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KWin Maintainer: Fanboys and Trolls Are the Cancer Killing Free Software
An anonymous reader writes "Martin Gräßlin, maintainer of the KWin window manager, writes an informative blog post about his experiences with the less favorable pockets of the Free Software community. Quoting: 'Years ago I had a clear political opinion. I was a civil-rights activist. I appreciated freedom and anything limiting freedom was a problem to me. Freedom of speech was one of the most important rights for me. I thought that democracy has to be able to survive radical or insulting opinions. In a democracy any opinion should have a right even if it's against democracy. I had been a member of the lawsuit against data preservation in Germany. I supported the German Pirate Party during the last election campaign because of a new censorship law. That I became a KDE developer is clearly linked to the fact that it is a free software community. But over the last years my opinion changed. Nowadays I think that not every opinion needs to be tolerated. I find it completely acceptable to censor certain comments and encourage others to censor, too. What was able to change my opinion in such a radical way? After all I still consider civil rights as extremely important. The answer is simple: Fanboys and trolls.'"
What the heck does this have to do with civil rights? Is some governmental agency preventing him from voting or serving on a jury?
I don't know either Gräßlin or KWin. But I get the impression from his blog post that he is unable to separate his personal and political opinions from his role as software maintainer. Perhaps that's the reason he experiences problems and has abuse targeted at him? Or maybe it's just his personality.
Democratic elections are also decided by "fanboys and trolls". Campaigning is the art of getting most of them on your side.
Open source is Ayn Rand's 1949 movie & 1943 novel The Fountainhead: be your own independent architect, do what you love to do, put it out there, see if anyone else loves it too, find your birds of a feather, flock together, and f— everyone else, especially your competitors on similar projects.
Seriously. Who cares about this guy's rant?!?!? Yes, this is the tired meme of the internet giving voice to annoying people.
Deal with it or avoid the internet.
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
The idea of free speech is that the state can't outright ban certain kinds of speech. It does not mean that every bit of speech must be included in every possible discussion forum. In some, you might want to be as open as possible in order to allow the widest range of unmoderated discussion. That was the goal of many of the early discussion fora like the WELL. But in others, you might want to restrict discussion more narrowly. This could be based on topic: on some Usenet groups, mailing lists, and webforums, there are ranges of topics considered on-topic, and others considered off-topic. How narrow the on-topic range is varies, and how strictly it's enforced varies (do you politely ask off-topic discussions to knock it off, do you axe them outright, etc?). It also could be based on behavior standards: do you ban people for personal attacks, for aggressive behavior, for doxxing, or any range of other activities? It depends on the community and their goals.
But the point is that these are all tradeoffs that vary by community, and don't have much to do with civil rights. It is your right to publish a shitty book of poems, but that doesn't mean you have the same right to email every poem you write to the Linux Kernel Mailing List. This is a pretty basic distinction, no?
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Exactly. Trolls and fanboys are a signal-to-noise issue, nothing more.
Good-bye
"No one believes more firmly than Comrade Napoleon that all animals are equal. He would be only too happy to let you make your decisions for yourselves. But sometimes you might make the wrong decisions, comrades, and then where should we be?"
-- George Orwell, "Animal Farm"
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
In the quoted blog, Martin Graesslin is basically asking if censoring zero-content hate speech from fanboys and trolls is a compromise on supporting full freedom of speech. It is not. In the USA, we make this differentiation. You are free to express any opinion, but may not do so with "hateful" language. "Fighting words" are forbidden in public forums. In addition, advocating illegal action is not the same as expressing an opinion. Saying something like "The bums in Congress should be removed from office, one and all" is okay, whereas "grab your gun, we march tonight" is not.
-- Perhaps I see less than some, but more than many.
Agreed, it was obviously the first time this kid (he acts like a kid) got his feelings hurt by the very
free speech he has been championing all along.
Welcome to the internet kid, grow a skin or log off.
KDE 4 deserved all the badmouthing it got in the early days. Its fine now, stable and works great very well.
But back then it needed a bashing, and it generally got it. And the arrogant spew that was returned
in the face of any criticism pretty much set the tone for the long fight that followed.
Disclaimer: I like KDE, I've used every version, I still use it today.
I was very vocal against the near death of KDE caused by the developer's arrogance.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Censoring other people in your own domain IS A FORM OF SPEECH!
The Neo Nazis can go spout their nonsense, but it doesn't mean I have to let them do it in my own home. Neither does Martin censoring his own blog mean that he is against free speech. He is exercising his own free speech in his own domain by censoring trolls.
There are any number of reasons to censor people in your own domain that doesn't indicate that you think their ideas are dangerous in themselves. You simply are telling them to take their ideas somewhere else, which we all have a right to do.
Look how well it is doing!
and either you will burnout or none of this shit will bother you anymore because you will have seen everything.
you think trolling is bad? flameboys? how about someone dumping their whole tray of food in front of you and screaimng at you as they walk out over a $2.20 item.
how about people calling you up and cursing you out because they got the wrong phone number?
how about a convicted rapist coming into your store and flashing people?
how about getting robbed at gunpoint at 3 in the morning for $7.00/hour?
how about your former manager getting pulled into a freezer and shot to death, 2 weeks after you quit a fast food joint?
first world problems baby. first world problems.
I find it completely acceptable to censor certain comments and encourage others to censor, too.
There's a difference between doing it on your forum or blog, which you own, and doing it for your whole country and everyone in it, which you don't.
There wasn't one rational reason stated why censorship is a good thing
Really? How about the idea that having a bunch of lame-ass mooches, trolls, and flamers causing nothing but drama increases the stress level of developers and causes them to abandon projects entirely?
That's a net loss for EVERYONE. The projects don't complete or get kicked way back on deadline waiting for someone else to pick them up, learn the code, learn to extend it, and finish it off. If they ever do, since those same lame-ass trolls and flamers are waiting to pounce again.
This guy needs to grow up and grow a pair.
OR, the lame-ass trolls need to grow up.
Look, I get it. You're 14, you live in your parents' basement, and to you swearing is only nominally less exciting than a furtive glimpse at a pair of tits. You think it makes you sound grown up. Used in moderation, it can. But there's a right way and a wrong way to phrase things, a right way and a wrong way to handle conflict, and a right and wrong way to deal with drama.
The problem with trolls, fanboys and flamers in this context is that they increase rather than decrease the drama levels and stress levels. Rather than putting out fires and being a little diplomatic, they throw gasoline on fires and expect the house to still be standing after the inferno.
Bad move. It destroys projects and drives people away from open source. Hell, the reason I never made the jump to using Linux on the desktop was my own experiences trying to set up a Mythbox in my living room; because I didn't have the exact hardware that one of the developers had, asked for some help, got shouted at "RTFM you fucking loser" over and over again when the documentation was crap and had no relevance to the situation I was asking about... screw it. I'm not going to try to navigate the 300:1 odds of finding someone helpful among that lame-ass crowd in order to try to use F/OSS and I can understand why it drives developers away too!
Accessibility is great, but sometimes we forget that when we bring the internet to everybody, we also bring everybody to the internet.
Lots of places I frequent are closing comment sections (Especially youtube channels. There is no greater indictment against humanity than youtube comments) because the robust moderation required to keep public commentary civil is simply not available.
I really do want to give people a chance, but the proliferation of social media and internet access has unfortunately proven what we've known all along.
People are dumb. Really, really, really, really dumb. Worse, the dumber you are the less likely to know that you are indeed dumb, and the louder and more narcissistic you become in order to leave your mark on the world.
I'm not claiming to be smarter than everyone else, but at least I know when to shut up.
Expect to see heavy handed moderation and tightening of public forums. Expect to see trust and reputation systems. Expect to see a drastic reduction in linking to social media and other toxic entities.
One begins to see why the founding fathers of the US didn't opt for a direct democracy. People really do need to be saved from themselves.
Easier way to avoid such things, look for people who use the word "sheeple", then disregard everything else they say.
SJWs are the new boogeyman. -Me
Free software, as good as it often is, does not do well in a consumerist society. We believe that anything good costs money and inversely, if it costs money it must be good and the more money it costs, the better it must be. What's more the implied belief is that if it's free, it can't be good.
But depite all that, it's not just people that are increasingly using it, it's that business is increasingly using it. I don't mind, terribly, that commercial software business actually uses free software to make their stuff... I do but I don't. VMWare still pisses me off in the sense that their product is Linux all over and yet they won't make a Linux client for it. (Way to take without giving back VMWare!!!)
But where the whole industry is going is changing. Where things will be in 3 to 5 years will be quite telling of where we're going and whether or not Microsoft will remain relevant into the future and all that. But one thing I know is certain: Things will not stay the same simply because Microsoft doesn't want them to change. And as Microsoft is apparently terrible at change, a pretty dismal picture is being painted for them. And seriously, are people really buying into the "cloud" nonsense?! Especially now with the NSA controlling the world's data?
Free software is and will be the way forward. Nothing is killing it. And I'm pretty sure open source software will be the way to restore trust in computing and in the internet.
A german saying:
"Wer will bauen an der Straßen, muß die Leute reden lassen."
Who builds on the street, must let people talk.
Yep, declaration of war on a war tactic worked so well the first time huh?
TLDR: Was hippy, got better.
American perspective vs. German(/European).
Yeah, yeah, stereotypes are evil, yaddy yah, but you know it's true.
Fuck systemd. Fuck Redhat. Fuck Soylent, too. Wait, scratch the last one.
The amount of people who don't actually know what a troll is, is mind blowing. Having a completely different opinion does not make you a troll. A troll has to without any attempt at valid point formation for his / her side, argue with the attempt to instil negative feelings or total false hood on the given topic. I hate trolls but I also hate people who don't know how to recognize a troll, having been modded down on this side many times for making good and logical arguments, I'm actually worried that people have lost the ability to distinguish a troll from someone who has a valid differing opinion.
As for Fanboys, well if you can make me a good set of points on why your product is better and if you can properly discuss them all with me and make me see that your not just a Fanboy without reason then your okay! The Fanboys I can't stand are the ones who talk about product X like it's the coming of Jesus but then can't talk about why they don't actually like Y, Z and T without saying they just suck.
The best part is, this works with everything! I don't care if your a software developer, home baker, car mechanic or just a noodle enthusiast, you need to be able to form proper reasons behind the things you do and why you do them. I'm not a musical fan but if you can sit down and explain all the reasons you like musicals then I'm not going to argue, we might differ entirely in opinion but at least you have good reasons and I can respect that.
It's simple.
In the wake of the NSA scandals, you have all sorts of people who want to support their side (aka the good guys) and make sure the other side (aka the bad guys) don't score political points on them.
So you see all these new and interesting mental gymnastics: "I supported free speech, but honestly it's over-rated. It's no big deal really. Illegal search and seizure?It's been going on for a long time now and we're safer! People are happier with fewer rights!"
And then because these thoughts become a total mess in their minds, they start making arguments that make no sense - like TFA. If it's your server, feel free to say whatever you want and let speak whoever you want. You have a right to to say whatever you want - but you do not have the right to force yourself to be heard. If you say something dumb on another person's server, it is their property and they can expunge it. If you say something dumb on your server, feel free to do so - no one can stop you - but there's no one who will be forced to visit your site to actually read it.
