Question I'd like to hear everyone's thoughts on possibly making votes public. This has been discussed in a lot of other issues, but here's a dedicated one for discussion. Positives Could help figh...
Probably better to post in the github issue rather than replying here.
environment more hostile to discussion and honest exchange.
“Voting” and “discussion” are separate things. The old forums did not have voting but still had polarization, personal attacks, hellthreads, etc.
The problem is that Reddit/Facebook turned “voting” from a tool meant to measure “quality” (e.g, this post is relevant to the community, this comment does not add to the discussion) into a tool to measure “popularity” (I agree with this, so I vote up. I don’t like this, so I downvote).
Either get rid of voting altogether, or let’s bring back a culture where “votes” are meant to signal quality.
If users are the problem and the platform encourages/enables them to behave like that, then the problem is the platform. Redditors act that way because the system incentivizes it.
What alternatives to votes would you propose to handle this better? Because I have no doubt the same thing will happen here too…
It’s just how people work, especially when things get heated. That said, perhaps that’s a poor example as a heated discussion isn’t necessary a helpful/constructive one…
I already said: upvotes only, remove downvotes, votes are public. If we don’t have downvotes public voting is not as important. But if we insist on keeping them, then yes it should be public
We also need people to be more accepting of stricter/heavier-handed moderation, which is a hard sell.
We can fix that by having moderators that can establish clear guidelines and show enough authority and can be trusted by the community. And yes, if the guidelines include something like:
Downvotes are not for disagreement. It’s fine to downvote if the argument is false or deliberately misleading, but if someone is making a good faith argument that you disagree with, either make a constructive response or simply let it go
Then the mods would be completely justified to call out users who are drive-by downvoting.
If you did it would not be rent free, or would it, einstein. But no worry, i don’t think about you, just this topic and your enthusiasm for it triggered my reply :)
Have a downvote for going off topic and “personal”.
But… we had those on reddit. I didn’t see many actual examples of the “moderator gone power crazy” stereotype that is so often echoed there (especially by people who fully deserved the moderator action they received).
The issue wasn’t that the rules were clear. The issue was that people refused to read them in the first place, and became hyper-defensive and obstinate whenever they were called out on it, even by moderators.
Lemmy admins can already see the votes (up and down). Used to just be in the database (select * from comment_like where person_id = ?), but since some 19.x update, it’s a menu item with a GUI popup:
Apparently, non-admins can already do this on platforms like kbin.
“Echo chambers” are incredibly common in our daily lives. I even really don’t get the whole “anti-echo chamber” thing. We select people to be friends we generally like and agree with. We often don’t associate with people we don’t like or disagree with. Why should social media be some totally egalitarian social exposure? That’s literally never been the case ever. We read what we want to read. We talk to who we want to talk to. I’m not going to be shamed into listening to some jerk who thinks gay people shouldn’t marry and belong in hell or whatever. I don’t want to share a beer with them, I would never invite them to dinner in my home, so why should I have to deal with them living rent free in my mind because I saw some ignorant post on social media yet again?
It’s not like I don’t know homophobia exists, so I definitely don’t need their particular brand of reminder and I know I shouldn’t engage them because it’s a pointless flame war.
I have plenty of work colleagues and family I disagree with, I read sources I don’t always love. I get plenty of exposure to other ways of thinking and ideas. Do I think people can go too far and literally only surround themselves with “yes men” socially? Sure. But come on. How many of us actually spend equal time with people we both agree and disagree ideologically with?
To be perfectly frank: the “echo chamber” argument is mostly just a cudgel used by the right to obliquely say a space is too liberal for their tastes. It’s not a moral imperative and they are demanding everyone else conform better to their ideals while also saying it’s immoral to leave.
No, votes should not be displayed public.
Blocking those who downvote creates further polarisation, echo chambers and an environment more hostile to discussion and honest exchange.
Following those who upvote creates personality cults and nepotism and devalues the content.
“Voting” and “discussion” are separate things. The old forums did not have voting but still had polarization, personal attacks, hellthreads, etc.
