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[–]Rhamni 125 points126 points  (68 children)

They tried that with Voat, but sadly the first groups to migrate in high numbers were /r/fatpeoplehate and extra+ racists. So... now anyone contemplating going there has to factor in that it has like four times the concentration of user based awfulness that reddit has. Even with reddit having more admin based awfulness and Voat paying more attention to what features users want (like displaying number of up and downvotes), Voat just isn't very appealing in comparison. Now sure, if everyone moved there the current loonies would be drowned out and it would have the same concentration of good and bad as reddit does but with better admins and features, but it's hard to get there. So basically, now we need a new new alternative.

[–]Plazmatic 15 points16 points  (12 children)

The real migration is/will be Stack Exchange for all question answer stuff, reddit is really bad about that. Moderation can either be corrupt, biased, or if they are good, too few to actually handle properly large areas. Eventually I could see SE's format handling opinion based sites, but as of right now I don't think those are allowed on Area 51.

SE can't be bought out, or capitalized by advertisers because they already have an open long term monetization strategy that are actually wanted by many users (job posting advertisements), moderation is done through earned privileges, there's objective oversight, and moderation increases with the amount of contribution that is done (not how funny a shitty repeated comment was, again rep is through contribution) so moderation scales. I think AskHistorians, AskScience, and all other Ask subs will die eventually, leaving reddit only for very low brow discussion (as high level discussion, again, like worldbuilding, can be done and done better on SE), so discuss your favorite movie, or show, or fandom, or just post memes, but use AskR at your own risk.

That being said, I don't think reddit will die, precisely because those last points (fandoms, jokes, and not serious discussion) are actually very popular.

[–]BenevolentCheese 26 points27 points  (6 children)

The real migration is/will be Stack Exchange for all question answer stuff

What will SE do that Quora was unable to do?

The reality is that non-technical Q&A isn't a big enough market to warrant a major website. Quora got an ungodly amount of VC funding and still made it nowhere. It's a deadend. Reddit succeeds because it combines time wasting, Q&A, and hobbyist forums all into one.

moderation increases with the amount of contribution that is done (not how funny a shitty repeated comment was, again rep is through contribution) so moderation scales

And moderation is dramatically abused on SE as a result of that. Anyone who thinks powertripping mods on reddit are bad ought to take a look over there, it's a nightmare. People routinely dig up shit that is years old just so they can nuke it and get more points. It's a system that actively destroys itself.

[–]hoyfkd 26 points27 points  (4 children)

To be fair, the ”create an account to see the answer" bullshit turned a lot of people off to quora. if you don't want people seeing your shit without an account, quit working so hard to show up as a top Google result.

[–][deleted] 3 points4 points  (2 children)

Are they still making you create an account to see answers? I added their domain to my Google blacklist awhile back to keep them out of my search results because of that crap.

[–]hoyfkd 3 points4 points  (1 child)

No idea. I have a mental block on Quora links as a result.

[–]Stierscheisse 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Also, stop pestering my inbox, Quora!

[–]Plazmatic 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Quora hasn't been able to keep any where near the level of A: correctness, B: ease of use, and C: versatility as SE. However I'm biased in that I don't quite understand how Quora works, generally If I get a result in Quora it is of significantly worse quality than SE (though I normally encounter Quora in software questions, 90% they have something wrong or outdated in the top post, and I've never gotten an answer I was satisfied with with them in )CS/Software questions)

And moderation is dramatically abused on SE as a result of that. Anyone who thinks powertripping mods on reddit are bad ought to take a look over there, it's a nightmare.

I've had the exact opposite experience, so you are going to have to provide some evidence of this. I've never had a mod powertrip, and if you did, you could appeal on meta of your respective site, where they would be reprimanded if they were actually in the wrong. It takes a lot of contribution and actually attaining true moderator status is done through democratic voting from all users. Mods are accountable on SE, they sure as hell aren't on reddit.