The point of the free speech amendment is make sure THE GOVERNMENT cannot decide that YOU will say whatever THEY want on YOUR servers.
Is an article on Slashdot complaining about fanboys and trolls ironic or just plain futile?
The guy is a free software developer and his ego is getting in the way. Essentially its "prima donna" syndrome where the reviews are only important when they bath the individual in glory. Yeah none of those reviewers know anything.... but you still read them ;-) ;-) .. Writes a blog...
The short story is that ICT in general has more people with ego problems than most segments of industry. Poor social misfit is valued by the company/organisation ego blooms, man-boy finds himself isolated and lashes out, discovers others are stronger, fiercer etc. Shrinks back into shell butt filled with hurt and rage
There wasn't one rational reason stated why censorship is a good thing
That's because he doesn't understand that "censorship" is a vague term which he failed to properly define.
I am a civil rights activist. Your right to be free from government sponsored censorship is, IMHO, a fundamental pillar of Liberty. That is not at ALL the same as a non-government entity choosing what comments it wants to display. Don't get me wrong, in many cases I despise the way server and forum owners try to regulate discussions and information... but it's their right to choose what is said in their name, or hosted on their forums.
And if you're going to be hard-line like you seem to be, you'll browse slashdot at -1 and never rate comments.
Nowadays I think that not every opinion needs to be tolerated. I find it completely acceptable to censor certain comments and encourage others to censor, too.
And from the article:
We need to find solutions to the fanboys and one of the solutions I came up with is to block them on my blog posts.
Moderated forums are not identical to censorship. Censorship is the attempt to prevent an opinion from being expressed. Moderation can have the objective only to prevent disruption of a particular forum, and not be an attempt to suppress an opinion. It is certainly possible for moderation to approach censorship in effect, depending on the prominence of the forum to the topic in question and the concentration of the authority to moderate, but moderation is not necessarily censorship and should be considered in context.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
Except he doesn't give two shits about trolls. He's worried about fanboys:
I can tolerate trolls as itâ(TM)s much easier to handle them. But fanboys are only there to harm you to diminish your work so that their world view doesnâ(TM)t break.
His point is that fanboys take as a given that their favorite software is perfect, and then engage in rabid apologetics to justify their position. In the face of change, they will quite literally invent reasons as to why their worldview is still correct.
Put another way: To someone who thinks "GNOME rocks => KDE sucks", nothing you can do to KDE will change their mind--it's still not GNOME, therefore it still sucks, and they'll create another justification as to why that is, forever and ever.
Since whatever purported problem isn't a real flaw, and fixing it won't make the fanboy happy, fretting over their posts is probably the worst thing you can do as a developer. And if listening to a fanboy can only do you harm, why let them derail all discussion and rob you of your chance to hear from those who can help you?
TL;DR--fanboys don't help discussion, and that's a problem if you depend on that discussion. It's not just butthurt.
DATABASE WOW WOW
You are a case of a flamer flaming flamers. :)
Fuck systemd. Fuck Redhat. Fuck Soylent, too. Wait, scratch the last one.
OR, the lame-ass trolls need to grow up.
Sure, trolls need to grow up (I know i need to grow up and I like to do my fair share of trolling), but to expect everyone else to change is stupid. This is the internet, this is how it is. You get trolls, fanboys and corporate shrills in forums. If you want to moderate your forums, cool, have fun. But to bitch about it ruining stuff? Really? You just told the trolls that they won by publicly bitching about them.
Be seeing you...
Look, I get it. You're 14, you live in your parents' basement,
Way to improve the level of discourse.
On the other hand, you've pretty well proved your own point about trolls and moochers causing drama.
Well played sir.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Sounds like he's having trouble differentiating between government censorship and non government moderation.
Free speech has nothing at all to do with moderating a privately owned forum in such a way that the conversations are productive.
RUGBYRUGBYRUGBY
And if you're going to be hard-line like you seem to be, you'll browse slashdot at -1 and never rate comments.
I browse at -1 (damn that goat.cx bastard, that lame posting is over a decade old), but I use the mod points I receive. Just a few days ago in fact. I modded up 3 posts I don't agree and 1 I do agree with, because they all made good arguments for their position.
The fifth one was a mod down for a crap argument. I debated whether I should let it pass, but it was a really bad argument. I didn't mod it down just because I disagreeed, I modded it Overrated in the hope the writer will improve his rhetoric down the line.
Even for civil rights activists, I think rating comments is fine as long as you mod up or down based on the post itself, not on your own views.
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
Samsung is all over the xdeveloper forums. I complained about my bootloader being locked OTA and within hours there were dozens of haters on me. That kind of shit didn't happen with Transformer.
Samsung took back my unlocked bootloader because Google wants me to rent movies. They're both evil.
I'm sorry. What was the end of your argument? I drifted off after you said "the word".
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
Touché
SJWs are the new boogeyman. -Me
The problem is that the term troll is now thrown around by oversensitive moderators/operators to silence people who offer alternative opinions, whether they be well reasoned or not. This is not trolling, period. Trolling is a deliberate attempt to derail the conversation. However, a troll only has as much power as you let him have. Moderator or user, both can deny the troll his power by sticking to rational arguments, correct facts, and the truth. See a post that pisses you off? Don't censor him, respond! As long as this concept is held in esteem, the only people the troll will piss off are the irrational users who are too embedded in their guilds to care (politics, cars, computing etc all have these). Just dont worry about them. It's not worth punching a hole into free speech that'll just get widened to the point where the forum becomes useless; where the whole site is sliced up into separate guilds that the administrators appease with nonsensical bans on certain terms or subjects because they're afraid to lose users.
slashdot suffers from this too, with people abusing the 'troll' moderation to knock down positions they don't agree with. It's the electronic equivalent of an ad hominem.
He thinks he has it bad? Hey, at least he's not on the Gnome dev team. Instead of crying to us, he'd be sobbing in his mother's arms!
HEADLINE: Paradise Lost!
[Germany]
Today, a naive idealist crashed headlong into reality, and his youthful dreams of utopia were shattered. No more Unicorns and skipping down candy-colored, lollipop lanes for this disillusioned, sensitive soul! Turn to page 6 and read all about the injustices this poor individual has suffered because of some mean old trolls on the Internet, and how his "everything should be like, free, man" world-view has been turned into "ve must rule with an IRON FIST, ja?".
Classic.
Come on Klaus, man up, hold your head high, and delete those posts. It's gonna be ok... they're just trolls and fan-boys, right? Right? And for the love of FSM, stay out of politics; we remember last time some sensitive budding artist got involved in politics there. (OK, that last part was uncalled for...)
Yes, and I think his description of the passive-aggressive attitude of fanboys are pretty spot on too, particularly this bit:
Obviously GNOME Shell and Unity are only an example. We can observe the same kind of cognitive dissonance with KDE fanboys. An example I can observe in regular intervals is that "the next version is much better and solves all problems" whenever a user is reporting about instabilities or other problems. The fact that another user is experiencing problems is challenging the beliefs of the fanboys which can be resolved by stating that the next version resolves it. We can see these comments for each version since 4.1.
Also known as "the boy who cried wolf" and you can only take so much of it before you go into "stop wasting my time trying to make me try the same broken thing you lying sack of shit" mode. Note that the same argument is also automatically used to invalidate any opinion that is more than five minutes old, since things are "totally different" now. And that attack is the best defense is popular in all walks of life, if you find your choice hard to defend go attack everything else as being worse. Another thing I see in forums that don't have moderation like /. does is trying to win by flooding the comment field, like there's 300 comments and 50-100 are from the same person aggressively assaulting anyone that posts anything that doesn't fit his opinion. It certainly makes it a total waste to read the comments.
On the other hand, a filtered version of the truth isn't the same as an unfiltered version. If you see a blog with nothing but praises, it's rather obvious comments are being moderated and that you won't be able to read what people really thinks about the subject. If you want constructive discussion you moderate to stay between the extremes where it is wiped out by the mud slinging and being wiped out because dissenting opinion is not permitted. But if you want public debate, well it's often not very constructive it's more of shouting match, people with closed minds and no intention of changing their position trading blows. Not too much different from politics really.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
In the wake of the NSA scandals, you have all sorts of people who want to support their side (aka the good guys) and make sure the other side (aka the bad guys) don't score political points on them.
It's older than that: this is exactly how so many Obama supporters went from being pro-transparency, anti-wars, anti-Guantanamo, anti-torture, etc. to anti-transparency, pro-wars, pro-waterboarding. They have to support their "side" at all costs, even when it means reversing their opinions.
The point of the free speech amendment is make sure THE GOVERNMENT cannot decide that YOU will say whatever THEY want on YOUR servers.
Exactly. Free speech is something we should uphold, but it doesn't mean that any private party has a responsibility to provide a platform for someone they don't agree with. If I have a blog, I can say whatever the hell I want on it. If people make comments on it, and I agree with them, I'll let them stand. If some troll (or anyone else I disagree with) says something I don't like, I'm free to delete it, because it's my blog, not theirs. If they want to exercise their free speech, they can do it on their own blog. It's only censorship when the government prevents you from exercising your free speech rights.
Put another way: To someone who thinks "GNOME rocks => KDE sucks", nothing you can do to KDE will change their mind--it's still not GNOME, therefore it still sucks, and they'll create another justification as to why that is, forever and ever.
Actually it can be read exactly the opposite:
The fanboy, (often the developer, or the developer's hangers on) won't hear any criticism, because such people are trolls, and instead make up any excuse and call anyone names who dares complain about any change, or point out the the emperors new clothes lack certain key features. There then ensues a great shout down from the developers inflicted on their own user-base. The perfect storm of bad user relations.
Instead of saying,
ok, yeah we can see how that might be counter productive for your use case, so lets put in a switch that you can continue to use the rest of the new package but fall back to the old method till we get this new stuff up to your liking
the developer community ends up saying
hey, its free software, download it and fix it any way you want, otherwise STFU or go run Gnome or Windows
Even when they happen to take the latter approach with a coder capable of digging through the mountain of code and making the change, they will not accept and merge the outside coder's changes, and they will apply patches to their branch that render the coder's changes impossible in the future.
Case in point: The Dolphin file manager in KDE4 couldn't begin to match all of the powerful feature of Konqueror of KDE3.5. Early KDE4 adopters were opting to still use Konqueror file manager (as well as bitching vocally). So the developers, instead of spending their time bringing Dolphin up to Kong's capabilities, went in and gutted Kong, and piped it over Dolphin wearing Kong's clothing. Rather than admit Dolphin wasn't ready for prime time, they maliciously removed any ability to make a comparison, any bridge that would keep the users happy. Sabotage! Utterly childish, utterly unnecessary.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Ayn Rand was an idiot, her theories flawed and they don't work. Provable.
Anyone who subscribes to her objectivism doesn't have two brain cells to think it through.
So, if he had said he follows Linus Torvalds because of his method of
be your own independent architect, do what you love to do, put it out there, see if anyone else loves it too, find your birds of a feather, flock together, and f— everyone else, especially your competitors on similar projects.
Would you have the same vitriol against him?
Because you don't sound like you have two one brain cells to figure out some philosophies are common among quite different people.
