Reddit's CEO edited comments that criticized him - <AUTHOR> http://www.theverge.com/2016/11/23/13739026/reddit-ceo-steve-huffman-edit-comments <comment><USER4> A little bit of backstory from r/outoftheloop on this issue :

To explain what's happened to anyone not wanting to dig through the threads, Spez, the CEO of Reddit, has admitted to editing some comments on The_Donald. Specifically, he changed mentions of his name in insults to the usernames of The_Donald moderators. According to his comment, he did this for about an hour before stopping. His comment states that he was very stressed over dealing with the removal of r/pizzagate and being called a pedophile for it, resulting in him going out of line and making edits to comments. He also says that he won't do it again, and that the community management team is angry with him.

The Reddit admins have had a strained relationship with the moderators and users of The_Donald, for multiple reasons. For a lot of users there, this validates some beliefs about the admin's treatment towards them, specifically that they make an active effort to censor their content. Other users on the site feel like this sets a dangerous precedent, as it demonstrates the admins can and have edited comments without disclosure. Further users feel like, while Spez made a mistake, he was unfairly treated and harassed by TheDonald and his response was an understandable outburst.

Now, people around the site are wondering what the repercussions of this will be. Some question if Spez will be removed from his position over this. Some wonder if the admins will come forward and admit they've edited comments in the past. Others wonder if a significant population from The_Donald will migrate to Voat, a Reddit alternative.

<comment><USER5> He out trolled the trolls then fixed it and fessed up. No big deal. Pretty funny in fact.

<comment><USER6> There's a bit of cognitive dissonance in this view, i don't think its funny from the point of view of the commenter.

Imagine that happened if the political viewpoint of the commenter aligned with something you were not against? Or what if there are edits that Spez isn't mentioning that are more intrusive than what he's admitted to? A commenters own text isn't his own.. It's a slippery slope.

<comment><USER7> I understand your point, but at the same time I don't feel like anybody thought they didn't have the capability to do such a thing. If you have control of the site and control of the data, it's not a stretch to imagine they can edit anything they want.

I'll be honest and say that if I was actually worried about such a thing happening, I'd go somewhere else. The bottom line is that Reddit doesn't exist to serve /r/the_donald - and that's not a shot at /r/the_donald, just that clearly it's priorities and Reddit's priorities are fairly different. If I was involved with something that I thought the admins weren't ok with, then I would take it somewhere else because I'd be well aware it's the admin's site to mess with in anyway they please. Even if they 'promise' not to do anything, there's no guarantee. Other sites that align more with their views could give them much better guarantees of that sort.

I'm in agreement with you though, to a point - I think it was a horrible move on Spez's part and I don't really find it funny. But while I (along with probably everybody else) didn't personally think something like this would happen, I didn't ever hold the opinion that it _couldn 't_ happen, just that the admins were smart enough not to do something like this, and that the admins had no reason to bother with my posts (And none of my posts are really that important anyway). If I had reason to suspect that the admins didn't like my stuff being there and was concerned about it, I'd go somewhere else. It's no different then why I wouldn't store sensitive information _only_ on Google Drive - Google has full control over it and could take it off on a whim if they really wanted.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> What an amazing multi-level clusterfuck.

You either need to ban /r/TheDonald, or just accept it for what it is, hold your nose, and walk away. I believe that I'd choose the former, but if I had the power to do so I might feel differently.

But this is the worst possible thing. It makes Spez look horrible, it undermines trust in the site and the admins, it confirms all the nutty things the alt-right believes about Reddit, etc. It makes actually dealing with any of the underlying issues much harder; anything that the admins do which is or might look anti-The_Donald can now be spun as "another example of their bias". And since we've already got such a glaring example of that bias, the claim is now plausible in a way it wasn't before.

Should have just quietly banned the sub and moved on. Or _not_ banned it and ignored it. Anything but this.

<comment><USER9> Can you please explain why you think /r/TheDonald should be banned? Should they be banned just because they have different political view than you do? Or is it because such opinions are not allowed on reddit as whole? This touches something that is bothering me when sites like reddit look like they are apolitical but clearly that is not the case. They picked side (which is completely fine) and in very non transparent way are punishing anyone who doesn't share their opinions (which is not). For the other side it then looks like its all part of hidden conspiracy when in fact it is just people running the site who cannot accept that not everybody shares their view on the world.

<comment><USER10> I think they should be banned because last times subs were banned the message was pretty clear: If your sub's influence starts to leak elsewhere on Reddit (with its users acting collectively being the key), you'll be banned.

The "fat people hate" sub seemed to be banned, not even for its subject matter, but because it's users were spreading their mess into other subreddits as a group. From what I've seen, the same thing is happening with The_Donald

<comment><USER11> /r/nfl should be banned because paytonface.jpg has leaked?

this ideas of "things we like can leak" but "speech that annoys us should be quarantined" is dangerous.

personally I find t_d somewhat useful to peak inside and see what the community is thinking on a given day. i can go read the liberal media for a while, see how Sessions is a racist, then peak into t_d and see the rebuttal. maybe if /r/politics was neutral /r/t_d wouldnt be necessary, but personally I like being able to see what each thought group is up to.

<comment><USER11> furthermore, you have admin sanctioned sections, like /r/srs, which are designed to mock opposite views.

the admins have tried again and again to suppress a pro-inscere type of speaker who speak in mocking hyperbole and not-literally. now they have grouped into one place, with an ideology (of anti pc speak) that took over a country.

you could argue the liberal pc "polite discourse" tolerance (of everything non white) was winning on reddit. but it didnt last.

t_d is now the anti-liberalism counterculture. the majority suppressing a counterculture they dont like never goes well. the ideas spread and last, and breaking up the places they congregate can make them more sympathetic victims. admins are treading on dangerous ground, and have been for a while.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> If he did this without indicating that he did so, then I'd argue that this is a very deep breach of trust, irrespective of the nature of the comments. He could have deleted them, or flagged some 'bad words' and indicated so.

This is an issue of integrity, so it's one of those 'fireable offences' type things.

I have no idea who this guy is, and certainly, many 'big corp' CEO's get away with much worse ... but it's definitely a problem.

Anyhow. Not good.

<comment><USER13> Pretty dumb move, he may end up resigning over this. Also there's no reason a CEO should have this level of access.

<comment><USER14> He's the admin, if someone should have the right to edit comments it's him.

Because the buck stops with someone and there are several reasons (security vulnerabilities, legal, copyright) to have text removed

<comment><USER12> 'securities, vulnerabilities, copyright' \- yes, he can remove comments, or edit them, so long as he is indicating he is editing them.

But editing them without notice, putting words in other people's mouths is a serious breach.

<comment><USER15> some of the arguments i've seen about it make sense - how do users know that this hasn't happened before? reddit comments have made it into court apparently, and now that it's public knowledge that reddit's higher ups can silently edit comments, that's a huge deal.

in my opinion, it's made me lose a lot of trust (not that I had a ton anyway) for the entire site.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Aww, that sucks :( Huffman always seemed like a measured and fair individual. I appreciated the way he communicated with the community when he took back the reins.

The act itself seems petty, the larger issue is the breach of perceived trust ... The_Donald finally made the frog boil over. Don't wrestle with pigs, they like it and you get dirty.

I do however have a hard time seeing a better replacement for spez so I hope him and reddit learned a lesson and put some measures in place to ensure this doesn't happen again. Everyone is allowed one major fuck up in my book as long as it isn't systemic, they admit it, and don't repeat it.

This seems to be another sign of reddit isn't quite mature enough both when it comes to leadership and technology to handle the scale of popularity they've grown to. They have all my respect but the league they're operating in provides a new set of unique challenges.

From a technical standpoint, it would be interesting if posts and comments could be signed so tampering wasn't possible and prevent even the temptation of doing so. Hard nut to crack in a user-friendly way though when everything is server-side.

<comment><USER17> Introducing- the Insult Blockchain- so in 10.000 Generations your ancestors know you called that guy a maggot

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Reddit has long enjoyed a level of perceived subversiveness that helped it seem cool. It almost paradoxically seems that reddit has become too edgy for the mainstream by housing /r/The_Donald, and now way more Big Brother than subversive after this. If it has to embrace one philosophy going forward, it's going to get a lot more sanitized and will lose a lot of its original allure.

From the fact that those slack logs were leaked, and from reading their contents, there's some significant internal turmoil among Reddit admins that this has only enflamed further. They REALLY want to ban /r/The_Donald. They are extremely frustrated with spez.

Then if /u/spez resigns, the biggest advocate (ironically enough) for not banning /r/The_Donald will not be in the way anymore. Recognizing this, it's possible that spez stays on for the wild ride of banning T_D and then leaves it to the next CEO to run the new reddit husk.

I'm not sure how reddit ever worked, however. Maybe it'll survive this just fine.

<comment><USER19> Most decent content on Reddit isn't from stuff like T_D, it's from local subreddits, community subreddits, fan subreddits and the like.

Just because these people are heavy users doesn't mean they're high value users. Clearly the opposite.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> That's hilarious. I've always found spez to be a genuinely good guy, on every front. I don't find this "disturbing" or whatever other thing people want this to be. People were being dicks to someone who's never done anything but try to make reddit a nice place for as many people as possible; he lost his cool for a minute and made a funny hack (a very specific hack, that required someone to have said "fuck /u/spez" to be changed, and the only effect was to change the target of the pointless insult). He rolled it back and fessed up an hour later. Big deal.

The reddit I want to see is the reddit Steve wants to build. It's doubly hilarious that the people getting so riled up are the same people who rant about "PC culture" and people being too sensitive. If ya get your knickers in a bunch about this, I think you have revoked your right to call anyone "too sensitive" ever again.

<comment><USER21> > It's doubly hilarious that the people getting so riled up are the same > people who rant about "PC culture" and people being too sensitive.

What are you basing this on? This happened on /r/The_Donald, and that sub tends to have people who dislike PC culture. So it's likely true that the groups you're talking about have a lot of overlap, as an accident of population samples.

I do not rant about PC culture or people being too sensitive, and I think spez massively fucked up here. A lot of the commenters on this thread think the same, more strongly than me. Do you just casually assume that those commenters rant about PC culture and people being too sensitive?

I also think that _getting annoyed when you can 't say what you want to say_ is a large factor in disliking PC culture; and _getting annoyed when admins edit other people 's comments_ seems entirely consistent with this. They want to be able to express themselves in a certain way, and stealth-editing their comments is the exact opposite of that.

<comment><USER20> _" What are you basing this on? This happened on /r/The_Donald, and that sub tends to have people who dislike PC culture. So it's likely true that the groups you're talking about have a lot of overlap, as an accident of population samples."_

Sometimes, I generalize as a tool for understanding large groups of people. Generalization is a useful tool; it isn't always right, but the preponderance of folks on The_Donald have, as a big part of their identity, being "anti-PC". And, the preponderance of folks getting really riled up about this are people who are participants on The_Donald subreddit.

So, sure, I probably swept up some innocent folks in my generalization. It happens sometimes. Luckily, I hold no political power, no power to censor anyone, and no power to cause anyone harm with my generalizations. All I can do is make fun of people on the Internet.

 _" I also think that getting annoyed when you can't say what you want to say is a large factor in disliking PC culture"_

More accurately, it would be "getting annoyed when you can say what you want to say, but other people are allowed to say you're an asshole for saying it", because no argument about being politically correct ever involved police knocking down your door for being an asshole on the Internet (unless "being an asshole" also includes "making actionable threats to someone's health", which _might_ bring a police response). Free speech is a thing, and it applies to people making racist/sexist/homophobic comments, and the people who reply angrily to those racist/sexist/homophobic comments.

<comment><USER21> If your generalization is an accident of population samples, and doesn't apply when you control for that, I'm not sure how you think it's useful.

If you think that anti-PC people are simply scared of being called assholes, you missed the time when someone got fired making a joke about dongles. And the time when someone else got fired for saying that Donald Sterling shouldn't have been fired for things that he said in his own home. And the time when Bahar Mustafa was arrested, although I acknowledge that a subset of anti-PC people seemed to celebrate that. And the time when a cake chain got successfully sued for not wanting to bake a cake they disagreed with. Just off the top of my head.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> One of the reddit employees/admins leaked Slack conversations... it's all over Twitter now.

[https://twitter.com/Cernovich/status/801680245631766528](https://twitter.com/Cernovich/status/801680245631766528)

<comment><USER23> It looks more like a chat with what I assume are external/non-paid sub-reddit moderators.

<comment><USER24> Yeah, almost all of those accounts look to be the volunteer moderators for the default subreddits.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> I think it has become impossible to run a social site without any central moderation today. You will attract a certain group of people, and they will act more and more horribly and brazenly (generally harassing third parties) until you just have to delete something. Then they will accuse you of censorship, and the rest of the community will side with them, not you. The harassment will turn on you. Eventually you will snap, and then you are in a world of trouble. It doesn't matter how much free speech cred you have built up over the years. It happened to the founders of Reddit, Twitter and even 4chan.

Of course I am painting site admins as too innocent here. Ultimately they brought it on themselves by letting the community norms fall off a cliff. Back in 2000-2010 being the rough underbelly of the internet was fun, but that period is definitely over.

<comment><USER26> All that's needed is to ban "meta mob" type content. Shit like SRS, kotakuinaction, subredditdrama, hell even /r/cringe, etc. That shit is toxic and frankly destroyed reddit.

<comment><USER27> Except those subs exist for a very real and tangible reason.

When the Orlando shootings happened /r/news censored it for almost that entire day deleting threads and banning people.

These alt subs only caught traction when the mains started pulling shady stuff

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Here's the original discussion (currently 477 points, 444 comments):

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13027031](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13027031)

<comment><USER29> Flagged off the front page. ..

<comment><USER30> Actually, it was the anti-flamewar filter that pushed it off, as dang explained later in the thread.

<comment><USER23> "It set off the overheated discussion detector (a.k.a. flamewar detector), which lowers the rank of a thread. We do turn that penalty off for particularly substantive discussions—which, though this may surprise you, I'm not sure this one is. Not every Reddit drama shitshow is uniform in its excellence."

"Edit: ok, we've reduced the penalty"

Apparently not enough to get it visible to the front page again, though.

<comment><USER31> Of course it was. The story was on the front page for over 5 hours, including 4 hours after we reduced the penalty. No moderator has touched it since.

HN's software causes stories to fall off the front page after a while. If you didn't happen to see a story while it was there, that doesn't make it "apparently" suppressed.

<comment><USER23> Why "of course"? Did you set it specifically so that it would be on the FP? It certainly wasn't within an hour of you writing that comment.

(I'm in Europe, so I was checking the frontpage many times while you guys were asleep.)

Eventually it did make it, that was quite a lot of hours later, and it only lasted for a handful of hours.

Edit: it strikes me now that there is a need for an hourly HN frontpage archive. Does this exist?

<comment><USER31> > _Why "of course"? Did you set it specifically so that it would be on the FP? > It certainly wasn't within an hour of you writing that comment._

Yes, we set it specifically so that it would be on the front page. That was the point. And it was on the front page for hours after we did that.

<comment><USER23> Yes, it was there for at least two hours, I think I can attest to that. In a full day. You guys really made a brilliant job of showing the moderation here isn't partisan.

Edit:

I found an hourly mirror of the HN front page.

The story is present in these snapshots.

[http://hhn.domador.net/2016/11/24/03/](http://hhn.domador.net/2016/11/24/03/)

[http://hhn.domador.net/2016/11/24/04/](http://hhn.domador.net/2016/11/24/04/)

[http://hhn.domador.net/2016/11/24/05/](http://hhn.domador.net/2016/11/24/05/)

[http://hhn.domador.net/2016/11/24/06/](http://hhn.domador.net/2016/11/24/06/)

But not after that. (Timestamps are bit ambiguous, but it seems like California time. Or failing that, Texas time, one hour apart.)

This matches the "including 4 hours after we reduced the penalty" statement.

My conclusion is that you set it to be enabled on the front page for four hours in the middle of the night, California time. So was it also not immediately set when you updated that comment - presumably?

<comment><USER31> Here's a complete list of the HN front page for 2016-11-24 (so far) in 10-second intervals. The first field is UTC seconds and the subsequent 30 fields are story ids: [https://gist.githubusercontent.com/anonymous/7a1e8916930cfdd...](https://gist.githubusercontent.com/anonymous/7a1e8916930cfdd964ab9eacfa37edc4/raw/948645c557512ed88c031acc453daa4ee5a5ebeb/gistfile1.txt)

Because it uses UTC, this file contains the entire lifecycle (so far) of the story we're talking about.

      cut -d' ' -f1-31 gistfile1.txt | grep 13027031 | wc -l
          3866

3866 10-second intervals means the story spent almost 11 hours on the front page. I posted that we'd reduced the penalty on the story at 1479955509. So by my calculation, it spent over 9 hours on the front page after we reduced the penalty. But perhaps I've made an error and you'll find it. Also, we don't "set" things to be on the front page for a given number of hours. If I say we reduced a penalty, that's what I mean: we reduced the penalty, and the usual software mechanisms (time decay, votes and flags) resumed their usual course.

Now I need to ask you for something in return. You frequently post comments making false insinuations about the moderation here. I'm fine with answering questions and dispelling doubts, but only for people who are asking in good faith. I'm losing that feeling in your case, because these comments of yours are both common and nasty. Would you please stop doing this? Apart from it being a bummer at our end, it undermines the integrity of the community. Good- faith users have a right to know that we don't do the things you routinely accuse us of, but the cost of replying to such accusations is orders of magnitude greater than that of slinging them in the first place, so there's a huge asymmetry here.

<comment><USER23> Thank you. This reassures my faith in you in this area.

Regarding the favor in return:

I think like 80% of our encounters have not been regarding "false insinuations about the moderation here" but rather, relatively speaking, more straight- forwarded cases of me edging my contributions towards the types of content that you don't desire to have on your site. Which I suppose is your prerogative, but not something I necessarily agree with.

Beyond that: I could and should try to limit these kinds of (moderation) queries to when I think it really matters, and only then. This would have been one of those cases that really mattered, so I am glad that you did clarify this.

I think at least in the beginning I was kinda surprised that there was someone who was actually bothering to respond to my often flippant remarks - I was used to Reddit.

<comment><USER31> I'm glad to read this and super glad it worked in this case.

It would be great if you would do those things. Even just not being flippant would help a lot. In return, we're more than happy to answer questions (edit: and also to fix mistakes and reverse bad calls when we make them). We don't see all the comments, though, so to make sure we see a question it's best to email email@example.com.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> The_Donald sub has ruined Reddit for me. I can't go into any remotely- political post without a bunch of weird alt-Right commentary that's been upvoted through the roof with poster's comment history filled with r/The_Donald shit.

Who cares if these people go to Voat or back to 4chan...

<comment><USER33> Fight back against the white supremacists and neo-Nazis and racists and write nationalists, both in real life and online. You think they're ruining a website? They took control of the USA. The might take control of France. I can't imagine how tired you'll be of them after they've run the world into the ground.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> The fact that this was part of a particularly crazy episode on /r/The_Donald/ should surely at least be taking into account before sentencing is determined.

"Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you" \- Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, Aphorism 146

</comment><comment><USER35> So this was about the banning of PizzaGate subreddit, and its understandable that a Reddit-Mob can be a scary thing, and needs to be dealt with somehow. But it feels Reddits moderation practices have become increasingly shady over the last couple years, and spez editing comments directly just shows how seemingly lax they are with their powers. You don't really have to be a conspiracy nut to see that places like /r/politics during the election had some very questionable moderation.

<comment><USER36> /r/worldnews is even worse, they outright censor everything that is not in line with the political affiliations of the moderators.

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> Washington Post linked to a reddit thread with comments bashing the CEO. The CEO did not like the world seeing him bashed by his own community and decided to impersonate the users to make them seem attacking the moderators of /r/The_Donald.

Reddit's TOS:

       > You are solely responsible for the information associated with Your Account and anything that happens related to Your Account.

The CEO crossed the line because he thought he could get away from any liability for doing it.

</comment><comment><USER38> Eh. Not exactly the personality fit for running a comminity site such as reddit: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uSVqoW1rz6w&feature=youtu.be...](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uSVqoW1rz6w&feature=youtu.be&t=835)

Pretty obnoxious person to be honest.

<comment><USER39> Right at home then, eh?

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> The head guy with God Mode needed a much thicker skin.

Running around like a headless chicken is the opposite of what was required.

Future people with God Mode should avoid repeating the same mistakes.

But that depends on what the God mode wielders perceive the mistakes were, either:

1) Losing composure and making secret edits

2) Getting caught doing it

Can trust be restored ? Open question.

</comment><comment><USER41> I'm not on any side. I'm just a bystander. See this and other incidents reminds of the time users got fed up with Digg and left for reddit. We'll see what happens with Voat in the coming months.

<comment><USER32> Voat is an awful place where fatpeoplehate, 4chan, and the racist-Right have set up camp.

No thanks.

<comment><USER27> Only because they were the first to get purged.

Any substantial migration from Reddit would drown out those voices pretty quick. Just look at their vote counts compared to practically any medium sized subreddit

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> Is the CEO of Reddit technical or non-technical? I'd be most shocked if this meant Reddit had user-content-editing tools for its employees, rather then one rogue employee going into the database(s) and changing data there.

I strongly get the feeling that tools were created at Reddit to allow them to do this, suggesting that sometime ago employees at Reddit thought "wouldn't it be great if we could change what users actually said"...

Don't get me wrong I feel no protectionism for a lot of the scumbags on boards like Reddit, but I would find an extreme amount of hypocrisy in "the front page of the internet" actively manipulating its content in such a way.

<comment><USER43> He's the founder of the site .. highly technical. He had to modify the database directly and tinkered with the "edited" flag or "modified" timestamp so the comment would not show it had been edited.

<comment><USER27> This is a huge part of this I don't see most here discussing.

The CEO didn't just edit the comments, he did so in a way that did not reveal the comment had ever been edited.

<comment><USER23> Options:

1\. He directly manipulated the production db (seems like they use Cassandra). Definitely doable for someone with a deep technical background, even if they spent 99% of the the past couple of years working "via other people", rather than writing the code themselves. I could easily imagine him getting database access privileges as a part of the "catching up what's happened since I left" process.

2\. Reddit has built easy-to-use, e.g. web based in-house tools for editing comments - without leaving any trace of the fact that they were edited.

I guess there also a third option; that he fudged the truth (err, lied) when confessing: that he asked some developer to do the work for him: presumably while laughing and thinking they were hilarious, and then took the blame for when it was time to confess.)

I think he needs to resign. Such a dumb, irresponsible action. I don't think someone that impulsive and immature should be the the CEO of Reddit. And since he's 33 rather than 23, it's not very likely he'll much more mature within a few years.

<comment><USER44> > deep technical background

I'd imagine comments are stored in plaintext in a table and could be edited by anyone with a modicum of tech experience

<comment><USER23> Well, yes. "Deep technical experience" is a superset of "A modicum of tech experience". :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> I'm slowly coming to the conclusion that reality is actually a simulation but unfortunately one that has been hacked by /b/

</comment><comment><USER45> [https://mobile.twitter.com/Cernovich/status/8016802456317665...](https://mobile.twitter.com/Cernovich/status/801680245631766528) \- deplorable how all these people at Reddit are calling for censorship.

If you ignore The Donald people, they implode. Don't respond to them and that's the ball gane. All Spez it is doing is pouring gasoline on the fire. Immature tone at the top doesn't help things right now. Spez needs to go.

</comment><comment><USER46> So basically Reddit has now been proven to have comments that may or may not be what the user intended. That alone should hopefully lead Reddit code changes that prevent anyone but the author of a post from modifying a post without very obvious indicators if permitted at all.

As it stands now, reddit is pretty much imparts no trust and nothing read there would have any trust associated with it.

depending on context I wonder what the legal exposure could be. could they trace a modified post that suggested something illegal?

</comment><comment><USER47> Lots of people are complaining about r/The_Donald in this thread, wishing that it would be banned. The casual attitude with which people are advocating censorship of Trump supporters is troubling.

They claim that it's polluting the rest of the site. It's not a default subscription, so it's not on the front page. It's at most a handful of the posts on any page of r/all, which by the way, almost no one browses according to Reddit admins themselves. Yes, the moderators of The_Donald ban opposing viewpoints, just like moderators in other partisan subreddits do. It is advertised as a 24/7 Trump rally, and that's what it is.

They claim that the subreddit is racist, sexist, homophobic, etc. If you took a moment to even read it, you'd find post after post expressing the OPPOSITE sentiment, advocating for equality for all regardless of race, sex, and orientation. The problem is that the definition that the left is using of "racism" has been broadened to include basically anything they don't agree with.

</comment><comment><USER48> I see a lot of handwringing about this but what are people really going to do about this? Go to Voat or 4chan? Even if people claim they feel they can no longer trust reddit they aren't going to leave. If anything this just gave reddit a huge amount of free publicity.

</comment><comment><USER49> Sigh. Why did spez do this? His entire credibility lost to a bunch of people who made my head hurt when I read their material. I popped over to voat and caught up. I was genuinely thinking there'd be some kind of vague link of emails and a few jumps in assumptions, but it's full on "here's a picture. Here's another picture. Look. They have the same shape in them. They are connected. Also, here's the person in this picture. That means they are connected to the earlier connection" type conspiracy stuff. And then there's full on accusations firing away about who's an FBI agent attempting to silence them.

The fact that u/spez did not just laugh at the ridiculousness of it all and instead chose to take it on this way, I'm trying to imagine what kind of abuse he's had to deal with today. :( .

</comment><comment><USER50> there are many sides to this.

for one, the CEO should be thinking "oh shit what did I do", because he's now responsible for every event on reddit. good job, I can't wait to see what happens, if anything.

for two, it really shows how violent people are towards those with differing political opinions.

note, I'm not referring to /r/The_Donald, I'm referring to everybody who thinks that /r/The_Donald should be shown the door with no other reason than "I don't agree with their views".

you're shouting at someone to shut up because you don't like what they're saying instead of arguing.

note, I don't like the folks there either very much, but they are people, with opinions, and they founded a place to share them, and it just so happens that they're pretty loud and easily spotted.

have some decency. stop calling for a total ban or witch hunts on the people you don't like, because you look _exactly like them_ to the outsider. and outsiders are all over.

develop some common decency. your fellow man isn't as terrible as you think he is. polarization will only cause more problems.

spez, the CEO of reddit, can't make this conclusion, which is kind of funny. if you can't do this, then can your users? can the users who're friends of the users? do you understand how this represents your community? clearly not.

I'll be sitting back and watching the outcome. at the most, it's social commentary. at the least, it's cheap entertainment.

</comment><comment><USER51> Reddit has been on my shitlist since the Ellen pao situation.

How anyone uses that site after how the Reddit community treated her is beyond me.

<comment><USER52> The politics of Reddit don't really touch most subreddits. Most people are there to talk about their interests and passions.

<comment><USER53> (read: porn)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER54> Reddit should have banned that sub a long time ago. Its nothing but a bunch of toxic neo Nazis being given a huge platform for free

<comment><USER55> But look at all that growth in user activity! Investors love it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER56> If this means the alt-right leaves, great.

</comment><comment><USER57> Somewhat off topic and not condoning the editing of comments (I probably will condone the closing of boards once I know more) but:

What the hell is a pizzagate? I saw it mentioned a few times while reading the mess that is the reddit detectiving for Assange but never saw a clear description. And now it is apparently a pro-Trump thing too?

What was the logic behind calling him a pedophile for that?

<comment><USER8> This is going to sound hard to believe, but...

...based on zero evidence, a bunch of alt-right types decided that a pizza shop in Washington was somehow the center of some sort of bizarre satanic pedophilia cult/ring/thing, and that further that Clinton was somehow involved.

It evolved into some sort of weird meme/circlejerk/echo chamber/witchhunt/circus, centered around /r/pizzagate, complete with doxxing, stalking, physical protesters outside the shop, trending twitter hashtags, all sorts of madness

Unsurprisingly, the sub was banned. And if you choose to ban a sub focused around uncovering (I can't believe I'm writing this) Clinton's pedophile sex ring, then obviously this is because _you yourself are a pedophile_ (and probably a Clinton supporter, which is probably worse). Why else would you help coverup Clinton's satanic pedophile sex cult?

(If you're curious, the original spark behind all this is Wikileak's release of John Podesta's emails. In them he mentioned eating pizza there. Which is clearly code for child abuse, and Podesta is sort of close to Clinton, so Podesta eating pizza is literally Clinton abusing children. No, I'm not making this up, and yes, that's the sum total of the evidence behind this. Literally, the whole thing is based on the supposition that it's so unlikely that Podesta likes pizza that it _must_ be a codeword for child abuse, because obviously child abuse is much more understandable than liking pizza, or something.)

<comment><USER58> I think it's sort of based on the fact that "cheese pizza" is 4chan slang for child porn, and there was a picture sent by podesta of an immigrant child (and her family) eating pizza with a title like "feels good" (that they helped this family, interpreted by conspiracy theorists as they molested this girl)

<comment><USER59> >"cheese pizza" is 4chan slang

This is not true actually.

FBI and some forensic science experts used it internally way back before 4chan was even created.

<comment><USER60> I think I speak for a great many of us when I say that I'd like a citation for the idea that even _4chan_ considered "cheese pizza" a code for child pornography.

Intellectually, it appears we're cruising along at approximately the "asphinctersayswhat" level of complexity.

<comment><USER61> The usage of code words and symbols by Comet Pizza and Besta Pizza are mapped to an FBI document that was uncovered. There's also been strange phrases uncovered in the Podesta emails that seem to indicate that code words are in use. Additionally, people have found hidden data in JPGs sent around, which appear to be hashes that were placed after the closing JPG headers. Not sure I believe any of it, but it's definitely interesting.

<comment><USER62> Could you link that FBI document explaining pedo-slang that Podesta was allegedly using?

<comment><USER63> AFAIK there is no such document. The only sourcing for the slang terms was an anonymous 4chan post.

        "hotdog" = boy

        "pizza" = girl

        "cheese" = little girl

        "pasta" = little boy

        "ice cream" = male prostitute

        "walnut" = person of colour

        "map" = semen

        "sauce" = orgy

[https://twitter.com/JaredWyand/status/794284672675147776](https://twitter.com/JaredWyand/status/794284672675147776)

The FBI document detailing the symbols can be found here: [https://wikileaks.org/wiki/FBI_pedophile_symbols](https://wikileaks.org/wiki/FBI_pedophile_symbols)

The similarities _were_ rather striking. One pizza place even changed their logo shortly after the comparisons were drawn. This only added more fuel to the fire. [http://i.imgur.com/GIRxh8r.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/GIRxh8r.jpg)

Myself being a huge fan of conspiracy theory I've seen this before: the minds become focussed on finding evidence, discarding Occam's razor, and mining for all the nuggets. What remains are coincidences that appear too good to be random. Compare with the "backwards playing record hidden messages" hype. Once someone points it out to you, your mind starts hearing it too.

P.S.: The "hashes" found in the .jpg images were a dead end / the result of pareidolia.

<comment><USER64> [https://file.wikileaks.org/file/FBI-pedophile- symbols.pdf](https://file.wikileaks.org/file/FBI-pedophile-symbols.pdf)

This document says a heart within a heart is symbol for GirlLover - <USER2> a relationship between an adult and a minor girl.

Wait 'til the conspiracy theorists see the logo for a multinational ice-cream company:

[https://duckduckgo.com/?q=walls+ice+cream+logo&ia=images](https://duckduckgo.com/?q=walls+ice+cream+logo&ia=images)

[https://imgur.com/a/8Yo0M](https://imgur.com/a/8Yo0M)

<comment><USER63> They actually did, and then they tried to find connections between the two. Turning up stuff like:

[https://twitter.com/ClintonGlobal/status/651606553884258304](https://twitter.com/ClintonGlobal/status/651606553884258304)

(A Unilever and Clinton Foundation cooperation found in [https://wikileaks.org/podesta- emails/emailid/1596](https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/1596))

and some older abuse charges brought up against people connected with Unilever.

See also: [https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:AfaAe2...](https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:AfaAe2oa8aYJ:https://www.reddit.com/r/pizzagate/comments/5e2lao/)

Also consider the possibility that the pedo symbology was inspired by the ice cream logo (and not the other way around).

But most likely just a (meaningful) coincidence. Hearts and spirals are common design elements after all.

<comment><USER60> So basically this is troll numerology.

<comment><USER63> Yes, in part. But don't underestimate the deliberate black, grey, and white propaganda elements of all this (see also: "meme magick").

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_propaganda](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_propaganda)

[http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/meme-magic](http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/meme- magic)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER65> Flag - duplicate - you may want to delete this.

There are about 10 threads on this in the last two hours. Some have 300 comments.

Take a look - one #28 is still on the front page now with almost 500 comments.

<comment><USER66> There's a vocal contingent of alt-right Donald Trump supporters that think this is a big deal.

<comment><USER65> I think it's a big deal and I wouldn't be in the "alt-right" for sure.

Having a CEO of a social media site impersonate users and censor comments calls into question the credibility of the their whole brand.

That's not a partisan perspective???

How would you feel if Paul Graham of HN changed your comment to "I am strong supporter of the alt-right?" ...you wouldn't like that. Opposing opinions are fine - using admin priledges to put words to literally put words in users mouths is madness?

I already made a comment elsewhere - but I'm surprised they haven't let him go. If reddit were a real company, they wouldn't tolerate that. I wonder what would happen if a middle manager started tampering with user comments - <USER3> would be gone.

<comment><USER67> Seriously? You think he should be let go over this? You think that other CEOs would have been? If so you have not been following the news much.

<comment><USER68> > You think he should be let go over this?

Absolutely.

> You think that other CEOs would have been?

Even if other CEOs who have done similar things have not been let go, that doesn't mean they shouldn't have been let go. This was a major breach of trust.

> If so you have not been following the news much.

Apparently I haven't been following the news much because I haven't heard of any CEOs doing something like this recently. The most "scandalous" (for lack of better word) thing that I've heard of recently concerning CEOs and political stuff was the controversy with GrubHub and Pepsi. If you're referring to events like those, I don't think they're comparable. I don't agree with the actions of those CEOs either, but there's a difference between the CEO of a company taking a stance against a political candidate and the CEO of a social media network putting words in his users' mouths by editing their comments. If you're not referring to stuff like the GrubHub and Pepsi and there have in fact been other CEOs who put words in their users' mouths by editing their comments or posts, I'd love some links. Either way, I still think they should be let go.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Look up "analogy" in the dictionary

Oh I see you're just trolling

<comment><USER69> Does reddit require an invitation to participate? No? Oh look, your analogy is trash.

<comment><USER31> You've been breaking the civility rules here atrociously. I realize you feel very strongly about this story, but if you continue to break HN's rules, we're going to have to ban your account. In the meantime, I've rate-limited your comments in the hope that you will cool down a little.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER70> Huh. Color me surprised. A social media website with a shit-for-brains business model has a CEO who, well, isn't the sharpest knife in the drawer.

Look reddit was never a source of real truth. It likes to think it is because every teenager and lonely 50-something wants to feel important.

Fine. Whatever. There isn't a big story here. The Lord of the Flies wanked off on Piggy's dead body.

Anyone who expected otherwise is probably daft enough to reheat pizza in the oven instead of in a skillet with no oil because that's what makes the bottom so crispy and the top so melty.

In other words, you're all mostly heathens and idiots about this.

If you want control of your content, host it yourself. Not on someone else's dime. Especially not an idiotic dime like reddit's that calls dimes gold.

Do I think this is a huge and massive breach of trust for reddit users? Yes. Yes I do.

Do I think it matters and that the people who are surprised by this basically have shit for brains?

Yes. Yes I do.

Does this actually matter?

No. It's just one more social media thing that will go away because the leadership fucked it up. That's all.

Our work is done here. We don't need to do this anymore.

</comment><comment><USER71> They should've nuked The_Donald six months ago. They should still nuke it now.

</comment><comment><USER72> I wonder how many of the hateful comments posted in that subreddit were actually written by the admins.

<comment><USER34> I think I can answer that one for you - very very few.

</comment></comment><comment><USER73> High-level moderators openly discussing being paid by CTR (Correct The Record - a Hillary Clinton organization): [https://i.sli.mg/eZXD0R.png](https://i.sli.mg/eZXD0R.png)

This is really funny, the undoing of Reddit - and for what?

<comment><USER74> You do realise that comment is making fun of people like yourself right? When people call you a shill all day your humour tend to include jokes about being a shill to mess with the idiots calling everyone that disagrees with them a shill.

</comment></comment><comment><USER75> As a moderator to one forum, I commonly edit the poster's posts if they are especially rowdy or otherwise rude to everybody else.

But its not a "prank", like what the Reddit CEO did. I make sure everybody knows that I made the edit (signing my name on the edit, using the poster's privileges), just as a warning that yes... as moderator I do have complete control over the conversation.

Its a threat that I make to keep rowdy members in check. But it only works because everyone trusts me (ie: I never "impersonate" the poster, no one ever "impersonates" my edits either). I know that if I "cross the line", then people will no longer trust me as the moderator of discussion. The position of moderator is to serve the forum, not to dictate the direction of every conversation.

The issue here is that Reddit's CEO is in charge of a community, and that community is losing faith in the leader because of his abuse of his power.

\</comment><comment></comment><comment>

From one perspective, I understand that moderators have surprisingly few options. Mods can delete posts, and maybe edit them (if they're careful and only edit in extreme circumstances). But... that's about it. Otherwise, there's not really much power mods have.

Banning doesn't really work. Everybody knows how to proxy up and reregister accounts to rejoin a forum. Warnings don't really count, a lot of posters don't care about them.

The threat of an edit war however? Well... that's basically the moderator's best tool. But it needs to be more carefully used than what the Reddit CEO did here.

<comment><USER76> No, there are a dozen issues with this but losing Faith in reddit's leadership isn't one of them.

That happened a long time ago.

<comment><USER75> If you already don't trust Reddit, then there's nothing lost by this event.</comment></comment></comment>


The Internet Is Rife with In-Browser Miners and It's Getting Worse Each Day - <AUTHOR> https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/the-internet-is-rife-with-in-browser-miners-and-its-getting-worse-each-day/ <comment><USER2> No matter what you think with regard to whether crypto-mining is "wasted" energy or not, my opinion is that running a miner in such a high level virtual machine is DEFINITELY wasting energy.</comment>


Apple and Their Quirky Design Decisions - <AUTHOR> http://zerodistraction.com/blog/2011/12/5/apple-and-their-quirky-design-decisions.html

<comment><USER2> Too devoid of content. The larger part that could be considered an argument, is this:

"""It's hard to look many of Apple's own super glossy and reflective candy coloured icons and not think: "what the heck?""""

Actually, it's not hard at all. The majority of Apple's own icons are just fine. And even if they were not, this is still not exactly evidence about "quirky design decisions" nor explanation why the author of the post "lost faith" in Apple's design circa 2009.

<comment><AUTHOR> Perhaps "questionable" would have been a better adjective than "quirky."

<comment><USER2> Well, Apple has made lots of questionable design choices, but I don't think iOS icons are one.

For example:

1) The removing of color from Finder icons. 2) Translucent menubar? 3) Silly 3D Dock? 4) Differing close/minimize/adjust placement/size of window icons? 5) the drag down to open iOS notifications screen with no affordance to even know there is one 6) ...</comment></comment></comment>


Moving off of Facebook, deport your photos w/ a bookmark - <AUTHOR> http://www.getphotolive.com/c,ext

<comment><USER2> Very nice. I don't know if this will encourage me to move but it's definately a useful tool -- especially for stalkers.

I wonder, though, what FB might say about it. They _banned_ a tool like this months ago.

</comment><comment><USER3> Does this have an advantage over the full export of all your Facebook content that's been available for some time? It's not clear from the description exactly what it does.</comment>


Factoring via Graph Three-Colouring - <AUTHOR> http://www.solipsys.co.uk/new/FactoringViaGraphThreeColouring.html <comment><AUTHOR> A really easy-to-follow argument that piqued my intellectual curiosity: By transforming a binary multiplication into a big circuit, you also have a big graph where a proper coloring represents correct factorization of the result.

Thus, the problem of coloring that particular graph is as hard as the problem of factoring the result of the multiplication. Therefore, the general problem of colouring graphs may be easy for many cases, but is hard for specific cases, and we can construct those cases by taking hard-to-factor numbers and turning them into graphs.

I _love_ these kinds of demonstrations, they are easy to follow for the non- specialist and demonstrate the beauty of mathematics and reasoning.</comment>


F*** MongoDB, F*** Node.js, and F*** You - <AUTHOR> http://java.dzone.com/articles/f-mongodb-f-nodejs-and-f-you <comment><USER2> Ok, interesting enough article, but could we cut back just a tad on the attention seeking headlines?

<comment><USER3> I think that was the point - an ironic title for a post that goes against the types of articles with exactly the same caracteristics.

<comment><USER2> I'm English, so I understand irony just fine. There are still ways to write interesting headlines without going Howard Stern on us.</comment></comment></comment>


Awesome Open Source Indie – A curated list of small open source products - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/shime/awesome-open-source-indie <comment><USER2> This is great! I nominate Google Play Music Desktop Player ([https://www.googleplaymusicdesktopplayer.com/](https://www.googleplaymusicdesktopplayer.com/)) - a great app that is totally free and open source.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you! I'll add it to the list.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> This is a super nice list and exactly along the lines of something I've been looking for.....but not for PHP or Javascript. Anyone have an idea where a similar collection of projects involving Java/C#/C++/C would be found?

<comment><AUTHOR> It's not only for PHP or JavaScript and it's not for projects but for products. You're very welcome to submit some Java/C#/C++/C open source products if you find them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> What's wrong with CLI tools?

<comment><AUTHOR> I have to draw a line somewhere between libraries and products. A CLI tool is more a library than a product in my opinion.

<comment><USER4> I couldn't disagree more. A CLI tool is a program/app/product like any other. A library is a piece of code that you call using another piece of code. And what about text-mode programs? Is Midnight Commander also a "library"?

There are a great many CLI programs out there, but only a few can be considered "awesome", and none of the classic Unix tools are eligible for the being "indie". It's a shame to not include standout projects like Fish, FZF, Ripgrep, FD, and Exa solely because they are command-line products.

That said, here are some other (non-CLI) products you might want to consider:

\- Wallabag (not that small but certainly not big)

\- Shaarli (a descendant of del.icio.us)

\- Wekan (another Trello clone)

\- Standard Notes (note-taking and syncing, like the Notes app that ships with Apple)

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah, I think I'm being subjective when deciding what to add to this list. For me, a product has to have a beautiful landing page and a nice UI. There are other awesome lists for CLI tools and I've linked to them in the issue. It's definitely not intended for this list to list Unix tools. Thank you for the suggestions, I'll add them.

<comment><USER4> Then this is a list of "beautiful open source landing pages and UIs".</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Google is seeking to deprecate Chrome's User Agent string - <AUTHOR> https://9to5google.com/2020/01/14/google-deprecate-chrome-user-agent-string-privacy/ <comment><USER2> I use a Firefox extension to switch user agents, and have been unable to login to Google Search Console with assorted strings-- it dumps you to a page telling you to switch browsers immediately after you enter your credentials.

Google Ads interface frequently breaks in a weird way when entering an ad group and returning to the default campaign listing while using the default FF user agent, but works flawlessly when set to Chrome.</comment>


H-1B Visa Violations: US Opens Probe into Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services - <AUTHOR> http://www.thequint.com/2015/jun/12/us-govt-to-probe-h1b-visa-violation-by-tcs-and-infosys

<comment><USER2> Why did they leave out Cognizant? They all do the same thing and Cognizant gets nearly as many H-1Bs as Infosys and TCS:

>Hira points out that over the last four years, Cognizant has received about 23,000 new H-1B workers with visas valid for up to 6 years, and has a number of workers on L-1s. (L-1 visas are used by multinational firms to transfer employees between countries.) "So, most, if not nearly all, of Cognizant's employees in the US are on some guest-worker visa," said Hira.

[http://www.computerworld.com/article/2489146/technology- law-...](http://www.computerworld.com/article/2489146/technology-law- regulation-offshore-firms-took-50-of-h-1b-visas-in-2013.html)

</comment><comment><USER3> They either exploited the system, or bribed some attorneys/h1b officers, it can be the case that India took nearly half of the H1Bs for so long consistently.</comment>


Is Responsive Web Design Practical? - <AUTHOR> https://studio.uxpin.com/blog/responsive-web-design-practical-uxpinchat/ <comment><USER2> The title is clearly asking the wrong question.

There are very few situations where it is not benefitical.</comment>


Source code stolen from GitHub.com - <AUTHOR> https://kev.inburke.com/kevin/source-code-stolen-github/?

<comment><USER2> Ok, I get it, this is a Satire. But it is not very good made Satire, because it leads to the point that source code in private repositories also can be stolen, which kind of threatens the reputation of GitHub organization. Hope that GitHub will contact this joker and explain how to make good satires.

</comment><comment><USER3> This article is totally confusing. Source is missing? So there's no local fork? Work is disappeared? Or someone just downloaded it and has a copy? How does missing have anything to do with the "someone else in the world is running my code" comment?? Copying would allow others to run the code without it going missing…

EDIT: This is satire? It was poorly done.

<comment><USER4> The words you want are "dumb" and "not that funny". At least, according to the last paragraph in the article.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> This article is mistaken. The fire icon next to the header of Trending Repos on their Explore page [1] clearly shows that those repos are "hot".

[1] [https://github.com/explore](https://github.com/explore)

</comment><comment><USER6> Has someone clicked on "Publish" 2 weeks too late for April's fool?

</comment><comment><USER7> Had me until:

"My code could be running on anyone's computer right now, anywhere in the world," said open source developer Andrew Benton. "Frankly, that is terrifying."

</comment><comment><USER8> I think the satire value is somewhat diminished by the fact that private repos are possible. If github __only __hosted open-source projects, then it would be funnier

</comment><comment><USER4> How dumb is GitHub! Not even running on a non-obvious port as the most elementary security measure.

Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb ...

<comment><USER9> You do realise this is satire, right?

<comment><USER5> You do realize his comment is a continuation of that same satire, right?

<comment><USER4> You do realise that RoG's comment was also a continuation of that satire, right?

<comment><USER5> You do realize that I realized that RoG's comment was a continuation of that satire, right?

<comment><USER4> You do realise that we all realise that these comments are a continuation of the satire, yes?

Er, with the possible exception of callesgg ...

<comment><USER5> Or perhaps theirs is the most satirical of all...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Is this a joke or a real problem?

<comment><USER11> Its amazing how often on HN people are interested enough to ask questions about an article, but not interested enough to actually click on the link and read it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> 14 days too late.</comment>


Gary the Great: Vaynerchuk sets the example of how to succeed in business today  - <AUTHOR> http://www.37signals.com/svn/posts/956-gary-the-great-vaynerchuk-sets-the-example-of-how-to-succeed-in-business-today <comment><USER2> I digest a lot of inspirational/motivational stuff on a regular basis and most of it leaves an empty feeling - like the person writing it is inauthentic because no one is superman but it feels like Gary Vaynerchuk is talking to me. In terms of News.YC, he's telling us to build something that will make a niche group of users happy - don't try to go after too big a market - make a small group of users happy and you will excel...

(Felt the need to transcribe one of his 3 min video blogs in entirety just now - apologies for the length of the comment)

Not Lying to Yourself

"not lying to yourself is really the key to any social media, life, business, family, anything

i think what's going on right now is so many people are lying to themselves

they're saying well i'm going to make the next Digg, or I'm going to make the next Facebook, or I'm going to be the next Oprah or I want to be the next Ze Frank

what you really need to do is to embrace who you are. it's a DNA game. you need to know who you are. and uh really that's why some of the things are working for me

i stopped doing what i was doing and I said i need to do something else for my heart and soul. I stopped lying to myself (not that I've ever been a big liar to myself) but I think a lot of people are lying - they think they can do things they can't or more importantly they think they can't do things they can.

and i think going forward, in this age of personal brand, where the barrier of entry to have a personal brand in the world is now zero - uh the people who are going to be able to stop lying to themselves and embracing what they're about and not being worried if the niche is too small are going to be the people that are going to excel and win and win in heart -

for example, i think too many people are trying to keep apps that are so huge or trying to develop brands that are so huge or trying to say they are experts in such a global thing. narrow it down to the thing that you are most core about. if you are the biggest expert in basketball, fine do a video blog on basketball if that's what you want. but more importantly if you're a bigger Clippers expert maybe that's what you should talk about. even if there's 45 fans that you have in the world. those 45 fans will bring you the happiness that someone else might have if there a million. not everyone is going to be Oprah, not everyone's going to be LeBron James. but trust me there's a lot of ways to be very very happy if you're just yourself. yourself is the victory in this social media game and in this world and with no privacy and personal brand becoming bigger and bigger every day

the people that stop lying to themselves are going to be the people that the world embraces"

</comment><comment><USER3> My favorite Gary Vaynerchuk quote: "Most people in the wine business are douche bags."</comment>


Semantic Data, Schema.org & The Future of Search - <AUTHOR> http://www.strategyinternetmarketing.co.uk/semantic-data-schema-org-the-future-of-search/

<comment><AUTHOR> So I've been pondering the schema.org announcement for a while, and after chewing the cud with a bunch of various search, UX and general experty web people, composed this. Thoughts, opinions and feedback, as always, appreciated.</comment>


Prevents you from committing secrets and credentials into Git repositories - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/awslabs/git-secrets <comment><USER2> Check out [http://pre-commit.com/](http://pre-commit.com/) with its "detect- aws-credentials"-hook, if you are serious about finding AWS credentials configured for AWS CLI/boto/etc. in your code. "git-secrets" will only check "./aws/credentials" for configured AWS credentials and not all other locations (different files, environment variables) where such credentials might be configured.</comment>


Susceptibility to fake news is driven more by lazy thinking than partisan bias - <AUTHOR> https://www.psypost.org/2018/07/susceptibility-fake-news-driven-lazy-thinking-partisan-bias-51707 <comment><USER2> It's not just an issue with fake news. People believe things, both true and false without applying critical thinking.

I recently saw someone objecting to climate change being characterized as a "belief" [1] as it's a scientific fact. Unfortunately, even with this being the case a large number of people believe in climate change because of their own inherent biases. It's absolutely possible to hold a belief that is true for the wrong reasons. And in the long term, unless the root causes are addressed equally harmful.

[1] the context was 60% or Americans believing in climate change.

<comment><USER3> Be nice if people using the term climate change were forced to define exactly what they mean by it instead of throwing it around like some kind of magical incantation.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> "Politically neutral" what ?

</comment><comment><USER5> As far as I cannot tell neither are really the driving factor, rather it's a desire to believe. People who want to believe in X look for stories which confirm X. X can be UFO's, or Muslim rape gangs, the blood libel, or FEMA detention camps... it doesn't matter. What matters is that the story reinforces the desired beliefs, then many people won't think too hard about it, they'll spread it to like-minded people, and reinforce the belief. The thinking looks lazy, and the person may look partisan, but that isn't the active ingredient. You see this pattern in everyone from free energy cranks, through anti-vaxxers and hyper-partisan ideologues, to people who simultaneously believe that Princess Diana was murdered, and that she faked her own death and is still alive. Likewise people who believed that Osama Bin Laden was dead before the SEAL raid that killed him, were most likely to believe that he wasn't killed and is still alive!

[https://www.livescience.com/18171-contradicting- conspiracy-t...](https://www.livescience.com/18171-contradicting-conspiracy- theories-mistrust.html)

[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5724570/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5724570/)

[https://www.researchgate.net/publication/235449075_Dead_and_...](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/235449075_Dead_and_Alive_Beliefs_in_Contradictory_Conspiracy_Theories)

It's a breakdown in how humans think and believe, it's just that. It doesn't dominate everyone's thinking, but it dominates enough people to skew elections and online conversations.

<comment><USER6> I think this is the evident reason. Anybody who's capable of any degree of self reflection can also probably see the exact problem in themselves. When I see a headline that confirms my own biases, I tend to be vastly less critical of it than one that challenges them. I have to consciously force myself to remain critical of things that say what I want to see, and that's very difficult - and something that the vast majority of people clearly do not do. And I think something that's really driving this problem is the deterioration of the media. When articles are increasingly regularly 'factually challenged' it let's people more easily kick in the cognitive dissonance and dismiss everything that opposes their own biases as fake.

And while you're giving some fairly radical examples, this applies to very simple and practical issues. Without stirring the hornet's nest with precise examples, it's safe to say that the reporting on most of any political issue is rarely even remotely impartial. So what is true and what is not? What we tend to believe, one way or the other, is what we want to believe - and you can certainly find some source or another stating it's true. Pair that with social media where people surround themselves with people who all mostly think the same way, and thus share a constant slew of sources all saying what these people collectively want to hear, and it leads sort of parallel realities where two large groups of people might see the color green, but one collectively convinces themselves it's blue, and the other that it's red.

<comment><USER4> "Anybody who's capable of any degree of self reflection can also probably see the exact problem in themselves. "

It has less to do with an ABILITY of self reflection than with a POSTURE to take in context. Look around you, you'll most probably meet many people who are ABLE to think "critically" yet fall for fake news and hoaxes. Also, there's the fact that it's easier to detect false information on questions you are familiar with.

<comment><USER7> "it's easier to detect false information on questions you are familiar with"

That's so important.

The old "modern" news has _long_ assumed a local minimum of giving the remaining audience strong opinions on things they have not personally checked. Distilled; it's a final pointless outburst of pretend-informed righteousness.

If I'm waiting somewhere watching the network that shall not be named it's an odd mix of funny and terrifying; the stuff they implicitly assume their readers do not know is so trivial... at some point you must assume it's not an accident that they also pretend not to know the unmentioned basic info.

I could link a wall of specifics, but why? Most people don't respond to being told they are wrong (myself in 04' included).

Deliberately tangential example: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7R3BN4T6XMw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7R3BN4T6XMw)</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Learning Go in the Browser with WASM - <AUTHOR> https://classroom.qvault.io/#/ <comment><USER2> It's pretty misleading that you only see the pricing after signing up. The landing page is all like 'sign up free' and only afterwards you have to pay $20 to do anything at all. And based on clues in the store, I would guess that once completing the course you'd have to fork out some more to get the certification but it doesn't say that anywhere. Not cool.

</comment><comment><USER3> Skip this.

There's just a "sign up" page, and nothing else.

Only 1 mention of Go on the page, no mention at all of WASM, etc.

This may actually be some kind of scam. ;)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for all the feedback! I just launched it today, I'll take this into account and offer some free functionality in the app

<comment><USER3> How about adding some info to the page, to people don't need so "sign up" to see wtf it's about? :)

<comment><AUTHOR> Also a good call. I'm an engineer and suck at landing pages so it may take a minute to make it look nice ;)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Not sure if this is just a front for testing demand, but agree with others that it feels very scammy. Never seen a paywall AFTER signing up without at least offering some trial.</comment>


International Journal of Proof-Of-Concept or Get the Fuck Out - <AUTHOR> https://www.alchemistowl.org/pocorgtfo/ <comment><USER2> Current issue: [https://www.alchemistowl.org/pocorgtfo/pocorgtfo14.pdf](https://www.alchemistowl.org/pocorgtfo/pocorgtfo14.pdf)</comment>


Ask HN: What was the easiest buck you've made on the web in 2014? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> [http://www.twodollarclub.com](http://www.twodollarclub.com)

<comment><USER3> This is brilliant and hilarious.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Send me a buck and I'll let you know.

</comment><comment><USER5> $1,100 a month from my Udemy course: [https://www.udemy.com/building-and- selling-a-niche-website-f...](https://www.udemy.com/building-and-selling-a- niche-website-from-scratch/?couponCode=redditpeeps123).

Once I got it it up and did the first little bit of marketing, it's been literally no work. Maybe 30-45 min a month answering questions, but I wouldn't consider that work. :)

<comment><USER6> Wow really? Maybe I should submit one ;)

<comment><USER5> It's definitely worth it if you have the time to do it well. I know one instructor who did $140k in his first month (he did have an audience beforehand though). Feels like a 'goldrushy' time in online education right now. A lot of people don't know this.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I put together what I think is a decent game on the iPad a little while back[1]. In 2014 I think it made me about a buck[2]. Putting something up in the App Store can be a good source of passive income, but don't recommend it if you are looking for more than _a_ buck.

[1] [https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/ocean- commotion/id518629974?...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/ocean- commotion/id518629974?ls=1&mt=8) [2] If you don't count the $100/yr developer fees

</comment><comment><USER8> The _only_ buck(s) I made on the web in 2014 was writing some Arduino code on spec for someone who was having trouble getting his head around a few concepts.

Initial code took about 1/2 hour and I charged a bit over $100. Don't remember exactly how much.

I then spent hours writing emails (on top of the documentation I supplied) explaining things as he tried to add functionality on his own :-(

</comment><comment><USER9> There was an article on digg.com about Google becoming a worse search engine. The article was on news.yahoo.com

Someone commented "5 dollars to someone who points out the irony in this", I replied. The guy sent me $5 via Paypal. I used the $5 to get a .com domain (special offer on GoDaddy). The domain was for my web design portfolio, and that's how I got started.

</comment><comment><USER10> Back in 2009 I put a couple drawings up on CafePress ([http://www.cafepress.com/fallinghawks](http://www.cafepress.com/fallinghawks)), then pretty much completely ignored the site. I just got a commission check last month. Apparently there was some falconry meet somewhere and somebody got a kick out of the shirts and bought a few.

<comment><USER11> May I ask you how to join this website and get revenue from our drawing ? tks

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Wordpress website setup. Choose theme from large Wordpress theme directory, show client theme demo site, install on Wordpress-friendly provider, configure and send login details to client with links to current Wordpress tutorial. My spend is <$60USD, profit margin is $400+ for very little work.

<comment><USER13> i have to ask: do you not consider this dishonest? why charge so much for doing so little? sure. people will pay a mint for something they discern as hard andhave no knowledge of, but i have to say i am concerned about your ethics in doing so. this is the ugly side of both capitalism and entrepreneurship.

<comment><USER14> There's value in having someone else do something for you. Eating at a restaurant is a basic example.

When there's risk involved, you're willing to pay even more. Hiring an electrician or plumber. And the value goes up the more risk there is, just like an insurance premium.

But value can go through the roof when there's a potential for gain on the line. Especially coming from a credible source with a proven track record of success. How much would you pay for a machine that spit out $2 for every $1 you put into it? Even if the total cost of that machine's parts was only $40?

A good consultant can analyze a business, figure out what needs to change, write some decent content, bring it all together in a theme forest template, set up so e traffic sources, and add 5, 6, or 7 figures to a business's bottom line.

Plus, if you're too cheap, they might not even consider you. Would you buy a $20 car? You'd be very skeptical and ask a lot of questions. There's even the weird pricing trough where you just assume it's a scam and move on.

All that to say that charging $500 is more than reasonable. I usually charge 6x-10x more for a superficially similar service (consulting plus template setup and customization). It's all about how you position your service, and what benefit you can guarantee your client.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> One of my businesses (www.iamlovable.com) has actually picked up paying clients from Instagram posts. Credit of course to my amazing business partner (@millieald) for cultivating that community as well. Please share those links with all the 18-30 year old women you know.

</comment><comment><USER16> Made over $700 in commissions from Digitalocean referral program.

You can sign up using the link below and get $10 hosting credit.

Referral Link: [https://www.digitalocean.com/?refcode=4d7fb2079a96](https://www.digitalocean.com/?refcode=4d7fb2079a96)

</comment><comment><USER17> I asked the tiny community of my hobbyist website to donate for hosting costs and got almost 150% of what was needed and asked for. The world wide web can run on altruism.

</comment><comment><USER18> Renting my washing machine ([http://www.lamachineduvoisin.fr/fr/](http://www.lamachineduvoisin.fr/fr/) in France)

</comment><comment><USER19> Once you have an audience that knows, likes, and trusts you, and a product they want, then most of the "bucks" made are pretty easy at the margin.

</comment><comment><USER20> Wrote a PHP script and made few easy sales [http://motyar.info/geodata/](http://motyar.info/geodata/)

<comment><USER21> How have you been able to build interest?

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> reddit.com/r/beermoney - made over $1,000 in the last 4 months in amazon gift cards.

</comment><comment><USER23> display ads make it easy to earn exactly 1 buck, but growing the user base is a grind</comment>


Afghanistan: The Making of a Narco State - <AUTHOR> http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/afghanistan-the-making-of-a-narco-state-20141204

<comment><USER2> We've spent more on Afghaistan than on Europe after the Marshall plan, in inflation-adjusted terms: [http://www.latimes.com/world/afghanistan- pakistan/la-fg-afgh...](http://www.latimes.com/world/afghanistan-pakistan/la- fg-afghanistan-us-aid-outlook-20140731-story.html)

Now, it could be argued that Western Europe had more in common culturally with the US, as well as being motivated to make things work by Soviet expansion right after WW2. But obviously we're not getting the results we want.

I'm sure this has been proposed before, but how about this: we buy all the opium Afghanistan produces ($3 billion this year according to the article). We can use it for production (to the detriment of Western pharmaceutical industrial synthetic opiate producers, but too bad) or just destroy it. Expensive for sure, but we keep a large volume of opium and heroin off the market, deny the fat markup on its manufacture to professional drug dealers (some of whom fund terrorism), and degreade their supply chains.

This might increase production, but there's an upper limit on the amount of land that can be used for opium cultivation and it seems like we're already close to it.

<comment><USER3> I don't see how that's even possible. A $3bil cash infusion is going to increase prices and create need for more product. The US can't just make a deal to buy opium at a fixed price every year.

It sounds like a slightly more practical version of your suggestion would be to just pay producers to stop producing, but that obviously creates a slew of other issues.

And if there is an upper limit to opium production, you're going to have to start a price war to get there, which just dumps more and more funding into the region.

<comment><USER2> _The US can 't just make a deal to buy opium at a fixed price every year._

Why not? We don't seem to have any problem throwing money into a hole as things are. Why not just use it for medical morphine? Right now there are fields growing opium poppies in western countries, which is pointlessly duplicative.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afghan_morphine](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afghan_morphine) [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2667253/Not- Afghanis...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2667253/Not-Afghanistan- Hampshire-How-opium-poppies-grown-UK-make-morphine-NHS.html)

<comment><USER4> Supply will work to match the demand. The US buying as much as $3 billion would put a huge floor on the demand. The illicit buyers would add more demand on top of that. The resulting higher price would encourage poppy farming yet again. But while production is ramping up it'd work.

I think it is wiser to pay farmers not to grow poppies.

<comment><USER5> If we can't prevent farmes to grow poppies when it's "illegal" to do so, what's to prevent farmers from taking money to "not grow" and still grow opium?

I suppose, if one buys into the idea that this is mostly the result of a free marked (as opposed to an intricate web of political, economic and organized violent crime) -- one could offer to pay opium prices for food crops. But then you'd probably have to destroy that food, in order to prevent people from selling the food back, and collecting double payments on "not growing poppies"...

<comment><USER6> And buying wheat or whatever that they need time and effort to produce from them at a golden price? (I don't know, I'm just sending a random idea)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Amazing reporting. Sometimes Rolling Stone does good work.

</comment><comment><USER8> The War on Terror provides the opportunity. The War on Drugs provides the rationale. Both these are levers controlled by the US and both cost it much in treasure and lives for little gain (I'm following standard US practice and ignoring the cost to the non-exceptional peoples of the world). Sadly most US politicians lack the bravery and/or integrity to even suggest touching those levers.</comment>


The Future of Fish Farming May Be Indoors - <AUTHOR> https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-future-of-fish-farming-may-be-indoors/ <comment><USER2> I'm passing this along from Michael Timmons mentioned in the article, a former professor of mine.

"""

Hello everyone (I was quoted in the article). The use of the term 'indoor' is actually not relevant. A RAS can be located indoors or outdoors. The key on the RAS is that the water is recycled (in a loop) that returns 99% of the water to the system instead of discharging the water from the system into a receiving body of water (or sewer system). Placing indoors in a 'cold' environment is beneficial for heat loss control.

HOpe that helps.

MBT (Cornell Univ)

"""

</comment><comment><USER3> I'm confused why this keeps saying indoor, when it just seems to be talking about a more modern "raceway" system that has been used since at least the 80's, that I know of. Everything it described sounds exactly like the farm my dad used to run, except inside. The "indoors" part just sounds like a more expensive way to do raceways and probably isn't needed in most cases.

Can anyone explain the difference? Or is "indoor" just a buzzword here?

I'm all for more fish farming. Raceways are extremely efficient. During harvest season we were harvesting around 30,000lbs of hyrbid striped bass every 2 weeks off half an acre, with just my dad running the farm and me helping with the grunt work. We also had a few of the unused raceways dedicated to Tilapia as a side income, which were basically self sustaining and just needed to be fed. They bred faster than we harvested them.

<comment><USER4> I'm guessing the implication of "indoor" is that is it climate-controlled, and external variations of outdoors are reduced entirely or as much as possible.

I'm yet to learn about fish but I know the binary difference of "outdoor" and "indoor" when it comes to crop farming.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> > Water in RAS tanks flows through a bubbling container called a bio-filter, > in which bacteria consume fish urine and convert it into a form of nitrogen > that is safe for the fish and environment

I wonder if a system like this might be instead kept clean (in part or full) with the help of an Aquaponics[0] system. In that design, you filter the water by growing food hydroponically. The fish waste acts as a nutrient for the plants, which clean the water for the fish. Food out of both ends of the equation.

[0][https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquaponics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquaponics)

<comment><USER6> They seem to be combining several steps here (though maybe I'm wrong). In a comparable aquarium build the bubbling helps to oxygenate the water and to support the protein skimmer. You have things like bioballs with a large surface area to contain the bacteria and that acts to process the waste.

But, to answer your question: I think it can probably be done on an industrial scale. Many larger fish tank setups have refugiums, where the water is processed. Some people set those up with plants which, in my experience, grow really well. I've only used underwater plants, but it makes sense that you could use others.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I find animal farming fascinating because they are basically just miniature bio-factories - converting feed and other additives into a higher-value food product. Of course, each different animal converts feed at a different rate of efficiency and over a different timeframe, in different controlled environmental conditions.

I think there is a huge appetite out there for tasty, cheap, nutritious food. Fast food mega-companies are ignoring a huge opportunity here - imagine if McDonalds (or equivalent) was a food choice your could healthily eat for every meal? They would be better off thinking as their food as part of daily nutrition, instead of a meal out. They could adjust their operations and menus accordingly - with a significant increase in revenue.

<comment><USER8> >Tasty, cheap, nutritious

Pick two.

<comment><USER9> You can have the full pack here also. Tasty and nutritious are subjective terms in any case. The definition of cheap depends a lot on the zone. The same food can be very cheap in a country and a delicacy in other. Offer and demand.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Salmon are predators making the '100 kilograms of fish feed' line misleading. We basically feed fish to fish.

Resulting in a fraction more fish we like at the cost of vast amounts of fish we like less.

ex: "Freshwater feeds contain 45–54 percent protein and 16–24 percent lipid." [http://www.fao.org/fishery/affris/species- profiles/atlantic-...](http://www.fao.org/fishery/affris/species- profiles/atlantic-salmon/feed-production/en/)

</comment><comment><USER11> I would have been interesting to hear more about ideas for how to feed the fish. I think a lot of the fish feed today is from land based agriculture which is not very sustainable.

There has been experiments with using bio reactors to grow algae based food instead.

<comment> Xt-6 The use of black soldier flies larva could be a sustainable way. The larva are fed with organic waste, then use as feed [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5M6u9ZX5ecE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5M6u9ZX5ecE)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Replace indoors by closed and you'll have it. Complex systems to maintain at long term, but we are learning still.

</comment><comment><USER12> Sad. The future should be sustainable lab-grown fish meat.

<comment><USER13> Or better still, just get the nutrition you need from plants. There's nothing essential in fish you can't get from plant sources, with a much lower environmental footprint.

And before somebody jumps in to say Omega-3, not only can you easily get that from plants but fish also get it from algae. They don't produce it themselves.

<comment><USER14> >Or better still, just get the nutrition you need from plants.

How about Vitamin B12? This article:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitamin_B12](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitamin_B12)

says: "There are no naturally-occurring notable vegetable dietary sources of the vitamin, so vegans and vegetarians are advised[5][6] to take a supplement or fortified foods."

There is also this part:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitamin_B12#Plants_and_algae](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitamin_B12#Plants_and_algae)

but who eats much algae, among vegetarians? Wonder if Spirulina is one of those algae. Need to check. Spirulina as a food supplement is commonly available in capsule form.

<comment><USER15> It's added to all soy milk, far as I know, so personally I've never had to worry about that, I get B12 with my breakfast cereal.

<comment><USER7> Along with a huge amount of phytoestrogens from your soy juice :-/

<comment><USER15> I didn't remember hearing about those; you say that like it's Bad, well, dark innuendo at least, beerlord.

A lil while googling about them seemed to say no-one's sure what good or bad effects they have, if any. And they're in a lot of things:

"According to one study...foods with the highest relative phytoestrogen content were nuts and oilseeds, followed by soy products, cereals and breads, legumes, meat products, ...vegetables, fruits, alcoholic, and nonalcoholic beverages."

And well, Japan has the world's greatest life expectancy doesn't it? And they have soy everything.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>