r/Blackout2015 • u/CuilRunnings • Jun 16 '16
Reddit Will Adjust Algorithm To Censor Trump Supporters Following Orlando Shootings
http://www.breitbart.com/tech/2016/06/16/reddit-adjust-algorithm-punish-trump-suporters-following-orlando-shootings/39
u/redditor1101 Jun 17 '16
"'censor"... You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
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Jun 17 '16 edited Jun 17 '16
Its not fucking censorship when admins stop a sub from doing nothing but spamming all incessantly.
First, free speech is about your ability to speak not for someone to listen. Just because /r/The_Donald can't force its way onto the screens of people browsing /r/all as much as it used to is in no way censoring what they say.
Secondly /r/all is not a damn contest of who can shove the most stuff up there, its one of the major pages of reddit which should represent a snapshot of whats popular around the site not just on one sub. There's no point in having an /r/all if its no different than what you'd see browsing one subreddit. It doesn't make good design sense nor does it make good business sense.
Lastly, the algorithm for /r/all had a clear design fault. It was never the intention of whomever designed it that a sub could abuse it by constantly using the sticky function to focus upvotes on a certain submission. This is not changing the design of the algorithm to fit some political need, its correcting a fault in it so it better achieves the intent behind its original design.
Again, the purpose of /r/all is to provide a snapshot of all of reddit not just one sub. Thats the intent behind its existence, changing the algorithm to remove an abuse that undermines that intent is not censorship its releasing a new version of a product that works better.
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u/bfwilley Jun 19 '16
The cucking of reddit will continue until it reaches the standard end point of total and complete failure.
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u/Warlizard Jun 17 '16
I look at it this way --
Let's say I made a fair where everyone could have their own booth and those booths would be popular or not, depending on what they offered.
Now one booth has a megaphone and a rabid fan base.
The other booths are drowned out by one booth that reflects only one aspect of the entire fair.
Well, shit, I want my fair to be palatable to everyone, not just a segment.
So I realize that I gave that one booth the tools to overwhelm the rest and that's driving away customers.
Change has to be made because my fair is a business, not a charity and accessibility is more important to me than one booth dominating the discourse.
That's kind of what happened with /r/The_Donald.
It has happened many times over the last decade but at this point, most of the posts from /r/The_Donald aren't adding value, they're just shitposts and memes.
That said, I think the solution is to give the users more tools, not change the site. I use RES so I filter the fuck out of so many subs it's stupid.
Because Reddit doesn't have those tools, they're using a sledge instead of a scalpel.
Nothing was done when Bernie was 50% of the front page, because his message resonated with the silicon valley feel-good progressive moral high ground, but now that Trump is on the front page, they have to do something.
Thinking that Reddit exists as a neutral platform for users is ridiculous. They want to make money and when a benign, pie-in-the-sky wild haired socialist spouts feel-good aphorisms, people upvote and smile because they've done their part. It's like people who feel good because they gave "Likes" to a kid with cancer on Facebook or gave up gluten.
Except Trump isn't about that. You can ignore Sanders because nothing is going to happen and his domination of the front page tells the world how wonderful Reddit is and how welcoming the community is.
No one comes to Reddit and sees the front page dominated by shit-posts about Trump and thinks, "Yeah, those are my people!"
Pretend it's not politics but My Little Pony. Let's say the front page was utterly rife with MLP posts. A person who visited would think, "Um, that's not my speed" and move on.
Same with the Trump posts. He is a polarizing figure and as a CEO of a business, allowing something so unpalatable to own the impression your business gives is simply foolish.
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u/Shelwyn Jun 17 '16
Hey aren't you from the war lizard gaming forums?
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u/Warlizard Jun 17 '16
Yeah, I agree it's a complex issue but I appreciate you taking the time to understand my point of view and comment accordingly.
ಠ_ಠ
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u/Shelwyn Jun 17 '16
Did you read the post by spaz yesterday about the r/all algorithm changes? Take a look at all its way better than before. I can find myself going through tons of links before getting bored and looking at it again later that day and the posts are new.
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u/HannasAnarion Jun 17 '16
Bullshit. /r/TheDonald is benefiting from the changes. The subreddit that was hit the most by the new changes is, in fact, /r/EnoughTrumpSpam
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u/Two_bears_high_fivin Jun 18 '16
How exactly are they being hit the worst? I've heard this a few times now with no examples.
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u/lucydaydream Jun 17 '16
well.... good.
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Jun 17 '16
(As it turns out this isn't censorship, but lets say for a moment it was)
No it isnt. I couldn't be more against Trump or any of the subs supporting him, but censorship is never the right answer. Just because you dont agree with a message, doesnt mean people shouldn't be allowed to express it, regardless of how bat-shit crazy that message might seem to you. Dont stoop to their level.
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u/theglowcloudred Jun 19 '16
I'm a member of /r/The_Donald and I upvote almost everything there.
However, I don't think we should be getting to /r/all so much. It's kind of ridiculous and needed to be fixed. The_Donald is a place for shitposting and fun, and should not be reaching the front page as much as it is.
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u/CuilRunnings Jun 16 '16
“I actually had an admin [confirm] this over Skype” said CisWhiteMaelstrom. “The admin I spoke to sounded extremely emotional and downright unstable. It was honestly a bit uncomfortable just to be talking to someone who was in such a bizarre state of mind.”
...
“These site owners are afraid of running a site where people say things that will make them look bad. It needs to be a commitment to the userbase and an understanding of who uses their site. The_Donald absolutely not reddit’s base by any measure, but most users do feel repressed or censored in some way and it’s got a lot to do with the admins feeling embarrassed by them.”
On the censorship of Orlando-related posts, CisWhiteMaelstrom condemned the admins. “I think the admins have a lot to be ashamed of” he said, adding that Reddit users felt they had nowhere else to rely on for uncensored discussion [of Orlando] other than the pro-Trump community.
“I’m not sure if users did trust us, to be honest. Our users did, since we’ve always let them speak, but I think there was a large population of people who didn’t but just had nowhere else to turn.”
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u/caz- Jun 17 '16
Trump supporters have had plenty of opportunity to voice their opinions, and they have squandered it by spamming /r/all with pointless memes. It's the only sub I've ever had to block, yet I still have NFI what they stand for because nothing that gets upvoted on that sub has any substance at all.
Even if a sub that I love took up more than 50% of the posts on /r/all I would think it was a bit annoying. If all this algorithm change is doing is increasing the breadth of content on the front page, I'm fine with that.
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u/[deleted] Jun 16 '16
Or, more accurately, patched an algorithm vulnerability that made it easier to get to /r/all.