[Jordrok]

The point of blocking is to prevent harassment, no? Hiding the blocker's posts from the blockee puts up an additional barrier to interaction. Even if it can be circumvented, it still requires some effort and may dissuade the person from continuing the harassment. There is a reason why this is the standard implementation for almost every social media site, and petulance has nothing to do with it.

[ImPostingOnHN]

The point of blocking is to prevent harassment, no?

No, the point is "I don't like this person for whatever reason so I don't want to see their posts".

"I don't want this person to see my public posts" can be done by making an account private, or not posting the posts publicly.

Otherwise it opens the door to trollish behavior like reply-and-block-to-prevent-retort.

To stop harassment, reach out to the platform, assuming it cares about harassment, and if it doesn't, contact law enforcement, or file a lawsuit.

[swiftcoder]

> To stop harassment, reach out to the platform, assuming it cares about harassment, and if it doesn't, contact law enforcement, or file a lawsuit

Your wording suggests that you seem to be aware that none of these avenues actually work in the real world, which is precisely why platforms have the ability to block.

[ImPostingOnHN]

> Your wording suggests that you seem to be aware that none of these avenues actually work in the real world, which is precisely why platforms have the ability to block.

You may personally infer that, but the precise reason platforms have the ability to block someone is, "I don't like this person for whatever reason so I don't want to see their posts or replies". Maybe you don't want to see their posts or replies because you feel they are harassing. Blocking/ignoring them stops you from seeing them. It shouldn't affect anyone else's ability to see their posts or replies to you.

Honestly, in what other public, online discussion forum can anybody without admin powers, arbitrarily and unilaterally ban others from publicly replying to public posts?

[swiftcoder]

Having worked at a fairly prominent social media company, that is not why social media platforms have block functionality. Mute, functionality, yes, absolutely.

Blocking is typically a much stronger remedy, aimed at curtailing targeted harassment.

[ImPostingOnHN]

Having worked with multiple online public discussion forums / media over the decades, that is precisely what blocking / muting / ignoring is for: the digital equivalent of plugging your ears. Don't want to hear an account you feel is harassing you? Good news: you don't need to! The functionality you're describing, on the other hand, opens the door to trollish abuse like reply-and-ban-responses.

In what other public, online discussion forum format can anybody without admin powers, arbitrarily and unilaterally ban others from publicly replying to public posts? That idea sounds insane to me.

It would be like if IRC's /ignore function prevented someone from sending messages containing your name – weird. You should be able to block yourself off from anybody you wish, and live in whatever bubble you wish, but not to control others' public speech. The platform has admins who can theoretically deal with law-breaking behavior like harassment or threats or CSAM, and if they choose not to, the platform sucks and I recommend you ditch it. coughtwittercough.

[Jordrok]

> In what other public, online discussion forum format can anybody without admin powers, arbitrarily and unilaterally ban others from publicly replying to public posts? That idea sounds insane to me.

Regardless of all your other arguments here, the change being made to twitter here does nothing to prevent that. Blocking a user still prevents them from interacting with your posts in any way. Now they can just see the post without being able to reply to it. So I'm not exactly sure what your point is.

[swiftcoder]

> In what other public, online discussion forum format can anybody without admin powers, arbitrarily and unilaterally ban others from publicly replying to public posts? That idea sounds insane to me.

I mean, Facebook and Twitter have both worked this way for years. Arguably that constitutes most of social media for the last decade.

[chii]

> can be done by making an account private, or not posting the posts publicly

but not the criteria where you _want_ other people to see your posts publicly.

aka, the ask is to allow individuals to "excommunicate" a particular user, not just blocking.

I'm glad, tho, that twitter does not allow this. I think having this feature allows for echo chambers...(tho, this is currently already true so may be it's moot...?)

[Jordrok]

> I'm glad, tho, that twitter does not allow this.

It does though? That is exactly what blocking does both before and after this change.

[bigstrat2003]

I would say that the point of blocking is to prevent someone from contacting you. Not to prevent harassment.

[pjerem]

The point is that contacting you isn’t always needed to harass you if the opponent have enough influence (or bots under his control) to harass you with its minions.

Of course it could be bypassed but it requires effort and most harassers are in fact pretty stupid people who just happen to have an influence over a group of people as stupid as them.

[cocacola1]

Seems like a distinction without a difference.