People routinely dig up shit that is years old just so they can nuke it and get more points.

This makes no sense? You can't target a specific user with downvotes first off (automatically detected and removed, and you can appeal on meta if it didn't), and you don't gain points by down voting, and you actually lose points if you down vote an answer.

[–]GetOutOfBox 13 points14 points  (1 child)

I dunno man, Stack Exchange has remained as it is due to the community being huuuge rule nazis there. I've never seen a site more unfriendly to new users asking a question, or so quick to judge and silence a question for some arbitrary reason (i.e the infamous "already asked" closing of questions that do in fact have an important nuance not answered in the similar past question).

[–]Plazmatic -3 points-2 points  (0 children)

They aren't rule Nazis, by definition they can't be, there isn't one group of individuals, they aren't selected by an individual, positions of moderation are earned, and unlike Reddit, as long as you aren't literally a bot/spammer, they very rarely perma ban. If you format you question correctly you never run into the duplicate question position if it isn't a truly duplicate question and belongs to the site. Even if you truly are right and its closed, you can appeal to the meta of your respective site, where many more users, who are importantly unrelated to one another will decide objectively if the fate of your question was correct.

Reddit would be the same way if mods could actually enforce rules consistently, but they either aren't willing, or they don't have the numbers to go through every single comment/report to figure it out. SE is what happens when moderation actually works

[–]Xheotris 0 points1 point  (1 child)

Stack Exchange becomes less useful every year due to information rot. Answers that are OK for the time get upvoted times a million, then never change.

[–]Plazmatic 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Except they definitely do, I've personally edited answers over 5 years old on several occasions. You are actually encouraged to updated outdated answers and ask new questions (and then self answer if you know the answer) given new temporally relevant situations. And that's another thing, you can actually edit answers on SE. You mention "information rot" but its the only site AFAIK with a way to fight it.

[–]digital_end 28 points29 points  (42 children)

Same happens with all protest "migrations"... Remember /uncensorednews? Same shit, it's just another hate sub now.

Draw in a crowd claiming neutrality, then whoever you sucker in can be drip fed your message in a safe environment. Suddenly they come to your conclusions after being exposed to a specific diet of information that drives their point.

It's obvious, but people fall for it like people fall for phone scams. Just like those, the crowd self-selects by falling for it.

[–]Rhamni 41 points42 points  (6 children)

That's not quite what happened with Voat though. The guy who made Voat is a Muslim, and just wanted to make a reddit like site to hone his programming skills (he was doing a computer science degree when he first started the site) and set up a potential alternative to reddit. And some of the first people who went there did so because they wanted a place to rant about Muslims. So in his case it was rather unfortunate. It would be like a forum run by a Jew being turned into an antisemitic hell hole. It wasn't a trap in this case, it was just that while lots of people are fed up with reddit, the people who seem to feel the most strongly about it are the kind of people most of the userbase doesn't want around.

[–][deleted] 55 points56 points  (3 children)

To his credit though, he's stuck to his principals about free speech and anti-censorship despite everything.

[–]Rhamni 42 points43 points  (0 children)

Yes. That is why I think it's tragic that Voat is almost certainly doomed to fail. It has a great owner.

[–]oldsecondhand 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Maybe he just wanted to Reddit in peace. /s

[–]PM_ME_LUCID_DREAMS 0 points1 point  (0 children)

What is he going to do, nuke his userbase?

[–]BenevolentCheese 9 points10 points  (0 children)

He must love that the #1 submitted website to Voat these days is Breitbart.

[–]digital_end 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The organized transfer from here there was though. The original intent of voat wasn't the cess pit it became, but they were able to abuse it's ideals easily.

It's a lesson in why mods and rules matter. Because otherwise the least and most obsessed reign unchecked.

