Intel open sourced Stephen Hawking's speech system - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.msdn.com/b/cdndevs/archive/2015/08/14/intel-just-open-sourced-stephen-hawking-s-speech-system-and-it-s-a-net-4-5-winforms-app.aspx <comment><USER2> Fun fact: the latest version of this software uses SwiftKey under the hood - [http://swiftkey.com/en/blog/swiftkey-reveals-role- professor-...](http://swiftkey.com/en/blog/swiftkey-reveals-role-professor- stephen-hawkings-communication-system/) (Disclaimer: I used to work for SwiftKey)

<comment><USER3> As a loyal SwiftKey on Android user, the prediction engine for SwiftKey is unnervingly good. Glad to see it's put to a better use than helping me write Facebook and HN posts.

It begs the question though, why isn't there a proper SwiftKey keyboard for Windows? The OSK on 8.1 is awful compared to SwiftKey on Android. The Windows 10 is a improvement, but I'd still pay for a better one.

<comment><USER4> Have they improved performance of SwiftKey? I had the paid version for years, was even a VIP (won a t-shirt and everything), but I switched off last year in favor of Fleksy as a faster, more lightweight alternative.

<comment><USER5> I think the performance of Swiftkey improved about half a year ago. But I think around the same time I started noticing a significant drop in Swiftkey's accuracy. It "feels" less accurate to me than it was, although I use it with 3 enabled languages at once and I imagine that also brings lower accuracy by default. Still, I think it has become quite a bit worse than before, and I worry they did that on purpose as a compromise to improve performance.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Bear in mind this project was started around the same time there was a ton of uncertainty around the future of Silverlight and WPF. Alas, one did die, one lives on for now. But nobody knew that at the time, including Intel, or apparently Microsoft. WinForms has never faced any forward compatibility uncertainty so it is a good long-term bet.

<comment><USER7> You mean Silverlight died? I've seen that said over the years, but:

A) Microsoft still mantains and updates silverlight.

B) It's mentioned as one of the components of Windows 10[1].

So I'm really confused here as whether Microsoft will kill it already, or keep it alive. They seem to be willing to kill it[2][3], but Netflix alone is enough reason to keep it alive.

[1] [https://www.microsoft.com/en- us/privacystatement/default.asp...](https://www.microsoft.com/en- us/privacystatement/default.aspx)

[2] [http://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/microsoft-wont- includ...](http://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/microsoft-wont-include- support-for-silverlight-in-windows-10-edge-browser/)

[3] [http://www.windowscentral.com/microsoft-confirms-its-new- edg...](http://www.windowscentral.com/microsoft-confirms-its-new-edge-browser- wont-support-its-silverlight-player)

<comment><USER8> Netflix supports HTML5, they don't "need" Silverlight. [https://gigaom.com/2014/11/26/netflix-silverlight- chrome/](https://gigaom.com/2014/11/26/netflix-silverlight-chrome/) [https://help.netflix.com/en/node/23742](https://help.netflix.com/en/node/23742)

<comment><USER7> Running Firefox 41 and it still loads the Silverlight plugin and explicitly asks for it if disabled... Also, Netflix needing Silverlight drove the development of Pipelight for Linux: [http://pipelight.net/cms/about.html](http://pipelight.net/cms/about.html)

It got my attention that Chrome supports HD "up to" 720p, unlike the rest that get up to 1080p. Why would that be?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> WinForms is still a great way to write desktop software if you don't need all the features of WPF, I just started a new project with it and have been really productive.

<comment><USER10> WinForms is _not_ simple. There are so many core classes that have counterintuitive edge-cases and overcomplicated behavior, and so many things you'd expect to work by default don't.

Databinding is a complete trainwreck, the Combo-box class is horribly overcomplicated by its double-duty as text-entry and drop-down-list, the DataGridView is a complete beast of leaky abstractions, and the layout engine completely falls apart if somebody alters the DPI unless you obsessively test DPI alterations yourself.

I don't blame Microsoft for any of this - it was 2000 and they were making a wrapper around some terrifying legacy code.

But this thing should have been tossed in the dustbin of history a long time ago.

<comment><USER11> Sure. But - serious question - what offering from Microsoft would you replace it with?

<comment><USER10> I keep using it because I'm used to all its warts and idiosyncracies. So I don't know what properly-supported alternative one should use. I just get annoyed how many brand-new fresh-out-of-college developers I meet that use it. They need something better.

<comment><USER11> Having used both WPF and Silverlight until 2010 (at which point I abandoned the Microsoft stack altogether) I agree, but I don't think the answer is either of those technologies.

Have you tried building GUI apps in Racket? That's the sort of thing I was wishing for when using either Java or .NET to build Windows GUIs.

<comment><USER10> I've done some academic intro-to-FP stuff in Racket, but haven't really got my feet wet with a non-toy application in it. So the GUI framework is good?

<comment><USER11> Yup. I haven't built anything of significance in it (yet) but it's proved really easy to learn, and (again, in my limited experience) rock-solid stable and fast enough:

A trivial example:

      #lang racket
      (require net/url
               racket/gui/base
               racket/sandbox)

      (define (menu-file-exit-click item control)
        (exit 0))

      (define frame
        (new frame% [label "Demo"] [height 480] [width 640]))

      (define menu
        (new menu-bar% [parent frame]))

      (define menu-file
        (new menu% [parent menu] [label "&File"]))

      (define menu-file-exit
        (new menu-item% [parent menu-file] [label "E&xit"] [callback menu-file-exit-click]))

      (send frame show #t)

... is all you need to create a basic GUI app with a File -> Exit menu option. And that really is all there is - no resource compilation, no code-behind, no separate languages for expressing the UI and the actions connected to it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Discussion of a previous article, focusing on the difficulties during the development of ACAT and tailoring it towards Stephen Hawking: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8686757](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8686757)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Github repository: [https://github.com/01org/acat](https://github.com/01org/acat)

</comment><comment><USER13> To everyone who's interested and programming and are thinking; what should I do/program? I'm sure there are a lot of small things or applications you can do to help other people in need. See it as a learning experience and something that might have a huge impact in other peoples life, how's that for a motivator for something to do? Kudos and respect to all people behind this project and to Stephen Hawking himself.

</comment><comment><USER14> My mom had ALS, and used single-switch input for a while, after typing and writing on paper weren't possible. She wrote out little notes about what she was thankful for, prayers, practical messages (she had Type 1 diabetes, and told folks her insulin doses), and recipes this way. Eventually she had to switch to giving messages to a human holding a letter board by looking towards them for 'yes' and away for 'no'\--cameras or Hawking's infrared-laser-based system weren't really feasible.

We looked at some software called EZ Keys from a company called Words Plus. (I don't think she used it specifically, at least for long--I know she used another program, a DOS-based one called Living Better that ran in 40-col. mode that I can't anything about on the Internet.) EZ keys looked more or less like Intel's thing -- scan rows, scan items in a row, completions/predictions over at left. It even had an option to use a frequency-sorted keyboard like the Intel one, with the common letters pushed to the top left (since those are the first rows/cols to be scanned). Hawking apparently used EZ Keys, so it's possible the Intel folks intentionally gave their thing a similar interface to make the transition easy.

It is worth remembering that no user cares if it's WinForms or whatever. Some folks might like a nicer voice if they haven't gotten used to theirs like Hawking ;), but the main concern is just getting the message across. Intel seems to have worked on the right stuff: better prediction (Presage [http://presage.sourceforge.net/](http://presage.sourceforge.net/), which looks interesting) and context-sensitive controls. The infrared-laser-based input method sounds cool, too.

This is a neat space: an optimization/prediction problem where improvements can be a significant help to someone. (There are also practical optimizations that don't have much to do with the general word-prediction problem: sometimes people have to say things about their care, food, etc., or generic 'hi' and 'bye', and it's good if those are fast.) A Web page or Chrome extension can do a lot--how close can you get to smoothly operating the Web with just the spacebar? the arrow keys and Enter? or plain old typing, but slowed down and using 0-9 for completions?

I've heard that nowadays, people with communication trouble and enough movement use text-to-speech on mobile gadgets with their nifty and highly refined predictive input and that's awesome.

</comment><comment><USER15> Thinkpad love there as well. His "custom" computer appears to be an X220 tablet in an enclosure.