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
Some people act out of pure malice. There IS such thing as people who not only don't contribute, they have a SUBSTANTIAL net negative effect on a project, and they are doing it on purpose. This is destructive behavior and it should be eliminated. Period.
> Yeah, I got hate mail, but not much, and so
> fucking what anyway? 95% of the mail was
> YOU ROCK, DUDE!!
Well good for you. What if it was 95% negative? 98%? 99%? 100%? At what point would you decide "fuck this, it isn't worth it."? What if all your mail was "you're wasting your life, how can you waste time on a game when people are starving? go do something useful!"
Also: different people are different. It's not up to you to decide how much crap anyone should accept, because I guaranfuckingtee you, there are some things that piss you off ROYALLY that I don't mind at all, and you wouldn't be very happy if it was up to me to decide how much of that you had to deal with. How would you like to work with a dead, maggot-infested cat on your desk, or in a room with flickering lights, or with loud rap/country/ska/harpsichord/whatever music playing, or surrounded by ugly naked people? What if you sat on a barstool and your boss kicked it out from under you every time he walked by?
Finally: he has facts on his side. Ask any sociologist "do negative people have a negative effect on a group's performance?" and you will hear a "yes" EVERY FUCKING TIME. No argument here -- it's fucking MEASURABLE. It's fucking REPEATABLE. It's fucking SCIENCE. Asking people to put up with bad behavior when they don't have to is STUPID.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
I don't get it. What does free speech have to do with censoring comments on a website? He seemed to be talking about government censorship being bad, and then he said that.
If you believe that censorship is fundamentally wrong then you have two choices: 1) Be a hypocrite and pretend it's different when you do it, or 2) don't censor content on your own Web site either. This KWin maintainer is choosing the first option. What he doesn't seem to appreciate is easy enough to understand: if the trolls can cause him to abandon one of his core beliefs and make a hypocrite of himself, then that's a victory for the trolls and a defeat for himself. It reminds me of how certain nations respond to terrorism by eliminating freedoms -- if the terrorists want to do as much lasting harm as possible, then they must be delighted by that.
.. government!" discussion every single time censorship is mentioned regardless of context. It's a nearly indestructible meme it would seem. You will probably be fired if you tell your boss to go fuck himself and that, too, is a form of censorship. Anyway, this is like a GPL vs. BSD license discussion -- check the Slashdot archives and you'll find that every conceivable point and counterpoint has already been debated ad nauseum.
This near-obsession with treating government as a special case even when the discussion is about abstract principles is why you were confused. Government is only a special case when the discussion is about censorship via the legal system, because government is the only entity legally allowed to use force or threat of force to achieve its goals. A Web site operator isn't going to arrest a troll and throw him in jail so that just doesn't apply here. Said operator might, however, delete certain posts or ban certain users to effect censorship.
I think our society in general is losing the ability to think in terms of abstract principles (part of why privacy is eroding). This is why we have to rehash the same old "but but
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
What has changed is that now you're one of the builders, rather than one of the activists.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
So let me get this strait... while he's a citizen, submitting to power, freedom of speech is the most important right we have. Then, once he gains a leadership role of a community that has freedom to say whatever it is they want, suddenly that right isn't so appealing? Excuse me while I fall out of my chair laughing at his dumb ass.
No the issue here is that he determines what is good and what is bad. Yes he has the rights to censor and I will defend his right. However, what I think he is missing is the idea of karma. If you look at my slashdot id it is an old one! I was there nearly from the beginning. And let me say in the beginning the trolls and fanboys were problems. But then karma came into the picture and problem was solved. The crowd will censor itself quite nicely actually.
"You can't make a race horse of a pig"
"No," said Samuel, "but you can make very fast pig"
Exactly. Trolls and fanboys are a signal-to-noise issue, nothing more.
...and when there's too much noise, it drowns out the signal. Trolls allowed to run amok are an effective form of censorship, preventing anyone else from having their voice heard. The "grow a skin or log off" group think censorship is fine, as long as it's not done by moderators.
"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies."
You are a case of a flamer flaming flamers. :)
No, he's just wrong. The kid is 11, not 14. :)
SOME slashdoters want insights into how to passage the rapids of Information Technology. Possibly MOST. At the least it is about learning from other people's mistakes. So in the middle of a (possibly) heated _discussion_ about foo one or more twerps barge in. They have mouths but not ears. I'll just repeat that: They have mouths but not ears. (Their brains may be a bit tiny as well.) Now if I was in a pub I could stand up and tell them to DIAF and leave their betters to fix problems on behalf of everyone. (IME this works if you have at least one supporter who is fully behind you at the time.) The equivalent in the Internet/Forum/Developer Café is some sort of censorship.
I'm all for it. If you're in the elite then you should open your doors to the others but don't be afraid to 'Blackball' the scum that poison proper and necessary discussion.
I think our society in general is losing the ability to think
Fixed that for you.
I think it's more the case that people got tired of posting goatse links
If you have some system like Slashdot's which moves junk comments to lower rating positions, this isn't a problem. Everybody should get to blither, but nobody should have to read or listen to their blithering.
How about the idea that having a bunch of lame-ass mooches, trolls, and flamers causing nothing but drama increases the stress level of developers and causes them to abandon projects entirely?
It's not that hard just to ignore them. Heck, I'd say that online it's only so much easier to ignore them than in face-to-face situations. Censorship is a slippery slope. He should know better.
A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
Ayn Rand was an idiot, her theories flawed and they don't work. Provable.
Anyone who subscribes to her objectivism doesn't have two brain cells to think it through.
Speaking of fanboys and trolls! Any time Ayn Rand gets mentioned on /. this shit gets posted. Someone must have a script or something.
Ayn Rand's fictional work and her philosophy of objectivism are different bodies of work, and separable. Objectivism has not held up well to philosophical argument, but then most ideas don't. Her fiction is, well, fiction: take it for what it is, interesting stories, grounded in her negative real-world experiences with Totalitarianist Communism.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Wrong attitude. One may grow a thick skin naturally due to the harshness of the environment, however it should never be a requirement to grow a thick skin to get on the internet, or join a video game's forums, or to become a free software developer. And why should being a free software develooper be such a difficult job when you don't need to grow a thick skin to be a proprietary software developer? If someone wants to spend their own time and their own money to make a product better why should they have to grow a thick skin first? If someone wants to go to a conference and learn more about some computing technology they shouldn't have to grow a thick skin first.
And why aren't pansies allowed to be free software developers? I'm not saying Martin is, but we shouldn't restrict people from contributing or scaring them away because they're too nice. Everyone body should be joining in here, not just just the rude people and those with swagger.
The very premise of "grow a skin" or "grow a pair" is wrong headed.
This isn't censorship anyway. It's his personal blog. Censorship is something that someone in power does, like governments or corporate bosses, or people who act as gatekeepers of information, such as letters to the editor of a newspaper. The trolling opinions are not being squelched, they can be spoken loudly and clearly on their own blog if they like, or on KDE mailing lists, and so forth.
Easier way to avoid such things, look for people who use the word "sheeple", then disregard everything else they say.
Replying to them and making it twice as visible that the word was used, does not further your cause. It does, however, let you show us that you're so much better and holier than them.
I don't like or agree with every term that everyone uses all the time myself. I just don't bitch about it. I don't tell others how they should express themselves because that's worse than any word they could use, and because I am not their lord and master. The only person I want to control is myself.
That this particular term "sheeple" gets so deeply and visibly under the skin of so many tells me something. It tells me that this word has power, that it's significant, that it must in fact do a very good job of connecting an ugly tendency with an ugly word. "Follower", "lemming", "droid", "trendy", "mindless automaton" etc. all describe the same thing, but for some reason it is the word "sheeple" that so many I'm-better-than-you types fixate on. That's all the more reason to use it.
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
Both are equally the problem. Online communities have a natural tendency to distill themselves down to a single meme complex. People who disagree with the tenets of the complex leave rather than be bogged down by people that would rather nitpick than reason.
You just told the trolls that they won by publicly bitching about them.
You should be moderated insightful. One of the biggest rules of the internet is Don't feed the trolls.
Help is available for those addicted to feeding the trolls, Biters Anonymous.
Free Martian Whores!
Even though neither moderation or editing what shows up on your own site is censorship, I agree completely, that's how you should moderate and is how I moderate. After all, "overrated" is just a polite way of saying "-1, brain-dead stupid" when it doesn't mean "not bad but it doesn't deserve a +4."
I don't care what people do on the websites they own. If there are too many trolls and not enough reasoned discussion I leave. If it looks like they're editing, I'll leave. If the site annoys me, I leave.
As to goatse, I don't follow shortened URLs any more.
The AC above said I should browse at -1, why? I've seen few comments at -1 that are worth seeing. If I want to read one, I can. But even as fast as I read I can't finish the internet and it's senseless to browse at -1 unless I'm moderating.
Free Martian Whores!
> or to become a free software developer
Are you fucking kidding?
You are putting your work out there for the world to examine and criticize. You damn well better have a thick skin. If you expose yourself to the possibility of some harsh remarks, then you should not be surprised when you get some.
It's not unlike choosing to become some sort of Hollywood celebrity. The scale is smaller but the principle is the same. The entire world can see you stripped bare and their response might be negative.
It might not even be with mean intent. The problem with expecting never to be offended is that everyone has a different standard in that regard.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Had I still been living in my mom's basement I never would have believed that their are IE fan-boys but now I work with some. Boy are these some real assholes--also known as idiots and luddites.
I object to power without constructive purpose. --Spock
If he's trying to badmouth the MythTV developers, I am inclined to believe that whatever grief he got he really brough on himself. They will go out of their way to try and be helpful. Unless you tread on one of their piracy sacred cows, they are a pretty tolerant lot.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
> I am a civil rights activist. Your right to be free from government sponsored censorship is, IMHO, a fundamental pillar of Liberty. That is not at ALL the same as a non-government entity choosing what comments it wants to display.
You are a piss poor civil rights activist.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
I agree and the thing that struck me about the quote that he believed free speech meant tolerating other speech. Free speech means prohibiting government from retaliating. It absolutely has nothing to do with people "tolerating" speech of others. As you said the Nazi's can (in my words) go fuck themselves. I'm not going to listen to them and I'm NOT going to tolerate their speech. That doesn't mean I support government censorship or physical violence but I'm NOT going to give their comments equal weight, I'm NOT going to allow them to speak hatred from my property and I'm not going to listen to them spouting hatred in public.
Free speech doesn't mean tolerating speech you find offensive. It is strictly about government trying to restrict speech. I'm entirely confused by this idea that's arisen in the last decade or two (primarily with Millennials in my experience) that free speech means tolerating speech. It doesn't. Being forced to "tolerate" speech you find offensive is IMO abusive and completely against the intent of free speech.
Moderating his own comments is just basic engineering fail.
If his comments are going to be moderated then it should not be him doing the moderating. It's like testing your own code. You have to be willing to accept feedback that's out of your control or else you'll never know if your stuff is any good.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
But it isn't your blog. Your blog is hosted on an ISP. That ISP is again connected to your readers through a number of networks.
All of these middle-men could similarly exercise their right to censorship, because they are not part of the government.