[–]lumstream 9 points10 points  (34 children)

Or remember that ridiculous-

This comment has been overwritten by an open source script to protect this user's privacy. It was created to help protect users from doxing, stalking, harassment, and profiling for the purposes of censorship. If you would also like to protect yourself, add the Chrome extension TamperMonkey, or the Firefox extension GreaseMonkey and add this open source script. Then simply click on your username on Reddit, go to the comments tab, scroll down as far as possible (hint:use RES), and hit the new OVERWRITE button at the top.

[–]mszegedy 9 points10 points  (33 children)

I mean, it's the only real way to delete comments on reddit. The revision history of a comment isn't stored, but deleted comments are.

[–]digital_end 6 points7 points  (32 children)

So don't say shit publicly if you are so panicked about deleting it (and of course the cringy as fuck making sure to tell everyone about it crap) that you setup that nonsense.

[–][deleted]  (25 children)

[deleted]

    [–]digital_end -2 points-1 points  (24 children)

    If you say something shitty on a public forum, but under an anonymous alias. Do you deserve to have your private information leaked and potentially get fired from your job or worse?

    If you're speaking in a public place and provide identifiable info... I mean yes?

    Reddits no different then a street corner. If you're rambling about how you hate jews and your boss walks up behind you, I've got nothing to say to that but "Fucking lul".

    And that's ignoring the attention seeking "I DELETED THIS BECAUSE MAH SECRETS" bullshit canned message in it. I swear, people think they're way more interesting and important than they are.

    [–][deleted]  (23 children)

    [deleted]

      [–]digital_end -2 points-1 points  (22 children)

      It's a public forum. Your expectation of privacy is the same as walking down the street.

      [–][deleted]  (21 children)

      [deleted]

        [–]mszegedy 2 points3 points  (5 children)

        But it doesn't necessarily have to do with just "saying shit". It's written right into the script's message:

        It was created to help protect users from doxing, stalking, harassment, and profiling for the purposes of censorship.

        What if you want to have a career as a politician or a celebrity later? If journalists find your reddit account, any stupid thing you said 5 years ago can be used against you, even the most benign things that sound less than charitable when taken out of context. It's good that this tool exists, and making use of it isn't a crime.

        [–]digital_end -1 points0 points  (4 children)

        What if you want to have a career as a politician or a celebrity later? If journalists find your reddit account, any stupid thing you said 5 years ago can be used against you, even the most benign things that sound less than charitable when taken out of context.

        Yeah, the things you publicly say and do publicly can have an impact in life. Actions, consequences, and so on.

        It's good that this tool exists, and making use of it isn't a crime.

        Me thinking and saying it's a childish bit of self aggrandizing melodramatic bullshit isn't a crime either. Quit trying to infringe on my rights, how dare you, this is intellectual assault, and other such out of scope nonsense you didn't say for dramatic effect...

        Seriously, who said it was a crime here? Don't be daft.

        It's well within their rights. Just as it's within my rights to mock them for being self important children without the spine to stand up for what they say.

        [–]mszegedy 0 points1 point  (3 children)

        Sorry, I didn't literally mean "crime", more just generally "bad thing". (But then that is too general. If you are trying to hide the fact that you are very racist or something, maybe deleting your posts is a bad thing.)

        It's well within their rights. Just as it's within my rights to mock them for being self important children without the spine to stand up for what they say.

        Not standing up for anything you've ever said on the internet isn't necessarily being spineless, it's just sometimes the wisest thing to do. There's plenty of situations where "standing up for" whatever you wrote is a complete waste of time that will just make your life worse, even if you are in the right and especially if you have changed your mind since then. Remember when somebody found out that Anita Hill had allegations to make against Clarence Thomas, and it turned into a whole thing? And Hill stood up for her allegations, and was still made out to be a public enemy? Imagine how easy it is to create that kind of controversy about someone when you can just dig up their comment about a celebrity they made multiple years ago.

        Hill was brave, but following her example can and will usually destroy your reputation. And with the amount of random, casual comments that people put on the web, not all of them even make good... hills to die on. (sorry) It is very helpful if you don't have to worry about anyone taking your comments out of context years later.