<comment><USER16> Would make sense, easily available commodity hardware that is reliable and in a decently small form-factor.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Is there Hawking's speech synthesis at all (there was an article that his voice is based on some hardware device [http://www.wired.com/2015/01/intel- gave-stephen-hawking-voic...](http://www.wired.com/2015/01/intel-gave-stephen- hawking-voice/) )? I understand it's "just" a "navigation" system (replacing the mouse and keyboard with the facial movement virtual key). If it's so, the title (the " _speech_ system") is misleading.

The project also doesn't use SwiftKey but

[https://github.com/01org/acat](https://github.com/01org/acat)

"Presage, an intelligent predictive text engine created by Matteo Vescovi."

<comment><USER18> @acqq: Shameless plug. This doesn't seem to have speech. However, I've tried to build a text to speech synthesizer in www.voiceclonr.com. Appreciate if you could try and leave feedback.

<comment><USER17> If I understood correctly the open-sourced version uses as an example the Microsoft's Speech API. Searching for which I find the gems like this:

[https://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/details/...](https://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/details/664196/system- speech-has-a-memory-leak)

"System.Speech has a memory leak - by eoghanoh

Status: Closed as Won't Fix"

I see your work is based on [http://hts.sp.nitech.ac.jp/](http://hts.sp.nitech.ac.jp/) Can you tell us what are your changes?

Edit: I see HN already commented your work:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9812734](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9812734)

<comment><USER18> So much developer rage in that Status :) On the HMM stuff, it was pretty much the baseline code from the link. The things I recall experimenting were more about getting it done faster (threading some training phases, different gcc options during synthesis etc).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> If anyone is considering downloading this to use his voice to annoy your best friend John with things like "Hello, my name is Steven Hawking. The universe is big, but not as big as John's mother.", let it be known that this software doesn't sound like Hawking.

</comment><comment><USER20> Presage is great, but to clarify some other comments - it doesn't involve any specific dataset, like SwiftKey - it simply does nice smoothed predictions when given a large database of n-grams (groups of words) and their frequencies. It's fairly easy to chop up a corpus into n-grams using NLTK or other tools, and there's a good port for Python called Pressagio.

My startup Spoken - [http://spokenaac.com](http://spokenaac.com) \- uses n-gram predictions to help users with aphasia or other language disorders speak. The user interface challenges aren't quite as intense as Stephen Hawking's binary input, but it's an interesting field if you're into design and big data.

</comment><comment><USER21> Forcing a disabled man to use Internet Explorer. Surely this is the basest form of cruelty.

</comment><comment><USER22> Now security researchers will analyze the code to find vulnerabilities to exploit Stephen Hawking's speech system. Next headline Stephen Hawing's voice sounds like Justin Bieber's voice, lol.

</comment><comment><USER23> The code in the GitHub repository [1] is pretty interesting to look around in.

[1] [https://github.com/01org/acat](https://github.com/01org/acat)

</comment><comment><USER24> Does it make sense to be more aggressive in predicting by giving the user a second level from which to choose? For example, if he types 'b', then it could offer to type 'black' or 'black hole'.

On the iPad, for example, if I type 'f', I get shown 'for', then if I accept, I always see 'example' and 'instance'.

<comment><USER25> I believe there is a predictive typing keyboard based off of Tries that is floating around out there for one of the mobile OSes.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Amazon passwords: [https://github.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=filename%3Aaws.ym...](https://github.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=filename%3Aaws.yml&type=Code&ref=searchresults)

</comment><comment><USER27> .Net WinForms? No wonder it sounds so bad.</comment>


YouTube to Remove Thousands of Videos Pushing Extreme Views - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/05/business/youtube-remove-extremist-videos.html <comment><USER3> I'm starting to think that comment sections on news sites are a really bad idea. At first I thought NPR and the like were cowards for removing theirs.

It's bad enough that NYT can be pretty biased on its own, but the comment sections are always full of low-tier thinking that just push whatever narrative is currently in the Overton window.

What I find distressing is how people remark that a telecom and advertising giant acting as a de facto government over the public square isn't a violation of free speech principles because they're a "private business", as if that's an original thought that's profound. Funny how people say "it's a private business" when it suits their own political interests.

We wouldn't blindly allow company-owned cities or states to pass laws, especially vague or undefined ones, that potentially violate our rights, so why do we allow "states" in _cyberspace_ to be run in such a way?

Ban people promoting violence? Sure, why not. I'm as against hate and violence as the next person. But not only is censoring "hate speech" becoming a slippery slope at the company level, it's bad for the public in general because it sets a greater precedent for what the big corporations that run our everyday lives can tell us what we can or cannot do, and with _no forgiveness_. I don't find it hard to imagine a world where individuals can be _instantly_ and _permanently_ banned from doing everyday things, just like they are on YouTube, because they said or did something off the platform.

<comment><USER4> Is a privately owned museum a "public square"? Or a sports stadium owned by a private company? Or a Cinema? Or a threatre? No, neither is youtube.

It's a place the public visit not a piece of public infrastructure. Repeating "public square" over and over again does not make it so.

<comment><USER5> On the other hand, a privately owned shopping mall is legally a "public square" in a number of states in the US, with the justification that it is explicitly a place for people to gather and interact, just like the main street of a town in the 19th century.

Which of these cases is Youtube more like? It's already hard to tell, and it's continuing to change. I expect the legal status of online forums to evolve over the next several decades, just like the legal status of brick-and-mortar spaces has evolved over time.

<comment><USER6> >On the other hand, a privately owned shopping mall is legally a "public square" in a number of states

Even then, it does not mean that those malls should allow anyone to sell wares. What it means it allows people to visit without discrimination on basis of legally protected classes like gender and race. YouTube banning a channel does not ban individual from watching videos, it prevents them from uploading videos which is akin to setting up stores.

<comment><USER5> > What it means it allows people to visit without discrimination on basis of > legally protected classes like gender and race

No, the "public square" designation specifically allows people to do things like come to the mall and set up political protests and whatnot. It's not about _access_ to the mall; it's about speech protections.

Is uploading videos more akin to setting up a store at the mall, or more akin to standing on a soapbox at the mall and giving a political speech? It probably really depends on the video, on whether the video is being monetized, etc.

In particular, I feel there is an important distinction between demonetization and removal here, from an ethical/moral perspective. I can't speak to the legal perspective; I am not a lawyer.

<comment><USER7> One flaw in the analogy is that physical space is limited and difficult for a person to move around in. The digital space is effectively infinite, and switching is as easy as typing in a new url (compared to the physical challenge of moving to another state/region).

<comment><USER5> There are all sorts of flaws in the analogies here; that's why they're analogies, not identities.

That said, I'm not quite sure I understand your point. A speaker in physical space can pretty easily take their speech elsewhere; most obviously to the nearest public street corner. So moving away from a private venue typically does not require anything nearly as drastic as "moving to another state/region".

I'd really like to understand your point and how it applies to both the mall and youtube situations, though, and would appreciate you explaining it if you have the time.

<comment><USER7> The crux is that digital space is infinite -- anyone can create a space for their own speech. In the physical world, people own very little space, and free speech almost always needs to impose on someone else's property. I think because of that, any comparisons between online speech and IRL speech are inherently flawed and not very useful.

<comment><USER5> Thank you, that explanation helps.

I think there's a difference between "you can speak" and "you can speak in such a way that interested people can hear". The former is not very useful in terms of the right people usually think of as "freedom of speech"; the limiting case of it in the physical world is "you can speak, but only in your own home". So what, if anything, makes for an online version of the public square, where one can go to present speech for consideration by others?

Also, I think online speech is more similar to physical-world speech than you make it out to be. You can't speak online without "imposing" on your hosting provider, their ISP, etc. If you self-host, you "impose" on your own ISP (and probably violate their ToS, if you have a residential connection). You "impose" on your domain registrar. These are all private entities, so you have the same sorts of issues as you allude to for the physical world. And these private entities have been known to restrict the speech of people relying on their services, so this is not a hypothetical risk.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> What I find funny about all this is that I'm certain if YouTube existed a few decades earlier we would likely be under pressure to ban "disgusting" pro-LGBT content or content supporting things as "vile" as interracial relationships.

We would say, these private companies have a duty not to radicalise our children. That our children are being led away from god and into sinful lifestyles like homosexuality.

Some of us would welcome our views being censored by a few execs in silicon valley because we would see them defending the moral values of the status- quo...

Surely I'm not the only one who feels it might be a little short sighted to give a handful of billionaires like Zuckerberg control over what we can and can't express in the 21st century?

If we're so concerned and don't want to see content we morally disagree with, why can't we have family friendly modes?

