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[–]Tom_Bombadil 8 insightful - 1 fun8 insightful - 0 fun9 insightful - 1 fun -  (4 children)

This is an interesting statement.

One thing that I respect about SaidIt, is that it doesn't have a downvote.
This is a crucially important feature, because it prevents nefarious agents from suppressing popular ideas that resonate with many people.
Ideas are dangerous to those who benefit from the status quo.

The main methods of controling information in up-vote only forums are:

  • Controlling the terms of a debate through the comments section
  • Forum sliding (also controls the debate)
  • Vote reduction
  • Vote/voter influence/suppression
  • Others?

Please make suggestions to this list if you are aware of other methods of manipulation

Some may have noticed that I comment here regularly. I read many submissions, videos, articles, and other people's comments.

I haven't noticed any SIGNIFICANT inaccuracies in any submissions. However, I could have overlooked something.

Has anyone else noticed any inaccurate submissions?

I find any encouragement by others to change their voting preferences to be extremely suspicious.
Well intentioned, or otherwise.

As the SaidIt community grows, we should expect outside agencies to take notice of this site.

These groups will attempt to influence members behavior in various ways; always under the guise of well-intentioned recommendations.

My two cents.

[–]wizzwizz4[S] 4 insightful - 2 fun4 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 2 fun -  (1 child)

This is also significant. Though individuals could also do this – one of the wonders of the internet is that you don't have to be a three-letter agency to act like one.

Ironically, your comment is likely to prevent people from voting on this PSA because they've followed its advice and read your comment which suggests against it… (My head's starting to hurt.)

There are three modes of influence I can think of:

  • Post
  • Comment
  • Recommendation

This proposal reduces the influence of posts slightly, in favour of comments, but also makes recommendations potentially more influential as people will become more accustomed to them.


Examples of stuff that reached the top of the front page but the comments disagree with:

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

This meme reached the top yesterday with a lot of controversy: /s/conspiracy/comments/k3o/saidit_keeps_getting_nonsense_frontpage/

[–]JasonCarswell 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

If you believe in one side of the left-right paradigm then you might be able to claim there are comments "biased-beyond-reality or fabricated outright".

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

That is certainly a possibility.
In that circumstance, evidence should be requested; and honestly evaluated on it's merits.

Conversely, there are some who comment to influence the discussion and steet it away from popular ideas, to avoid the appearance of a consensus on popular issues.
They are not honestly commenting, and they do not honestly consider evidence.