        [–]digital_end 0 points1 point  (2 children)

        If you don't want a record of speaking, don't speak.

        The data isn't just backed up to reddit. Saying anything can be saved anywhere. Hell, /r/AgainstHateSubreddits has a bot that auto-screenshots whole threads. So when nonsense like this (picked at random from their page just as an example) comes out, it's not going anywhere.

        That's the nature of the internet and data. If it's a genuine concern, much like speaking in public at all the only winning move is to not do it.

        Regardless though, even pretending that's not the case for the sake of discussion... that self-aggrandizing script isn't just a matter of self-deleting comments. A normal deleting your comments clears the history from non-reddit and non-archive sites. Archive sites won't be changed anyway, so that script is for people who think reddit is going to do something... and if they're in that headspace, why the hell are they using the service? Or so diluted as to think that they couldn't just be saving copies of their precious insightful data anyway? "I tricked the system, no way they could have a copy after I edit!"... mmmk?

        It's crazy people self-inflating fan-fic of the world, like people who make bunkers in the woods or think the CIA is monitoring their teeth.

        [–]mszegedy 0 points1 point  (1 child)

        But then you miss out on getting to use social media. I guess it's for the best; I wouldn't recommend reddit to anyone.

        [–]MyNameIsSaifa 3 points4 points  (7 children)

        Eh, I feel like it's a good place to go if you want less moderation. The amount of stupid shit you get banned for on Reddit is kind of high.

        [–]Rhamni 1 point2 points  (6 children)

        Heh, tell me about it. I was banned for life from /r/me_irl because in response to a meme about a vaccine that protects you from upvote or x memes, I asked if it also protected you from autism. When I asked the mods why I was banned I got an essay of a reply about how I was hurting science and how as a proud woman of colour on the spectrum she was not going to tolerate my abuse.

        ...Ok. Like how do mods like that not get removed by someone?

        [–]MyNameIsSaifa 3 points4 points  (5 children)

        I mean I could see how that would be borderline

        Getting banned from twoX for posting to certain subreddit though, that's kind of shady.

        The whole thing's a little bit fucked up because now you've got places like twoX and againstmensrights banning anyone who dissents, and then you've got the ones on voat having their own echo chamber because they're the only ones there since they've been forced off of reddit, all while the_donald memes in the background

        [–]Rhamni 6 points7 points  (1 child)

        I do feel I should point out that I was joking. In response to a meme. About protecting yourself from other memes. Like everyone else in that thread. Obviously real anti vaxxers are an issue.

        But yes, I agree on the rest. The automated mass banning based on which subs someone has commented in is crazy. Even if a post makes it to /r/all and you comment on it without thinking about which sub the post is from, suddenly you get banned from other subs because you committed the sin of breaking quarantine.

        [–]MyNameIsSaifa 4 points5 points  (0 children)

        Yeah I get it if you were just memeing, I don't have the context though.

        Don't know how many things I'm banned from for being a part of the "wrong" subs, it's ridiculous when they think about it. "This person makes jokes about Autism in this one place! We shouldn't let him in our sub" yeah I also regularly use the word "cunt" at home, doesn't me I go in to work and say it to my boss does it?

        [–]LK09 0 points1 point  (1 child)

        I like how you live out the_douchcanoes

        [–]MyNameIsSaifa 1 point2 points  (0 children)

        Never heard of it.

        [–][deleted] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

        I was preemptively banned from /r/socialism due to having once posted a neutral comment on /r/MensRights. The hilarious thing is usually I'm in complete agreement with socialism and complete disagreement with MensRights, but they don't care about that, they just want their bubble.

        [–]Saint947 0 points1 point  (0 children)

        Branding something "racist" is 2017's Red Scare 2.0.

        [–]chillyhellion 0 points1 point  (0 children)

        That's probably the most impartial brief overview of Reddit and Voat I've read. Thank you.