I for one am glad we were all radicalised to support the "homosexual agenda". I'm glad we were radicalised by people like MLK to resist racism. And sure, there were some extremists along the way who took it upon themselves to commit acts of terrorism for the "greater good", but we understood these people were rare and this was the unfortunate, but necessary cost of liberty.

So before we continue too far down this road, are we certain we have all the answers now? If someone can be banned from social media sites for stating biological (but perhaps unfortunate) facts such as, "trans women aren't women" are we completely sure we'll get mass censorship right this time?

It might be worth remembering vast majority of us hold one or two "extreme views" that others find morally offensive.

Edit: Not that I should have to, but for those who are suspicious of my motives, I'm a left-wing, pro-LGBT, anti-racist type of guy.

<comment><USER9> I don't think the analogy fits. Those individuals are protected classes and refusing them access like this would be discriminatory behavior. Likely not illegal in USA but it would be illegal elsewhere.

Racists are not a protected class of people. They aren't afforded those same rights. And on some grounds their disruption of society actually puts an onus on you as a platform to restrict their access.

<comment><USER10> They weren't protected classes when the political pressure would have been against them.

"Protected class" basically means politically favored group, and as GP points out, that changes.

<comment><USER9> Yes it does, but to attempt and claim that White Supremacy could ever be considered a "protected class" is absurd.

This isn't my bias speaking here, this is a contextual reality, the world has constraints and there isn't any iteration of what we have that would allow this reality to evolve.

The only wiggle room you have here is on free speech grounds but we have already figured out, that this does not apply here.

<comment><USER11> Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights is already include ideological and philosophical views as protected.

To quote the EU court: " _the Court held that "A fair balance of personal rights made it necessary to accept that others' thought should be subject to a minimum of influence, otherwise the result would be a "strange society of silent animals that [would] think but ... not express themselves, that [would] talk but ... not communicate, and that [would] exist but ... not coexist."_

It basically comes down to the idea that people have a freedom to express a religion _or_ belief, and its the later word which has in the courts view a much larger scope as it also covers ideology and philosophy. A belief can be anything from the view that men are more violent than women, or that immigrants are more violent than natively born.

The US has generally a much narrower definition for protected classes, but there are three states that consider political affiliation as protected class. California, D.C., and New York, where the later protect against discrimination because of political activity. ([https://www.legalmatch.com/law- library/article/political-aff...](https://www.legalmatch.com/law- library/article/political-affiliation-discrimination.html))

All that said, protected class is unlikely going to work on a youtube video. If youtube wanted to ban all non-white non-christian people they likely could do so, as people in videos are not employees of youtube and thus are not covered by the anti-discrimination protection.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> You ever been to a legit protest? Have you been near the police line at a protest when there are thousands of protesters and hundreds of police officers and tensions are high and really not nice stuff is being said all around? And the police officers just stand there at the ready. (Sometimes they don't and they antagonize protestors or just plain assault then, but my experience has been that is the exception.) I have immense, enormous, huge respect for those officers. Sometimes the individual officers personal beliefs align with the protesters. Sometimes not. But they stand there. Just stand there. If things get violent then they shut things down. But a lot of times it feels like things don't get violent because they are there and people know they will shut it down if things get violent. That's what I want YouTube to be. YouTube should be the public infrastructure that is available for people to gather and exchange ideas upon, such that most people don't even give a second thought to the importance of having public streets available to protest on, and the police are there when the law is broken or unprotected speech is spoken. That is it. The job doesn't pay well. It's not a glorified role. And it's prob pretty miserable when things get heated. But it's a beauty to behold when you step back from it all and take it in and see what is happening.

<comment><USER13> I don't know if this is what you meant, but that's what youtube is doing now. They've decided that these neo-Nazi videos are causing violence, so they've stepped in to remove those bad actors for the sake of everyone else.

<comment><USER14> > They've decided that these neo-Nazi videos are causing violence

I've decided that your comment causes violence towards people inclined to believe in freedom.

And so does Antifa, BLM, third wave feminists.

When do we start banning them? And are you "ok" with having someone else randomly labelling your speech as something "causing violence"?

No? Then if it's not ok to do to you, why is it ok to do upon others?

<comment><USER13> I don't think you're running a video hosting platform - and if you are, I'd be inclined not to use it.

You're also welcome to take your business elsewhere, if you wish YouTube had more Nazis on it.

<comment><USER14> The problem here is not real Nazis.

It's that leftists are increasingly categorising reasonable discourse and arguments they don't agree with as "extremist right wing propaganda" (or just Nazis), and based on that get accounts defunded or banned.

The left is widening their already rampant use of censorship.

Allowing one side to dictate what the other is allowed to say is generally not good for a democracy.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> That's fine if we can agree on what is an "extreme view".

YouTube has already decided that academic software vulnerability exploitation proof-of-concept videos are "dangerous content", which results in video removal and a strike on your account.

<comment><USER16> An extreme view is anything that may reduce income by making advertisers leave.

<comment><USER17> Correction: Anything that can be reasonably argued to make a layperson believe that it has the potential to make advertisers leave.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Here is the actual blog post: [https://youtube.googleblog.com/2019/06/our- ongoing-work-to-t...](https://youtube.googleblog.com/2019/06/our-ongoing-work- to-tackle-hate.html?m=1)

Main points:

>Removing more hateful and supremacist content from YouTube

I think this is great, I see nothing of value being lost from channels whose whole schtick is to marginalize people's of a target group.

>Reducing borderline content and raising up authoritative voices

I do like attempts to curtail outright scams and misinformation, but don't like YouTube choosing "top channels" as voices of authority.

>Continuing to reward trusted creators and enforce our monetization policies

I think this shows what drives YouTube and many other platforms, what is and isn't advertiser friendly. Principles only go as far as the bottomline.

<comment><USER19> > > Removing more hateful and supremacist content from YouTube

> I think this is great, I see nothing of value being lost from channels whose > whole schtick is to marginalize people's of a target group.

Who gets to pick what's 'hateful' and 'supremacist' though? Did you think of that?

<comment><USER13> Google. Is this a trick question or something?

<comment><USER20> More specifically, the political party with the most supporters at Google (currently democratic party, but could change)

<comment><USER21> They gave slightly more to republicans last time around: [https://www.opensecrets.org/pacs/pacgot.php?cycle=2018&cmte=...](https://www.opensecrets.org/pacs/pacgot.php?cycle=2018&cmte=C00428623)

<comment><USER20> Yeah but that doesn't tell you anything about the party alignment of employees.

1 rich republican Google employee donating $500K vs 100 middle class democrat Google employees donating $4K will yield those results you posted, yet the demographics would indicate 1% republican.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Will YouTube also remove their algos that send people down rabbit holes of "extreme views" and encapsulate individuals in information bubbles that seem to validate and fail to challenge their views?

The platform should shoulder as much or more blame than the content in this case. Free speech man. This is not ok.

<comment><USER22> >and encapsulate individuals in information bubbles that seem to validate and fail to challenge their views?

Err, how do you know that the algorithm does this? And also, how do you know that people are not exposed to other views outside of YouTube. And lastly, why do you think its the job of an entertainment platform to "challenge" views?

<comment><USER23> > Err, how do you know that the algorithm does this?

Youtube optimizes for watch time. Most people don't want to spend their afternoons having their views challenged.

Any algorithm that properly optimizes for watch time of the masses will learn to validate views.

<comment><USER22> Right, we can all speculate. I'm asking for some objective proof, if any such is available. We can only propose a solution if we first demonstrate that the problem is real.

<comment><USER23> I don't want to assume bad faith, but I have the impression that you are arguing just for the sake of arguing.

What about my statement is speculation?

• Youtube themselves state that they optimize for watch time.

• I don't want to go and search for papers on this, but I don't think the idea that people prefer to have their views validated instead of challenged is in any way controversial or speculation.

• It's also not speculation to state that people want to spend their time doing things that gives them positive emotions.

You clearly won't get "objective proof" on this, because the only way to actually proof this would be to do a formal study on it. And why would anyone to a study on such an obvious non-controversial topic?

<comment><USER22> Maybe it seems confrontational to you but, I don't think "how do you know this" is the same as "can you make a reasonable guess". I don't want to have a personal back and forth with you on this, because it doesn't serve any purpose.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Give your worst political enemy the power to decide what is "hate speech" and what is "disinformation" and then you'll realize that free speech isn't something we should ever compromise on. - Naval Ravikant

</comment><comment><USER25> I strongly disagree banning anyone or any video that does not call for violence. I think it's a slippery slope and smacks of book banning. The information is out there, right or wrong. Who is it to judge what the public should see?

