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Ask HN: Has there been more conspiracy comments on HN lately?

• wmf 4y ago
  Agreed. Voting and flagging seems to be taking care of them though.
• olalonde 4y ago
  Do you have some examples? To me, the lowest quality comments are always in the cryptocurrency related submissions but it's been like that for a long time. Overall, I don't feel there's been a significant change in comment quality and I rarely see conspiracy type comments being up voted.
  • eganist 4y ago
    This non-crypto topic from 7 hours ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33674562 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33674562
    • r721 4y ago
      I wrote a reply for your other comment which is now flagged (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33678566 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33678566), so posting it here: >despite being littered with comments that were flagged/unflagged I don't think that's a factor affecting ranking - big amount of user flags (for the whole thread) and "flame-war detector" ("when the number of comments on a submission exceeds its score") do affect ranking negatively though, so I guess dang manually removed downranking factors for that thread.
      • eganist 4y ago
        > I don't think that's a factor affecting ranking - big amount of user flags (for the whole thread) and "flame-war detector" ("when the number of comments on a submission exceeds its score") do affect ranking negatively though, so I guess dang manually removed downranking factors for that thread. It's not just dang modding anymore (citation: an email to me on Nov. 4), as I understand it. So it sounds like someone else made that call if that's what happened. The majority of HN's rules were violated repeatedly all over that thread, including the submission itself - https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. But the problem is that rules also exist around meta-discussion of HN's own discussion quality, and it's a poor experience when discussion quality is slipping if there's not also an avenue to reasonably meta-discuss why that's the case, either as a consequence of how the platform is operating or as an outcome of society's direction in a broader sense.
    • bakugo 4y ago
      I don't see why anyone would expect a topic such as this to have particularly high quality comments when the issue being discussed is itself extremely anti-intellectual. That said, are there any comments in particular that you think step out of line, or is it most of them?
      • eganist 4y ago
        Most of them. Especially the deeper you go into More-land, the more deads you'll see. like I said, surprised this lasted as long as it did. This thread should've been dead before even landing on the front page.
    • antifa 4y ago
      Becoming a woman is not the path for me. But it's so wild how much of this website is pro-status quo, anti-bio-hacking, anti-personal freedom on this topic. And especially anti-intellectual and anti-curious on the topic, too. Way too much culture war leaking in from meatspace.
• bluenomatterwho 4y ago
  2016 was questionable. 2020 was not. There is no conspiracy, this is fact checked by Snopes.
• Kukumber 4y ago
  I don't think so There is a growing amount of users that are coming up with interesting comments "conspiracy" is usually something a reader do not understand, lack details, knowledge or simply just the context, or is confused about something, it's ok, it happens Use that as an opportunity to challenge your method of thinking, acquire new knowledge, and develop argumentation skills to challenge something you feel is wrong Argumentation remains the best weapon to fight misinformation It's not interesting if everyone thinks the same As long as we remain civil, we should encourage each other to challenge our views and ideas
  • gregjor 4y ago
    Give HN readers some credit. "Conspiracy" does not mean "something a reader does not understand," or has failed to challenge their thinking or knowledge about. Nor do baseless or ignorant comments necessarily come from conspiracies. Argumentation does not fight misinformation. Study after study shows that people rarely change their minds, even when faced with seemingly incontrovertible evidence. We have an innate bias to accept information that confirms our beliefs and reject information that does not. No amount of argumentation will sway a convinced flat earther or QAnon believer.
    • philwelch 4y ago
      > Argumentation does not fight misinformation. Study after study shows that people rarely change their minds, even when faced with seemingly incontrovertible evidence. Out of curiosity, do you have citations for these studies?
      • gregjor 4y ago
        I don't offhand, but Google has plenty. https://www.google.com/search?q=facts+dont+change+minds https://www.google.com/search?q=facts+dont+change+minds
        • philwelch 4y ago
          Plenty of links to blogs and magazine articles, sure. I was hoping for some help getting to the bottom of the actual studies though. Otherwise it comes across as though you’re just repeating something that you’ve absorbed from the popular corporate media.