The problem is that Reddit/Facebook turned “voting” from a tool meant to measure “quality” (e.g, this post is relevant to the community, this comment does not add to the discussion) into a tool to measure “popularity” (I agree with this, so I vote up. I don’t like this, so I downvote).
Either get rid of voting altogether, or let’s bring back a culture where “votes” are meant to signal quality.
Redditors did that, rather than reddit I’d argue. Still the same result of becoming a far less useful heuristic though.
Not really sure how to “fix” a system like that, which depends on the masses to do something correctly. They… don’t.
If users are the problem and the platform encourages/enables them to behave like that, then the problem is the platform. Redditors act that way because the system incentivizes it.
What alternatives to votes would you propose to handle this better? Because I have no doubt the same thing will happen here too…
It’s just how people work, especially when things get heated. That said, perhaps that’s a poor example as a heated discussion isn’t necessary a helpful/constructive one…
I already said: upvotes only, remove downvotes, votes are public. If we don’t have downvotes public voting is not as important. But if we insist on keeping them, then yes it should be public
We also need people to be more accepting of stricter/heavier-handed moderation, which is a hard sell.
We can fix that by having moderators that can establish clear guidelines and show enough authority and can be trusted by the community. And yes, if the guidelines include something like:
Then the mods would be completely justified to call out users who are drive-by downvoting.
Or some self entitled 3rd party admin would do that just because they’d feel like people owed them explanations.
Hey, do I owe you anything for all the space I’m taking in your head or am I still living rent-free?
If you did it would not be rent free, or would it, einstein. But no worry, i don’t think about you, just this topic and your enthusiasm for it triggered my reply :)
Have a downvote for going off topic and “personal”.
You are the one pontificating in my comment, and I am the one going personal. Seems like your reasoning is as good as your reading comprehension.
But hey, thanks for stopping by!
But… we had those on reddit. I didn’t see many actual examples of the “moderator gone power crazy” stereotype that is so often echoed there (especially by people who fully deserved the moderator action they received).
The issue wasn’t that the rules were clear. The issue was that people refused to read them in the first place, and became hyper-defensive and obstinate whenever they were called out on it, even by moderators.
No moderator went on to call out users who were down voting for disagreement, because this data is not public on Reddit.
(Score: 5, Insightful)
Meta-moderation and multi-dimensional voting. We were happier with slashdot and we took it for granted.
Maybe the upvotes should only be available to the person who owns the comment or post. Maybe to the mods and admins, too?
Lemmy admins can already see the votes (up and down). Used to just be in the database (
select * from comment_like where person_id = ?), but since some 19.x update, it’s a menu item with a GUI popup:Apparently, non-admins can already do this on platforms like kbin.
Same idiots playing games with each others in the open is better than bots and manipulation going on behind the scenes.
“Echo chambers” are incredibly common in our daily lives. I even really don’t get the whole “anti-echo chamber” thing. We select people to be friends we generally like and agree with. We often don’t associate with people we don’t like or disagree with. Why should social media be some totally egalitarian social exposure? That’s literally never been the case ever. We read what we want to read. We talk to who we want to talk to. I’m not going to be shamed into listening to some jerk who thinks gay people shouldn’t marry and belong in hell or whatever. I don’t want to share a beer with them, I would never invite them to dinner in my home, so why should I have to deal with them living rent free in my mind because I saw some ignorant post on social media yet again?
It’s not like I don’t know homophobia exists, so I definitely don’t need their particular brand of reminder and I know I shouldn’t engage them because it’s a pointless flame war.
I have plenty of work colleagues and family I disagree with, I read sources I don’t always love. I get plenty of exposure to other ways of thinking and ideas. Do I think people can go too far and literally only surround themselves with “yes men” socially? Sure. But come on. How many of us actually spend equal time with people we both agree and disagree ideologically with? To be perfectly frank: the “echo chamber” argument is mostly just a cudgel used by the right to obliquely say a space is too liberal for their tastes. It’s not a moral imperative and they are demanding everyone else conform better to their ideals while also saying it’s immoral to leave.