<comment><USER26> YouTube is in charge of what they serve on their site. That's your answer right there.

<comment><USER27> I'll never understand this reductionist argument. Yes, YouTube/Facebook/Salesforce/etc can do whatever they want. That doesn't mean that it's good for society or that it's not worth talking about.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> We're not talking about the removal of extreme political views. We're talking about the censorship of one particular ideology. Where is the corresponding elimination of polarizing videos espousing views from the radical left?

A wholesale expunction from one end of the spectrum is hard not to interpret as politically charged censorship. Let's see how many Antifa and BLM videos get taken down.

<comment><USER29> > We're not talking about the removal of extreme political views.

Yes we are.

You are implying equivalence where there is none. Black Lives Matter and Antifa are not equivalent to white supremacists.

<comment><USER28> You're arguing with the least interesting part of my point.

Just watch how many radical left videos get removed, irrespective of what group posted them.

<comment><USER29> You appear to not be understanding my point. The videos being removed are not some "radical right" that serves as the opposite of your definition of "radical left". They are "channels that advocate for neo-Nazism, white supremacy and other bigoted ideologies". BLM, Antifa, etc. are not the "left" equivalent of these "right" viewpoints.

<comment><USER30> As someone who finds them both distasteful and hateful; yes, they are very similar. All sides need to reign in their extremists, or become defined by them.

<comment><USER31> Black Lives Matter literally exists to highlight disproportionate police violence against people of color;

not only are they _not_ calling for expelling whites (the "reverse" of what a lot of white nationalists call for), what they are asking for is that people of color be treated by the state enforcement mechanism at parity with white people.

You may find that distasteful, but it is difficult to see what aspect of that is hateful.

From their own website: "We are working for a world where Black lives are no longer systematically targeted for demise."

[https://blacklivesmatter.com/about/](https://blacklivesmatter.com/about/)

I'm only writing all this because it's very important not to let rhetoric like "white nationalists and Black Lives Matter are equivalent"; they're not and it's disingenuous or dishonest to conflate them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Regarding the general phenomenon of removing 'hateful content' from social media platforms (Facebook and Twitter as well) there seem to be primarily two reactions:

1) Good. Hateful content spreads hate and causes it to multiply. We should not allow it to proliferate on the internet.

2) This is censorship. It it is the fault of the individuals watching/reading the hateful media who are to blame for number of views the videos/articles get.

So I wonder: is it really an either/or decision? Is there no third option here? It seems like a classic ethical antinomy. Authority influences people but, at the same time, the authority always needs to be recognized as authoritative by the people who are influenced by it.

</comment><comment><USER33> Why do some people think they're entitled to say what they want on youtube?

<comment><USER34> because it became the de facto place most of non tech-savy people go to to see videos online. They have a huge monopoly on our time and attention and that's extremely disturbing.

Imagine that the electricity company providing electricity policed what kind of devices you can use inside your home (you are allowed to connect a Samsung washer but not a Bosh washer). There would be a lot of outcry.

<comment><USER35> > _They have a huge monopoly on our time and attention and that 's extremely > disturbing._

You mean that you willingly give them control over your time and attention.

<comment><USER34> the issue is not me or you but with the masses of people that don't know // don't care where they give their attention. And that's the huge majority unfortunately.

<comment><USER35> That's their choice. If they don't like YouTube they should boycott YouTube, not leverage the government to force YouTube to host arbitrary videos for free.

<comment><USER36> How do you make small kids boycott YouTube before they gets addicted to it? If so then we can also have people simply boycott drugs and not make it illegal.

<comment><USER35> The same way we prevent small kids from visiting pornhub: through responsible supervision.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> Even as lifelong card-carrying ACLU supporter I don't see why they don't just take down anything they damn well please.

They're a private company and are entitled to have a curatorial viewpoint—and for my particular beliefs culling white suprematists and borderline pedophilic content is a Good Thing.

You're entitled to say whatever you want in this country, but I'm not obligated to broadcast it for you.

<comment><USER19> I think the problem is that they censor views they don't like that aren't breaking any laws, which makes them a PUBLISHER but then they claim they need protections only offered to OPEN PLATFORMS.

They've often claimed in court to be an open / neutral platform, because that comes with legal protections against what your users post - [https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/jul/02/facebook-...](https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/jul/02/facebook- mark-zuckerberg-platform-publisher-lawsuit)

Publishers (like Forbes when people blog on there) on the other hand are responsible for their user posts. I think Facebook / Youtube is more like the Forbe here, so they should be treated legally as a publisher.

<comment><USER38> I cannot find any mention of youtube in the link, it seems to be about facebook.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> I'm not entirely sure that certain large sites have thought through the legal implications of this kind of behavior, and no I'm not talking about "censorship!" or other free speech laws that are applicable to government rather than private entities.

Back during the late 90s all of us working on public websites knew that allowing user-contributed content was a great way to build both community and to increase the sheer amount of content, which increased advertising revenues. But there's a catch to user-contributed content... in order to avoid legal responsibility as a site owner for the user content posted on the site you can't moderate that content directly. The reason for this is the "common carrier" rule.

Common carrier essentially states that as a communications platform you are not liable for the legal implications of the communications that occur on your platform as long as you do not choose to engage in editing or moderating that content. AT&T, for example, was not legally liable for a conversation that occurred on their telephone network even if the conversation involved the commission of a crime (we're plotting a terror attack, a bank robbery, etc.) The reason they were not liable was because they did not monitor the communications on their network and did not cut off a phone call if it sounded like you were planning something illegal, evil, whatever.

The minute you, as the carrier, begin actively moderating the content (as opposed to setting up common universal rules such as site karma or user driven moderation), you are responsible for ALL of that content. You managed to remove 99.99% of all illegal communication? Too bad, you're still on the hook for that 0.01% that you missed.

This does not mean that content may never be removed by the company, it's just that they must do it under the order of a court or applicable government entity... in the same way that AT&T could not tap your phones absent a court order.

Many sites opted not to have user-contributed content due to the potential concerns regarding advertisers or their own brand reputation. Others did allow such content and later removed things such as comments and the like due to the conflict between violating common carrier and the problems that arose with advertisers and/or their brand (see Yahoo Finance comments circa 2002 or so).

</comment><comment><USER40> I know this will be an unpopular opinion, but Youtube can delete whatever they want. It's their site. AFAIK, most people don't have legally binding contracts stating that Youtube must keep all their videos online. Even the big streamers that make money off Youtube have to follow whatever guidelines Youtube come up with. I bet there is wording that says something to the effect of "Subject to revision..." or like that in the AUP.

That said, there is nothing stopping people from creating their own sites, or putting taboo / extreme videos on chan sites, forums, etc... and plonk it down behind Cloudflare or Akamai. i.e. 4chan, 8chan, I mean, you won't find more extreme videos that what get posted there every 90 seconds. In this case, I am not linking to the examples.

</comment><comment><USER41> We talk all the time about the two internets, one of China and one of the rest of the world. But more and more we are seeing a new division arising within America itself of two internets. I can't say how this will play out long-term, but with alternative-media sites rising we may well see two broad forces developing.

<comment><USER42> > ...but with alternative-media sites rising...

That should be happening, but isn't - not to the degree it naturally would. Debanking. Payment processors have been very busy weeding out potential competitors to the big names in SV. I almost want to laugh at the fact that the early cryptocurrency proponents experienced the exact same treatment while building the very thing that would protect those presently being targeted by Visa/Mastercard. I'm still banned from two major banks...

This youtube censorship stuff is going to pale in comparison to the coming wave of debanking. There is a very freaked out class of people who have their hands on the wheel at the moment (especially true at Mastercard), so you can't rely on traditional profit motives to predict behavior - anything is possible. My financial adviser suggested, with a straight face, that I consider a portfolio built around some new social equity index... my account has been self directed ever since.

<comment><USER41> Yes this is absolutely true. But once the cryptocurrencies gain a true grip, along with alternative payment processors, we will really begin to see a true divergence. In some sense, such particulars are the bedrock of the second internet.

