[hilyen]

So whomever is majority gets to decide what information is trustworthy? I understand it's supposed to utilize sensors and all sorts of criteria to come up with a logical & reasonable trustworthiness check. But what if one of your majority voting blocs doesn't believe in science? It's humans doing the verification, which can be corrupted.

[coverband]

It's irrelevant if there will be people who refuse to trust these sources, as long as they can establish a pedigree by continuously providing accurate information. If info from one node can be invalidated by other trusted sources after its original reporting (by publishing the facts after the dust cloud clears), the node will have the incentive to stick to the truth.

[JamesianP]

Any group that holds to principles and establishes a strong reputation would tend to become a target for activists to take over and push their agenda. At least this seems to be how things work out in the US.

[thrown_22]

The spectacular implosion of the ACLU in recent years comes to mind. They spend so much time sniping each other over tweets that we lost Roe vs Wade on their watch.

[themitigating]

Why would infighting about Roe V Wade affect their reputation?

[thrown_22]

They were fighting over who said what and twitter and were paralyzed to the point that they couldn't do anything about Roe V Wade.

[themitigating]

The entire organization spent each working day sending tweets and nothing else?

How long do you think a tweet takes to write?

What are they supposed to do about roe v wade? Are you passing the blame for that being overturned to them instead of Trump and republicans who are responsible?

Is this a way to help republicans win in the midterms, deflect the blame for roe v wade to some unrelated organization?

[themitigating]

A group that has a strong reputation has higher probability of being truthful

What's an alternative to reputation?

Can you also provides evidence that activists have taken over most sources of information in the US?

[bboygravity]

> Can you also provides evidence that activists have taken over most sources of information in the US?

Most sources of information that the majority of people consume and trust, yes: https://dfmworkers.org/hedge-funds-and-newspapers-a-simple-p...

I can definitely see how fake or real activism would benefit hedge funds to drive attention away from news about how they've been destroying the financial markets and economy through deregulation and corruption.

I can also see why they would want to own newspapers to just directly trade on whatever they know will be in their own newspaper tomorrow (or news website in 1 second).

[JamesianP]

You should simply believe what I say due to my strong reputation on social networks.

Higher probability of being truthful is actually too low a low bar, if it comes to asserting a bias over truth when it really matters.

[themitigating]

On Bias:

Everyone has biases, that includes companies since they are composed of and controlled by people It's difficult to determine if a person or companies biases affected the information they provide with certainty. Further I'll state that since everyone has these biases it's basically a wash and pointless to discuss on an individual level.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Higher probability of being truthful is actually too low a low bar"

We can't set some minimum level of reliability that needs to be passed because we are ranking sources against each other not against an undefined value. Even figuring out what that value is seems extremely difficult. This reminds me of the corruption discussion a few weeks ago, people were comparing the US to nothing, just making statements like "There's alot of corruption".

Since we need to get information about what's going on around us we have to use one or more sources of information. Therefore if there is a contradiction between sources we use reputation. --------------------------------------------------------------------

"You should simply believe what I say due to my strong reputation on social networks"

I don't know your reputation nor has anyone else told me about you. However let's talk about why, in general, individuals on the internet are more likely to be less trust worthy than dedicated news outlets. This is assuming you are only using reputation and there's no other variables.

1. People on the internet can and normally do use a pseudonym. Having to create a new account with a new name isn't that painful if your reputation is destroyed for some reason. This is much more difficult for a business. Since the consequences of starting over are less for a person it increases the probability of they are lying because it reduces the effect of a punishment

2. An individuals primary function isn't the distribution of information nor are they funded by it. CNN is a news network, that's their main function. If people stop watching them they can go out of business whereas a person on the internet just continue living even if their reputation is ruined.

Since the stakes are so low for a person that increases the probability they'll lie (This is similar to 1)

3. Due to anonymity it would be difficult to sue individuals on the internet for defamation or to hold them accountable in. CNN is a company that is registered as a corporation.

It's difficult to enact punishments for a person on the internet vs companies and the less likely a punishment will occur or the less painful the punishment the higher the probability a person will commit the crime

[JamesianP]

No it's the difference between probability and conditional probability. Both individuals and authorities have demonstrated the same probability of just delivering their preconceived bias when it really matters.

As for social networks. Both businesses and reddit'ers gain reputation by simply saying things others want them to say. Your theories all depend on people wanting the truth, as opposed to being told what they want to hear. And my statement was actually a joke because of how you so quickly pivoted from asking what alternative there was to reputation, to then asking me for thorough evidence.

[eurasiantiger]

It’s bitcoin all over again. Doublespend, doublethink.

[themitigating]

No solution is perfect and disinformation is dangerous.

I don't get responses where people point out that a proposal to solve a problem won't be 100% effective.

[Hamuko]

I'm not sure if it's going to be effective at all. How do you even know that an authorative data source is actually authorative and correct?

It's also kind of funny that this idea comes from Japan, where school history textbooks, an authorative data source of sorts, have had a rather optimistic view on the world during 1937–1945.

[themitigating]

Can you provide an example of misinformation in the textbooks?

[fhfjbufu]

They have a textbook approval system that prevents anything negative getting into classrooms.

https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_history_textbook_controv...

[themitigating]

"Despite the efforts of the nationalist textbook reformers, by the late 1990s the most common Japanese schoolbooks contained references to, for instance, the Nanjing Massacre, Unit 731, and the comfort women of World War II,[2] all historical issues which have faced challenges from ultranationalists in the past.[3] The most recent of the controversial textbooks, the New History Textbook, published in 2000, which significantly downplays Japanese aggression, was shunned by nearly all of Japan's school districts.[2]"

Seems like that's been cleaned up and they were omitting information, which is bad, but when I think of misinformation I think of lies.

EDIT: Just to be clear, your statement was "where school history textbooks, an authorative data source of sorts, have had a rather optimistic view " which implies it is widespread and happening now. My counter shows that not to be true.