Saidit is its own worst enemy - a combination of mean and stupid - which keeps Saidit very small and ultra right-wing

submitted by bootylicious from self.SaidIt

sorted by:
top
newinsightfulfun
you are viewing a single comment's thread.

view the rest of the comments →

[–]HibikiBlack 9 insightful - 4 fun9 insightful - 3 fun10 insightful - 4 fun -  (9 children)

Meh, It's true that people should make an effort to raise the level of discourse, but I've been in far worse places that Saidit. I think one of the main issues right now is how the front page is constantly being manipulated. With more interesting content people have more themes to talk about. This is something that can be countered by the community itself, just group upvote the good posts, it would make the job of the shills way harder. However, /u/magnora7 something needs to be done to repress the accounts engaging in vote manipulation. I'm not saying that we should just use force right away but something needs to be done about it. What do you think we can do to help as a community? Recently socks and/or Phoenix was seen by Muskrat engaging in vote manipulation, I'm sure there's something that can be done against that.

[–]magnora7 5 insightful - 3 fun5 insightful - 2 fun6 insightful - 3 fun -  (8 children)

I agree this is a problem, and why a forum that has no votes but still uses the reddit format may be a new thing to try on the next forum.

The fake upvoting problem is an issue, and the real deal is these people have infinite IP addresses and can spoof their browser credentials. I've made scripts that detect activity like logging in and out to too many accounts too quickly, but even these rules can only block a certain IP. And if they have a completely different IP address every single time they make a page request, then there is literally no way to block them.

We at least have it fixed so when a user is banned from saidit, their votes go away as well, which helps remove the effects of vote manipulation. But the reality is, they just keep creating accounts with unique credentials each time, and so I have no way to differentiate those accounts from the accounts of regular users other than the behavior of the account... I have done some work developing algorithms good at detecting accounts that vote too quickly all together on a the same post or comment, and then autobanning all those accounts. But the result is they just make 10 more new accounts every time. This has been going on for years and I'm honestly not sure how to better engage it than we already are. I am open to suggestions, but also the amount of programming work necessary to get marginal improvements on this issue is rather steep.

We also built the block buttons, so posts by known troublemakers can be blocked by the users. We've really given the issue a fair shot many times over, but the real problem is that the vote system will exist to gamed in the first place. Another idea I had is to make a forum that limits the number of IP addresses a user can have, using the fact that the browser credentials and IP are randomized every time as a giveaway to shill activity. The problem is many VPNs mimic this behavior as well so it's again tough to differentiate between shills and normal users. Which is of course what they are trying to do, to pretend to be normal users while hijacking the information stream.

I think the real answer is a no-vote forum, where the threads are sorted by who left the last comment, old school style. But even this can be hijacked with enough volume. I really hate to say it but the text-based forum is in trouble because I have been thinking seriously for 5 years about this issue and I don't have a better solution than what we currently have. So many forums have failed because of it. Any better solution requires a team of people working 24/7 to monitor each post and comment individually as it arises, which is a ridiculous amount of work that requires a ridiculous amount of money. We have 10 volunteer content admins which helps but it only goes so far.

Anyway, if people have ideas, I'm listening.

[–]HibikiBlack 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (7 children)

That's fine dude. I'm just thinking about creating larger mod teams so you don't have to deal with the whole mess alone. Have people interact and keep an eye on bad faith users, and be more active when it comes to upvoting the good stuff. That way the community can regulate itself. We have defeated socks/Phoenix in this fashion already and I'm sure we'll do it again.

[–]magnora7 3 insightful - 2 fun3 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 2 fun -  (6 children)

Thanks. I think we are doing alright overall too but there's always room for improvement. Having 10 content admins like saidit does is helpful. The real danger to having too many content admins is that one of the shills infiltrates an admin position. I think we've avoided this so far, but it's tough.

[–]HibikiBlack 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (5 children)

If you see giving room to content admins as dangerous, well It's just a matter of trying to create communities so that everyone can contribute to detecting and punishing shills.

Take some advice and don't do the same thing I did by trying to solve everything alone.

[–]magnora7 3 insightful - 2 fun3 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 2 fun -  (4 children)

well It's just a matter of trying to create communities so that everyone can contribute to detecting and punishing shills.

That's called reddit votes, and it's already proven that system is far too easy to hijack.

The fact I already took on 10 content admins shows I'm not trying to do it alone.

[–]HibikiBlack 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

That's fine just remember we have your back too.

[–]magnora7 4 insightful - 2 fun4 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 2 fun -  (2 children)

Thanks, I appreciate you all that help saidit be the best it can be

[–]HibikiBlack 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Look at me promoting Saidit in the comment section:

https://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/wrrblb/the_wef_is_losing_the_online_information_battle/iku6vvi/?context=3

I'm more hyped than ever dude so you keep yourself strong too. That goes to our brother d3rr as well.

[–]magnora7 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I do see you telling people about saidit and it's awesome to have your help. Saidit has definitely grown because of your continued work, and the work of many others who share links and tell others about saidit.