• gpm 4y ago
  Yes, absolutely.
• PakG1 4y ago
  I've always wondered how long it would take for HN to succumb to an eternal September where the "rest of the world" finally joins. Whatever HN is doing to keep discussions as high-quality as they are is pretty incredible. Yes, HN has changed over the years, but the fundamental aspect of conversation quality hasn't changed significantly.
  • Grimburger 4y ago
    The text only format is enough to keep 90% of people away.
    • CommitSyn 4y ago
      Also the karma limits. I have almost 150 comment karma and still can't downvote. I'm not sure when downvoting/report, etc. come into play, but I'm fine even if it's much higher -- it seems to be working well.
      • r721 4y ago
        >After users reach 501 Karma, they gain the ability to downvote another comment. >If a user has 31 Karma, they can flag submissions. https://github.com/minimaxir/hacker-news-undocumented https://github.com/minimaxir/hacker-news-undocumented
      • deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
  • 1letterunixname 4y ago
    That already happened c. 2013 when signal declined as early adopters and the cool kids from YC batches were swamped and dissuaded by randos. Nowadays, there are so many on HN who aren't part of the startup, academia, or STEM scene that there isn't nearly as much signal as there was. I think the only solution for a high-signal news aggregator + comments is invite-only with a small fee. (I constantly throw away accounts whenever they reach 1-3k karma. It doesn't mean anything and it brings out the true nature of people when they believe they have the upper hand.)
• justanother 4y ago
  Depends on what is meant by 'conspiracy'. If you refer to certain American and British political topics, you're not wrong. Some people whose opinions I formerly valued have been thus subsumed by the vast divisive misinformation machine to which we find ourselves subject in this age. It's not without historical precedent, but it is nonetheless a sign of the times.
• 1123581321 4y ago
  It seems like there are more off-the-cuff or aggressive comments from people who can’t turn their opinions, right or wrong, into discourse everyone can participate in and learn from. (Like this one.) Slowly educating or misinforming a forum or newsgroup over a couple of years by sharing dozens of interesting links and writing a book’s worth of novel analysis is a dying hobby.
• 32gbsd 4y ago
  I dont aggree == conspiracy. Seems to be the trend.
  • nowherebeen 4y ago
    That’s very narrow minded and incredibly short sighted. Good arguments have a thesis and supporting evidence. Conspiracy arguments have no supporting evidence.
    • postalrat 4y ago
      Do you have a thesis and supporting evidence or are you making a conspiracy argument?
    • AnimalMuppet 4y ago
      Conspiracy arguments do have evidence. It's just cherry-picked. I think this is the hallmark of a conspiracy theory - out of all the available evidence, this small subset is "the truth", and all the rest is produced by those in the conspiracy, with the intent of misleading us. They don't let the evidence speak; they define all evidence as true if it says what they believe, and all evidence as made-up lies that contradicts their predetermined view. But they do have evidence. And boy, do they want to tell you about their evidence, and point you to their sources.
  • timeon 4y ago
    You are dismissing criticism here with shallow formula. Isn't it the same?
    • 32gbsd 4y ago
      a conspiracy theory is criticism. it works the same way no matter which side of the equation its on.
• derwiki 4y ago
  I remember the first time, years ago, that I saw a “Reddit-style” quick take be upvoted, instead of downvoted for ignoring the guidelines. I was sure it was the beginning of the end.. and maybe it was—but it still feels like now we are at the beginning. So almost certainly lower quality now, but no where near bad enough to outweigh the good. Overall the level of discourse is still much higher than any other online community I’ve ever been a part of.
  • gpm 4y ago
    I don't think this thread is about comment quality in general (which I agree is still quite good), but conspiracy theories in particular.
    • leereeves 4y ago
      What conspiracy theories? I don't recall seeing many on HN. (Ok, there are some comments about "birds aren't real" on a high ranked post right now, but that's a joke.)
