Facebook Locks Out Ron Paul Following Column Criticizing Big Tech Censorship
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See how this is now starting to not make any sense? How many more 'mistakes' will Facebook make for them to realise that them and the rest of Big Tech is the actual problem?
So to me, inaction on Facebook's part isn't a non-choice; it's a bad choice.
The thing we probably both agree with is that nobody should trust Facebook to make good decisions.
Where we part is that I think Facebook already made mistakes by hosting inflammatory garbage. I'm glad they're under public pressure to fix those mistakes.
Edit: I think people are missing the point. I don't particularly disagree with any of the replies. HN's commentary is pretty superb in part due to censorship and I agree that without a big stick being used open communities turn to trash. My question is though, why are people defending the mods here but when FB tries to do the same thing, we act like FB is some cyber Gestapo out to dominate speech on the web. It boils down to HN good, FB bad; it's shallow and hypocritical. And I maintain that shadowbanning is an abusive practice. If a user's behavior is such that the user can no longer participate, the user ought to know this. Shadowbanning is like internet gaslamping. You are telling the user one thing while the reality of the situation is different. Websites should not be playing these mind games with their users.
I won't say HN is perfect and there are no false positives, but they are doing pretty well considering being out numbered a thousand to one. Most of the time I investigate a dead or banned individual, I think, yep makes sense. While it's felt a bit heavy-handed at times, I haven't found a place with better discussion on average.
Within a year HN would fill up with trolls, commercial spammers, bigots, and culture warriors of all stripes.
As a result HN would lose a large portion of its industry veterans and nerdy academics.
Within two years, the site would be like every other garbage heap on the internet.
First off, enable showdead to see the shadowbanned users. I vouch for their posts sometimes, because sometimes they're good posts. But a great deal of them aren't really here to be a part of the conversation. It's not censorship, it's curation, and I think HN is better for it. Want trolls? Hit up 4chan or something.
A HN account doesn't have much value. Unless commenting on HN is what gives you joy in life, you won't be impacted much if you lose it. Major socials can be a big part of one's identity, the way one communicates with friends, work and businesses. The "value" of your account grows with usage. There's no chat on HN, no follower graphs or whatever. Pretty sure most HNers don't even notice usernames on here.
I do believe any business has the absolute right to censor anything they want. But in case of FB, Twitter etc too much censorship [0] compromises the value proposition. On HN it is the value proposition.
For the record, yes, I do think they're self sabotaging and will eventually pay the price. I'm guessing the demise will look much more like IBM rather than Myspace.
[0] For example, it makes perfect sense to ban people who actively harass others. Most users don't want to deal with too much nastiness, it reduces the value of your platform.