What you are missing is this: When you censor your blog, you are not a _platform for free speech_. It is not your responsibility to be one, but as a society, for free speech to have any meaning, there must be platforms for free speech.
The press has traditionally been such a platform. Today ISPs and network operators must be platforms for free speech.
If you let any non-government organization censor, then free speech is no better off in the US than in China or Russia. Most censorship is done by private companies, not by the government. Self-censorship is censorship, and by implicitly letting the platforms for free speech in society dwindle, free speech is lost.
Her fiction is like that of L Ron Hubbards. It feeds into her stated positions on politics or religion.
This can be especially hilarious in the case of L Ron Hubbard.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Its just an open, and free form of censorship. The only way to make it more open would be to say who modded you up and down and why. But this might lead to reprisal voting and politics so as far as I'm concerned peer censorship works.
Additionally the -1 comments are still there, they are just out of the way and can be read if you want to have a laugh about goatse and frosty piss.
That's a nice view, but I don't see how it's ultimately defensible. You seem to be arguing that anything that prevents anyone from expressing their ideas any way he or she wants is against the "abstract principles" of free speech.
How do you reconcile your position with the idea that people shouldn't be allowed to talk during movies? As far as I can see, banning a troll from a website is like removing a loud person from a theater -- people are in the site to discuss site-related stuff, and the troll is disrupting that.
Why is it ok to be extremely rude on the internet, but not ok to react to the extreme rudeness by deleting people's comments?
It takes a certain amount of maturity to express differing opinions on a public and largely anonymous forum in a constructive and polite matter, but I think that maturity should be expected - and people who fail to show it should be censured appropriately. Having your comments removed from someone's personal blog because they are rude and immature is perfectly acceptable.
I noticed at least one person in the linked comments owning up to their rudeness and apologising. That is the short of behaviour that should be encouraged, not the development of a 'thick skin'.
Can't retrieve my account login from where I am at the moment - but I thought I'd chime in:
The principals of democracy need not be applied to every endeavour - particularly such largely personal endeavours driven by small numbers of highly motivated individuals practicing their craft for no reward.
Where is it written that when I release something into the wild that I also need to permit people to bash me or my work - imperfect as it is, when I control the medium that they're using to do so? It's no different to having someone at a house party causing trouble - you're within your rights to ask them to leave the house - it doesn't impinge on their free speech - they can exercise it, just that they have to do it somewhere else. I can then exercise my right to not engage those people if it suits me - and that's what has happened here.
If there's enough genuine discord, a fork will occur, the people who complained will follow it and people on both sides of the split are happy and peaceful - and as long as people are mature enough to cross-port each others innovations where they are mutually agreeable, everybody wins.
A message board, mailing list or any other internet medium isn't a ballot box - removing members from an online community you run who aren't perceived to be contributing positively will improve things for those who do care and have a vested interest and ensures that people who are donating their energy and time for free to the world can continue to feel good about doing so. Every time a disagreement occurs in the OSS community we need to be sensible enough to not race towards demonstrating Godwin's law.
Some people can't take the idea that others don't want to hear what they have to say, but that's life. It doesn't belie fascism, nobody is getting black-bagged in the night.
-Steve Gray
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jyoOfRog1EM
IMO, that is the end of the discussion if "censorship is warranted".
brandelf -t FreeBSD
What if it was 95% negative? 98%? 99%? 100%?
Then its likely that your project either doesn't have nearly enough exposure, or this feedback is largely legitimate and you should figure out what is fundamentally offensive about your software to these people. It could benefit your skill and perspective significantly, down the road, even if you never actually come to agree with the detractors completely.
An implicent part of the freedom of speech is the freedom to ignore or to not hear what someone is saying.
To that end, while it is wrong to censor people and make it harder for others to hear what they have to say... there is no problem with empowering people to selectively ignore people.
The distinction is that a censor will decide for you what you do or do not what to hear while YOU personally decide what you do or do not what to hear.
We could go further by allowing individuals to personally elect or appoint censors. Say you trust someone to decide what should and should not be blocked. But that's it.
Are trolls and fanboys an issue in ANY community? Yes. But the proper solution is to empower the community itself to determine who is a troll or a fanboy or whatever term you wish to use and who is not. It is not the right or responsibility of some overriding organization to make that determination.
Some sort of "admin" is fine on a forum or private community social networking system. But as a general rule in free society, speech must remain free... as must the right to ignore.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
It's older than that: this is exactly how so many Obama supporters went from being pro-transparency, anti-wars, anti-Guantanamo, anti-torture, etc. to anti-transparency, pro-wars, pro-waterboarding. They have to support their "side" at all costs, even when it means reversing their opinions.
Bull! I don't know anyone on the left supporting those things, but we would like to know why the right is pushing these things as a scandal now, when they were cheering them just a few short years ago.
Most support for the Dems is lukewarm, it ends at defeating the Republicans. The Democrats suck, but the Republican agenda, socially, environmentally, culturally and economically, is a disaster we cannot afford.
And I thought, StackExchange is infuriating and demotivating...
You are *not* entitled to your opinion -- you are entitled to your *informed* opinion.
Being a "tin plated overbearing dictator with delusions of godhood" is not cool and shouldn't be tolerated generally.
And that, precisely, is the trouble with tribbles.
I don't think haters are any different than fan boys. I'm not talking about people who boycott an organization because they don't like the organization's practices. I'm talking about those who hate something because it sucks or it is popular to hate. The beauty of open source software is that if you hate it, you didn't pay for it, and are free to change it or fork it. In this case, I think the KDE developer in question would be best off ignoring fan boys, haters, and trolls. Don't feed the trolls are very wise words. I think fan boys and haters joining OSS project's discussions qualify as trolls in this case, because it seems the OP is saying they are just stirring the pot and not adding anything useful to the discussion. It could also be the people the OP wants to "censor" have some valid critical opinions the OP doesn't want to hear.
If somebody else has something that important to say, they can put it on their site, they don't need to destroy yours. Even if your site tries to gather different points of view.
Also, the press was never "press-like". It was always a matter of "if you have something to say, write your own journal".
Rethinking email
Two words: common carrier.
If the web host (not ISP; ISPs don't provide blogs) censors people's private blogs, then it becomes responsible and liable for the contents of everyone's blogs. So they don't. Same goes for ISPs censoring what people look at and do with their internet connections.
However, on my private blog, I have every right to exercise editorial control over what's posted there.
What you are missing is this: When you censor your blog, you are not a _platform for free speech_. It is not your responsibility to be one, but as a society, for free speech to have any meaning, there must be platforms for free speech.
I'm not missing anything. I don't know about you, but if I had a blog, my aim is not to provide a platform for free speech. I don't know why this should be anyone's aim. A blog is a platform for you to exercise your free speech, not to provide a forum for anyone and everyone to exercise their rights.
There's nothing preventing other people from getting their own blog from a web host. Web hosting plans are dirt cheap these days; eating out at McDonald's once a month costs more.
The press has traditionally been such a platform.
No it hasn't. The press has always exercised editorial control. Newspapers have never been open forums for everyone to write whatever they wanted. They were (and still are, though they're in their death throes) platforms for the newspapers' owners to write their own opinions (mainly in the op-ed page), and to let some select people write their opinions and have them be aired (in the "letters to the editor" page). They don't publish every single letter to the editor that shows up in their postbox. They only have so much space anyway, but they also only post letters they agree with, along with perhaps some select ones they don't agree with. They certainly don't post letters that we'd consider "trolls" or highly inflammatory, including foul language, or just plain stupid (unless they strategically include these to make some groups of people look bad). There's no way for us to know which letters didn't get published.
Today ISPs and network operators must be platforms for free speech.
They are, if you include web hosts in that group. ISPs and network operators do not prevent people from writing blogs, and webhosts are dirt cheap. There's not much (beyond $3/month, plus the cost of registering your domain) keeping you from starting your own blog.
Most censorship is done by private companies, not by the government.
Citation needed. I don't know about other countries, but here in the US I really don't see any censorship at all going on on the internet (on public streets is another matter, with "free speech zones", brutal arrests of peaceful protesters, etc.).
This is in theory manageable with web of trust. It basically works so that everyone can up or down-vote, and everyone can decide who's votes to trust on what is crap.
I don't let people come into my house and say whatever they want either, my web server is an extension of my house, albeit one I allow more open access to, it's still my private property however, and I reserve all my rights. Anyone using my server is a guest who's there because I haven't revoked access, which I can do for any or no reason.
nobody's perfect
In this day and age anyone not pathologically idiot can set up a blog and publish his opinion to the world. Moderating a forum or a mailing list does not prevent the publication of a given opinion.
Just look at the Streisand effect and see how even the US government did not manage to shut down wikileaks. Censorship is almost impossible nowadays for opinions that some people want to hear.
Moderating a forum is what we call an editorializing process. When I come to, for instance, KWin support forums, I expect to see discussions about KWin bugs and workarounds, not opinion for or against Obama. This is not to see that I refuse that people who want to talk about Obama can do it, but not in this place. There are numerous other venues on the web to do so.
The Wise adapts himself to the world. The Fool adapts the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the Fool.
If it doesn't add value to the conversation, it's probably spam, or at least doesn't belong in a permanent archive. One problem is the subjective nature of such a decision. Another is how much time it takes to decide when one must process large numbers of comments. I don't see this as a free speech issue. They can "speak"...elsewhere.
IMO there are speech that deserve censorship.
In 1934, fascists groups almost succeeded a coup in France, their own divisions being the reason why they did not take power. France was leaning the same way as Spain, Italy and Germany, but decision was taken to forbid fascists groups in 1936. In the end, France had its own fascist regime in 1940, but a military defeat had been required to get there.
Of course drawing the line between limiting the ability fascists ideas to spread, and abusive censorship is not easy and should be watched carefully by the people. But I do not think it should be bluntly discarded.. WWII taught us that some speech can really hurt beyond words
I don't know anyone on the left supporting those things,
Obviously, you haven't been reading Democrat forums, or indeed Slashdot discussions that veered off into Obama arguments. There's tons of Obama apologists out there, people who obviously voted for him and support him. No, not everyone on the left is like this; there do seem to be a fair number of people, leftists and Democrats (the two are distinct but overlapping sets), who are disillusioned and/or angry with him, but a large portion of his supporters (hard to say whether it's a majority or not) changed their tune, from being critical of Bush's policies to supporting Bush's policies now that Obama has adopted them wholesale.
but we would like to know why the right is pushing these things as a scandal now, when they were cheering them just a few short years ago.
That's easy: because Obama supports these things, and they're anti-Obama, so just like the Democrat voters have changed their opinions and are now pro-war, anti-environment (Obama supports KeystoneXL), pro-big-banks, the Republican voters have had to change their opinions and adopt opposite opinions on many issues.
The Democrats suck, but the Republican agenda, socially, environmentally, culturally and economically, is a disaster we cannot afford.
The Democrat agenda is the same as the Republican agenda, it only differs in extremely minor and insignificant ways.
Criticism is one thing. Premeditated bashing by zealots who have no interest in honestly critiquing, but seek simply to bash your work to pieces because it is not part of their holy canon or is perceived as commiting some sort of cybernetic lese majeste is completely another. I saw no reference to the former in the article, and plenty to the latter.