      • gpm 4y ago
        Basically all of them. They tend to eventually be flagged (though not always), but the overton window has also generally moved on this site to becoming more accepting of them. If you want an example, I picked a thread out via google. It's particularly high density, because that's all you can easily find with google. You'll need show dead -> on in your settings to see the worse comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33406207 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33406207
  • theossuary 4y ago
    It really depends on the thread though. Usually, if there are more comments than points for a post, the comments tend to be reactionary and not particularly interesting.
• dqpb 4y ago
  I was rate limited all day for making some pro free-market comments. So, at least the moderators are cracking down on something.
• TheCaptain4815 4y ago
  Given the simplicity of fune-tuning LLMs these days, it wouldn’t surprise me. I’m actually shocked it’s not more prevalent. I’m almost positive these systems are running on 4chan /pol/ as a means of throwing discussions off topic. Heck, some guy on YouTube did that already and documented himself posting 20,000 posts in a few days using a fine tuned model.
• theknocker 4y ago
  • 1letterunixname 4y ago
    Citation and evidence needed.
    • theknocker 4y ago
    • theknocker 4y ago
• jrumbut 4y ago
  I've noticed that around elections there is a slight relaxing of the rules about partisan politics (or maybe the moderators just get overwhelmed). This rapidly brings in the low quality/conspiracy/baseless claims stuff. In my experience, it is already calming back down.
• raphlinus 4y ago
  What I think has happened is that the culture wars are taking over more and more topics. Not only the obvious stuff like race, LGBTQ+ rights, crime, and labor, but increasingly things that don't traditionally fall on the left/right axis: vaccines, lab leak theory, content moderation, and even programming languages to some extent (admit it, the representation of trans people in the Rust community triggers some people). One thing that gets me is that, putting aside the question about whether one side or the other is right, the culture war stuff is just incredibly stupid. It's like people have gotten a lobotomy and their ability to do critical reasoning and respond to empirical data has been replaced with just pure tribal identity. My sense is that this is happening across the country (and perhaps to some extent the world), and HN actually has it easier than a lot of other places.
  • rayiner 4y ago
    > It's like people have gotten a lobotomy and their ability to do critical reasoning and respond to empirical data has been replaced with just pure tribal identity Culture wars expose fundamental value differences. Like when someone says “we should eliminate prisons” what’s the rational debate to be had about that? Leaving aside right or wrong, clearly people on opposite sides of that issue just see the world and human nature fundamentally differently. I don’t think it’s really about “tribal identity” because culture war issues actually expose intra-tribal schisms. I’ve been a democrat most of my adult life but I can’t wrap my brain around some of the stuff that’s been normalized in my Romney 2012 suburb.
    • cloudfifty 4y ago
    • random314 4y ago
• nitwit005 4y ago
  I see the more general problem is "automatic responses" to certain topics, where conspiracy theories are a part of that. If Facebook is mentioned, there is always someone saying how terrible Facebook is, even if it's an article about how Facebook's datacenters run their air conditioning. They just can't help but post about hating Facebook. Similarly, any mention of certain topics result in someone spitting out the related conspiracy theory. Perhaps those posts are inevitable, but I wish people downvoted them due to not being relevant. It seems they trigger the right emotional response to get upvotes.
  • shashashasha___ 4y ago
    actually your comment triggered the right emotional response from me. i couldn't agree more and it makes many articles comments section look like a copy paste.
  • gaganyaan 4y ago
    I know it's not really your point, but I'm fine with people continuously reminding everyone that facebook is a terrible company. They shouldn't get free goodwill from ostensibly neutral articles.
    • s1artibartfast 4y ago
      that fine and well but there are a lot of people that find the constant reminding and outrage both boring and exhausting. I don't wasn't to live my life in a constant state of outrage, negativity, and hate. Sometimes I want to be open minded, curious, and enjoy learning.
      • sshine 4y ago
        I’ve deleted my Facebook account many years ago, and I don’t need to criticise them at every opportunity. When asked why I’m not on (happens extremely rarely), I say it is against my moral conviction to be a member, and they don’t ask what I mean, because they know. Thus, I can live a positive life without evangelising my own choices.
