I don't know that it's possible to maintain the "friendly" vibe everywhere. I'm seeing a growing amount of hostility, both passive and overt. It's the nature of the Internet that people disparage opinions and even facts they disagree with. My response thus far has been to identify such hostility and then ignore the person as much as possible.
Yeah, the overt stuff is easy enough to dispel with politeness but the passive stuff is harder. Especially on Reddit, there seems to be a huge number of people that will stubbornly cling to beliefs no matter what evidence to the contrary you provide, and will respond with rude little snarky quips even if you were being civil.
For example, I saw this one video post talking about Bonsai in Tennessee. The person in the video had a thick southern accent and really mangled some of the Japanese terms. One user mentioned this and then was berated by several people defending the person in the video, claiming that's how Japanese people speak too. When I provided a links audio recordings of native Japanese speakers, proving how actual Japanese people pronounce the words, the only responses I received were, "I don't care, I'm still right."
Welcome to the Internet. Where everything's made up and the facts don't matter.
I haven't run into any bad comments yet, but I'm sure they'll come. Ignoring these comments is definitely the best way to go. It'll make the environment much less hostile and combative.
I wish this were true, but I think in the long term, it's not sustainable. Simply ignoring is not enough. We need to work to create a culture where trolls, etc. don't get satisfaction from posting. While everyone ignoring them would be ideal, I don't think people will do it as the userbase grows. "Raging" or responding strongly isn't going to be successful either. I think the right thing to do is quickly, briefly call them out on their BS. "Your comment is inappropriate because BLANK." If we can somehow limit our responses to trolls to a single comment like that, I think there's a greater chance of delaying the onslaught of hostile comments.
We worked very hard to create a system that works against trolls and spammers on every turn, we hope this system will hold up as this community scales. Here is an excerpt taken from our Reputation & XP: A guide to Leveling on Snapzu documentation that I think everyone should read:
Some of today's biggest social networks use "real name" policies that suppress creative expression by forcing users to construct alternate versions of themselves often narcissistic in nature to conform to social norms associated with offline life. This sucks! No one should ever have to pretend to be someone they aren't. On the other hand, anonymous social networks can promote abusive behavior like trolling and spamming due to a lack of accountability and real life consequences. Sadly neither approach fulfills the right environment to promote creativity and self expression, but we believe there may be another way!
At Snapzu we embrace responsible anonymity with a platform that allows anonymous users to build-up a reputation based on creativity, quality, and positive interactions with others. A high level profile represents dedication and seniority, promoting mutual respect and trust amongst our members. Forget fake internet points, a system that factors in a 'reputation score' when calculating XP towards reaching higher levels rewards creative and helpful individuals, while punishing those who bring nothing but harm to the table.
We have all worked hard to get to where we are as a community, and the mature and responsible personality is something we are willing to fight for as we grow.
The site has the feel of a personal branding while at the same time preserving all the good that comes with anonymity. People don't usually want to ruin their personal brand - but those that do can be dealt with accordingly.
Very sound system, and I hope it works out as planned!
In the same way that reddit offers you the ability to unsubscribe from a lot of the "defaults", you could leave some of the default tribes, but that won't affect people that come here without accounts, or people that choose to keep the defaults.
Often, the people who would be in a position to counteract the negativity or hostility of a community will choose not to fight that battle, because they can just leave and make their own tribe, with blackjack, and hookers. Hell, it usually doesn't take that much; people will often leave simply because of a difference of opinion. There's no opportunity cost for them to leave and form their own group, so they will. /t/<inserttribehere> will have a sister tribe called /t/real<inserttribehere> as soon as the first major spat happens.
The cross-pollination between tribes makes it a little less isolated than on reddit, though. Since you can (at higher levels) post up to five different tribes at the same time based on topic you're likely to end up contributing to tribes you don't have listed as default. I'm not subscribed to /t/kids but I end up posting some content to that tribe because it becomes relevant to some of my topics.
As each community grows, the hostility will increase. The only way to maintain this peaceful vibe is to make sure that this community will . stop growing, which isn't very fair to a lot of people. So the most we can do is to just ignore the meanness and be nice to all. ;)
I don't know that it's possible to maintain the "friendly" vibe everywhere. I'm seeing a growing amount of hostility, both passive and overt. It's the nature of the Internet that people disparage opinions and even facts they disagree with. My response thus far has been to identify such hostility and then ignore the person as much as possible.
Yeah, the overt stuff is easy enough to dispel with politeness but the passive stuff is harder. Especially on Reddit, there seems to be a huge number of people that will stubbornly cling to beliefs no matter what evidence to the contrary you provide, and will respond with rude little snarky quips even if you were being civil.
For example, I saw this one video post talking about Bonsai in Tennessee. The person in the video had a thick southern accent and really mangled some of the Japanese terms. One user mentioned this and then was berated by several people defending the person in the video, claiming that's how Japanese people speak too. When I provided a links audio recordings of native Japanese speakers, proving how actual Japanese people pronounce the words, the only responses I received were, "I don't care, I'm still right."
Welcome to the Internet. Where everything's made up and the facts don't matter.
Other than a helpful link here and there I had pretty much stopped discussing anything over there the past year or so.
I haven't run into any bad comments yet, but I'm sure they'll come. Ignoring these comments is definitely the best way to go. It'll make the environment much less hostile and combative.
I wish this were true, but I think in the long term, it's not sustainable. Simply ignoring is not enough. We need to work to create a culture where trolls, etc. don't get satisfaction from posting. While everyone ignoring them would be ideal, I don't think people will do it as the userbase grows. "Raging" or responding strongly isn't going to be successful either. I think the right thing to do is quickly, briefly call them out on their BS. "Your comment is inappropriate because BLANK." If we can somehow limit our responses to trolls to a single comment like that, I think there's a greater chance of delaying the onslaught of hostile comments.
We worked very hard to create a system that works against trolls and spammers on every turn, we hope this system will hold up as this community scales. Here is an excerpt taken from our Reputation & XP: A guide to Leveling on Snapzu documentation that I think everyone should read:
We have all worked hard to get to where we are as a community, and the mature and responsible personality is something we are willing to fight for as we grow.
Yes, I was thinking the very same.
The site has the feel of a personal branding while at the same time preserving all the good that comes with anonymity. People don't usually want to ruin their personal brand - but those that do can be dealt with accordingly.
Very sound system, and I hope it works out as planned!
In the same way that reddit offers you the ability to unsubscribe from a lot of the "defaults", you could leave some of the default tribes, but that won't affect people that come here without accounts, or people that choose to keep the defaults.
Often, the people who would be in a position to counteract the negativity or hostility of a community will choose not to fight that battle, because they can just leave and make their own tribe, with blackjack, and hookers. Hell, it usually doesn't take that much; people will often leave simply because of a difference of opinion. There's no opportunity cost for them to leave and form their own group, so they will. /t/<inserttribehere> will have a sister tribe called /t/real<inserttribehere> as soon as the first major spat happens.
The cross-pollination between tribes makes it a little less isolated than on reddit, though. Since you can (at higher levels) post up to five different tribes at the same time based on topic you're likely to end up contributing to tribes you don't have listed as default. I'm not subscribed to /t/kids but I end up posting some content to that tribe because it becomes relevant to some of my topics.
Yes. I'm going to enjoy the politeness while it lasts.
I think this is the key. Trolls starve when unfed, the only reason they thrive on Reddit is because it's a smorgasbord.
This is where user tags would come in handy.
As each community grows, the hostility will increase. The only way to maintain this peaceful vibe is to make sure that this community will . stop growing, which isn't very fair to a lot of people. So the most we can do is to just ignore the meanness and be nice to all. ;)