<comment><USER42> Maybe. I have no doubt that cryptocurrency use will be common, primarily because it will be necessary in a world dominated by software agents that can't rely on meatspace money, but I'm starting to wonder about likelihood of the original political goal. Wallstreet gave up fighting it after a couple of years, and is presently positioned as the guy selling the shovels in the gold rush, but there is an increasing amount of direct interaction. It seems like they think they'll be able to maintain the present segmented status - which is obviously not going to work. So I expect they'll go full hands on mode once it is obvious that there is no going back. What will that look like? Well every couple of years, since the very beginning, some idiot has tried to start a colored-coin/tainted-coin service - to, you know, think of the children... making the currency worthless after being tainted by activities deemed unacceptable (ransomware, exchange hacks, etc). No matter how many times it is explained that this eliminates the property of fungibility, which is what makes a currency a currency, these people keep popping up. Well wallstreet might be able to make it happen, if they make the move before there is more widespread global adoption.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> What I worry here is that the extremity of a view will vary depending on how close it is to your own beliefs. Extremists don't self identify as extremists, so the question is where does YouTube's temperament lie?

<comment><USER44> We've seen their leaked meeting videos. We know where their temperaments lie.

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> The beginning of the end of YT. "Extreme" is the ultimate slippery slope situation, and Google is unable to articulate respectable, bright-line rules around extremism. I can think of dozens of startups that allow video sharing, and some like streamable seem to have speeds and compute that outperform YT.

</comment><comment><USER46> I said it about facebook and I'll say it again about youtube: zero credit for deciding extremist views like white hate have no place on your platform a decade later.

How many ad dollars did Google make off these videos?

And how much damage did hosting those videos do?

</comment><comment><USER47> How easy is it to shut down decentralized systems like mastodon, ipfs, bitchute etc? because i feel they are going to become quite popular

<comment><USER48> The nuisance model on Mastodon is different. Silos push everyone together in the same space, so you pretty much have to fight to protect your own little corner.

People you might like to remove from your experience will tend to congregate on certain instances favorable to that kind of thinking. You have the power to block that instance at an individual level. There isn't the same impetus to deplatform them because you can just break the link.

I have many (but not all) "free speech" instances blocked because they're packed with users who try to force that perspective on me by (for example) removing content warnings when replying. I don't have to appeal to any authority to enforce my boundaries. Only the owners can decide who has the power to make those decisions on centralized social media sites. That seems to be outsourced moderators with little or no understanding of niche or marginalized communities.

</comment></comment><comment><USER49> Private companies like Google can't be expected to uphold human rights. They will almost always act in their own financial interest. It's up to the citizenry and their elected lawmakers to force them to do what is right.

All it would take is a law that compels public internet services to behave as if they're public services once they start reaching >33% of citizens.

The problem seems to be that a large percentage of citizens don't grasp that important freedoms often have a high price tag. Anyone can see this with the response to second and fourth amendment issues, and the same is becoming true of the first amendment.

Free societies have an inherent amount of chaos. That chaos is the price you pay. People desiring to live in a fully ordered society are unwittingly asking to live in a prison.

</comment><comment><USER50> I'm sure that Google has been waiting for a youtube media panic to pull the trigger on this for a while. They'd prefer to be an on-demand cable channel, and would love to remove _any material controversial to anyone,_ but didn't want censorship to _be_ the story (especially with antitrust stuff going around.)

Google isn't in the video business because it wants people to be able to share videos with each other. Google is in the video business to sell ads. Censoring the illiberal is the way to get to get liberals to support censorship. Announcing manual control over the suggestions is a way to justify steering viewers away from any content, starving it of revenue, and getting it off the platform.

</comment><comment><USER51> So, they're removing _thousands_ of bad videos... _thousands_! Don't worry though, there are many, many other videos just like those on the platform. Your default recommendations are still going to suck.

<comment><USER52> Headline says thousands of videos, story body says thousands of videos _and channels_. I imagine you have to remove only about 20% of the videos/channels to account for 80% of the views.

</comment></comment><comment><USER53> I think the difference is that YouTube /pays these people/. It's almost an employer/employee relationship.

YouTube generates revenue, youtube shares that revenue, contributors with tons of views are making money directly from YT.

This is simply not the same as Twitter, etc. Twitter may make money off of eyeballs. I may somehow make money by becoming twitter famous. But my money is not coming as a share of twitter revenue.

The incentives are all screwed up. YT benefits financially the more 'shocking' my vid can be, and I benefit financially if YT does.

<comment><USER54> If that was the only issue, YouTube can demonetize the content or creator. They already do so for controversial content that advertisers won't abide. The fact remains that people want this content completely gone from YouTube, and preferably the entire internet.

</comment></comment><comment><USER55> For almost all of human history, sharing and persisting information had a pretty high cost. To get something into someone else's head, first you had to verbally tell them. Then you could at least write it once and have it read multiple times. That written work persisted over time longer too, though it required scribes to manually copy them periodically to broadcast it farther.

During all of that time, driving the cost to persist and broadcast information down has been a good thing. The cheaper the better, because it gives more brains access to useful information. I think because of that, we assumed the ideal cost is zero.

In the past several years, I believe we are slowly, painfully, realizing that we were wrong. The web has driven that cost down to practically zero. Any rando can write anything and it will be served on the web to all and sundry in perpetuity.

The problem with that is that it makes it equally easy to broadcast _mis_ -information. What humans need to prosper is access to _good_ information — true facts and useful ideas. Information that helps us take actions that help people.

When there's a non-zero maintainance cost for info, someone has to periodically choose to pay that cost. The scribe has to decide what book to copy. The printer has to decide which pamphlets to re-print. The public access channel has to decide which shows to schedule.

If someone can't be motivated to care about some piece of information enough to do that, it naturally decays and disappears. Like evolution, there's a natural selection process where some memes die. Now, granted, even with a non- zero cost, bad or misinformed actors may choose to further bad information. But I think that happens way more often when the cost to doing so is nil.

So, when you have a non-zero cost, it encourages a certain amount of selection where useful information tends to last longer. At the same time, you don't want the cost too high. When that happens, only the powerful are able to decide what information persists and they choose only information that furthers their own power. Driving the cost down has been, I think, one of the major engines of democracy.

But I do think we've overshot the mark now. In the next several years, it's going to be up to us as a culture to figure out how to effectively deal with the hurricane of misinformation constantly roaring around us. It is, I think, the biggest threat facing human society today.

(You might argue that climate change is a bigger threat. But note that a primary reason we're failing to take sufficient action on climate change is because of misinformation.)

</comment><comment><USER56> I applaud any effort towards deradicalisation, but we need to work towards transparency. My gut reaction to the college board instituting an adversity score, was that it would've disproportionately impacted a guy like me growing up, but I've since come to realize that I'd prefer one entity with a transparent methodology tackling the problems instead of each institution, like Harvard, having an opaque system of their own.

</comment><comment><USER57> Most people are not information or media literate, they don't do their own research to fact-check claims, and they believe any authority who says something similar to what they already believe. The "marketplace of ideas" requires people to put in the effort I describe, effort that they clearly aren't, so the responsibility for checking and enforcing content limitations passes to the platform owner.

If you don't like this outcome, argue for more humanities and social science classes in primary and secondary education to educate society in evaluating claims and the other aspects of information and media literacy.

</comment><comment><USER58> I always find things like this interesting. A short while ago I posted a thread here [1] on a publicly owned service engaging in clear viewpoint discrimination with nary a peep. YouTube, a privately owned service, moves to moderate their platform and all hell breaks loose.

Mind you this isn't an attempt to defend YouTube at all given what they did yesterday but rather that I've always seen the battles over free speech and the bias on HN as being incredibly lopsided.

[1] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19976398](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19976398)

</comment><comment><USER59> My sense is that unless content creators get views for calling out the behavior of other content creators, they risk losing likes and advertising revenue. Then they become the political agenda guy, and no longer the comic book movie critic, chef, video game expert, or theremin playing guy they were trying to portray. I'd like extremism resolved through naming and shaming, a living exile ideally, but I don't think drafting popular YouTubers to do so is completely realistic. Black Mirror, here we come?

</comment><comment><USER60> > The company also said that channels that "repeatedly brush up against our > hate speech policies," but don't violate them outright, would be removed > from YouTube's advertising program

Even their own rules written by them is never enough for censors. They have to invent stuff like "brush up" to extend censorship even further, even when recognizing there's no violation of their own policies, that they themselves wrote. Talk about slippery slope...

</comment><comment><USER61> It would be good if they apply the policy consistently to people in power too, such as politicians. I doubt they will though.

</comment><comment><USER62> Note that it's not extreme views (like my adherence to the FSF).

Nope, we're talking about "videos and channels that advocate for neo-Nazism, white supremacy and other bigoted ideologies".

