SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
After experiencing extensive spamming, ad-hominem attacks, and trolling it became necessary to protect the site by preventing all Anonymous Coward (AC) comments by anyone who was not logged in. This was a reluctant measure but it proved to be 99.9% effective. It was however, far from ideal. It partially isolated many of the responsible ACs who contribute regularly to the site and provide a valuable input to many of our discussions. They are still able to use journals for posting as the editors of SoylentNews have no control over the content of journals or the comments made in them.
I sought an alternative solution and provided access to some of the stories on the front page and marked them as AC Friendly. I had hoped by demonstrating to those abusing the site that there was a simple solution that they would perhaps cease, or at least return to previously manageable levels. Unfortunately this was not to be. The abuse restarted almost immediately and has continued in every AC Friendly story that has been published. It has clearly demonstrated that this isn't a case of the abusers defending free speech or any other laudable and justifiable aim but simply an attempt to prevent the majority of the community from holding any form of discussion at all. I am not continuing the AC Friendly stories on the main page with the sole exception of this Meta story.
I next tried to switch the attempts to include our AC community around by providing stories from the front page initially to my own journal, but subsequently to the journal of a new account named 'AC Friendly'. This was rather labour intensive and was not something that I could continue to do in the long term. These efforts have been ignored and do not seem to be of any interest to the AC community. Likewise I will not continue this effort unless there is evidence that it is wanted.
There are many perfectly understandable reasons for wishing to post comments as an Anonymous Coward. This was recognised when the original Slashdot code was written and provision was made for such individuals in the software. It is a straightforward matter to log in to the site and then automatically post as AC from then on. This both protects the site itself and those using it. If your justification is that you do not trust the staff then I must question why you would want to remain on the site.
Free speech is an essential part of our ethos but it is necessary to realise that free speech and anonymity are not necessarily related. We want people to be able to express their views without fear of harassment, abuse, or unfair moderation. Only by doing so can we truly claim to have free speech. It means that even those with whom we strongly disagree have the right to express their opinions. Subsequent attempts to argue against those views should not involve any form of harassment of the individual making them. Any attempt to prevent someone from expressing their views is directly counter to the very concept of 'free speech'.
Likewise, anonymity is something to be valued. Attempts to unmask either named or anonymous accounts is unacceptable to this site's administration and will not be tolerated. Those who publish information that appears credible to us must be deterred from continuing by whatever means are necessary. We cannot verify every claim made regarding the personal information of a community member and we must therefore assume that it is has some basis in truth and is an attempt at doxing. It does not matter where the information stated in the claim originates or whether it has been stated on this site or elsewhere previously. If it has the potential to unmask a community member it will be treated as doxing. The site will do all it can to protect community members. We are also fortunate that in the 8 years we have been operating we have only had one account that felt it was an acceptable thing to do. That account has been closed.
There is absolutely no doubt whatsoever that the toxic environment that has developed on the site has cost us numerous valued community members - both staff and regular contributors of submissions and comments. It cannot be allowed to continue. There is also no doubt that there is a straightforward and simple solution, and that is to prevent AC participation without the creation of an account. The software was designed to do this and it is wasted effort trying to find alternatives when it is unnecessary to do so.
There has been quite a bit of discussion over the last week or so. We have had a former community member (who was also once a member of staff) return to the site with his own story. Initially he chose to remain anonymous but subsequently decided to continue his comments under his username. I encourage you all to read the link given and the subsequent comments given in reply. I am very grateful that has taken the effort to explain why he has did what he has done and I welcome him back to our community if he choses to stay. As part of my reply to him I made the following statement:
It is vitally important that everyone is able to express their own point of view without harassment or intimidation or even unfair moderation. We do not all agree with each other. That is the same in any community. But by full, frank and honest discussion we can at least understand each others point of view and possibly identify potential solutions. The freedom of expression is still essential on the site - but it can only exist if we can ensure that it can be conducted in a suitable environment.
I stand by that statement. Since that comment was published I have received other views and experiences of the toxicity of our site from a significant number of individuals, including regular community members and both current and former staff. Quite simply, if we do not change then in all likelihood we will not survive much longer. It is not too late to make the necessary changes but time is running out.
I promised you that no changes would be made to how the site operates without first giving you all the chance to express your own opinions. But you have to decide now which path you want the site to follow. This cannot be a simple vote - as an extreme example we have no way of verifying that AC comments are not the result of a single person, or if some sock-puppets are still active on the site. Everyone has the right to be heard. However, let me point out a few rules:
- Any attempt to disrupt this Meta by spamming, ad-hominem attacks or trolling abuse will count as someone expressing an opinion that we should insist on accounts for all those wishing to post as AC. If anyone thinks that by abusing the site they will be helping their case they are mistaken. However, such actions will clearly show to the community that those who have been making the most noise about being prevented from expressing themselves are not actually fighting for free speech, but rather they are determined to prevent you from exercising your right to it.
- It will be pointless to keep repeating the same views as an AC. We cannot separate them. You want to be anonymous, you choose to have the account ID #1, and this, unfortunately, is a direct consequence to that decision.
- All views will be collated and then a decision will be made based upon them by the staff. This will include the SN Board who may accept that decision, but who have the right to choose the path that the site eventually takes. It may not be the decision that any of us want.
This is an important issue. It cannot be a simple vote but I encourage as many people as possible to express their opinions. It might be the last chance for you to do so. The Meta will stay active for several days to at least mid-week - but if it is abused excessively then it will be taken down and we will be forced to make a decision base on whatever views we already have or can get from elsewhere. I will endeavour to move the Meta in the story queue so that it remains on the front page. Many of our community log on at different times of the day or only on specific days. I would like to give everyone a chance to see the Meta story and to make their views known.
This is your opportunity - please do not waste it.
[Ed's Comment: See bold text - warning 2022-07-10 12:36 UTC]
(Score: 5, Interesting) by inertnet on Saturday July 09 2022, @10:21AM (54 children)
Would it be possible to (user selectively) add a 'hidden' attribute to any comment thread that has a -1 spam score, that was started by a 'real' AC?
I have no problem moderating such comments as spam, which would make them instantly invisible for logged in users that don't want to see them.
(Score: 3, Informative) by janrinok on Saturday July 09 2022, @10:35AM (31 children)
Code changes are not possible without a Perl programmer volunteering to join the team.
(Score: 5, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @01:46PM
Oh, but they are possible. The site may not work after, but one definitely can change the code.
(Score: 2) by inertnet on Saturday July 09 2022, @03:33PM
Another option would be if someone would write a Violentmonkey script to do the filtering. In that case nobody has to touch the Perl code.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @04:03PM (3 children)
SoylentNews is the last place I can post AC. Slashdot stopped it sometime after beta, which got me to stop posting there (I actually have an account dating back to '99 or so, but never used it preferring to post anon for a long list of reasons.) If not for anonymous posting, I have reddit, hackernews(ycombinator), hackaday, and many other sites I can focus on (and lately had been already.) Should a permanent removal of anonymous accounts happen, Soylentnews will go the way of Slashdot in my viewship. Somewhere I still check on rare occasions but often overwhelmed by other sources.
If this is my last post: Soy long and fangs for all ze fish.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @04:30PM
Last I checked you can still post anonymously on slashdot provided you are logged in. It's been a while so maybe that changed?