      • 4y ago
• brigandish 4y ago
  Maybe there are more conspiracies happening - there are more humans than ever and more communication channels than ever, should we be surprised if more conspiracies occur? Or are you simply referring to opinions currently deemed unpopular or outside of the Overton window? Those are the opinions I most want to hear, I can get mainstream thinking almost anywhere, it’s mainstream. Thus, without any examples your question is impossible to answer.
• eganist 4y ago
  The fact that this thread (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33674562 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33674562) survived for as long as it did despite wildly transphobic "automatic responses" (nitwit005's words, well put) tells me that we're probably on that downhill trend. I remember (vaguely) a particular automatic control existing to mitigate low-quality discussion by simply demoting threads with heavy flag/unflag trends from the front page, and here we have an example of a thread linking to a pretty inflammatory blog post that managed to stay on the front page for hours despite being littered with comments that were flagged/unflagged repeatedly. Even now it's #50, seven hours later. Just with that single case study of a topic, yeah there's a downhill trend to be noted. Edit: oh hey, the flagging actually worked this time. lol
  • leereeves 4y ago
    Is this what the OP meant by "conspiracy comments"? Simply opinions that differ from yours? Or controversial content in general? That's not the definition of "conspiracy" I'm familiar with. Perhaps OP could provide some examples of the conspiracy comments they're referring to.
    • eganist 4y ago
      No, you're right, I was referring to the superset (controversial threads that invite emotionally satisfying but uninspiring conversation), of which conspiracies would be a subset.
• whateveracct 4y ago
  Definitely. There are frequently people who state unproven things as fact. For instance, when discussing the FBI informants' role in the Gretchen Whitmer kidnapping plot. It isn't a proven fact that "the FBI planned it" or anything of that sort. Yet, many HNers asserting it was an FBI false flag.
• realkiddredd 4y ago
• daVe23hu 4y ago
  HN why would this flagged? are we that fragile?
• wizofaus 4y ago
  Perhaps, but only around E.M.'s intentions re: Twitter, that I've noticed. One or two about the supposed "real purpose" of HN, but I gather they come up from time to time anyway.
• daVe23hu 4y ago
  truth is always an issue
• daVe23hu 4y ago
  its all a conspiracy OMG we are going to hell I don't qualify as I'm a recent observer cast me as one who has not vaxxed
• ohiovr 4y ago
  Basically any post that disagrees with Sinclair Broadcasting, Turner Broadcasting, Fox news or Disney is a conspiracy theory so there aren't many of those here because of their popularity here. But if that bothers you feel free to continue hiding comments that go against your limited view of the world.
• x1ph0z 4y ago
  This thread is already if drawing comments in defence of those “conspiracy” theories. So yes I’ve also noticed the same pattern.
• Markoff 4y ago
  I joined 2016, but was reading already years before and honestly I feel HN went downhill from tolerant forum with civil discussion to place where anything against HN hivemind (not that different from most of US companies which vastly support Demoracts with their donations) is downvoted into oblivion. You call those comments "conspiracy comments", I call them comments with alternative views and as we learned through the pandemic, the people banning and downvoting the "conspiracy theorists" (who were actually spreading facts/truth) were in the wrong and they still can't admit their mistake and it's same thing with anything political. You question why would be Russia firing rocket at Polish farm - bam, conspiracy theorists, Russian troll! Next day, oh well, shit happenes, Ukraine just made mistake, let's forget about it and let's forget about those conspiracy theorists from day above, but let's keep their downvotes so they won't dare to spread their opinion. I'd prefer if HN went back to technical topics away from political nonsense which has hardly anything to do with technology. I especially don't like the raising amount of self/metaposts like these with questions how you spend your free time, how long is your... and other teenage topics, which is quite surprising considering recent poll where vast majority of users should be above 25-30, so one would expect certain level of maturity.
  • seattle_spring 4y ago
    > the people banning and downvoting the "conspiracy theorists" (who were actually spreading facts/truth A broken clock is still right twice a day. It's my observation that the conspiracies of the last few years have been almost entirely debunked. When someone claims they were "proven right", their evidence usually circles back to the same conspiratorial source that made the claim in the first place.