He's under no obligation to give the latter a podium simply because he's written software.
Acquiring an open, informed opinion can require no small amount of work. If he sets that work as his bar for critique and commentary, I have no problem with it.
"If you say something dumb on another person's server, it is their property and they can expunge it."
And that is how governments feel about their subjects, saying things they do not like on their land.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
Because the world does not bend over backwards to accommodate people.
And expecting everyone else to make sure you are comfortable is completely wrong headed.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
In my experience it was the developers of FOSS software who yell at you and tell you that they are not going to fix the documentation because they do not have to.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
I think it's more the case that people got tired of posting goatse links
We really didn't get tired of it, but Netcraft confirmed that it was finally dead.
Yes, I said that "some philosophies are common among quite different people" because I am not claiming Rand and Torvalds are similar in their actual view of the world. But they both can be described by the part I first quoted. Many people could be.
Actually, my biggest problems with Ayn Rand were:
1) Her novel The Fountainhead was as subtle as a ton of bricks falling on your head; and
2) She was a hypocrite who didn't actually live according to the philosophy of Objectivism. She used it to rationalize being a horrible person, rather than follow it like Howard Roark did in the novel.
I don't have a problem with Objectivism itself. It's just another philosophy.
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
And why should being a free software develooper be such a difficult job when you don't need to grow a thick skin to be a proprietary software developer?
Unless you're writing that proprietary software for yourself in isolation, it helps a lot to have a thick skin. If you release it to the public, it will receive harsh criticism. If you work with peers, sooner or later somebody is going to criticize something you've worked on.
I will say that at least at work you're paid to put up with bullshit. On the other hand, developing free software can be good resume filler and experience, along with a sense of accomplishment if people like your stuff.
This comes as no surprise, since progressives have historically disdained freedom while giving lipservice to it.
-- Jimtown Kelly
To me, it's connects them to 9/11 truthers, that's why I can't stand it.
SJWs are the new boogeyman. -Me
They are neither Fanboys or Trolls but professional disrupters hired by or benefiting from a relationship with the major propritary software vendors. They regularly change position and identities so as to shut down legitimate discourse.
AccountKiller
I've never had a customer call me an idiot or insult my mother, and I've seen some very angry customers. The issue isn't about someone criticizing the product, it's about someone trolling or criticizing the developer.
Maybe the issue isn't really free versus no free, but the fact of using online forums or blogs which invites the internet trolls to come out. Free software developers tend to rely on the public internet sites more often.
My house, my rules. Same for my blog or my forum.
It is absolutely, perfectly ok to censor anything I run on my servers in any way I want. If you don't like it, run your own server, where you can say whatever you want.
Really, I thought this was so blatantly obvious that it doesn't require explanation or justification. I'm shocked that people even discuss the point.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
Whether you are talking about software or any hot button political topic the real truth is evaporating right in front of us. Stupidity is fostered by those who think you can say something intelligent using a maximum of 140 characters. The ability to signal Likes or Dislikes does not help in the slightest when trying to get to the truth. For every "for" site or forum there is a corresponding "against" site or forum that contradict one another on almost every important point. Damn near every forum you read ends up becoming an echo chamber for one side or another. About the only decent forums I read are technical in nature where the topics and questions that don't revolve around anyone's opinion to determine what is right or wrong. Of course the exception is the fan boys and sycophants pontificating on how wonderful their choice of OS and Browser is to the exclusion of all others.
No shit, just go to a site like HuffPo and see how many of them will, cheer and make excuses no matter how jackbooted Obama gets because "he is OUR guy". Its fucking ballclub mentality and frankly is what is killing this country.
As for his bit about "censoring trolls"? I have found faaaar too often the word troll means "I do not agree with you". Its the same as shill which means "You like something I don't like". in both cases its total bullshit, and it works to promote groupthink which is great if all you want is a room full of yes men, again go to something like Fox or HuffPo to see a group that trips all over each other to agree.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
It's only censorship when the government prevents you from exercising your free speech rights.
From which definition of 'censorship' it follows, that if a government were to allow only a single ISP to be registered, that ISP (not being a government entity), can prevent you from exercising your free speech rights, that would not be not censorship. Sure the company is run by the prime minister's brother ... but it's a private company.
Of course this a purely an hypothetical to illustrate the insufficiency of so uncomplicated an understanding of censorship. We have to good fortune to live at a time when the means of communication could never be concentrated into the hands of a few large corporations.
Better to be despised for too anxious apprehensions, than ruined by too confident a security. --Edmund Burke
If you really believed any of the bullshit you just spewed, you'd campaign actively against anti-spam filters. After all, nothing should ever be censored, right?
The problem in that case is that it's not the government's land. The problem there is the government thinking it is their land, rather than them being employed by the people to enforce their (those peoples') rights to that land.
Someone exercising their rights over their own property is perfectly fine. Someone else attempting to claim rights over someone else's property is a problem. Government censorship is a problem in principle (consequential problems aside) because it claims a right for the government to control what other people can do with their own property.
-Forrest Cameranesi, Geek of all Trades
"I am Sam. Sam I am. I do not like trolls, flames, or spam."
Freedom of speech does not mean I must provide you with a microphone. Moderating forums and mailing lists is not censorship.
Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
Noooo. because as the other poster pointed out that just makes him a hypocrite because censorship is just fine as long as HE is the one doing the censoring. ironically this is the EXACT same thought process that happens with those that censor in government, as they are 100% sure that they know what is right and what is wrong and you are just too blind to see that.
The fact that he uses "trolls" as an excuse which we have seen here that word really means "I don't agree with you so you must be bad" just shows how big of a hypocrite we are talking about as I have seen people labeled a troll for every fucking position on the planet? Oh you are a libertarian? liberal? republican? bullshit you are just a fucking troll because you don't kiss my ass and agree with everything i say like a drooling sycophant!
You know what you get when you get rid of everyone that disagrees with you? shit like HuffPo and Drudge where no matter how wrong or shitty a politician acts they will line up to kiss the ring and justify any abuses as long as the right letter follows the name and you are nothing but a fucking troll if you don't support OUR side in this! you get giant groupthink circlejerks that devolve to the point it becomes fucking parody, it becomes "Oh gee whiz, isn't (insert X) swell? Why it sure is, you'd have to be a fucking retard not to support (insert X) and see its the right thing to do!"
So I'm sorry but you can't scream about censorship while you are censoring those that disagree with you without being a giant fricking hypocrite and that is what we have here. How much you wanna bet you go to his comments section and its yes men central, with groupthink thicker than the stench of a porta potty in august?
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Government is a special case because government gets to use violence against you. KDE can't prevent your from posting on any non-KDE blog, they can't arrest you, they can't throw you in jail, then can't shoot you if you resist, they can't torture you, etc. But government can. Even those warm fuzzy governments that wring their hands and feel your pain.
It's not censorship if KDE doesn't provide you with a microphone. Sheesh. Enough with the whiny gimme attitude.
Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
To a certain degree, the downside is that this can lead to a big old circlejerk (also-known-as groupthink - also-known-as, colloquially from the pleasant times of 1930's-40's Germany; zeitgeist).
But by-and-large, I have been on slashdot from before the moderation system. I remember the debates. I didn't agree with the reasons for moderation. But after CmdrTaco made those changes, things did get better, and I really do agree that peer moderation, though not perfect, is the best way to deal with fanbois and trolls. (and ESPECIALLY astroturfing - which has been a HUGE problem, here on slashdot, historically).
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
Then there's the part in the book where the architect blows the building up because they didn't follow his plans exactly. Apparently to Ayn Rand artistic sensibilities trumped property rights.
Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
It's a form of filtering, not censorship. Comments are filtered so if you choose you can only view the highly scored comments but that is your choice. Personally I read at -1 so I see all the comments, you can do the same.
Everything is like that, you only have so much time so you read what is interesting to you and sometimes have to filter content some way. My mail program is set to put messages into different folders, often based on headers and some folders such as the spam one I hardly read, but it is there if I choose. Same with Slashdot, it is your choice whether to read all comments or let the crowd filter the comments so you can save some time.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
I don't let people come into my house and say whatever they want either,
Be better to phrase it as my home as the problem is if you are a renter and the house owner, aka landlord, tries to censor what you say in his house.
Same with your ISP controlling what they allow your web server to say, especially if there is only very limited choices in ISPs (web hosts). There has to be a balance beyond saying it is only censorship if the government is doing the censoring without infringing too heavily on private rights.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
It's only censorship when the government prevents you from exercising your free speech rights.
Entities and people unrelated to the government can engage in censorship, but not all censorship is necessarily bad.
That's an interesting comment. I would think that the only reason that you're still on Slashdot with that account is that the fine people that run it have a fairly strong commitment to free speech as opposed to censorship, and are willing to endure various types of nonsense.
A pity you didn't chose to try speaking with your own voice from the start, but instead decided to ape and harass me. You could have gone with a much better name, such as "deep fjord," or "frozen fjord," or maybe "cold logic," or even "cold fiddler." (Nudge nudge.) Now you're stuck with "coid fjord." A cheap, deceptive, knock off name that will always be confused for me, especially if I stop warning people about you. (And a warning was entirely justified given your initial behavior.) I'm glad to see you making a positive contribution even if I disagree with a fair amount of what you write. Well, at least you'll probably always be more popular with the crowd. And it's popularity that always shows what's right, isn't it?
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
"my posts are always polite, no swearing, no threats, no personal attacks" "most people are brainwashed cretins who can't think for themselves" "for the cretins who can't think, words on a computer screen are too much for them to bear, so they have to BAN people for making them think."
One of these things is not like the others, one of these things just doesn't belong...
"To any truly impartial person, it would be obvious that I am right."
To a certain degree, the downside is that this can lead to a big old circlejerk (also-known-as groupthink - also-known-as, colloquially from the pleasant times of 1930's-40's Germany; zeitgeist).
Zeitgeist has been a common word ever since the 18th century, it's present-day definition is given by Klotz (who writes about the genius saeculi in 1760) and heavily criticized by Herder (who probably coined the German translation) just nine years later.
Goethe writes of the "Geist der Zeiten" ("Spirit of the Ages") in his Faust I and Hegel made the Zeitgeist an integral part of his view of history.
NS propaganda occasionally used the term but seeing how they intended to be their "thousand year reign" to be the end of history the idea of a relatively ephemeral Zeitgeist wasn't particularly appealing to them.
Get me some citations that link the popularity of the term Zeitgeist (which as I have shown has been around in a well-defined manner that reflects its current usage ever since the mid/late 18th century) to the 1930s-40s or kindly shut the fuck up.
I can't agree with a single thing he said in the article
Hmm, are one of those "You're either for me or against me" types? Things are not so black and white, you know, and you might benefit from trying to see things from the other side, even if you don't agree. Freedom and democracy are not absolutes - what is freedom to me may feel like a straitjacket to you.
As far as I can see, what he is saying is that democracy and freedom only work if more or less everybody are willing to play by the rules; that is why it can never work, when the West tries to impose democracy on nations that are not prepared for it. Hell, even in Europe it took a couple of generations before people really took to it, because it takes that long to educate the population in democracy.
