I agree. I already tend to get tossed into a category because I don’t agree with a majority of the user base. If people can get categorized more by how they vote, and lemmy users are already pretty savvy, I can see a scenario where people get tagged.
Comment on Lemmy devs are considering making all votes public - have your say
CaptPretentious@lemmy.world 4 weeks ago
I think it’s a bad idea. It’s just going to start harassment and witch hunts when someone gets a downvote they don’t like. Stalking is going to be a thing, people are going to aggregate all the votes you’ve done to make assumptions about you to then bully you. Once public, sources outside Lemmy will start gathering and cross referencing data about you.
In the US, when you vote, the vote is private to protect the person. Making votes public will only empower those that would abuse it. It very well could end Lemmy due to massive bulling, harassment, and the decline of activity.
Aermis@lemmy.world 4 weeks ago
CaptPretentious@lemmy.world 4 weeks ago
Exactly. We need counter views. One of the problems with any type of social media has been echo chambers and the lack of healthy debate/conversation. People have forgotten how to have a civil debate/conversation with someone else. And people tend to act like, if you don’t 100% agree with me, than not only can we not be friends, but you’re actively an enemy. That shouldn’t be the case. We do not need everyone to agree on everything, it should be acceptable to have a different opinion.
With everything public, we’re going to have no healthy conversation since people will use previous votes (up or down) against someone. One of the issues is, an up/down vote by itself doesn’t give much insight into anything. It’s not like the vote itself is quantified. We already see people try this with digging into post history to make assumptions of someone and bring it up as “evidence”.
Aermis@lemmy.world 4 weeks ago
Man it doesn’t even need to devolve into a debate. You get berated just for having an opinion on something more and more. That’s the problem with the voting system anyways. People that don’t share an opinion with you shouldn’t even have an option to down vote. Just don’t vote at all. Up votes are for shared opinions. But even then the biggest gripe I had with reddit was the system has the up voted “popular” comments as the most viewed as well, leaving the opinions of people unseen without looking for them.
People are impressionable. If they see everyone agreeing with a comment they feel they need to skew their opinion towards the common dissent or risk being alienated. We’re communal creatures. And social media screwed with our heads with the need to fit in.
Cataphract@lemmy.ml 4 weeks ago
I thought the whole argument was the internet was an echo chamber because of it being anonymous. Look at right-wing groups that employ masks where they can hide their true intentions behind “just being normal citizens”. It’s the groups like “Moms for Liberty” that are outed for their corruption because they have to use a public face during council meetings and such where you can’t be anonymous.
I’m having trouble seeing how downvotes would leads to more harassment. You would have to make sure you’re comfortable with putting your opinion forward just like with commenting. If there’s someone going around downvoting someone relentlessly it will be brought to light for all to see, not hidden like it is now. That would encourage more people to speak up because their detractors would have to do so publicly and without explanation they seem like they’re not bringing anything to the table in the discussion (returning downvotes to their true intention in the process).
CaptPretentious@lemmy.world 4 weeks ago
I’m having trouble seeing how downvotes being public would lead to more harassment.
It’s not just downvotes. Upvotes could be used as well.
You would have to make sure you’re comfortable with putting your opinion forward just like with commenting.
That works unless your opinion is the minority. What if there’s someone’s gay in say a location that might put them to death for being gay. And now they can’t even upvote/downvote safely because any action they take could be used against them. Swap out gay for any really where people can be punished IRL for something online.
If there’s someone going around downvoting someone relentlessly it will be brought to light for all to see, not hidden like it is now.
To what end? What benefit does that bring other then further harassment/bullying? If I actively know someone is downvoting me because I said Batman sucks and they decided to go through my entire post history to downvote everything, what, if anything should the response be? Do we form up a council to start handing out punishment and review cases?
That would encourage more people to speak up because their detractors would have to do so publicly and without explanation they seem like they’re not bringing anything to the table in the discussion
There’s a huge disconnect already from view count, posts/replies, and votes. If you’re going to require that a vote must come with an explanation… you’re going to see engagement drop to 0. This really sounds like the “if you have nothing to hide” that’s thrown around on why governments/police feel the need to pry into everything. Which you might agree with, but I very much don’t. And frankly, I don’t think it’s going to encourage more people to speak up, simply because people just don’t have the time. It’s easy for a person to just upvote/downvote something without saying something, especially if they have nothing to add.
curbstickle@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 weeks ago
The problem is its already pretty public, just for mods and admins, and non-lemmy instances.
While I agree its not ideal to have everything be public, given it functionally already is, this just makes it easier for users to see. Right now its a minor hurdle, but still a hurdle - but your votes are not really private/anonymous to start with.
CaptPretentious@lemmy.world 4 weeks ago
I personally think it should be locked down and votes should be kept under a very tight lock and key.
I posted this already as a response, so I’ll sort of post it here. If we start mapping users to their IRL selves, and agencies can start capturing what someone votes on, you have a few problems. 1) Marketing agencies selling your data again. 2) Governments can start using someones posts against them. You’re might not, but there are several that will. And Lemmy is a global platform.
curbstickle@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 weeks ago
I absolutely agree that its a problem. The problem is there is nothing stopping companies/governments from doing that now, and I don’t know if its feasible to make them actually private on Lemmy.
Right now, they aren’t private, you just need a few extra steps to see it all.
CaptPretentious@lemmy.world 4 weeks ago
Agreed. I’ve never liked that it’s already as public as it is. I remember when Lemmy was taking off and there was a discussion and to me it seemed like people were in favor of Lemmy stepping up user security, but seems that never happened. If user security isn’t critical, than the Fediverse is a complete failure and should NOT be used by anyone for any reason.
Ashelyn@lemmy.blahaj.zone 4 weeks ago
Data is not suddenly public just because some people have access to it. Data is public when it’s available for anyone to look at. Privacy is almost always going to be a trust issue on some level, and very few things are possible to do truly anonymously. Some data will always be available to someone in a position where it’s possible to abuse. Instance admins can see your IP address. Should that be available for everyone to see?
curbstickle@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 weeks ago
Anyone can stand up an instance though. So its available for anyone to look at right now.
I don’t think it should be made easier, but I don’t think its fair to suggest its currently private in any way, shape, or form today.
Because it is decidedly not.
Ashelyn@lemmy.blahaj.zone 4 weeks ago
Y’know, that’s fair. I think I misspoke, and meant to say that the admins of your instance can see your IP but not the admins of another, but I’m not 100% sure that’s true because I’ve never looked at the protocol.
If every interaction is already public on the backend/API level, then simply not showing the info to users is just a transparency issue.
The more I’m thinking about this, the more I believe it’s a cultural/expectations thing. On websites like Tumblr, all of your reblogs and likes are public info, but it’s very up front about that. Social media like Facebook, IG, and sites like Discord, it’s the same; you can look through the list of everyone who reacted.
index@sh.itjust.works 4 weeks ago
I think it’s a bad idea. It’s just going to start harassment and witch hunts
LLMs are smarter than the average foe already and governments spend millions on online propaganda. We NEED a witch hunt and lots of fire
endofline@lemmy.ca 4 weeks ago
I am fan of Swiss Appenzeln Innerrhoden voting system. In public and with hands up. It’s supporting the civic courage values. It’s easy to ostracize people for no reason when you’re anonymous
TubularTittyFrog@lemmy.world 4 weeks ago
i already have had multiple weirdos harass me on lemmy for not being leftist enough.
way too many people take the internet comments/points WAY too seriously…