[at_a_remove]

I mean, you can quibble at the examples, and I think the article needs more of them, but it is not ... wholly inaccurate. More examples ought to include the Fahrenheit 451 nature of the situation. Recall that the government didn't just decide to start burning books one day in that novel. Rather, people began going into libraries and tearing out pages which offended them. It was a bottom-up movement.

Now, so much of moderation comes from the users, and a downvote to show that a comment is inaccurate is indistinguishable from "I do not want people to see this opinion, even if it is true," and so a great deal of moribund condition of the Open Web is due to things like manipulation of rankings. Sure, why not file a false DMCA copyright claim on YouTube? Get that thing you don't like off the Internet.

I have no ready solutions to offer.

[lowdose]

I think more people should contribute instead of just leaching. The economics for platforms work when only 1% is producing content while the rest is consuming. This vocal minority is more and more driving every platform to extremes, the voting doesn't even work on HN people downvote accurate comments. Downvoting without clarification doesn't happen IRL you have to express your opinion.

What about for every comment you get the right for one downvote? More comments from people why they feel the need to downvote, that would clarify a lot more and could bring new insights to every discussion in general.