I just went to the site and see anonymous cowards posted.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @07:21PM (1 child)
Can you post anonymously at reddit, etc.? I thought you needed an account at those places. If so, what would be the difference here such that you would stop posting, but keep posting at the other places?
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @01:21AM
I think that is their whole point. If you have to waste time to get and maintain an account, you might as well do it on a website you think or feel is "better" for whatever reason. You can disagree about how large of a hassle requiring an account is or which websites are "better" but their assessment is ultimately a subjective determination from their perspective.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @04:40PM (12 children)
It's fairly absurd to try to run a site without a programmer for the [lame] lang the site is written in. Maybe try raising money for this next donation drive and then pay people for perl//cobol contributions.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @08:21PM (11 children)
The lefties here ran the programmer off the site, for his too-conservative-for-them views.
https://soylentnews.org/~The+Mighty+Buzzard/ [soylentnews.org]
https://github.com/TheMightyBuzzard [github.com]
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @11:38PM (9 children)
From the comments I read it was his abuse of admin privileges. Keep up that fake persecution complex.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @12:08AM (8 children)
From the reality I lived, you are lying, and I'm sure you know it. YOU are the fake, here.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @01:47AM (7 children)
The well-timed (poorly-timed?) database failure wiped his "don't do disco" post, where he mentioned the reasons being something other than the lefties driving him off. And, I might add, reasons that appear to have been correct in hind-sight. Compounded by the fact that there have repeatedly been "unexplained" bans on users that only came to (public) light after he left. Looks like you are the fake one since you are wrong on both counts.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @03:10AM (6 children)
The "unexplained" ban on a user - singular user - involved ari. Being generous, Buzzard made an error, and failed to set an expiration on a mod ban. Being less than generous, ari succeeded in really pissing Buzzard off, and Buzzard intentionally put a mod ban on ari with no expiration. Buzzard did not impose arbitrary bans on multiple users, as your post implies.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @08:15AM (5 children)
So you did know he abused his admin privileges and that he said he wasn't driven off by lefties. Interesting.
(Score: 5, Informative) by janrinok on Sunday July 10 2022, @10:43AM (4 children)
He wasn't driven off by lefties. He may, or may not, have disagreed with the opinions of the majority of staff. Like you, the first thing I knew about it was reading it in comments on here.
It seems that half of this site believe that this site is a hot bed of right-wing extremism, and the other half believe it is full of lefties. Actually, it is neither. It is a bunch of guys who don't discuss politics and are all cooperating to keep this site going.
He possibly made an error when imposing a moderation ban - but there is nothing to indicate what actually happened so it is all speculation.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 11 2022, @01:04PM
He was canceled OMG! Crazy leftists like Joe Biden are out of control! Bring back Steve Bannon and Roger Stone, we need some sensible moderates.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 12 2022, @02:22AM (2 children)
Except, right now, c0lo is mod-banned, no one knows why, or even how to undo the ban. Coincidence? Judge for yourself!
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Tuesday July 12 2022, @04:21AM (1 child)
I don't know how to walk a tightrope or how to paint pictures as well as one of the old Masters - I'll bet that you don't know either.
It is a coincidence that neither of us can do those things. It isn't a conspiracy though....
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 13 2022, @11:24PM
But you can do the right thing and unban Aristarchus.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday July 12 2022, @05:41PM
If you are such a fragile snowflake that you can't handle people disagreeing with you in the comments then you probably shouldn't be running the site.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @06:24AM
lol, mod parent up
(Score: 5, Funny) by Samantha Wright on Monday July 11 2022, @06:53AM (7 children)
You know what they say: that which one perl coder writes requires at least two to fix.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Monday July 11 2022, @07:00AM
I've moderated it as Funny - but there is a lot of truth in that statement.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by RS3 on Monday July 11 2022, @05:01PM (5 children)
I'm not presently a full-time coder (could be if I was in the right job) but I've done some. Yeah, perl syntax is "interesting" and seems easy to make mistakes. Seems like a language you really need to sink yourself into, unless you're just making some very minor tweaks (which I've done).
FWIW, I remember a tidbit of a discussion here about perl, python, etc., and TMB saying that perl had the best string handling of any of them. So I guess like many things in life, you take the good with the bad?
My analogy might be: I work with a lot of physical tools, and some are both very powerful and dangerous. Used with complete understanding and care, they do amazing things, but there's little room for error.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Tuesday July 12 2022, @02:35PM (4 children)
While using a table saw, a small lapse in attention can result in unintendend amputation!
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Tuesday July 12 2022, @03:46PM (3 children)
True that. Bandsaws worry me even more, unless you have "blade stop" or "saw stop" or similar. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwXlh9I4htc [youtube.com]
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Wednesday July 13 2022, @01:56PM (2 children)
Really, why's that? Is there a safety risk I'm not aware of?
My impression has always been that bandsaws are among the safest power saws available. Injuries are mostly related to accidentally shoving your hand/arm into the blade. I can certainly see the risk for something like meat cutters rapidly free-handing cuts all day long to make a quota, but that's an inherent risk of any powered cutting tool. As long as you pay attention and you don't fuck up, you'll be fine. (Well, the blade breaking or coming off the wheels can be scary, but proper maintenance virtually eliminates that risk except for the thinnest blades)
Table saws are especially nasty because in addition to the universal risks, there's several ways the work can bind up that will pull your hands into the blade faster than you can react, and/or lift material on top of the blade and throw it at you fast enough to cause serious injuries.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Wednesday July 13 2022, @03:48PM (1 child)
Well, to each his own. :) I don't think I've ever felt like a table saw pushed or pulled anything such that it could hurt me. I always use some kind of pusher if I'm anywhere near the blade. And table saws (are supposed to) have various blade guards and anti-kickback things, but not bandsaws. For some things you can use a "feather board" on a bandsaw, but not really a blade guard that I know of. Maybe some have them?
I think either saw is very dangerous, and I think more in terms of exposed blade.
You mentioned paying attention, etc. That's the whole point of designing in safety- people are not perfect, so I think it's fair to at least start with as much safety guards and shields as possible. Of course most people (guys) remove many of them. Some are admittedly very annoying, but that one time you're more tired than you realize, get distracted somehow, etc., you'll regret it.
My poor brother lost the tip of his thumb on a table saw. He had shut it off and was clearing debris and heard the blade "ding". My great consternation: it's electrically fairly trivial (I'm an EE) to make the motor stop very quickly, and I'd be in favor of a law that requires power tools to stop nearly instantly when switched off. My DeWalt cordless tools do that. In fact most better cordless tools do that (quick stop).
Humans will be human, and I'm very okay with designing in safety when / where practical, and I think we all know how much safety is designed into things all around us. Of course some of it is excessive, but the lawyers never rest...