As much as I don't like censorship, views that advocate for _extermination_ of other people can rightly fuck off.

<comment><USER63> YouTube gets to decide what a "bigoted ideology" is. That's a sweeping term that can be used as a catch-all for videos they don't like.

I think that this will be bad for the platform overall -- an increase in censorship is never good.

<comment><USER13> An increase in censorship is very frequently good.

Consider a discussion forum that never banned any users or removed any spam. It quickly becomes very difficult to have a meaningful discussion when a third of the posts are "CHEEP ROLE X bUY NOW" and another third are racial hatred.

<comment><USER63> Except this is censorship based on political ideologies

<comment><USER13> I thought censorship was never good? Now it's sometimes good except when it's based on "political ideologies," except for whatever example I bring up next, which of course is another exception.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER64> I think the analogies in this case are often extremely accurate ways that people have been getting the point across. I'll add one of my own in just a second. The problem here is not censorship at all, the problem is monopoly. Take the recent Disney acquisition of Fox for example in which in the acquisition they were forced to sell off regional fox sports stations in their purchase. The problem was they were about to have a monopoly on sports TV content. Now look at YouTube which has a near monopoly on ALL user uploaded video content. The problem is an entire industry - user uploaded video - <USER2> consolidated. Peoples incomes, their very livelihoods depend on YouTube. YouTube decides whether individuals succeed or fail with user uploaded video with their recommendations, suggestions, and trending algorithms. Success of individuals depends as much on YouTubes opinion of them as much as on their own abilities to produce content. YouTube itself people wouldn't call a small company, but it doesn't have that many employees... unless you start to count people who upload videos as employees, then they have millions of them, most which work for free until they can make it big. YouTube is the largest employer in the world and their monopoloy on content means their employees have no where else to go when they get banned. This doesn't even scratch the fact that typically we have seen bans done across multiple platforms - Facebook, Twitter, iTunes, Paypal, Patreon. They all ban users simultaneously to silence people and cut their income off. Imagine if the water company decided your speech meant you were too evil to be worth supplying. Well Money is not quiet as necessary as water but it comes close for many people who are working or trying to make it big at YouTube. Hey you can buy water from some other company, they might say, right? Even other large companies are depending on their YouTube videos to succeed and they employ hundreds more people who rely on YouTube. It is clear that their monopoly on user generated video content is what is the true problem. How can their power be weakened is the better question than what should they be censoring. Splitting YouTube from Google and the rest of Alphabet is a start. They likely saw this coming a long time ago and preemptively worked towards this goal with their recent restructuring. How else do you break up a monopoly that was made by user choice? Well in the Disney example they simply split the channels. Force YouTube to split into two or more companies. Whether that means breaking subscribers right now the middle and making two companies or dividing it up into multiple categorical companies then do it. I don't know the best way but I do know their dominance and user lack of choice by virtue of the monopoly is the true enemy, not censorship.

</comment><comment><USER65> Well, not surprising

> The tension was evident on Tuesday, when YouTube said that a prominent > right-wing creator who used racial language and homophobic slurs to harass a > journalist in videos on YouTube did not violate its policies. The decision > set off a firestorm online, including accusations that YouTube was giving a > free pass to some of its popular creators.

For context: [https://www.theverge.com/2019/6/4/18653088/youtube-steven- cr...](https://www.theverge.com/2019/6/4/18653088/youtube-steven-crowder- carlos-maza-harassment-bullying-enforcement-verdict)

</comment><comment><USER66> In my opinion, sites like YouTube that rely on user generated content should drop any pretense of being neutral - they aren't and never have been. What they have been doing is dodging responsibility for being the publisher of racist and harmful material.

I'm sure that YouTube would say that they don't play favorites but even if that were true, as we have seen there are organizations all the way up to nation states that are hell-bent on corrupting platforms like YouTube for their own ends. And they don't require much corrupting.

Moderation is key. Sites like Hacker News work only because of strict moderation by humans. Similar sites without such moderation quickly become a haven for trolls and spam. Automatic systems can always be gamed - what is needed is a strong editorial hand.

I don't want YouTube to end - there are thousands of hours of great content. But if it is to survive it needs to make a choice of what kind of site they want to be. Letting itself be anything its users want is turning it into a cesspit.

<comment><USER19> Google / Facebook are private companies, and they should absolutely be able to pick and choose what is posted on their platform if they want.

However, they SHOULD NOT be able to have it both ways where they censor posts they don't like (like a publisher would do) but enjoy protections afforded to actual open / neutral platforms.

Once you start censoring things that aren't breaking any laws, you're now a PUBLISHER and not an OPEN PLATFORM, so you are responsible for what's posted on your site.

<comment><USER66> Youtube has always been a PUBLISHER. They have never been an OPEN PLATFORM in any real sense.

They have so far managed to shirk responsibility for PUBLISHING hateful content while being amazingly on-the-ball when dealing with copyrighted material.

I am sure YouTube wouldn't put it in these terms, but from the outside it looks like every day they make the editorial decision to enforce copyrights while pushing hate speech. I am sure this makes sense financially.

<comment><USER67> If they are a publisher, then I can sue them for users posting false information about me or putting me in harm's way.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER68> And yet they're not taking down Crowder's homophobic videos??

<comment><USER69> They kinda are over at Twitter: [https://twitter.com/gaywonk/status/1136056663927087105](https://twitter.com/gaywonk/status/1136056663927087105)

They've demonetized Crowder.

> Update on our continued review–we have suspended this channel's > monetization. We came to this decision because a pattern of egregious > actions has harmed the broader community and is against our YouTube Partner > Program policies.

Then they've made some additional confusion by talking about how they'll remonetize him when he removes shirts from the shop (they've presented it as the only requirement to reinstate monetization). At the end, they've doubled down on the first thing they've said:

> Again, this channel is demonetized due to continued egregious actions that > have harmed the broader community. To be reinstated, he will need to address > all of the issues with his channel.

</comment></comment><comment><USER70> Not good. What's "extreme"? Medicare for All? Brietbart News? Islam? Haredi? School shootings? Kim Jong-un? Putin? Trump?

YouTube already tries to transcribe videos to text. Is it within the state of the art to recognize common false statements and superimpose a crawl with counterarguments? One thing you have going for you is that the nuts aren't that original. If you had a classifier that could pick up the 100 best known nutty statements, you could do this.

Is there a startup in this?

<comment><USER71> It's up to the advertisers really, think cable TV. A little bit of edginess, but if it gets crazy a boycott can force an advertiser pull out. We're only a few years away from YouTube turing into cable TV, maybe even the FCC will get involved in making that determination.

Edit: I don't agree that advertisers should be in charge, I just think they will ultimately decide the line between edgy and extreme.

</comment></comment><comment><USER72> From the article: 'The new policy will ban "videos alleging that a group is superior in order to justify discrimination, segregation or exclusion," the company said in a blog post.'

Is this going to include videos that mention "white privilege" (which one could argue alleges superiority of white people) in which white people are asked to "check their privilege" in some way (which one could argue is an attempt to justify exclusion)?

<comment><USER73> > "check their privilege" [...] (which one could argue is an attempt to > justify exclusion)?

If you can make the case, maybe. I mean, it sounds like a kind of insane case to make to me. Who's being excluded, and from what, merely by having their assumptions challenged in a discussion context?

The groups actually being targetted are ones that tend to advocate for the status of the US as an inherently white nation. Sort of an easier sell to my mind.

<comment><USER74> It's not surprising there'd be groups advocating for that. They don't want to become a minority in their country, as both history and current events show that's a bad position to be in.

<comment><USER73> I can't tell if you're making a dispassionate explanation for why hate exists or if you're actually advocating for white supremacists...

<comment><USER74> My intent makes no difference, and the statement isn't limited to whites.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER75> Relevant xkcd (todays): [https://xkcd.com/2159/](https://xkcd.com/2159/)

</comment><comment><USER76> Extreme _political_ views. The title is missing a very important qualifier.

<comment><AUTHOR> I added it, although the it's on the NYT website.

<comment><AUTHOR> The [Political] got removed, not by me.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> You're not pro-LGBT if you think trans women aren't women.

<comment><USER8> This isn't my opinion. I will happily call people by whatever pronoun they wish to be called. That's just common decency in my opinion.

That comment was in reference to this story, it looks like I got the quote wrong: [https://www.nationalreview.com/news/journalist-sues- twitter-...](https://www.nationalreview.com/news/journalist-sues-twitter-for- banning-her-over-women-arent-men-tweets/)

I think there's a difference between how we should recognise someone socially and the reality of an individual's biology. What's worrying here is that stating a biological fact can be viewed as too extreme if it goes against a certain political ideology.

But there are plenty of examples like this. I know people have been kick off of social media for suggesting the Prophet Muhammad was a pedophile, or for discussing racial crime stats. And many of the examples I've seen of this don't appear to be in bad faith either, in fact most seem to be in the interest of honest dialogue. They just had the wrong opinions.

<comment><USER13> "In reality, you're not a woman, we're just pretending because we're polite" isn't a very pro-trans stance.

<comment><USER77> But "trans women cannot (yet?) bear children" shouldn't be an anti-trans stance, either.

<comment><USER13> Is anyone saying otherwise? I haven't heard of anyone being banned for that.

N.B: what somebody says they are banned for and what they were actually banned for often differ.

<comment><USER78> > what somebody says they are banned for and what they were actually banned > for often differ

Based on our experience at HN (not that it generalizes) I'd even say they usually differ.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER79> Good. Online radicalism is a thing.

To all the people here who are decrying this as "censorship", remember that during the early 2010s, Islamic radicals were getting radicalized on YouTube by pretty benign sermons (Ex: Awlaki and his "tour of Paradise" lectures that inspired Boston 2013, fort hood and a bunch of other international attacks). YouTube removed all that out and I think Muslims getting radicalized on YouTube plummeted.

White supremacy is a much bigger deal with a worse tail risk than Islamic extremism. Don't see why anyone would object to removal of Neo nazi content yet go along with the removal of wahabi sermons.

<comment><USER80> > White supremacy is a much bigger deal with a worse tail risk than Islamic > extremism.

Wait... you're saying that white supremacy is worse than islamic extremism? Is you opinion perhaps a manifestation of your perspective? I'm sure there are some people in Syria, Afghanistan, etc... that would disagree with you.

BTW, I'm not saying one is worse than the other, just that they are both bad, both a problem, and both should be removed from social media.

<comment><USER79> White supremacy was the cause for the worst wars of the 20th century. A white nationalist uprising in Europe would be deadlier (again) than Islamic extremists taking over most middle eastern nations due to the resources that will be available to them.

<comment><USER71> >A white nationalist uprising in Europe would be deadlier (again) than Islamic extremists taking over most middle eastern nations due to the resources that will be available to them.

Reckless speculation considering the latter did happen. You're fearmongering in order to drive censorship and oppression of viewpoints you disagree with.

<comment><USER81> How is he fearmongering? A white nationalist uprising is quite literally relatively recent European history, and resulted in the torture and slaughter of _tens of millions._

Before Al Queda, the West's biggest fear was domestic white nationalist terrorists like Timothy McVeigh.

EDIT: It's very disturbing that so many people don't understand what the Nazi platform was all about. The supremacy of the "Aryan Race" was literally a platform of the Nazi party from the beginning. The subjugation of Jews was a part of the party platform from the beginning. The use of paramilitary squads to enforce ideological purity was a part of the party from the beginning. And it just got _worse_ from there.

<comment><USER27> The battleground was fascism vs. capitalism vs. communism. Fascism was, at it's core, reactionairy to the rise of communism and it's dishonest to describe it simply as "white nationalism".

Furthermore, for a "white nationalist" movement they spent a whole lot of time killing and oppressing other "whites".

<comment><USER51> Fascism was not "reactionary". It was, in many ways, a sibling ideology to 'communism', but with glorification of violence, a broadly "irrational" (i.e. _explicitly_ anti-intellectual, and almost relishing in the use of blatant propaganda as a means of influence) attitude to mass politics and either nationalist or (in the more extreme Nazi version) racially-supremacist ideology as major selling points. "White nationalist" is somewhat inaccurate as you point out but "reactionary" is totally wrong, and Soviet propaganda is the only reason why some people today still think of fascism as "conservative" or "reactionary".

<comment><USER27> > Fascism was not "reactionary"

Fascists gained power in Italy, Germany, and Spain as a direct result of anti- communist sentiment (and in the case of Germany, a failed communist revolution). Mussolini's early writings were directly proposing nationalism as the answer to communism's failures. Everywhere fascism had success it was because it was pitted against the threat of communism. I don't know how the rise of Fascism was anything but reactionary.

<comment><USER81> I agree that facism's rise was tied to nationalism's rise.

But we're talking about the root causes of WWII. And one of the Nazi party's specific goals when invading Poland was to exterminate the Jews and Roma (Gypsy) populations of Europe.

<comment><USER82> > And one of the Nazi party's specific goals when invading Poland was to > exterminate the Jews and Roma (Gypsy) populations of Europe.

Are you sure about that? Wasn't "the final solution" proposed significantly later?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER83> dang, could you please flag this post, people are disagreeing with me here and this post isn't technically stimulating.

I think we should keep politics out of HN at this point, I don't want it to become reddit.

<comment><USER84> How do we deal with cases where a topic is important and relevant both technically and politically? I agree with you generally, but it would also be a big shame if many socially and technically interesting and impactful stories simply could not be found or discussed on Hacker News.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> And here we go. As usual the "racist" pretext is being used to censor videos.

I have no doubt that there are some terrible awful racist videos in that lot but you have to wonder how many times this is ALSO used as a mean to censor pretty much any video that the youtube execs don't like. Censorship is getting worse

Edit: Replacing "Censorship is coming back" with "Censorship is getting worse"

<comment><AUTHOR> No censorship. You are still free to create your own YouTube clone and publish your extreme political views there. Maybe call it "GabTube"?

<comment><USER85> "Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me."

A free society has costs, including tolerating speech you find deplorable. To support censorship because it aligns with your current political leanings makes you no different than the politics you take issue with.

Will you complain if Google mass fires left leaning employees? It's entirely within their right to do. You could even start a competitor to hire those people!

<comment><USER86> This isn't censorship full stop. What you are advocating for is forcing YouTube to carry content that it doesn't want to.

I also think it's grotesque to quote an anti nazi poem in defense of nazis.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER87> "They came for the Nazis and I protested. Then they came for me and it was the Nazis."

Tolerating extreme views is okay as the price for freedom of speech. It does not mean large platforms are obligated to give them megaphones. Some kinds of speech do cause harm far beyond someone getting angry at someone else's views.

</comment><comment><USER88> Hacker News should follow YouTube's lead by nuking this thread. Flagged.

</comment><comment><USER89> It's curious to me that people who were absolutely up in arms about ISPs censoring content are 100% okay with Youtube doing it. Not that I support the views that these videos they're removing espouse (I don't) but it seems to me to be a pretty big about face by this community.

<comment><USER90> Well YouTube isn't a pipe but a platform in spite of its popularity. I can always head someplace else with a website. I can't just switch ISPs casually as entering a different URL.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> If you believe that YouTube unjustly engages in censorship on their platform then boycott YouTube and encourage others to do so. Just because YouTube is popular doesn't mean YouTube is obligated to host your videos for free. In reality, YouTube is unimportant and not something the government should guarantee you access to.

</comment><comment><USER91> There are comments being removed from this thread even though they are not supremacist. People need to wake up to the control of big tech, big govt, etc.

<comment><USER84> Wouldn't that imply that the only reason comments might be removed from Hacker News is if they encourage violent, extremist political ideologies?

<comment><USER92> I'm surprised this post is even still up. HN usually removes anything remotely controversial. A couple weeks ago, they removed a NYT article solely because the article had "White Liberals" in the title.

<comment><USER78> > HN usually removes anything remotely controversial.

That's not close to true. How people arrive at these generalities is beyond me!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER93> As an antifascist I welcome this move, though at the same time I fear the risk of abuse.

FTA: "... and videos denying that violent incidents occurred"

This one seems perfectly tailored to match with the Chinese Govt. negationism about Tiananmen Square events, so that would be generally A-OK for us, but what about videos or comments by police officers denying violent behaviour of their colleagues? Would their videos/comments be axed the same way? Then what about governments lying about civil deaths figures or use of banned weapons in military attacks?

100 Euros and a beer that the rule will be heavily bent case by case.

</comment><comment><USER94> YouTube is a privately owned and operated proprietary delivery platform. This is no different from a TV station deciding what to air. If you don't like it, switch platforms or just host stuff yourself somewhere.

Yes I am concerned that these dragnets will delete a lot of content that doesn't even match the stated criteria. In my experience Google/YouTube's evaluation of content for compliance is not very deep or well considered. It's generally performed by underpaid overworked folks that lack any domain expertise.

