Slashdot Mirror
Comments About Comments
theodp writes "This weekend's NY Times is all-about-the-comments. First, Michael Erard recounts the history of Web site comments and explains how their technical origins have shaped the actual commentary we've come to expect as usual today. On dealing with people-behaving-badly, Erard writes, 'Only a few [high-traffic sites] seem to have tried user-moderation systems like the one developed by Slashdot's creator, Rob Malda. Founded in 1997, Slashdot rapidly began to suffer from what Malda called 'signal-to-noise-ratio problems' as tens of thousands of users showed up. Rather than embracing the chaos (which was a hallmark of Usenet, another digital channel of communications) or locking things down with moderators (which e-mail lists did), Malda figured out a way for users to moderate one another. Moderation became like jury duty, something you were called to do.' Next, NY Times community manager Bassey Etim, who oversees 13 comment moderators, offers up his comments on comments, agreeing that 'the comments are where the real America is.' Finally, there's Gawker's next-generation Kinja, which aims to further blur the lines between stories, blog entries, and comments."
Personally, I like making comments on comments. I especially like self-referencing ones.
. . . comments on my comments!
Earn my blessing, or my wrath!
The Internet King? I wonder if he could provide faster nudity.
It's obvious that comments are what make some websites attractive. This is one of them.
In Slashdot I usually find very interesting what other people think about the news. Sometimes, there're some jewels: Comments about people who really know what the news is about and offer their perspective. I same those comments as bookmarks. I wonder why there's not a "favorite" option to save them.
Sorry, didn't read TFA, what are we talking about again? Ah, comments.
I like making comments about comments about a story about comments about comments.
The more you moderate a forum, or prevent users from posting anonymously, the less honest it will be. If you really must moderate, do like Slashdot and let the users do it.
The cow says "Moo." The dog says "Woof." The Timothy says "Thanks, valued customer. We appreciate your input."
Made even more appropriate by not actually being the first post.
I never understood the desire to 'first post'. It's like saying "I've not a single useful thought in my head, and look how fast I can let everybody know it!"
Horribly depressing.
Yo dawg, I heard you like comments, so I made a comment on your story about comments on comments, so you can comment while you comment.
do {print "Mini-Geek Rules!\n";}
until ($TheEndOfTheWorld);
'the comments are where the real America is.'
There was this article recently on Yahoo! Finance about people giving Liberty to prevent a financial melt down.
Anyway, the article and many commentors parroted the argument that the Community Reinvestment Act of 1977 caused the financial meltdown. Many commentators and pundits have "reasoned" that the law caused the meltdown because it "forced" banks to lend to poor people who couldn't afford the loans. Did they have data to back up what they said?
Fuck no! Rush, Hannity, O'Rielly and all their clones pulled it out of their ass.
Here is what some economists found out
...the available evidence seems to run counter to the contention that the CRA contributed in any substantive way to the current mortgage crisis.
tl;dr; Most of "Real America" just mindlessly parrots what they see and hear in the media.
If you structured it so "last post" was a thing, people would never stop commenting. At least the race to first post is self limiting.
John
. . . . because of the existence of chatbots, trollbots, etc., since at least the late 1990s (automated software agents programmed to seek and respond in specific patterns), and since contracts have been publicly announced in the last few years (meaning they've been effectively working on them the previous decade!!!) to program "ConsensusBots" --- automated software to "persuade" (i.e., misinform and disinform) large numbers at popular newsy sites and social networking sites --- many, if not most, comments today are highly suspect!
Last Post!!!
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
This:
MartinJrMakesPoopVideos: hi everybody i just started my onw chanel, its really awsome even tho their arn't any videos on it, click on my name and check it out cuz as a looser i base my personal validation on how many people look at my channel! I only subscribned to this sooper popular chanel so i could solicit my own garbace in the commnts
Seriously, can we do something about these kids? Like, send Tonya Harding over to break their shins? I hear she could use the money.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
Since moderation is on-topic ...
The biggest weakness with Slashdot's current system is the way that early posts get a disproportionate amount of attention, and mod-points. When a new story shows up, so long as I post within 5-10 minutes it's pretty easy to get modded to +5, even as an AC.