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Wednesday July 13 2022, @04:17PM
Table saws have all the standard safety devices precisely *because* they're so dangerous. They're not perfect though (and most of them need to be removed for common tasks like non-through cuts), and *none* of them do anything to protect you from sliding your hand straight into the blade along with your work-piece (aside from SawStop, which is very cool, and unfortunately even more expensive)
A bandsaw meanwhile can *only* hurt you in the one way none of the tablesaw guards protect against. Assuming you're not doing anything stupid like wearing gloves, long sleeved shirts, or anything else that can snag on the blade and drag you into it, the only force it can exert on the work-piece is straight down against the table. And properly configured, you should never have any more exposed blade than you actually need for the task at hand - that's a large part of what the adjustable vertical guide arm is for. It protects you from any accidental contact with the blade while simultaneously stabilizing it for a cleaner cut.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Monday July 11 2022, @03:18PM (2 children)
It's an interesting thing, but I would figure that one wouldn't need a "Perl programmer" to make small modifications. Just a programmer or a smart person with enough interest. Though, perhaps, I'm too much of a hobbyist to realize how bad of an idea that would be.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Monday July 11 2022, @05:32PM
You are welcome to look at the code [github.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 13 2022, @05:51AM
If you can't see how bad it could be.. best not to get involved unless you like the steep learning curve. Could be.. fun?
(Score: -1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @02:30PM (2 children)
It doesn’t matter what you say. JR has seized power and his mind is made up. Technical suggestions will be shot down with “But Perl!”. This article is just for show.
(Score: 2, Redundant) by janrinok on Sunday July 10 2022, @10:47AM
Lol - I would like some of whatever you are smoking please! I am simply the only administrator available on site for the majority of the day. If you want to change that then volunteer to help!
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday July 12 2022, @05:44PM
Perl isn't that hard. None of this is that hard.
That only hard part is deciding what is best for the site and coming to some sort of agreement about it.
Thus far, dramatically changing how the site functions at a technical level has not met that threshold.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @03:10PM (13 children)
Don't know if this is the current codebase, but I the code is/was located at https://github.com/SoylentNews/rehash/ [github.com] , searching the tracker, it seems I even was able to contribute ever so slightly.
I'd volunteer to implement things, but being compelled to work in perl for just one project, despite being able to accomplish what was needed, was such a poor experience for me that I swear off doing anything but the most minor bug fixes. the most I'll do now is add rss feeds to a place.
(Score: 2) by turgid on Saturday July 09 2022, @07:33PM (12 children)
How big is the codebase?
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 2) by fliptop on Saturday July 09 2022, @09:55PM
Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @02:07AM (10 children)
Categorizing files.
SLOC Directory SLOC-by-Language (Sorted)
25333 plugins perl=25333
25075 Slash perl=25075
7000 themes perl=7000
3141 bin perl=3141
2928 utils perl=2685,sh=243
1261 sbin perl=1261
124 docs perl=124
0 httpd (none)
0 sql (none)
0 top_dir (none)
Totals grouped by language (dominant language first):
perl: 64619 (99.63%)
sh: 243 (0.37%)
Total Physical Source Lines of Code (SLOC) = 64,862
Development Effort Estimate, Person-Years (Person-Months) = 15.98 (191.78)
(Basic COCOMO model, Person-Months = 2.4 * (KSLOC**1.05))
Schedule Estimate, Years (Months) = 1.54 (18.42)
(Basic COCOMO model, Months = 2.5 * (person-months**0.38))
Estimated Average Number of Developers (Effort/Schedule) = 10.41
Total Estimated Cost to Develop = $ 2,158,895
(average salary = $56,286/year, overhead = 2.40).
SLOCCount, Copyright (C) 2001-2004 David A. Wheeler
SLOCCount is Open Source Software/Free Software, licensed under the GNU GPL.
SLOCCount comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY, and you are welcome to
redistribute it under certain conditions as specified by the GNU GPL license;
see the documentation for details.
Please credit this data as "generated using David A. Wheeler's 'SLOCCount'."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 11 2022, @12:42PM (9 children)
so, is Slash directory composed of 1 or 2 files? :-)
But more seriously, looks like no updates for 2 years...
https://github.com/SoylentNews/rehash [github.com]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by janrinok on Monday July 11 2022, @03:42PM (8 children)
TMB started building a house, or converting another building into a house. The problem with software maintenance is it is not always the most exciting work to be doing. Bug squashing can be repetitive and, don't forget, he was doing it all for free. He would fix critical bugs but the list of desirable enhancements just kept getting longer. Even in 2019/20 the slow exodus of community members and staff was evident but by no means critical.
There were some obvious changes that would help - such as we are considering today - but he was not very enthusiastic about them to say the least. Perhaps it was the thought of the code changes that would be necessary to meet a changing site, or perhaps it was simply his personal belief that absolute freedom of speech was paramount no matter how many people it might drive away, I do not know. I can only speculate. His house took longer than he was expecting and, quite understandably, he wanted to get the job finished, and he probably needed funds to do that. The demands on his time grew. He decided to leave.
Once he began to spend more time on his house work effectively ceased on any new coding here, but he would still fix critical bugs. It stopped completely when he left about a year ago.
People often suggest 'Why don't you get a new coder". If you know someone who is competent in Perl and will work for free please point him in our direction. Others suggest 'You must rewrite the whole thing'. Well if you have a bunch of people who will also do that for free then point them in our direction too!
But both of those are to some degree missing the point. At the moment the code works. It is not perfect, but it works. As long as we can keep feeding it with stories (which I believe we can just about do) and you can continue to discuss and comment on them, then we are still providing a service to this community,
The problem is not a single factor. It is not just a toxic atmosphere, it is not just repetitive bug squashing, it is not just the fact that everybody on the staff has the same problems as everyone in our community. Real lives, the need to pay the mortgage and put food on the table, the need to maintain family relationships, the need to keep a job or even look for a new one. It is a combination of all of these factors and more.
It is true that some try to exploit one or more of these factors for their own personal pleasure, but they are not the only reason we are where we are. They might make the job more difficult but there are solutions to the problems that they bring.
People are tired after 2 years of a pandemic, they are facing an uncertain future, and they have numerous pressures upon them each day. Some haven't got the same energy or motivation to give their time for free to support a website, no matter how laudable the reason for that website might be. No one person can change it - but perhaps a community can. I do not know what the future holds, but I can only give it my best shot.
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Monday July 11 2022, @08:47PM (4 children)
So. How modular is the codebase? And how easy is it for Perl code to interface with code in any other language?
Maybe, just maybe, it's possible to do the rewrite one piece at a time.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 11 2022, @11:15PM (3 children)
To answer your questions: Some code is highly modular and others less so but they followed good practice of keeping most things behind subroutines. There are hard ways and easy ways to do it and the relative ease (from trivial to good luck) depending on the foreign language.
It is totally possible to rewrite this site using a number of techniques but no one wants to do so. There are even steps that non-programmers could do to help, but the will isn't there to do the trivial things to set those up. The fact is that it has been over two years since this site has been touched and no one seems to even want to do the minimum. Frankly, I can see why The Mighty Buzzard reached the conclusion that he would end up doing everything and I'm sure any replacement sees the same writing on the wall. To illustrate the point, the most vocal of the administrators here (which may have drowned out the others) seem completely unable to understand that there are numerous suggestions in this story to fix the spam problem that don't even require touching the perl code. This directly points at the level of institutional knowledge here. Sadly, there is no one willing to take up the mantle and the longer it takes to find one, the less likely it becomes.
(Score: 3, Informative) by janrinok on Tuesday July 12 2022, @04:06AM (2 children)
Which is exactly what we have done. We can now block the spam and remove the spam from view - no Perl code has been changed. Secondly, no decision has yet been made. We are still reading and considering all suggestions.
