| > How do you distinguish between dishonesty and honesty? Who gets to determine that? There are two types of communities, in my opinion. ...and most, like HN, fall somewhere in the middle. There's the community that's open to all, doesn't censor anything, and is flooded with low-quality or manipulated content. Then there are the communities that are private. They have groups of mature people who DO appreciate different opinions, and are able to engage in constructive discourse. Obviously dishonest content, as judged by older accounts or mods, are removed. Ideally older or high-reputation accounts have greater voting weight. The danger in the latter is that the community loses the diversity of thought if those top accounts misuse their power to direct a narrative, but as these private communities are numerous - participants can simply leave. You could even make the argument that they could be paid communities, if the quality and analysis of the community is high. For example, I pay to belong to the Arms Control Wonk Discord channel because that community provides detailed analysis on international events on WMDs/conflicts that you cannot find elsewhere. It is low on advocacy, and high on analysis. HN is in the middle. They ban poor quality accounts, but it's still a free and open forum. For now it works, but as it becomes more popular, I've noticed a decline in content quality and an increase in advocacy. |