I think there is some merit to what he says - we have to defend our values, like freedom and democracy against those that want to take them away. And yes, that also means restricting their freedom of speech.
What was able to change my opinion in such a radical way?
You got old.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Look, I get it. You...
You win today's internet :)
On another note:
Hell, the reason I never made the jump to using Linux on the desktop was my own experiences trying to set up a Mythbox in my living room;
It's sad that that was your first experience. Though as a quite long time Linux user with an analog capture card I also failed utterly to set up MythTV back in the day. I gave up before consulting forums however.
From what I gather, such people tend to occupy the lower-to-mid level forums. Obvioulsy the newbie forums expect newbies and tend to boot people who are plain rude to newbies. The upper level tech ones (e.g. development mailing lists) tend to be occupied with people who can ve very brusque, but respond well to carefully asked questions (like that document written by ESR: how to ask questions the right way).
It's the mid level ones tend to be the worst: you've got the wannabe's on there who aren't as good as the top guys but want to prove themselves by making less experienced people look bad.
I would recommend Arch if you ever feel like giving Linux a "go". It's a bit more work than a system like ubuntu, but for delving into the guts it's more transparent and the forums have been IME helpful rather than rude.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
At first, I thought, is this guy talking crazy to himself?!? Slashdot needs a better font for usernames (maybe something with serifs), this whole problem is kinda circa 1995 AOL Instant Messenger.
Democrats and Republicans are like Coke and Pepsi... plenty of choice, unless you don't want to drink a fucking cola.
And you calling them "truthers" is any better? Yeah, right.
There's no hypocrisy if your distinction is one of scale. I regard censorship as only being bad when it has an impact on an individual's ability to speak freely. There is no problem with a single newspaper refusing to carry something, as long as there are other newspapers that are willing to run it or some other (relatively easy) mechanism for publication. There is a problem if a government or an industry body says 'no one may run this story'. There's a difference between saying 'you may not post this opinion on my blog' and saying 'you may not post this opinion on any blog'. The latter is dangerous censorship, the former is exercising free speech - the thing that rules about censorship are supposed to protect. It only becomes a problem when everyone with the infrastructure to host blogs says 'you may not post this on a blog that I run', at which point there should be government intervention.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
No, it is only hypocritical if you think you can have a blog (or whatever) with moderated comments, while wanting to prevent someone else from having such a blog. And this actually applies to government censorship too. If government expects to publish information in web or in a dead tree format, then government can't prevent others from doing the same without exercising censorship.
In the wake of the NSA scandals, you have all sorts of people who want to support their side (aka the good guys) and make sure the other side (aka the bad guys) don't score political points on them.
It's older than that: this is exactly how so many Obama supporters went from being pro-transparency, anti-wars, anti-Guantanamo, anti-torture, etc. to anti-transparency, pro-wars, pro-waterboarding. They have to support their "side" at all costs, even when it means reversing their opinions.
Al Franken. WTF?
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
The first time I got mod points was a bit like graduation - yippee! and all that. Then I read the docs because I realized that it was more than about what I thought or felt; it was about considering what I read and realizing that for me it was required that I try to be responsible to the ideas and their expression rather than my druthers. It was, and remains, a sobering thing for me to use them. Mod points are a way that I can try to be useful however small that is, in partial payback for an interesting place to visit.
You want world-class Fanbois and Trolls? Develop for Apple instead.
You know one of the hallmarks of a troll it to twist the context so as to make it *their* favorite bugaboo. In this case, a against the US.
Agreed.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
Why don't you help out. Writing documentation is even more thankless than bug fixing.
If information wants to be free, why does my internet connection cost so much?
How could I, or anyone else for that matter, write documentation for features that are completely undocumented and have an ambiguous name?
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
How dare you try to limit my ability to use my free speech. Why not change change your message to say: N*ggers and Jews are the cancer Because the label you are attempting to put to a "people" is intolerance and discriminatory. And we're not tolerant of those who are intolerant.
Entities and people unrelated to the government can engage in censorship
How can something outside of the government engage in censorship? Since censorship means "you cannot say this". How can some other organization prevent you from saying anything you like? Sure, they don't have to let you post it on your blog, but that's very different from telling you under threat that you cannot say it anywhere.
This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
No it definitely is their land. In fact that is even how land property works in western nations. You basically ~lease~ it from the government. That is how they have so many legal rights over you and "your land"; And exactly why doing things yourself on your own land is restricted immensely. That is why certain land is considered part of the US for example, because they own it.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
I agree with your other points, but this: If some troll (or anyone else I disagree with) This just makes me think you're as ignorant as the OP. Everyone should be able to say whatever they want. If people cannot "tune them out", "ignore them", or "have an intellectual conversation" to help this other person see the error of their ways, that is their own fault. And if the "argument" lacks any validity and is nonsense, good. At least it will be entertaining to read. Ultimately though, I would feel sad for them, that they cannot construct a decent conversation to express why it is the way they feel.
And as many on /. know, when the noise swamps the signal, communication ceases. Thus a good reason to censor the noise.
Since censorship means "you cannot say this"
If you suppress information on even a single website, that is censorship since you're censoring information.
It does not matter if you're technically able to speak elsewhere; were we to go by that definition, censorship would not exist at all. It would be next to impossible for even the government to ensure that an individual cannot get his/her message out at all, so using that sort of criteria to determine if something is censorship seems rather foolish.
Nothing about censorship says it has to be done under a threat, or that it has to be 100% effective.
Check UIDs. I'm COLD FJORD(826450). User COID FJORD(2949869) has impersonated me. Don't confuse us if he trolls you.
How could I, or anyone else for that matter, write documentation for features that are completely undocumented and have an ambiguous name?
So what you're saying is that you'll write documentation when you have some good documentation to write it from?
Shame nobody ever wrote documentation on how to make a wheel or fire. Then we wouldn't still be stuck in these caves eating nothing but fruit that happens to fall off of trees and roll into the cave...
"I modded it Overrated in the hope the writer will improve his rhetoric down the line."
Good luck with that, Overrated is the most over-abused moderation on Slashdot because it never used to trigger meta-moderation (and still may not, I stopped paying attention a long time ago)
I was not aware of this. Now I understand why I get that one so often.
meaning there was no check on it's abuse and 99% of the time it means "I want to silence this person because I disagree".
This I assumed to be the case anyway.
There's literally zero chance anyone will be able to separate your honest Overrated downmod from a political troll that just wants to censor and they'll just write it off as such.
If you don't like a post and it's not explicitly troll or flamebait then just leave it alone and focus on up-modding the genuinely good and factual stuff. Don't play the Overrated game, it's too arbitrary and too full of abuse for anyone to take any legitimate meaning from it.
I will keep this in mind the next time I get mod points.
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
That said, I don't see how allowing something in public and allowing something in a privately owned place are inextricably linked politically. There is an unnecessary and false assumption here that if one supports the public civil right to free speech, they must allow people to come into their home and say anything they please.
Freedom of speech has never, ever been free of consequences. I support the legal protection of free speech because I don't believe the government has or should have a right to dictate which ideas are expressed.
The point of my support is served properly even when we have laws against slander, libel, perjury, and yelling "fire" in a crowded theatre (where there is no fire; it would be reasonably appropriate where a fire existed). Free speech is very different from spreading falsehood with malicious intent.
In SOVIET RUSSIA... erm...NSA AMERICA, the Internet logs onto YOU!
What? The only way to write documentary for some esoteric feature is for the developer of said feature to document what he coded.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
this is exactly how so many Obama supporters went from being pro-transparency, anti-wars, anti-Guantanamo, anti-torture, etc. to anti-transparency, pro-wars, pro-waterboarding. They have to support their "side" at all costs, even when it means reversing their opinions.
Yeah, not all of us. Frankly, screw that guy. What a disappointment.
/disenfranchised American
I went to eat some animal crackers and the box said, "Do not eat if seal is broken." I opened the box and sure enough..
The original dev may well not be working on the project anymore. Putting you in a no worse position to write it than anyone else.
If information wants to be free, why does my internet connection cost so much?
OK, so maybe the feature just is never documented, and the only one who uses it is the original developer and his friends. I might not be any better than anyone else, but that does not make it possible.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
I think that in many cases 'Fanbois' putting down the competition is fueled by fear. I know in some cases I do it myself!
Here's the thing... we don't all like the same stuff but some things are more popular than others. Most of us are lacking in at least one (if not all three) of time, ability and motivation to take over our favorite projects ourselves. If we perceive that the competition is getting all the users... well.. maybe the developers will start giving up. Maybe the project we like will go away. So... we oppose the competition in any way we can.
For example... I don't like Gnome very much. Most of the reasons are things I could change by customizing it but Gnome isn't even all that easy to customize. You have to (the last I checked, it's been a while) install an extra program that then allows you to edit things in a big jumbled up thing that looks like the Windows registry. (I don't like registries). Plus, for any distro I have tried, Gnome's defaults are almost exactly opposite of what I prefer.
Now... I know that many people do like it that way. They like the default options. They like the simplicity of not having many options staring them in the face. They aren't stopping me from using KDE. But... since Ubuntu chose Gnome it seems like 'everybody' is using it. What if the KDE developers stopped bothering? Then I would eventually HAVE to use Gnome. So.. I enjoy putting Gnome down. Because I REALLY don't want a future where I am stuck with it.
I don't like Mir or Wayland. I know they will lead to better performance for games and such. I know that that is a good thing. I don't have any time for games. I fear it will not support remote display the way I want it to. No doubt somebody will implement a remote compositor for it. But I fear it will be a VNC/Remote Desktop type solution. I do use those myself but I also use a remote X server as a terminal. I don't want to just be able to connect from some full PC environment using an application I have to start. I want my terminal to work as it does now, I hit the power button, it loads a minimial OS (fast plus low maintenance) and automatically brings up a login screen to my main computer. It never feels like I am connecting remotely, it's like I am sitting in my office.
If Wayland (or Mir) get all the developers then maybe new applicaitons will not support X. I am a programmer but I am nowhere near knowing how to write my own compositor! If this happens then my way of doing things is permanently screwed! So... I will bad mouth Wayland any chance that I get! Because I fear losing what I have. I would much rather see Wayland and Mir fail to get users. Somebody else will solve the gaming issue eventually anyway, hopefully without removing the functionality I use now.
Maybe this is a generational gap but I don't get it, why is removing comments from one's own site considered censorship?
Preventing someone from propogating their ideas at all... that is censorship. Preventing them from doing it on your own website/blog/etc... if anything that is free speech!
You have your site to propogate YOUR ideas. Saying you have to accept other's ideas there... that just seems like it tramples your own freedom of expression. Anybody can get their own place to post their propoganda! I think putting somebody down for deleting a comment is like putting a homeowner down for not letting people paint their contrary opinions on the outside of their house.
That being said I will also take what I read with a grain of salt. For example, I wouldn't form an opinion of KDE vs Gnome's popularity by reading the comments on their respective websites! I would look for a neutral third party site for that. It's just common sense!
Liberals complained about this during the Bush administration, and continued complaining about it during the Obama administration. There's a very good reason the NSA whistleblower went to a prominent liberal blogger instead of FOX News with his story: because that blogger spent years harping on this very issue while FOX News was jumping up and down about ridiculous made-up stories about Obama's birth certificate.
Rightists were the ones who flip-flopped on these issues. The government spying on us was the greatest thing in the world when Bush was in office, and now that a Democrat is in office, suddenly they decided it's something terrible. They think we won't notice that they completely reversed their positions on this issue if they accuse us of being the ones to change positions. Either they really are so stupid that they don't remember calling us traitors for complaining about this during the Bush administration, or they think we're stupid enough to fall for their dishonest debating tactic. I'm not entirely certain which is worse.
i wouldn't want anybody being in charge of licensing free speech. NY Finance Elite, homeless people without a dime to their name, middle class mid-america suburbanites. No matter how much any particular group or person may align with my beliefs, I do not want them or anyone else telling me or anyone else what free speech is valid.
Censoring is not just wrong morally because it hampers our freedom. Censoring also lends undeserved credibility to crackpot viewpoints, because people automatically assume "Ah ha! There must be something to what that guy is saying if the powers that be are trying to suppress his point of view!"
This moron is not succeeding in suppressing viewpoints that offend him, he's making the problem worse. If someone is offering a bad idea, then let him or her argue it out in public where everyone can see/hear. If it's a bad idea, it'll become apparent eventually.
does everyone realize we wouldn't even be discussing all this, had a Traitor not told us, about it
that if a government were to allow only a single ISP to be registered, that ISP (not being a government entity), can prevent you from exercising your free speech rights, that would not be not censorship.
Wrong. That's still censorship, just in an indirect and underhanded way.
Moreover, if an ISP (which is the company that provides you internet access to your location; ISPs are not the same as web hosts) exercises any control over what you say or do on the internet, then they lose their common carrier status, and become totally responsible for everything you do with that connection. If you download any child porn, the ISP is responsible for that as well, and needs to go to prison for CP trafficking. Communications companies can only free themselves of liability by turning a blind eye to everything their customers do, except when they receive a warrant from the government to look at someone's communications.
That's only a slight difference: if I understand correctly, in Europe, if someone writes something slanderous on your blog, you can be liable for it if you leave it there, whereas in America it's not quite so clear-cut. That's totally different from what we're discussing, which is whether blog owners should be allowed to delete comments they don't like. Well according to you, in Europe, not only can blog owners delete comments they don't like, they're required to delete comments that are slanderous.
My assertion is that on a private blog, you (the owner) have every right to delete comments you don't like (aka moderation). Where in the world would that not be correct? It's true in America, and obviously it's true in Europe by your own admission.
I say this as someone working on such projects. Really volunteer, we need you. Your perspective may change significantly when you see what it is really like working on these things. And worse, working with people who post issues. NOTE: this is not necessarily your user base, just the ones who are prepared to say something, or worse, rant.
Also if you are prepared to help in some way*, and are otherwise polite. You will get a much better response. Perhaps not all you need, and perhaps not when you need it. But don't be fooled. Even when you have commercially supported software, you probably won't get that either. At least in my experience.
*this can be as small as "if someone helps me understand this properly, i will write some documentation". Ok so perhaps not that small. Don't forget many of us are not paid to do this. Its our weekends.
If information wants to be free, why does my internet connection cost so much?
Interesting how you get a "flamebait" moderation for this. It must have been an American who did that.
One of the forums I keep visiting has unfortunately rather high concentration of trolls. They keep repeating claims that have been disproved several times, and keep demanding 'answers' regarding those claims. The entertainment value is rather low as it prevents the actual discussion (and arguments) with the people that actually are capable of arguing their side.
It is what it is.
Know that some are very thankful for the stability and security you provide, not to mention the price.
I think it would be very cool to volunteer at some point for a project. I guess one hard part would be finding a project that you both like, but is also not complete. Who wants to volunteer for a project that all they do is add bloat and change perfectly fine features into experimental strange designs.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
"... 95% of the mail was YOU ROCK, DUDE!!"
Agreed. In my experience other users will usually call out an obvious troll or offensive comment. It speaks higher of you to let your readers defend your position than jumping in to delete posts you consider offensive. Over time, your blog will lose credibility if your readers know your comments are censored. However, this is his personal blog and he certainly does not have to tolerate abuse. The haters are free to voice their opinions in their own blogs, where they will too be flamed.
There is nothing so powerful as an idea whose time has come.
Sorry but I'm throwing a flag, bullshit on the field. you are using the classic "It is ONLY bad if (X) does it" which time and time again has been shown to be bullshit, either you are for something or you are not PERIOD.
After all by your logic as long as a single dial up ISP is willing to run a certain kind of speech it would be 100% okay if all the other ISPs blocked it because "There is no problem with a single newspaper refusing to carry something, as long as there are other newspapers that are willing to run it " so as long as ONE is willing to run it then that is okay.
The fact that you managed to get marked insightful just shows how few really think here because you know what that attitude gets you? Free speech zones. after all you can still speak freely so what is the problem? The problem is you make damned sure they can ONLY speak far enough away they will be marginalized and ignored, that is what. You are also ignoring the second half of my post, which is what you get when you start doing this and that is HuffPo and Drudge circlejerks where all that is left is people that agree with you no matter what.
You go to a site that doesn't reinforce this groupthink mentality? Its like night and day. here if I point out that a certain driver model doesn't work and isn't used by anybody else I will instantly get swarmed by the groupthink who will bury me STRICTLY because of Dogma, when you ask them to name even one actual thought out reason why they support X model over Y model? they can't do it, its "X says it is bad so it must be bad". whereas i have gone to other sites with a similar article and posted the same position, what did I get? A nearly 2 page discussion on the various merits and weaknesses of different model designs!
As we have seen time after time troll ends up being "I don't like your position so it MUST be bad" which is a cancer that just kills discussion, only groupthink is allowed. So even if you support his right to censor (again hypocrite that it is, because it is "X is bad if THEY do it but not if WE do it") that doesn't change the fact it has the intended consequence of "weeding out" all that don't think like the mod until the whole place becomes nothing but fawning sycophants. Again all you have to do is look right here, certain positions are simply not allowed because they go against the groupthink and no matter how well reasoned or researched your position is it WILL be crushed by the yes men.
So I would say a hypocrite is a hypocrite, it would be like saying he is for government aid to the poor while hiding all his money in the caymans, he talks the talk but he sure as fuck don't walk the walk and he rightly deserves to be called out for that.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Slashdots moderator system is a form of censorship.
It's not censorship if anyone can still read the posts that have been modded down.
Moderating his own comments is just basic engineering fail.
THIS. Does he weed out his own spam, too?
But also, deleting comments you don't like shows a critical failure of imagination. There are better ways to handle trolls, and better things to do with one's time.
Put a "flag for moderation" button on guest posts. Every time a trusted user clicks it, the post's font size becomes smaller.
Well of course lots of people. Also most projects are so far from complete..........
If information wants to be free, why does my internet connection cost so much?
It was written by an American too, we aren't all blind.
I'm American too, just completely disillusioned about my countrymen. We're not all blind, just most of us.
Nothing about censorship says it has to be done under a threat
...and so it is not necessarily anything to be concerned about. Free speech is infringed when a person is either prevented from communicating or is coerced into not communicating by the threat of retaliation for doing so. In the case in question, no-one is having his free speech infringed, and the suggestion of an entirely hypothetical and utterly implausible circumstance (one in which Martin's Blog's comments section is the only channel of communication for these trolls) does nothing to alter the facts of the case.
that is censorship since you're censoring information
That's a tautology.
There's a difference between a blog owner saying 'you can't post that on my blog. I will delete it' and the government saying 'You can't post that anywhere including your own blog or else run the risk of jail time/fines/execution'. This is why the latter is censorship and the former is simply owner's discretion. Is the radio station declining to play a particular song censorship?
The definition of 'censorship' is government action. At least, that's the most common definition. I suppose you could argue that the more colloquial usage of 'someone told me I can't do whatever I please' is also a valid definition.
This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
Wrong. That's still censorship, just in an indirect and underhanded way.
Why? Is it because censorship is "something governments do" (and would it then still be censorship if the CEO were not the President's brother?), or is it because censorship is essentially restricting the flow of information. Because if it is the latter we should be just as worried about about censorship arising as an expression of corporate power as of state power. In the C18th when the government was seen as the solitary locus of power this was not a concern, but our notions of censorship need to adapt to contemporary reality (eg. Walmart's pro-active censorship). And of course censorship is even more about what we see (read) rather than what we say.
I'm not saying that a blog owner need accept all comments, duh. Nor am I even saying that all censorship is bad ... very few people, even those who claim to be 100% anti-censorship, would accept child porn (which is, outside the US, almost everywhere illegal per se) openly for sale at their local supermarket. Rather I think that an outdated understanding of censorship, which sees it almost by definition as an activity restricted to government, will increasingly fail to be able to deal with the real threats to the free flow of information which are emerging from other loci or power.
Moreover, if an ISP (which is the company that provides you internet access to your location; ISPs are not the same as web hosts) exercises any control over what you say or do on the internet, then they lose their common carrier status ...
Not entirely relevant as this may be the case at current US law and my hypothetical Banana Republic was not the US (nor am I in the US). But sure, I'll concede choosing an ISP was perhaps not the best example. However being in Australia where the government regularly tries various schemes to get ISPs to filter our access, you'll forgive me for that (and yes this would obviously be government censorship). I would add that living in Australia I'm every bit as concerned to one single corporation which already claims 70% of the newspaper readership is actively campaigning to undermine media diversification laws so that it can repeat this in the electronic media as well.
Better to be despised for too anxious apprehensions, than ruined by too confident a security. --Edmund Burke
the source code can only tell what the code does. It cannot tell you what it is intended to do. It cannot tell you which apparent features are really bugs.
There's a huge difference between suppressing comments because they point out real flaws in software, and suppressing them because they say the software sucks big ones.
The second kind of comment is not useful.
Unless, of course the purpose of the software is to blow instead of suck -- then it's a bug,
If he's your fan, politely set him straight. If he's your competitor's fan, ignore him like you would a troll. If he's a fan that's complaining that you ruined his favorite feature you should reevaluate what you did.
Free Martian Whores!
Some people act out of pure malice. There IS such thing as people who not only don't contribute, they have a SUBSTANTIAL net negative effect on a project, and they are doing it on purpose. This is destructive behavior and it should be eliminated.
The only way to deal with a troll is to ignore the troll. If he pisses you off, he's won.
Well good for you. What if it was 95% negative?
Then what I was doing probably sucked and I should listen to them. If it was 95% positive, I changed the content/presentation/whatever and then I got 95% negative (e.g. KDE4) I'd know I fucked up badly and try to fix it. Being a prima dona is counterproductive. You can't please everybody but if you're pleasing nobody you're doing it wrong.
How would you like to work with a dead, maggot-infested cat on your desk, or in a room with flickering lights, or with loud rap/country/ska/harpsichord/whatever music playing
I'd quit and do the same thing somewhere else.
What if you sat on a barstool and your boss kicked it out from under you every time he walked by?
I'd have him arrested for assault.
Ask any sociologist "do negative people have a negative effect on a group's performance?" and you will hear a "yes" EVERY FUCKING TIME.