Try it yourself - as soon as a new story hits, quickly summarize your gut reaction to the summary, hit post, and watch the mod-points accumulate. The downside, of course, is that anybody who shows up late will struggle to get heard amongst the noise.
Oh yes, and I really dislike it when 50% of an entire comments section consists of replies to one post. This seems to happen because people want their post to get noticed.
Can anybody think of a good solution to these problems? Or are there other moderation problems which need dealing with?
... became widespread and new generations grew up with the internet, 99% of internet comments are mostly garbage. I've found that Websites run by intelligent, educated people who put their real face, name, background on the net tend to be more informative than random commenters as the net has grown. Since as more of the general population and new generation of kids begin to lurk and comment on websites comment quality goes through surges of greatness and mediocrity as generations come and go.
As an adult I find partisan comments the most uninformed, history and politics for anyone with any intelligence is IMMENSELY complex. Trying to apply black and white solutions and old out-dated 19th century political ideologies to complex problems is not sign of intelligence. Most of slashdot tends to fall into the extremely distorted american political spectrum since most slashdot commenters/moderators are american.
I find as the internet became a mass phenomenon slashdot comment quality has become almost as awful as the rest of the internet. The political comments tend to be the most uninformed since it highlights the deep indoctrination of the american public. Since most comments tend to be from the most populous country (america), 300 million vs say 30 million in canada.
So you get a massive boatload of nonsense when anyone mentions politics, anything deep and requiring serious thought and analysis can only usually be found through those who are honest and open and put a face to their opinions.
Those of us who see the world through technical eyes know many of our current values, ideals and institutions are not in line with what is actually true about the universe. We're doing all sorts of irrational bone headed shit in all areas. I find america and americans bizarre in their adherence to simple minded political and values based sloganeering. It's not the sign of an erudite mind.
In order to find solutions you have to study how institutions change over time and they must be informed by how the universe and nature actually operate, all of our institutions are totally out of line with this kind of thinking.
This is likely to get modded down to "-1 Disagree", but I guess that's the point. If someone says something positive about religion, protecting their children's innocence, etc... it gets modded down. Don't think like the loud members of the group? Here's a mod down for you. Think that the teleology of the universe points to a cosmic designer? Here's a "-1 Disagree" for you and a bunch of hate to go with it. You must think like the hive mind or go unheard.
Comment moderation like that on Reddit and Slashdot censors dissension and encourages hate.
Moderators should be identified.
If you are going to moderate, you should be willing to stand behind your moderation. Anonymous moderation leads to people down modding things they simple disagree with rather than flagging actual abuse.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
Have you tried Kinja? It is *not* a positive in any sense of the word. It is terrible, bloated software packed with bugs. It often doesn't work at all, or on some major browsers, and when it does work it often screws up any formatting the author attempts.
Worst of all, it's run by free moderation -- as in, there is no oversight or appeal process for bad moderation calls. You can get into an argument with a moderator and find yourself blocked from the entire site, with no recourse. Kinja enables overzealous moderation and petty forum dictatorships, the situations that many good discussion forums take pains to avoid.
If Kinja is the future of internet commenting, then internet comments are truly dead. The net will become balkanized groups of friends chatting in their own echo chambers, a worse situation than in the BBS days.
Genocide Man -- Life is funny. Death is funnier. Mass murder can be hilarious.
Apparently you are mistaken, since as I reply, your comment has a score of 4.
It is true that some people mod down comments because they disagree. But there are often other cooler heads who bring balance to the moderation.
Usually, controversial comments get modded down because there is no actual substance to the comments. And since such posters often start with an attitude of paranoia and overestimate their own importance, they DO get modded down, and they think they are proved right.
I like to moderate week-old comments, when I get mod points.
Imagine the poster's surprise: "Hey! I got modded up for a comment I wrote last week!"
Gives me a warm feeling: two parts happiness, one part mischief.
-kgj
No Comment
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I'm pretty sure you just uncovered the secret to Slashdot's success.
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun