Is Facebook More Censorship Resistant than Steemit?
In a recent post I made about a political video negative towards Hillary Clinton being removed from Facebook, I got into a debate with @sigmajin about whether Facebook is more censorship resistant than Steemit.
I wrote the following response to address his most recent comment, but realized that this would be better suited for a full blown post since I want to hear from more voices on the topic. So without further ado...
Ok lets try this again. In an attempt to get straight to the point, I'll concede the following points so we can stay on topic: 1) I'm stupid; 2) I don't understand game theory, 3) I don't know how to use logic to make arguments; 4) I'm stupid. Conceded. You've bested me on all of those points.
Now that we can agree on that, lets examine my original statement that I assume you took exception to:
@blakemiles84: This is an easy 'target of opportunity' for us to demonstrate the value proposition of a censorship-resistant social media platform.
Now lets look at your statement:
@sigmajin: no one has ever presented a compelling argument that steemit is more censorship resistant than facebook.
Now to annoy you more, lets take a look at the exact definition of censorship:
the practice of officially examining books, movies, etc., and suppressing unacceptable parts.
- I asserted that one of Steemit's main value propositions is that it is censorship resistant (while implying that it is more resistant than Facebook given the context of the post).
- You asserted that you haven't seen an argument to convince you that Steemit is MORE censorship resistant than Facebook.
- Censorship equals 'suppression' of ideas.
- Censorship is on a variable scale of severity from totally free expression of ideas all the way to total suppression of ideas.
Facebook is actively engaging in censorship as a matter of POLICY and employs people to shut down accounts and remove content from their PRIVATELY OWNED platform.
Sorry. I've done this and seen it done, and it's usually not pretty, IMO. I prefer rational, non-emotional debates with a shared goal of reaching more truth and so far I haven't seen that happen with this individual. Thankfully, he's muted me so I don't have to worry about it anymore. :)
Right @lukestokes, changing ideas doesn't mean debating it mean something is to be shared for the purpose of information and knowledge.
Yep. Just now learning that. At this point, saying that Steemit is not more censorship resistant than Facebook is ,at face value, trollish.
He's like a troll mastermind though.... and if he reads this will likely take it as some sort of sardonic compliment. Slippery but clever enough to be nailed down on any point through use of linguistic tactics alone. Never concedes. More likely to ridicule.
That he blocked you and then forgot that he was the one that blocked them is hilarious and telling.
I'm glad he is making his own post about it so it will be easier for me to selectively censor it and scroll right by :)
You guys made me wonder why I'm not following him, the name is known well enough, after all.
It was truly, honestly simply because we have completely different interests, that is all, so I looked whether I had an unpleasant encounter with him.
I did have an encounter, but not unpleasant. So, to be fair, he upvoted my corrections of his corrections of my post; I count that as a "concession": so in dubio pro reo, I assume he is not completely immune to sound reason and solid arguments and just loves, as much as I do, Socratic trolling and playing devil's advocate.
For some, that is terribly annoying, others appreciate being pushed beyond their intellectual comfort zone.
You are both right: censorship is impossible on the blockchain, as it is decentralized and immutable. At the same time, if a whale or collective of whales downvote a post into invisibility and oblivion, thus denying it attention, readership and "rewards", it does constitute a form of censorship. So it actually depends on the interface.
So far, however, I am quite pleased even with Steem as seen through the Steemit lens. "Conspiracy theories", I mean, valid criticism of the status quo receive much more attention than threadbare attempts at "coincidence theorizing", ridicule of tinfoil crackpots and defenses of "conventional wisdom", "externalized thinking" or "received knowledge".
Note the "so far"; the potential dangers posed to the project by future generations of whales have already been highlighted.
I invite you to read my post, where i make effectively the same point (its linked above). And i don't have to call those who disagree with me trolls to do it.
BTW, i don't remember why i upvoted your correction. I usually upvote most replies, even if i don't necessarily agree with them. AAMOF i upvoted this post, even though blakes replies are somehwhat libelous.
If you read through blakes and lukes posts (and especially through lukes posts on steemit abuse) , what they want is a system where people aren't free to disagree with them except on certain terms (that they decide on). If that isnt censorship, i don't know what is.
Not so no drama in my thread, just a huge love fest(well not that huge). Blake and luke apparently know they can't hang... but just as a by the by, how is my name well known? I don't really post that much.
Naaah, you are all just disagreeing for the sake of disagreeing.
But that's okay, I'm judging Steem by the drama it spawns.
Also, just realized he has never done an intro post on his account so has no reputation stake tied to it.
My name is on the line with everything I say, as is yours. He can literally afford to be pretentious on his account. More reasons to avoid. Maybe his sensitivity to censorship resistance on here is due to people selectively ignoring him because of his attitude.... Just like I'll be doing from now on :)
Yes, i have done an intro post. More lies. More libel. More mischaracterization.
Just like the lie about this made up "emotional argument" i had with @lukestokes.
Thats the difference between me and you. I can (and did) make my point without adhominem.
Flagging isn't censorship, even if a post is flagged a 100 times, you can still read it.
Flagging hurts the author financially. Maybe we will see interesting things in the future as somebody buys in the platform with just this intention.
It only hurts an author financially if that author's job is Steemit. Which wouldn't be a very smart career as you may get a payout, not you will get a pay out.
The thing that causes censorship here is the community being greedy. Everyone follows the highest paid posts instead of looking for good content that they genuinely enjoy. Whales on the other hand mostly vote posts with the intention of making steemit look better. This vesting / curation system is a double edge sword.
I'm glad you mentioned someone buying in because once that starts to happen there will be even less opportunity for new users to grow.
This excerpt from whitepaper may explain behavior of the members of community.
"The value each currency achieves depends upon the demand for influence within a
particular community and how large the market believes each community can get. Unlike
prior systems, subjective proof of work enables a community to collectively fund the
development of whatever it finds valuable and enables the monetization of previously non
monetizable time."
If you are interested, here is my take:
https://steemit.com/censorship/@sigmajin/censorship-and-sensibility
also its pretty hilarious that there are hidden comments ITT
EDIT -- oh nvm theyre just hidden for me its luke.
further edit: I was actually planning to post today about censorship anyway, so rather than upset Mr. Miles and Mr. Stokes, ill just do that.
Yea... I've learned my lesson. Do not engage you. You feed on disagreement. Your emotional disagreement with @lukestokes explains the tone of your response and the dismissive nature of every response you made.
You're too intelligent to not understand why a blockchain is at least as censorship resistant or more censorship resistant than a centrally controlled server and database.... Wow just writing that reconfirmed the absurdity of your argument! And best of all: I have an idea for the next post I'll write about how you wasting my time was not in vain since I earned enough money to at least buy a gallon of milk. If I had had this argument on Facebook I would have wasted a LOT of time "debating" with you.
Obvious troll is obvious.
I don't recall ever having an emotional disagreement with @lukestokes, or anyone here for that matter. nor did i make a dismissive response. You made what i believe to be a bad argument, and i pointed what I perceived to be the flaws.
I expect youll earn quite a bit on the post, much more than enough to buy a gallon of milk.. its the kind of post that does well, and it already has a bunch of upvotes. I suspect none of the whales is up yet. Hell, i even put in my four cents, fwiw.
Obvious ad hominem is also obvious.
Anyway, best of luck with recruiting Orfeala and the post and everything, for now ill just finish mine.
hey blake, just as a coda. Dan thinks youre wrong too:
https://steemit.com/censorship/@dantheman/censorship-is-impossible-in-a-free-society
Thanks for bringing up an important issue, @blakemiles84! We wrote an article on censorship today too. We were drawn to Steemit because it purports to be a censorship-free platform, which is far superior to our experience with FB.
While our experience on Steemit has been waaaay better than that on FB, we do find that users try to censor one another through the downvote (or by threats of reporting to authorities). On one hand it's not a big deal, but on the other hand it is a big deal because the underlying intent of the downvote is to silence another user. It causes injury as it affects reputation, author rewards, and limits the audience reach (in which case, the entire community suffers when valuable content is restricted).
The levels of censorship that @sigmajin alleges are far more serious.
Censorship absolutely has to be addressed even on the smallest scale. There is no place for censorship in a free, fair, just, and logical society, from whales or minnows or the government or hippies. If it is tolerated to any degree, it will grow and grow and grow. Steemit is not at the level of censorship of Fascistbook now, but continued conversation and debate are necessary to keep it so.
I think just censoring crap or spam.. is only tolerable... But full on centralized is not what the block chain is about.
Steemit.com is just a browser to the steem blockchain. If people don't like the flagging or reputation system on steemit.com, they are free to fork the code and build their own interface to the blockchain which has no censorship and pays no respect (visually) to the reputation scores. That, to me, is uncensored data. Claims can be made about the steemit.com interface, but since the data is open to anyone and the interface is open source, I don't see how it can honestly be compared to other completely closed source systems with no public data access.
both social networks abuse censorship and flagging
But only one has the power to make accounts and content disappear down the memory hole.
And on Facebook, the censorship is done from the top down, by the moderators of the platform.
On Steemit any so-called censorship (more accurately, flag-abuse) is done by users. It's just a community promoting and criticizing content based on how they subjectively value it. It isn't censorship.
Facebook will not tolerate porn
I believe facebook is more censored
im pretty sure outright porn would be flagged to invisibility here too
Check out @girlsgonewild it got flagged over 6 times!!!!
obvious catfish. the graph paper is a dead giveaway. I guess it does speak to the permissiveness of the platfrom that it wasn't flagged into oblivion. That said, its all pretty PG-13 rated. I still think outright porn probably wouldn prob get memory holed.
I think this is fine for now.