The assumptions about adolescent males are probably considerably over-generalized. Flamers and apparent bigots and hate mongers come in all ages and genders.
The US is the birthplace of liberty as far as instituting a political and legal system originally based on individual rights. I disagree strongly with a clain that the US censors open discussion of political and religious issues. The US as a government entity does no such thing. I can discuss any religion or atheism or make up a religions, satirize any religion and so on to my heart's content without the government once stopping me. The late censor-ware stuff is a failure of the govenrment - a failure to live up to its own governing principles. But I know of no censorware that will censor a religious or anti-religious work or discussion. Perhaps I am behind the times on this. I have no problem if individuals want blinders on their minds or even the minds of their children. I have a huge problem when the government attempts to make the blinders uniform and mandatory.
What I cannot expect is for anyone to be forced to provide me a podium or air space for disseminating my views. The WEB is open enough that I and everyone else can build their own podium. This is actually a good thing.
It is not possible to keep freedom but to remove it from all whom you find offensive. This is a contradiction.
it seems odd that I would have such a rigorous set of factory defaults in that image I don't think it's odd at all -- in fact I suspect almost everyone else posting here, including me, has a similar set of defaults. I also suspect you should add "American" to your "white, twenty-something male" -- am I right? As someone who's only one of the above (I won't say which), I've noticed that it is the privilege of the powerful to assume that their own image=human default setting. The powerful are mostly (note not all) white males; they control a massive chunk of global cultural output; our own assumptions are heavily influenced by that global cultural output; so it's no suprise that most us end with the same defaults -- although few are able to notice it and I admire those who do, especially when they're close to "default" themselves. I'm particularly struck by the fact that almost *everyone* who's been posting in this discussion, with a few noble exceptions, has assumed that this is an American forum full of American people -- lots of discussion about race and gender diversity, but a big blind spot about national/cultural diversity. On the internet, what's a "foreigner"? Just a thought.
I am dead serious about this, and anybody who thinks otherwise is lying. E-mail me if you don't believe me.
Normally when a comment starts with that subject it's a flame. This is not a flame, read on.
This is Katz's third installment of a column where he defends his right to write for slashdot from a whole lot of people who don't think he should, some more intellectually than others. JonKatz's right to post is not news, it's not for nerds, and it really doesn't need to have a whole column dedicated to it. The cluebie sign reads "take it to private email."
JonKatz will not take it to email, because he is a sensationalist author who needs this kind of drivel to promote his work.
Katz continues to deny that there is any possibility that his opposition might have even one thing right about him. If you deny the validity of any opposition you deny the validity of your own argument. Katz writes:
But the founders of this site never meant for Slashdot to be an exclusive club for programmers using a particular computer operating system.An obvious poke at people who don't like Katz's use of Windows. Here's another clue, on slashdot, no one knows what OS you use. Unless you know me, you probably don't know what OS I use. I happen to use linux, but not as my primary operating system, and not as what I'm writing in right now. Oh no! No one knows what operating system you use unless you tell them. The complaint about Katz's OS comes from his decision to tell us by using mangled HTML and nonstandard characters. This is a totally valid complaint, and you SHOULD expect better from slashdot. I wouldn't tolerate a book that was published in this format, would you? I'm amazed CmdrTaco and the slashdot editors allowed this to begin with.
Katz says nothing in his recent articles. He has nothing to say and isn't very good at being insightful. I've been trying to catch up on slashdot tonight and I'm tired so I'll just make a few comments:
Communities naturally tend to exclude some people and make others feel welcome.Hurray for ethnocentrism and stereotyping. Please do not take out your frustrations with your own culture on the rest of the world and call it "natural."
Adolescent males are hungry for attention and peer approval.
Note even more ethnocentrism. This would sound really great next to a quote from one of JonKatz's essays on the evils of profiling, but I haven't got one. Anyway, it seems Katz has changed his mind about profiling kids.
Should we be concerned that entire social groups - women, newcomers - don't feel welcome here?
I'd REALLY like to see some evidence for this. In the second part of this series there was a large thread about black people and women being slashdot readers. We need statistics before anyone can make sweeping comments like this. Slashdot offers total anonymity and transparency. No one has to know who you are, or even that you're reading. I see no reason why slashdot should necessarily cause people to not feel welcome.
An entire generation has grown up learning how to communicate viscerally and impulsively, which is both exciting and creative. They also take no responsibility for what they say, and learn to think impulsively and instinctively.
If there's one thing slashdot has done which I approve of greatly, it's create a forum where the media has to take responsibility for what they post - or be demonstrated wrong by readers. With rare exceptions like the Sengan incident, no news post on slashdot does not appear without the ability to post responses to that article and say "HEY, you're wrong, here's why..."
As for his suggestions:
More moderation. Require all members to moderate discussions.
What kind of freedom is this? All this will ever do is dilute the efficiency of the moderation system and make slashdot membership a burden (not that it would last very long). I like the infrequent moderation point awarding system.
Innovate. Could sites have "free-fire" zones, areas designated for posters who want absolute freedom, but that others can avoid if they wish?
This sounds like Microsoft's idea of innovation. Anyone who was around in the days when BBSes were at their zenith knows that flame pits are not a new idea. Maybe you only have to remember the internet longer than 3 years ago. While "free-fire zones" or flame forums or whatever you name them can be fun for a while, I've never seen them be very effective in moving drivel away from the "on-topic" zones nor get people to channel their hostility to them. I don't see why slashdot should serve as a room with padded walls for those who want one.
I'm not a smorgasbord.
and she sucks
Women tend to use more passive-tense language. It is well documented in sociolinguistic studies, and the tendencies persist in written communication as well as in spoken communication. They are more likely to use tentative language, offering suggestions and looking for consensus ('don't you think?' 'do you agree?' and 'please don't be mad at me') than men are. There's some evidence that this is fairly cross-cultural, that women actually think in a way that is more attuned to the social environment, but I'm sure there's a good amount of socialization involved, as well.
Ethnic and age differences are usually more subtle, and often complex (educated black people often show a *stricter* adherence to rules of grammar and usage, and try to affect near-Oxonian discourse, in order to combat the stereotypes of black people as uneducated, of urban black english as 'wrong,' of black intellectuals as unrigorous, etc.)
You seem to be afraid of the stupid, old, non-white and female. Since you've already demonstrated that you're stupid, why don't you just shut your mouth before some stupid old non-white female beats the shit out of you.