There are 4 current administrators - two of whom have jobs and other commitments which means they cannot sit on the site all day, and another who is recovering from a severe medical issue. We do talk to each other. They appear on the site whenever they can. There is no disagreement amongst us - none of us want to go down this path but nobody can offer us a better working solution other than saying that we have to accept the status quo.
However, elsewhere we do have key posts in the team that are currently a single person. Those people are equally fed up with the toxic environment and if they decide to leave the site closes immediately. We would prefer to explore other avenues to seek alternatives.
We can only try our best - nobody is promising anything unrealistic.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 12 2022, @06:09AM (1 child)
Excuse this diversion but if you can block the spam and remove it from view, what's the problem then? This site seems more than happy to host literal spam as long as it is invisible.
Back to the point at hand, I'm not saying you aren't trying your best or aren't in a bad position or that I demand you give up your lives for free or demand that everyone on the site team post more instead of lurking. That sentence was trying to point out that at least from what I've read and remained in my memory most times most people make a suggestion, you answer with "we don't have a perl coder." When the things you are replying to don't require a change in the perl code to implement, it sort of conveys that no one knows what is going on when no one else says otherwise. Which directly leads to the feeling that the perl coder is basically volunteering to do everything. The primary endpoint of your website is, or should be, the website. If it doesn't exist here (and arguably in an easily accessible form), it might as well not exist at all. And that goes for the staff, institutional knowledge, everything.
(Score: 3, Informative) by janrinok on Tuesday July 12 2022, @06:53AM
I managed to solve that problem within the last day. It is not a simple nor intuitive action. It requires an administrator and, with the best will in the world, I cannot sit on this site for 24 hours a day. Furthermore, spam is not the only issue that we are addressing as the first sentence of TFS clearly states.
The first part of resolving this particular problem is to prevent the spam from reaching the site in the first place. We have a solution for that - we are discussing it here. Like most of the abuse (but NOT all) It is originating from our own ACs. The second part is preventing it from disrupting the enjoyment and utility of the discussions. I now think we have a solution for that problem too, but I will have to wait and see if it works as well as I hope it will.
It has not been fully tested as far as I can tell so there may still be gotchas lurking in the database. I'll have to keep my fingers crossed.
I have just provided 2 more AC Friendly stories to today's bunch - in the past that has meant a quick return of the spammer and others who wish to prevent the site from functioning as it should. We will have to see what the response is today, won't we.
If we cannot have a high signal to noise ratio in our discussions then the site will continue to lose community members and staff, it will close. Some critical posts are currently manned by a single person and, without improving what we have, they will also leave, it will close. Without growing the community the site will wither and die slowly because there will be too few people able or willing to support it. We therefore have to improve the quality of the site overall. This is only a part of that effort. Standing still is not a workable option.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by coolgopher on Tuesday July 12 2022, @01:58AM (2 children)
In my (professional) experience, people who advocate for rewrites of a mature code base most often vastly underestimate the effort required to even reach feature parity. I've all too often seen projects crippled because the proverbial baby was tossed out with the bath water, often with a lame excuse for NIH (Not Invented Here) syndrome. Perl is not an awful language. It's just flexible enough to make it easy to write awful things /very/ tersely. I've seen more monstrous things written in JavaScript (ECMA Script if you want to be pedantic) than in perl, they just haven't been as terse.
The big hurdle/investment isn't in getting up to speed with perl, it's getting up to speed with the domain/architecture/design.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 12 2022, @04:45PM
Remember the days between the end of Netscape and the non-broken release of Mozilla. There was a year or two for nothing.
(Score: 4, Funny) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday July 12 2022, @05:48PM
In my experience it's very rarely CODERS who suggest just redoing the whole damn thing from scratch!
Even in the rare circumstances it would actually be the best move!
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @08:08PM (1 child)
Set your threshold and breakthrough to 0
Set all negative mods to +1, but set Spam to -6
It screws up the displayed score on negatively modded posts but it hides the Spam, and catches a few false positives, but overall it works like a charm.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 13 2022, @12:46PM
Good idea. Has merit. Can be done with the current system. Eventually these losers will give up and go elsewhere. Otherwise eventually a better system for cleaning and ghosting or purging their comments can be made.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by RS3 on Monday July 11 2022, @05:29PM (2 children)
In another discussion a few days before this discussion I tried to suggest something I think would work, and be easy to implement. Not sure if this is matches up with what you're asking. Very simple code change, BTW:
"Spam", and only spam, would now be a -2 score. Reading level threshold would be expanded from -1 to -2.
Everything else would remain the same (review by editors / admins, punishment for misusing "spam" mod, etc.)
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday July 13 2022, @01:25PM (1 child)
Why -2 though? I thought a spam mod gave a -10 karma - why not set spam at -10 to match the karma?
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Wednesday July 13 2022, @03:32PM
I wasn't aware, or had forgotten, about the -10 karma. Yeah, sure, that could work too. I think. I'd have to look at the reading threshold code.
The point is that spam's score would be unique, easily filtered out, and also easily identified by anyone wanting to review the posts which are marked spam. Should be a trivial code mod.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @10:23AM (2 children)
janrinok does not understand the internet. The more he tries to control, the more star systems will slip through his fingers. I may post at length later, the the initial mistake was to ban aristarchus. We all knew it was downhil from there.
Oh! Shit! I are banned? See my point? No? well, there you go.
(Score: 3, Touché) by khallow on Saturday July 09 2022, @10:26AM
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Opportunist on Saturday July 09 2022, @11:46AM
You might want to append your post with the "why we should care" part. So far I can't see anything towards that.
Why would I care that some random nobody I can't give a fuck about was banned? I don't even know why he was, let alone care about it.
(Score: 0, Redundant) by Frosty Piss on Saturday July 09 2022, @10:41AM (1 child)
TL;DR
(Score: 5, Informative) by janrinok on Saturday July 09 2022, @10:45AM
(Score: 5, Informative) by Flyingmoose on Saturday July 09 2022, @10:44AM (1 child)
I really hate having to scroll and scroll and SCROLL past hundreds of ASCII swatikas. Whatever it takes to get rid of the flooding.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @10:24AM
Would you rather see the evil racist jew symbol of the six-pointed rothschilds yellow star?
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @11:05AM (9 children)
I post frequently as AC here, however, the best method of identifying me is the borked English and unneeded use of anachronisms ;-).
However, the thing preventing me from registering to many services is the lack of responsibility. This is something many users and many service operators want to consider, but they unfortunately don't.
The first responsibility is the user's responsibility. This is not only for the spamming, but also a general "being-a-d...k-factor", the same toxicity we have with spamming bots, even if organic bots, or this specific libre software developer who infested his release with malware, I have an eye on you :).
However, the second responsibility is higher. Spamming bots can be finally filtered or banned. For this open source developer, there is always an alternative. However, the Operator's responsibility for the data which is processed when users register is much, much higher and writing "we're responsible for nothing" in terms is a big no-go for me for such service.
Many Operators have no idea how big this responsibility is. The data, and of course the metadata, is a valuable thing which may be used as the currency if the need pushes to it, and it is only the Operator's decision to use it or not. In modern times, unfortunately, it has to be assumed that it will be used. If some Operator would have ethical norms, the service will be bought over by someone without such standards.
The second part of the responsibility is even more higher, as it is partially outside of Operator's decisions. And here it needs the balance between "Knowledge is power" and "the less you know the better you sleep". Sometimes Operators would rather destroy everything they gathered instead of letting it get into wrong hands. There is an enormous number of external actors wanting this data. Starting from ordinary database leak crackers, through government services, bandits with law articles instead of nightsticks, up to totally unforeseen consequences. For example currently passing data to the law services is done everyday. If tomorrow the law will push something unacceptable, transmission will have to still work. You wrote two years ago that you ate a grilled meal? If tomorrow environmental laws will forbid such things and boom - you are criminal now. That's the unseen responsibility for the Operator.
And don't even try with "law doesn't work backwards" absurd, as for the mob it works.
So it's sometimes better not to have the data.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Opportunist on Saturday July 09 2022, @11:52AM (8 children)
It's trivial to register a mail account with some throwaway provider. And since you don't really need it anymore after you registered, it's no big deal if the provider flags it as "suspicious" and deletes it moments later. If anything, it's a bonus.
That's pretty much what I did here. I have frankly no idea whether the mail address I used to register still exists.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @12:25PM (5 children)
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=list+of+throwaway+email+providers&hps=1&atb=v314-1&ia=web [duckduckgo.com]
I won't recommend any particular provider, but it is indeed pretty trivial to create a one-time-use email, solely for the purpose of 'verifying' a new account.
Depending on your security requirements, you'll probably want to avoid any that ask for your real email address for verification. Don't sign up if you have to link your Google, Facebook, or other account to gain access. Use it one time, to verify to SN that you're a person with an email, then throw it away, never to be used again. Welcome aboard, Jeanne d'Arc!
(Score: 3, Informative) by Opportunist on Saturday July 09 2022, @01:08PM (4 children)
My real email address you say? Sure, it's throwawayworksfor2minutesatleast@gmail.com.
(Score: 2) by TheGratefulNet on Saturday July 09 2022, @09:24PM (3 children)
interesting.
the hash of that long string is actually my luggage combination!
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
(Score: 3, Funny) by Gaaark on Saturday July 09 2022, @09:47PM (2 children)
hunter2?
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by Opportunist on Sunday July 10 2022, @11:38AM
WTF, all I see is *******?
(Score: 2) by TheGratefulNet on Sunday July 10 2022, @08:53PM
that's the laptop password
THE laptop.
oops. said too m*h3eouyU)
NO CARRI
ah fuck it.
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @06:41PM (1 child)
Unfortunately modern services have a list of blessed e-mail providers and would not accept anything else. Recently one e-mail provider wanted me to give them my phone number.
For some time, I'm thinking about a bit better idea: Generally this all leads to putting information to someone's database. So let's put something there that the original owner would never show anyone :). I'm not talking about publishing it! I wish it could be possible to make e-mail addresses containing magnet links, so selling the unholy scriptures forbidden by Mickey Mouse would rather put the operator on a watch list :).
(Score: 2) by captain normal on Sunday July 10 2022, @04:50PM
"Recently one e-mail provider wanted me to give them my phone number."
Judging from all the spam phone calls from faked numbers that I receive, that should not be very difficult to get around.
Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts"- --Daniel Patrick Moynihan--
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @11:10AM (56 children)
I question what the alternative might be. A North Ireland solution to Brexit? A South Carolinian response to the Supreme Court going bonkers on Rowe v. Wade? Or janrinok running amok due to some positng unsolicited repetative something not useful and quite besides the orders of the General major? No simple vote, in the army, or in SoylentNews, when this is a private, military, organization. I stand by for a courts martial of apk, to have him called before the mast, hauled under the keel, or otherwise dealt with accordng to the rules of the Royal Navy. Did they ever wonder why so many left, illegaly, to become privateers?
Once again, I call for Soylentils to give janrinok the Black Spot. Our leadership has betrayed us.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by janrinok on Saturday July 09 2022, @11:24AM (55 children)
When you said that " I may post at length later" I was expecting something of a delay. You are still doing ad-hominem attacks. You cannot resist a dig at me, or dalek (with that poor attempt at fishing too), or khallow, or Runaway1956 whenever he shows. You cannot let one go by, can you. Seek psychiatric help - there is something seriously wrong with you.
As I said, I will count this as a firm vote on your behalf for requiring an account before posting as AC shall I? You have made your views known, you can go out to play now.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @11:51AM (54 children)
You fucker, janrinok! Of course I do an ad hominem against you, since you are a kaka aner, and your positions on anything hardly matter, since you are a bad person, the one responsible for banning aristarchus. You are more or less equivalent to Pontius Pilate, or the French man, Vichy France, where you collaborate with fascists like the Runaway1956 of little brain. These are not ad hominems, but relevant questions of your intellectual competence.
Oh, and janrinok, I think you wear your trousers too tight, and will never pass for a frenchman. Of course, you were never truly a Brit.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @12:07PM (53 children)
aristarchus is responsible for aristarchus being banned
if you can ever understand that, and accept responsibility, you will be a better - something
damn, I almost called you a man
(Score: -1, Spam) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @12:33PM (49 children)
Runaway is responsible for aristarchus being banned, and the gullible admins who believed the tale of doxxing? I mean, how many soylentils know he lives at 148 Wallaby way 119 on the Little River Way in Sydney? See? No one. So there never was no doxxing. What is this all about? Can't janrinok silence aristarchus? So sad, too bad.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Runaway1956 on Saturday July 09 2022, @01:05PM (22 children)
I'm unsure whether aristarchus has the mental capacity to reconstruct the course of events, that have been explained to him multiple times.
Over the course of about 18 (or more) months, ari made multiple posts in which he phished for my name, and details about me, which I have never published. At some point, he discovered a source of information, and published what he believes to be my full name, as well as what he believes to be my mailing address. I just went with it, for the most part, only asking him if he was going to come visit me in person.
One night on IRC, ari posted the information that he has collected into #soylent. Shortly thereafter, an admin questioned me, "Did ari just dox you?" My reply in the affirmative led to ari being called out, then to a temporary ban, then to a permanent ban when ari decided to flout admin decisions.
So, again, only ari bears responsibility for ari being banned.
I repeat, once again: ari's permanent ban did not result from doxxing, but from telling admin to go screw themselves because he was not going to abide by any disciplinary action by admin. Runaway didn't do that. Janrinok didn't do that. AC didn't do that. The Flying Spaghetti Monster didn't do that. aristarchus is directly responsible for every word, and every action, that got him banned. Had ari agreed to his temporary ban, he would have been back posting his brand of nonsense in just a few weeks. Instead, he decided that the community has no right to police itself, and told us all to get fokked.
And let me also repeat, once again: anyone who cares to search through the #soylent logs can find multiple instances in which aristarchus declared his intent to destroy Soylent News.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @01:54PM (20 children)
Your trolling, sock puppeting, and misinformation certainly didn't help. How about taking some responsibility and divulge ALL your sock puppet accounts in the interest of good faith?
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Saturday July 09 2022, @03:45PM (19 children)
I took responsibility for my actions. As succinctly as possible, I'll reiterate here. It was obvious to those who looked that ari was running a sock puppet army. At least 4 accounts, probably more. After complaining a couple times, I decided to fight fire with fire. I mod bombed ari and his socks mercilessly, until admin decided enough was enough. When admin took action, I admitted to my transgressions, explained my reasons, and immediately STOPPED all related sock puppet activity. I accepted my mod ban, and waited that ban out, exactly like ari could have done. Ari chose to fight the admins, rather than accept his mild punishment for his misconduct.
So, one more time: Runaway is in no way responsible for ari's words, actions, bans, attitudes, or any community condemnation. Runaway only exposed ari's sock puppet army, nothing more, and nothing less.
Want verification? Azuma Hazuki doesn't like me, and she doesn't like ari either. However, she was present on IRC for a number of 'conversations' between ari and I, as well as similar conversations between ari and admin, as well as between myself and admin. She probably knows as much about the whole sock puppet war as anyone outside of admin. Ask her if the basic facts I have presented are true or not. Whatever else 'Zumi may be, she seems to be honest. Deluded, but honest.
Take it or leave it, makes no real difference to me.
(Score: 1, Troll) by Azuma Hazuki on Sunday July 10 2022, @07:14AM (5 children)
I'm not deluded, thanks, Mr. "it's not an insurrection unless it actually succeeds." Mr. "50 million dead progressives." You fucking ratshit nutbar. If I had my druthers, you AND Ari would be permbanned. He's a trolling spamming schmuck and you're a stochastic-terrorist zombie. I STILL haven't ever seen the supposed dox Ari is supposed to have dropped, but just based on the fallout it's obvious he did.
Both of you can go to Hell, and between the two of you it's certain you at least will.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @07:30AM (4 children)
for reals yo cluck cluck cluck
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @04:40PM (3 children)
And ^ that is the type of mature response you get from the rightwing dipshit runaway and his pals that want to spread domestic terrorism. THAT is why the site is dying, because some people push back against the fascists and the crybaby conservatives can't handle getting a taste of their own typical vitriol.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Sunday July 10 2022, @05:41PM (2 children)
Except it wasn't posted by Runaway or anyone else that he knows - but you knew that too. Because you forgot to change your IP between posts. Dipstick.
How do you think we are going to collate all these replies that are coming from ACs? If they all have the same account number we have to use something else!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @09:37PM
Hahaha wow, either an amazing coincidence or you are lying out your ass. TOR isn't a super massive network so I guess the coincidence isn't too unlikely. Really hope you're not actually that vindictive.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 13 2022, @11:29PM
Omg lol, full Dunning-Kroger. All you know is that Runaway didn't post that comment from his account with the AC box ticked. You do not know that Runaway didn't post that comment from TOR, or a VPN. And I don't know if, given how ridiculous this grudge is you have with Aristarchus, Runaway did in fact post that from his account with the AC box ticked, but you could be flat out lying!
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Sunday July 10 2022, @01:21PM (12 children)
So was that your socks modbombing Hazuki [soylentnews.org] as well around the same time? It's hard to imagine who else it might've been. C'mon Runaway, own up!
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 4, Interesting) by janrinok on Sunday July 10 2022, @02:07PM (4 children)
We have covered all of this. When it came to sock-puppets both sides were as bad as the other in my opinion. They both got awarded the same punishment for their sock-puppet abuse. But as Aristarchus had 'previous' his ban was slightly longer. This is standard SN procedure and has been in place since 2014. Runaway apologised, explained what had happened, and accepted his punishment. I acknowledge that fact but it does not justify what he did. The punishments were given out privately. We do not favour public shaming. It was deserved by both of them and they could both have gotten on with their lives. It meant also that aristarchus could no longer control the discussion by his use of sock puppets. He was and remains convinced to this day that there are numerous sock puppets on this site. It isn't so. I cannot say that there are none but there certainly are not many. I do not believe any of them are controlled by Runaway1956.
Except Aristarchus decided to go public to denounce his punishment and be so doing dug himself into a great big hole. He continued to abuse the site, posting complaints about his treatment in numerous unrelated stories, by increasing his doxxing of Runaway and possibly at least one other person whom I believe opted to leave, and carrying on verbal attacks against many innocent parties. The sock puppets and the doxxing were separate issues although it is possible that the intensity of the latter was exacerbated by the former. Aristarchus - then as now - simply felt that he should be able to hold a special position in our community, that he was somehow above everyone else and deserved different treatment. We did not agree nor did most of the community.
We are currently on 17640+ accounts. The huge majority (8,000+) of these are spam (porn, insurance, leather goods, sex contacts etc) or bots that appear to simply create false accounts with names such as (yxttAfogma, 'http welcome to India touris' etc). Other than taking up an account number and a bit of DB space they cause no problem by themselves. In the last 500 new accounts fewer than 8 (8 !) are genuine accounts. There are also over 35 attempts by aristarchus to create new accounts under different usernames. We have let him develop several accounts to see if he has reformed and wishes to behave as everyone else. You know our findings regarding that. He compromises his accounts at most within a day or two and we can now identify them within hours of them being created and disable them. Despite his claimed 'internet skills' he has failed to realise that he is making a basic schoolboy error. No, I am not going to tell you what - it makes my job so much easier, thank you.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 12 2022, @08:25AM (3 children)
Evidently not enough. No one seems to know what went on behind the scenes. What evidence was there? Who decided? Why is Runaway still here?
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Tuesday July 12 2022, @08:35AM
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?noupdate=1&sid=50331&page=1&cid=1259533#commentwrap [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Tuesday July 12 2022, @12:02PM
Evidence was found in comments, on IRC, and in submissions made by 'aristarchus'. We are NOT going to publish doxxing material.
A team of 5 was involved in the investigation This was necessary as we had to access various parts of our infrastructure and no one person involved had that level of access access. We also consulted with a member of the board. We were directed, on occasion, to find additional evidence when what we had might have been inconclusive, which we did. The process took several weeks and a lot of man-hours.
We feel that it is wrong to do somebody's dirty washing in public. The evidence was saved in one secure location. We removed evidence from public view where possible but this wasn't always the case. I am not going to point it out to anyone as that defeats the entire point of trying to remove it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 12 2022, @04:48PM
Yeah! Why is anybody who disagrees with you allowed here?!?!
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Sunday July 10 2022, @02:36PM (6 children)
Yes, that was me. I already covered that in another post, way back when. 'Zumi has a tendency to downmod everyone she doesn't like every time she responds to them. So, she irritated me at about the same time everything was coming to a head, and I wasted a bunch of downmods on her for a couple days. Fact is, mod bombing 'Zumi was key to everything. It seemed that community complaints about mod bombing were being sloughed off for a long time, BUT, when a female complained, it got everyone's attention, and action was taken pretty quickly. I don't want to accuse anyone of being sexist or anything, but facts is facts.
From my perspective, the bot war was a success. Things did come to a head, the real bad actor was exposed, and measures have been taken to correct the problem. As janrinok puts it, ari no longer has the ability to control the conversation, or to bury comments he doesn't like with moderation bombs. Twenty (or more) downmods are devastating to anyone's karma!
And, seriously - operating a bot army is a pain in the ass. Remembering which bot made which comment, remembering which proxy to log in from, details details details, and I know I messed up multiple times. Once staff began investigating, it took very little time for them to identify my bots. I really don't recommend anyone does it. Although - it was a learning experience, and I could do a better job if I ever did it again. Maybe I should contribute some Twitter bots for Elon Musk to discover?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @04:44PM
You sound like a small lobed male.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Azuma Hazuki on Sunday July 10 2022, @05:04PM (4 children)
Serious question for you: how, in this regard, are you ANY different from Ari?
You both deliberately and serially broke the rules and abused loopholes in the system's enforceability parameters to prove a point and force the admins to change something. You did the exact same thing he did minus the doxing. That you admitted to it and stopped, to me, means nothing; you are as guilty as he is.
Also? Referring to women as "feeeeeeeeemales" like some kind of incel Ferengi reject is so creepy and gross I can practically see the slime dripping off your keyboard. What got them on your case, you fucking nutbar, isn't that I've got two X chromosomes; it's that I'm a useful and longstanding member of this community who posts honestly, doesn't sockpuppet or spam, and has actually relevant things to say. They were protecting someone who lives up to the spirit of what SN is *supposed* to be about. Take your wretched, aggrieved false victimhood elsewhere.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1) by Runaway1956 on Sunday July 10 2022, @06:14PM (2 children)
Serious answer for you:
I entered the war with the goal of exposing an existing bot army. Mission accomplished, I shut it all down.
And, I will spend all eternity considering what shit means to 'Zumi. /sarcasm
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Monday July 11 2022, @05:58AM (1 child)
Amazing. You've somehow managed to marry and reproduce while still spouting incel dogma almost line for line.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 12 2022, @02:00AM
/eyeroll
Would you two get a room please?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by janrinok on Sunday July 10 2022, @06:21PM
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @08:23PM
And he succeeded. Collective punishment destroys everything
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @01:27PM (24 children)
So you expect volunteers, who are probably already using too much of their spare time running this site, to go check up on the validity of possible doxxing data before acting upon it?
If it looks like doxxing it has to be treated as doxxing!
(Score: 3, Informative) by janrinok on Saturday July 09 2022, @02:04PM (23 children)
It actually was a bit easier than that although it took many man-hours to carry out the subsequent searches and analysis. Aristarchus had been making submissions from at least as early as 2020 with bits of text in them which, to the editors, made no sense. It wasn't until we investigated further after the event that Runaway1956 has just described that we subsequently identified that text as attempts at doxing, which he had actually submitted as potential stories under his own username. He had presumably hoped that we would publish them on the front page. Those submissions were not published and were deleted. I believe some material might remain in the database as we stopped searching any earlier than 2020.
He was initially given a 3 month ban - he refused that and it defaulted to a permanent ban.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @08:35PM (14 children)
aristarchus has been posting since the beginning. He does not even know who Paul is, or that he makes leaf blowers. Phishing? Words do have meaning. I notice that the spamming that is the cause of all this meta turmoil is not being discussed at all. Curious.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @10:36PM
You fool. The spamming comes and goes, it's almost seasonal. You, however, never stop insulting and assaulting the intelligence of members, indivicually, and collectively. Ari is the primary subject of discussion here.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Sunday July 10 2022, @07:25AM (12 children)
How do you know what aristarchus knows?. How do you know what claims aristarchus has made if, as he has argued, they have never existed? Yet you include 2 pieces of information that are unnecessary to support your statement but which aristarchus has said in another attempt perhaps at doxxing somebody!
Well, he stated that his target was having 'financial problems' - but he never provided any proof, he just repeated the slurs. He stated the name of the church he and his family frequented and what involvement his wife had in the church - again without proof but providing a known location and approximate time where they might be found. He claimed to have details of his target's criminal record for various crimes, but never provided any proof. Was he suggesting that the target was already a criminal and thus should not be allowed to remain on this site? And I can continue with more examples, but I simply ask "why would anyone even want to collect such information and then publish it". It was, at best, a sustained attempt at a smear campaign on the target and his family. At best it was an attempt to drive somebody away from the site, and, much worse, quite possibly to incite a physical attack - "Why doesn't somebody beat some sense into him?"
I stress that no-one has provided a shred of evidence to support any of aristarchus' allegations. The data was never 'published' earlier on this site other than by aristarchus and, if he does have it, then it was researched and collected elsewhere which I feel indicates a certain degree of intent.
We cannot verify every possible claim of personal information - it was, and will remain, considered to be doxxing.
Read the opening line to the Meta story : "After experiencing extensive spamming, ad-hominem attacks, and trolling" It clearly includes all the recent disruptions. Notice it doesn't mention anyone by name. It wasn't about aristarchus.
Then read the second comment which was by aristarchus: "Bring back aristarchus! Nothing is going to change until you admit the primary mistake. Free speech is that, or it is not. By banning aristarchus, you violated the primary value of SoylentNews, and your pathetic attempts to justify it only drive people who believe in away. And attract right-wing nut-jobs even more. . Well, it seems aristarchus wants to make this discussion about himself and his own politics.
The spamming is completely removed by disallowing AC posting. For now, that problem has a potential solution.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @04:50PM (6 children)
Well for starters it absolutely schooled the libertarian fantasy that 100% free speech no matter what was bullshit. Having trouble reconciling with reality mr J? Funny how angry yall are about aris annoyimg complaints, while the years of excessive bigotry and support of rightwing violence were defended as fReeeee speech. Would have been slightly tolerable if staff would have done anything other than defend the neo-nazi garbage, but here we are.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by janrinok on Sunday July 10 2022, @06:18PM (5 children)
If that sort of material can be published in the USA in your own newspapers , broadcast on TV, if Trump or MJT can say it in public, if your own Representatives can repeat it freely - what makes it illegal for someone to say it in his journal? I detest it, I certainly don't agree with it. That doesn't give me the right to stop someone from saying it if it is legal, no matter how distasteful to me it might be.
Which laws were broken? Do you think that the fact that you disagree with someone is enough to justify that they be banned? Has he committed an offence? Have you told your own LE?
You think I am fighting against you - you could not be more wrong. But I don't start a battle that I don't think I can win. Circumstances do change. You have in the past pleaded with me to take some action. Now you want to dictate exactly what action I should be taking.
Free Speech CANNOT be selective. It either exists or it doesn't. Ari, under whatever name he chooses to use today for a post, claims to be defending Free Speech but he wants to silence those with whom he disagrees, and even prevent those on this site from giving their points of view in this discussion It is not about Ari or Runaway - it is about Free Speech and creating an environment where it can be exercised without intimidation, harassment or fear of consequences. And if some Anonymous Cowards cannot accept that concept then they are on the wrong site. Those that can are welcome to stay and join us.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @09:37PM
"it is about Free Speech and creating an environment where it can be exercised without intimidation, harassment or fear of consequences. And if some Anonymous Cowards cannot accept that concept then they are on the wrong site. Those that can are welcome to stay and join us."
This sounds so stupid ("an environment where /F/ree /S/peech can be exercised without fear of consequnces") it should definitely be prominent in the site's manifesto.
Seriously people, if your parents taught you about 'free speech' in an environment 'without fear of consequences', they were doing you a grave disservice. I'm tempted to start thinking
The first rule of Free Speech is that you would be wise to never try exercising it without at least serious consideration and contemplation of, if not simple fear of the possible consequences.
-modwotac
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @09:43PM (3 children)
Then publishimg publicly available information is protected by freedom of speech and you should unban aristarchus. Woops, you wrapped yourself into a pretzel of contradiction and hypocrisy! Hard to imagine how your brain works. PS: not aristarchus, and I think he should stay banned for doxxing, but not if you're going to selectively apply such rules. If you want to argue site rules, then Runaway should be banned as well since you obviously have limits not relating to legality. Seriously, you should see a psychologist, something ain't right up there if you can say this crap with a straight face.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Monday July 11 2022, @05:58AM (2 children)
No sources were quoted for the information compromised by the doxxing. There is no way of knowing if they were 'public sources' or even true statements.
Doxxing is against the site's expected standards of behaviour. We have promised to do all we can to prevent compromises of personal data. We are also free to decide who can join this community if we chose to do so.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 11 2022, @06:43AM (1 child)
"Doxxing is against the site's expected standards of behaviour."
While stochastic terrorism and factually incorrect misinformation is fine? Bad values you're promoting, makes one wonder how many accusations leveled towards the site have merit.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Monday July 11 2022, @07:28AM
Is it illegal? - if it is please inform your local LE. The Gendarmerie here aren't interested.
If it is not illegal - then argue against it. Prove the claims to be false. That is what discussions are all about.
If you do not wish to engage in that discussion then move on to another story.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @05:44PM (3 children)
Agreed. Now permaban Runaway1956 for his stochastic terrorism promoting rightwing political violence, best summarized by his infamous "t0 million dead progressives" post. No? Then you're a MASSIVE hypocrite. Doxxing bad, but promoting violence against millions where someone has simply to go down the street is so much worse. Death threats are not even protected speech in the US where Runaway1956 and the SN server are located.
Do explain yourself Janrinok.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Sunday July 10 2022, @06:55PM (1 child)
(Score: 0, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @11:58PM
"It can be exercised without intimidation, harassment or fear of consequences"
"50 million dead progressives" along with defending insurrection and applauding the Rittenhouse murderer certainly made me feel unsafe. So it is OK to make threats as long as they aren't too personalized? It becomes ever more clear that you simply defend alt-right puds.
With any luck society will survive Nazis 2.0 Murrica Boogaloo, and sites like SN will be used as examples of why we must legislate against stochastic terrorism. You comain about AC spam while the rest of us complain about the normalization of fascist behavior where violence is used against political rivals.
You're a sick person, at least we're FINALLY getting the discussion where you lay it all out. Sad that you actually think you're righteously defending freedom here. Again, hopefully humanity survives in spite of you good men doing nothing. Threats of mass murder to save Runaway's offspring from a future of brown people (his words) is so far from OK and should have him banned according to even the low bar of SN's own rules.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Monday August 01 2022, @07:40AM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 14 2022, @12:54AM
I don't think the second comment is by me. Of course, things are murky, when evidence is surpressed and progroms take place in back rooms. You are falling for what intelligence analysts call "mirroring", assuming your opponent is thinking what you think that they think. So try to keep it all straight, jan!
aristarchus [Actual, signed, verifiable aristarchus post! Right here! If AC posting was banned, this could no longer happen.]
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Sunday July 10 2022, @11:44AM (7 children)
I appreciate you've got a lot on your plate at the moment janrinok, but I have to question this statement.
I can't find what date it was in the IRC log, but I saw where he was asked to choose between the temporary and permanent bans. He responded by referencing the trial of Socrates, who suggested he be punished by being given free meals at the Prytaneum. The staff dismissed this classical reference and said that as he had not given an answer as to which of the two bans he would prefer, they would default to the 3 month ban. This is in direct contradiction of your above statement that "it defaulted to a permanent ban."
So when did that 3 month ban change into a permanent ban? Where was it announced? I don't understand how it could "default" to a permaban when it was already stated it would be a 3 month one. I can understand if this was a further punishment for additional violations of the site's policies, but to describe that as "defaulting" to a permaban sounds a little confusing.
I get that ari is being incredibly disruptive to this site and I get that it's putting some people off. I'm just looking for a bit more clarity about how this has been handled and communicated please.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Sunday July 10 2022, @12:26PM (6 children)
Despite several further warnings for his behaviour, Aristarchus failed to comply with the conditions and a full ban was imposed on 5 Feb at 14:47 UTC. Note also that a Permanent Ban clearly states that any further posts from aristarchus will be treated as spam. His accusations of being unfairly spam moderated are entirely incorrect.
Had he served his temporary ban he would be back with a full account now. as from 5 May 2022. As MartyB said "Actions have Consequences". At the time we were also heavily criticised for being too lenient with him and for allowing him to choose a lesser ban if he so wished. Our intention was to allow him to remain having hopefully realised the mistake he had made.
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Sunday July 10 2022, @01:40PM (5 children)
Was the conversion to a full ban communicated publically via this site or IRC?
The statement I was referring to is this [sylnt.us]:
I understand why you might decide to permaban him. I just feel like we could've done with a little more transparency. However, I know you're very busy at the moment, so I won't keep pushing this issue.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Sunday July 10 2022, @01:47PM
Gah the comment links on the IRC history don't seem to work. Try this:
https://logs.sylnt.us/%23soylent/2022-02-06.html#05:30:25 [sylnt.us]
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Sunday July 10 2022, @02:17PM (3 children)
Aristarchus was informed by direct admin-to-user (A2U) message and to the email given as his contact point. The temporary ban did not prevent him from logging in to his account. The permanent ban disables his account.
There is public announcement but you will have to wait a while until I have time to do a search for it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 12 2022, @08:35AM (2 children)
What janrinok is trying to say, is, aristarchus never chose anything. Janrinok just did what he was planning to do all along, much like the present situation. Aristarchus never got his free dining at the Pyrtaneum. And more's the pity.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Tuesday July 12 2022, @08:46AM (1 child)
You chose to dox somebody.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @01:33PM
If that were actually true, his beer find would be funded from now to next decade.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2022, @01:03PM (2 children)
And, they were very lenient with that brat. Free speech can result in the belief that you can say anything with no consequences of you're not bright enough to pay attention.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @04:54PM (1 child)
Umm, hey genius, that is exactly what SN has been saying since the site started. No consequences for anyone because free speech. Now you say consequences because you personally dislike the target? Love me some conservative hypocrisy!
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2022, @05:54PM
Hehehe, that is conservatives all over. Gimme muh freezy peaches! Except when you say things that unsettle me, especially when Runaway's obvious yet closeted homosexuality is involved.
It's the same bullshit with bathroom laws on a higher level. Didja hear about the latest trans guy who attempted to comply with bathroom laws and use the bathroom of gender assigned at birth (female), which he was directed to do by the owner of the property? Wombyn blew the rape whistle, trans guy instantly morphed into a dick girl, summoning the muscle-bound enforcers of chivalry, and the transmasc dick girl was charged by the boosway army with disorderly conduct. You don't even need a dick, or to be a girl, to be a dick girl! We have achieved dick girls who pass Azuma's "one drop" essentialist legality, and we couldn't have done it without the total and utter bold-faced hypocrisy of conservatives and bathroom rape hysteria!
Conservatives are bullshit machines and pathological liars.