This is part of why I am a data packrat. If something is really interesting I snarf it and store it on my personal NAS. Easy to do and means I'll have backups of things that get "disappeared" and can share them with others if needed. If more people did this I think we'd have less of an issue with this.

<comment><USER91> > YouTube is a privately owned and operated proprietary delivery platform.

Are there any public online social platforms? There literally isn't the equivalent of a "public space" online so many view it as a de facto public space.

</comment></comment><comment><USER95> '"Opinions can be deeply offensive, but if they don't violate our policies, they'll remain on our site," YouTube said in a statement about its decision on Mr. Crowder.'

I'm sure those policies will shift stealthily until everything except Baby Shark videos is banned.

Left, right or center politically? But a little too spicy for your average 8-year-old? Banned. Gotta keep the Coca-Cola ad execs happy.

It's a curious hyper-puritanical yet simultaneously secular social order we find ourselves in today. I'm sure this won't lead to any social unrest or civilization-wrecking upheaval.

<comment><USER96> We can always go back to liveleak and vimeo. I think all the youtube I watch would be fine for an 8 year old and I think most of the people who use youtube are the same. The most popular platform should be the most innocuous. But there should be alternatives.

<comment><USER97> _We can always go back to liveleak and vimeo._

Good luck trying to monetize that. Good luck getting viral traction with that. (I will be happy if someone succeeds, because that will be the end of the YouTube monopoly on video commentary.)</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Kind and Green News – HN for animal welfare/rights, clean meat/tech - <AUTHOR> https://news.kindandgreenworld.com/ <comment><AUTHOR> Currently membership is invite-only. Please don't hesitate to ask for an invite. Just let me know the username you would like. Looking to grow the community!</comment>


Ask HN: Why did this shut the entire network down? - <AUTHOR>

When I was in High School I was using the computer lab and noticed an ethernet cable hanging down next to the switch (I think had about ~24 inputs).
 I plugged it in and a couple seconds later the internet for my entire school was down. Not a single computer in the school had internet. The head of IT ran into the room and had no idea what was going on. I unplugged it once I realized that it was my fault the network was down and everything was back to normal almost immediately.
 So my question is: Why did plugging the cord in shut down the internet for the entire school? (I assume that it was already plugged in to the switch and was plugged in again, but it was so messy I couldn't confirm that) <comment><USER2> The cable was probably already plugged into the same switch. You caused a hard-loop.

It was probably an unmanaged switch. An unmanaged switch cannot participate in spanning-tree, and therefore cannot detect the hard loop. Because the loop wasn't detected it caused a broadcast storm, bringing down the network.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you! I don't know much about networks so I'm glad you could answer the question

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Could be a bridge loop, where switches route packets in a circular ring. Spanning-tree-protocol is designed to detect and avoid that problem, but it's not always enabled.</comment>


How to detect if your visitors use Facebook, Google, Amazon and most websites - <AUTHOR> https://www.webdigi.co.uk/demos/how-to-detect-visitors-logged-in-to-websites <comment><USER2> Lol, I am logged into 7 sites!</comment>


Show HN: Live Program Notes for Schubert Sonata in B-Flat - <AUTHOR> https://liveprogramnotes.com/demo.html <comment><USER2> They completely skip over Schubert's patented "quick-cross-over to flat-VI" in the first theme. It's even followed by-- you Schubert fans already guessed it-- a German sixth to sneak back to B-flat. So smooth.

Highlight reel.

Listen to the famous third movement of the String Quintet in C major. Where does it first modulate? You guessed it-- flat-VI. And after he stops on that German sixth chord, where do we go? Well, to G here, but that's just prep for the repeat signs back to-- you guessed it-- C major, baby! Yeah, Schubi ftw!

How bout the Unfinished Symphony in B minor-- where's that 2nd theme? Well ok, it's _regular_ VI there but still... Schubert likes going to VI. It's his signature move. And if I start reading through one of his Lieder at random I bet I don't go 4 pages before hearing another such moment.

I like the idea of realtime notes, but you gotta have a pretty wide context for them to be anything more than an arbitrary collection of trivia for newcomers. That's a nice way of saying if you're a newcomer, you _got_ to listen to _a lot_ of music before things make sense. Just like you can dribble in one square meter of a basketball court and understand the game.

I mean, what could F# minor as a "distant key" possibly mean to a newcomer who hasn't had music theory? Without the context it's the musical equivalent of talking about some new software including "blockchain" technology. Maybe it means something significant. More likely in the context of mid-19th century harmony, it doesn't.

But if put on your Schubert jersey and get a season ticket, ask yourself-- how exactly _is_ F# minor related to anything? Well, we started changing keys earlier by quick move to a sublime melody G-flat major. Any musician will tell you F# is just another way to spell G-flat. Wait a sec: Schubert took us to the _minor_ version of that same key for the second theme. _Minor-flat-VI_. Holy cow!

Austria wins the championship! Austria wins!

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, thanks for this. The modulation to G-flat and then the respelling to f# is absolutely stunning. I debated quite a bit about what to say here. I often dislike program notes that give a harmonic play-by-play, for exactly the reasons you say, but I was hoping to help build an intuition for what a "distant key" might sound like. If they hear it and are told it at the same time, maybe it'll register that it does sound foreign.

But you're right that it's meaningful in the context of the earlier iteration -- I'll give some thought about what can be done here. Perhaps it's another layer or for another audience.

<comment><USER2> I think the main difficulty is the chasm between people who intuitively grasp that music can unfold over time like a novel can, and people who hear music as aesthetically pleasing sounds in no particular order.

If we could somehow flip a switch to make the latter group hear what musical drama is like it would be equivalent to gaining a new sense. Like millions of people sheltered-in-place suddenly realizing they now have free access to tens of thousands of Netflix series written in their native tongue over the past thousand years.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> This is in my opinion one of the greatest piano pieces ever written, but it can be difficult to engage with for the first time, since it really needs careful listening. I wanted to help people unfamiliar with the music to find a way into it, because it's so easy for it to just become background music.

Originally I wrote this to accompany my own live performances, but I think it's perhaps even more useful for helping people stay present with the music when watching online. Would love feedback!

<comment><USER3> This is so successful. Great choice of piece + performance. IMO there are really cool things you could do with the UI. (Like being able to skip back to sections that you reference to remember what they sound like. Also, would be cool if all sections were displayed all the time instead of only showing the current movement.)

Props, I really enjoyed this!

<comment><USER4> Great idea. Adding optional links to videos with scores, when they're are available, would be a welcome addition.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Great performance from Mitsuko Uchida and really nice commentary on the side. It's the first time actually reading text describing the music for this piece, although I have heard it many times. The commentary brings new structure and context to feelings that I have found difficult to articulate before.

I also enjoy Murray Perahia's playing of this piece as well.

I can imagine this type of exercise would be very excellent way to really study and analyze a piece, because you're forced to rationalize the ineffable.

</comment><comment><USER6> This is awe-inspiring. Thank you! It is so rare to see people who appreciate the late works of Schubert - even young professional musicians often find them too long and not "flashy" enough, which is partly why we rarely see them being played at any piano competitions.

I can see that Live Program Notes may be part of the future of classical music. Wishing you all the success!

<comment><USER4> His late works are nothing short of a string of miracles, one after another ... and we're very lucky they were not lost, thanks to the efforts of his musical colleagues in the decades to come. An astounding story.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> If people liked this, this is actually the third in a series. Schubert wrote them in quick succession (as he knew his death was near) and some internal references within the series.

D958 D959 D960 are the numbers to look up.

Mitsuko Uchida (the featured pianist) is the go-to for Schubert recitals, her exquisitely sensitive touch is great for realising the lightness in Schubert's music which tends to switch between ironic, tragic and profound at a moment's notice while he grappled with the reality of his impending death.

Although currently I am listening to the Alfred Brendel recordings (who is another go to for Schubert).

</comment><comment><USER8> I really love this. I showed it to my kids, though it didn't resonate as much for 7, 5, 3. Maybe someday.

As a novice pianist, I would love to see alongside the discussion some piano chords and progressions. That would be really fascinating to see with the commentary.

If you need help programming that part, I would be very happy to help.

</comment><comment><USER9> 2nd movement of this sonata (the Andante sostenuto) is one of the most perfect things ever created by humans.

</comment><comment><USER10> Mitsuko Uchida.

</comment><comment><USER11> Interesting idea, but talking about music is like dancing about architecture.</comment>