It's not just science, it's common sense. If there's a group of devs on your team and one is negative, kick him out of the group. If he's not part of the group then ignore him. Feeding trolls is counterproductive.
Free Martian Whores!
Actually, I'd argue that a far better person to document a routine is someone who didn't write it. The author is liable to be too blinded by what he thinks it is doing to see what it is actually doing. Far better to have documentation written by someone who was forced to preruse the code and figure out what is actually going on.
It's all about how many alternatives you have to exercise your free speech. When the government mandates something, you have no choice: there's only one government, and you can't pick and choose which government's laws you want to follow: the government has a monopoly on governing, by definition. If the government colludes with (rather than mandates) corporations to restrict free speech, that's no different. It's still coming from the government. If a monopoly corporation restricts free speech, that's really little different from the government doing it, because again you don't have any real choice since that corporation (say, your regional ISP, assuming your region only has one ISP) is acting like the government. Indeed, even if the government isn't colluding with or forcing the corporation to restrict free speech, they're neglecting their responsibility to regulate monopolies (and break them up when they don't serve a useful purpose and are abusive), and in effect, colluding with them (a "sin of omission", you could say). The same goes for oligopolies: having 3 choices that are all exactly the same isn't any different than having a single "choice", or no choice at all. And again, it's the government's responsibility to regulate and break up oligopolies, just like with monopolies. So it's entirely valid to say that all these are "censorship", and are also the fault of the government.
However, to call it "censorship" when a minimum-wage worker who pays $3/month for his blog hosting service deletes inflammatory comments is really stretching things. If you want to make inflammatory (or any kind of unpopular) comments, there's nothing preventing you from signing up for your own blog for $3/month. Anyone can afford $3/month. Even compared to the pitifully low minimum wage we have here in the US these days (about $7.50/hour I think), which hasn't changed significantly in ages, that's still easily affordable, and is certainly much cheaper than owning a car, paying for rent/food, and in fact it's a lot cheaper than any ISP service I've ever heard of (and having a blog isn't much use to you if you don't have a computer and internet access, though you could take the trouble to go to the library to do it if you're really poor). It's even affordable compared to standing on a street corner with a sign: Sharpie markers to draw your sign will probably cost as much as a month's worth of blog service.
That could even be a routine part of code review. The programmer gets the documentation, and gets to say, "That's not what I meant at all...."
Etc., etc.
One may grow a thick skin naturally due to the harshness of the environment, however it should never be a requirement to grow a thick skin to get on the internet, or join a video game's forums, or to become a free software developer.
Someone who faints at the sight of blood is unsuited for a job as a paramedic. I have a fear of heights, which makes me unsuited for the job of roofer or window washer. If you have a blog, web site, or join a forum you're going to get flamed. If you can't handle flames, you're unsuited for blogs, forums, or running a web site. It's part of the job description!
This isn't censorship anyway. It's his personal blog.
Tell him, he's the one who spoke of censorship as if flaming and trolling should be illegal.
Free Martian Whores!
Hmm, are one of those "You're either for me or against me" types?
No, that's just nonsense. I like KDE, think it's the best desktop environment I've tried and support his work. But the piece read like he wants trolling and fanboying outlawed. He's entitled to his opinion and entitled to express that opinion. There usually are shades of gray, even with censorship. If someone lies about you maliciously you should have recourse. But the only recourse you should have against someone expressing an opinion is to counter it with your own arguments.
we have to defend our values, like freedom and democracy against those that want to take them away. And yes, that also means restricting their freedom of speech.
You don't see the logical disconnect in that sentence? You're saying we have to give up freedoms to be free.
Free Martian Whores!
I'm American too, just completely disillusioned about my countrymen. We're not all blind, just most of us.
A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the majority discovers it can vote itself largess out of the public treasury. After that, the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits with the result the democracy collapses because of the loose fiscal policy ensuing, always to be followed by a dictatorship, then a monarchy.
Do you have any historical examples of this? I've never heard of a monarchy being instituted after a democracy (or dictatorship), though there's certainly plenty of examples of democracies collapsing and being replaced by dictatorships (usually military juntas). This has happened in Turkey many times.
The haters are free to voice their opinions in their own blogs, where they will too be flamed.
I don't disagree with that. My problem with TFA was it looked like he wanted speech like that outlawed. My site didn't have a messageboard but I got a lot of email, and posted much of it and almost all of the negative mail, which I lampooned on the site.
There are plenty of offline trolls, too. Note some of the comments after the story, that's just how things are.
Free Martian Whores!
I think it is fair to argue that a country like North Korea, with a totalitarian dictatorship, de facto hereditary successor-ship, and charismatic leader; is not so particularly different from an autocratic monarchy. See also Venezuela and Iran.
Iran just elected a new President. That doesn't look too much like a monarchy to me. Venezuela doesn't look like much of one either; it appears to be a democracy as well, though like ours the voting is probably heavily rigged. NK is really the only one that looks a lot like a monarchy, with its hereditary leadership. Other autocracies may share the autocratic feature with monarchies, but a monarchy is characterized by hereditary, autocratic leadership. Otherwise it's just a dictatorship or oligarchy.
Anyway, given that NK never had democracy at all, it doesn't support your assertion at all, instead it actually disproves it. Korea was originally a kingdom, and was then seized and occupied by Japan. When Japan lost WWII, it was split apart, much like Germany, with the Soviets controlling the North (which then came under the rule of Kim-Il Sung), and the south controlled by the Americans, which then declared itself a new democratic state. Things haven't really changed since then, governmentally. So NK went from kingdom to colony and back to kingdom. SK went from kingdom to colony to democracy, and hasn't left that.
If anything seems to be the real undoing of democracies, it's not "the majority voting itself largess out of the public treasury", it's massive corruption, where a tiny minority votes itself largess out of the public treasury. See the USA and Brazil for examples.
I think we are pretty much on the same page, corruption and cronyism are the real problems. From the public treasury votes are purchased with public perks, and power is purchased with private perks. It is really just a symptom of corruption either way.
My intent in mentioning North Korea was to point out a situation where a dictatorship developed into a monarchy, which most certainly was the case in NK. History is ripe with examples of fiscally unstable democracies developing into dictatorships (usually under the guise of communism). By the transitive property, we find a pathway from democracy to monarchy.
Iran. When was the last election for a new Supreme Leader? Yes, there is a Supreme Leader of Iran.
Venezuela was a weak example.
It's all about how many alternatives you have to exercise your free speech.
As well as how many alternatives you have to access the products of someone else's speech. Agreed.
If a monopoly corporation restricts free speech, that's really little different from the government doing it, because again you don't have any real choice ... The same goes for oligopolies
Yup, that's my concern.
Indeed, even if the government isn't colluding with or forcing the corporation to restrict free speech, they're neglecting their responsibility to regulate monopolies (and break them up when they don't serve a useful purpose and are abusive), and in effect, colluding with them (a "sin of omission", you could say). ... And again, it's the government's responsibility to regulate and break up oligopolies, just like with monopolies.
It may of course that the government is simply to afraid to tackle the information gate keepers at whose sufferance they "govern."
But sure, It is arguable that it is just for a government to restrict the businesses of companies who are tending towards monopoly/oligopoly especially in the cases of corporations. That is, since the corporate form (in contradistinction to partnerships, joint stock or family companies etc) exists as a creature of parliament, --ie. the legal personality and limited liability they enjoy has been bestowed on them by ThePeople as a social quid pro quo --it is just that their activities be subject to reasonable public control. How impinging on the proprietary rights (even for the avoidance of monopoly) of a non-incorporated entity might be justified is perhaps not so simple.
Whoever you want to hold responsibly I would simply reiterate your opening statement: It's all about how many alternatives you have. Or to put it another way, it is about the power to restrict the free choice of another, (whatever form such power takes), and whether this power is being exercised arbitrarily.
However, to call it "censorship" when a minimum-wage worker who pays $3/month for his blog hosting service deletes inflammatory comments is really stretching things.
Absolutely. Moreover if said blogger (and bloggers in general) were to have the honour to delete comments, not on the basis of disagreeing with their author's sentiments, but on the basis that they are inflammatory or simply stupid, we may have a situations where "censorship" actually aids information flow.
We seem to be approaching agreement?
Better to be despised for too anxious apprehensions, than ruined by too confident a security. --Edmund Burke
Absolutely. Moreover if said blogger (and bloggers in general) were to have the honour to delete comments, not on the basis of disagreeing with their author's sentiments, but on the basis that they are inflammatory or simply stupid, we may have a situations where "censorship" actually aids information flow.
Exactly, which is why in this case we use a different word with a totally different connotation: "moderation". Lots of people prefer moderated forums because the signal-to-noise ratio is much higher. As long as there's plenty of choice (or the freedom to start your own competing forum if you like), "censorship" (with its negative connotations) isn't the right word IMO. There's also another term: "editorial control". Just like newspapers pick and choose which letters to the editor they publish, forum owners have a right to do the same.
You don't see the logical disconnect in that sentence? You're saying we have to give up freedoms to be free.
Not really. What I say is that freedom is not an absolute - it is a subjective thing. I feel that I have all the freedom I want and need to go about my life and be happy; but I also live under a lot of restrictions. The thing is, I agree with those restrictions on my freedom, so I don't mind, it part of the price you pay for being a member of society. As far as I can observe, most people feel the same way.
What I am getting at is, I don't think we disagree all that much; you say, yourself, that "there are shades of gray, even with censorship" - but that was not apparent in your first comment, where you seemed to be completely against the very thought. The reason I don't agree with that viewpoint is that I think history shows us that when trolls and fanatics are given a free rein, they end up dominating the public discourse. Hence the Nazism in Germany in the 1930'es or the Muslim terrorism now - these things occur because decent people do not have the courage to stand up for decency as individuals (because they will be targeted by the bullies), and because society does not dare to seize the power to do the right thing, in the name of "freedom of speech".
Is that right, do you think? To my mind it is important that we as a society at least dare to consider this subject with an open mind.
No, it is only hypocritical if you think you can have a blog (or whatever) with moderated comments, while wanting to prevent someone else from having such a blog. And this actually applies to government censorship too. If government expects to publish information in web or in a dead tree format, then government can't prevent others from doing the same without exercising censorship.
Even if the government itself never actively published anything, it would still be censorship to prevent someone else. Hypocrisy, no; censorship, yes.
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
To me, it's connects them to 9/11 truthers, that's why I can't stand it.
If you seriously investigate the official explanation for how those buildings collapsed, particularly Building 7 which was never struck by a plane, you will see on your own that there are far too many things that just don't add up. If a shoddy and inconsistent explanation for something so important is acceptable to you, then okay, it makes sense to think the 9/11 truthers are ridiculous.
Just one thing to get your inquiry started, should you choose to make one: 9/11 was not the first time a concrete-and-steel skyscraper was struck by an airplane. It is also not the first time such a building had a serious fire. Matter of fact, similar buildings have burned for days, not hours. It was, however, the first time such a building ever collapsed for this reason.
Even if I hated someone's guts, I could still respect that they draw a clear distinction between what they want to believe and what they are willing to consider. What you want to believe is more of an article of faith.
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein