[Seattle-editorial]
Some ideas for newswire categories (and eventually ... ratings)
Ben Seattle
bensai at pix.org
Fri Jan 2 12:45:44 PST 2004
Hi everyone,
In response to Kellan's suggestion that IMC activists were
fatigued and need a rest--I have waited until January to send
this to the Indymedia editorial and tech lists.
I have posted it to the newswire and I include here the responses
that it got.
I have created a mockup of how this might look at:
http://struggle.net/ben/2003/1226-seaimc-mockup.htm
I have commented in the past concerning news wire policies (see
for example: http://Struggle.net/Ben/2003/1025-Sea-IMC.htm )
however so far I have not drawn much in the way of substantive
response. I have been to a few meetings and so far have not
really found it possible to make a solid connection with anyone.
If anyone has any thoughts on the following I would be very
interested in hearing them.
Sincerely,
Ben Seattle
----//-// 2.Jan.2004
http://struggle.net/Ben (my elists / theory / infrastructure)
============================================================
IMC website ideas: newswire categories/rating
Ben -- Dec 27, 2003 07:27
============================================================
Summary:
----------
The recent work on the Seattle IMC code base and website redesign
provides a good opportunity to add features which will increase
the signal-to-noise ratio of the newswire. Newswire posts can be
broken into one of 6 categories: (1) Local, (2) National,
(3) International, (4) Actions, (5) Rants and (6) Seattle IMC
principles, policies and evolution. All 6 categories should be
visible from the main page. Also--we need to begin thinking about
an eventual system whereby readers can rate the usefulness of
posts and choose to view only those posts which are highly rated.
Hi everyone,
Following are some ideas for the new Seattle IMC website.
I will post this essay (together with any interesting
comments it receives) to the Seattle IMC editorial and
technical discussion lists in a week. (I will wait until
then because it appears that most of the local IMC people
are exhausted from installing the new code base and
dealing with organizational and financial issues--and
these people need an opportunity to recharge their
batteries.)
For those who do not know me--I am a local activist and
an occasional critic (generally in a constructive way)
of the Seattle Indymedia center.
_________________________________________________________________
>From the Seattle IMC editorial list (December 15 and 16):
> Also it would be possible (and worth serious consideration
> I think) to have a split newswire in the style of SF.
> SF splits the newswire into 3 pieces, local news,
> globally interesting news, and other global news.
> 3 categories. I will list them to
> show my understanding of content and philosophy:
> Local
> Local with relevance to the maxim "think globally, act locally"
> Global
I like the idea of making use of different categories for
different kinds of news. I have some ideas concerning making use
of more than 3 different categories . But before going into
that--I would like to explain a little about the background (at
least as I see it) to our present situation.
The context
-------------
The Seattle IMC and other IMC's are experiencing problems with
their newswires. These problems mostly revolve around a struggle
to maintain newswire focus and a high signal-to-noise ratio in
the face of increasing amounts of right-wing spam and posts from
people who are clueless but desperate for attention.
These problems tend to surface, in sharpest form, around
controversial political issues (ie: the national oppression of
the Palestinian people) where the mainstream media converage of
events is furthest removed from material reality that many
activists deal with on a daily basis.
The newswire problems, in my view, can be best understood as a
product of the collision of two immense and conflicting forces:
(1) There is a very high level of ignorance in our society
. due to the efforts of the ruling class and its subservient
. mainstream corporate media (and many other institutions)
. to keep the bulk of the population passive and ignorant
. about even the most basic political, economic and
. cultural issues.
(2) The emerging revolution in digital communications,
. for the first time in history, is making it possible for
. people, on a large scale, to easily express their views
. to a relatively large audience and engage in discussion
. and debate of a kind that has immense potential to
. puncture the blanket of lies with which we smothered
. on a daily basis.
The IMC newswire problems are currently manifesting themselves in
the form of being a nuisance--an irritation. To some, it may
appear that everything would be fine if only a few clueless
people (or a few troublesome topics) would go away. My view,
however, is that it is useful for us to step back and look at the
larger context--because, in the next few years, the existing
problems are going to become far more intense and severe--and we
need to be thinking (and experimenting) with powerful methods of
rating and filtering newswire posts.
The context here is that:
(1) increasing numbers of people, in the US and internationally,
. are coming online, and
(2) the need for popular (ie: not controlled by corporations)
. interactive news sites, run in a democratic way, where
. anyone has the right to post--and to help determine
. what appears on the "front page" is becoming increasingly
. obvious, and
(3) the conflict between antagonistic views (and antagonistic
. political trends--and antagonistic social classes) will be
. increasingly focused on the emerging interactive news sites.
. The problem of maintaining a high signal-to-noise ratio is
. going to get far more complex and intense as new
. technologies such as RSS (ie: really simple syndication)
. become popular and news wires begin to accept RSS
. feeds from personal and political blogs maintained by
. activists or by writers who have something to say.
. In the long run we will need to make use of rating
. and filtering systems. I hope that we begin to think
. about these kinds of issues today. The problem of
. maintaining a newswire of compelling interest in a
. situation of very intense competition for attention--is
. highly interesting from the standpoint of both theory
. and practice.
Suggested categories
----------------------
I would like to see something like the following six
newswire categories:
** local
** national
** international
** actions
** rants
** Seattle IMC principles, policies and evolution
I believe that it would be possible to offer space on our front
page for all six categories. Some page layout modifications
would free up a lot of wasted space. For example we currently
use at least three lines for each newswire post, including a
blank line to separate posts--but we could redesign the newswire
column (including making it a little wider--as the SF site does,
and eliminating the blank line between posts) such that each post
is allotted a single line. We can also make the page wider than
the standard 640 allowed by VGA. Most users only had VGA when
Indymedia got started. Since then monitors have gotten bigger
and cheaper. (If we make the page wider the VGA users will still
be able to see all of the newswire section by making use of the
horizontal scroll bar.)
I have created a mockup of how this might look at:
http://struggle.net/ben/2003/1226-seaimc-mockup.htm
I believe it is also useful to have a separate section for
actions (demonstrations, meetings, etc) as was discussed in
December.
A section for Rants can be useful because a lot of the posts we
get are not really "news"--but there will never be a clear and
unmistakable dividing line between what is "news" and what is
not. Having a place to put strong opinions will be useful both
(a) to reduce tension with posters who want their post to be
visible from our main page, and (b) because this section would
eventually, in its own right, be quite popular with our reading
audience.
A section on Indymedia principles, policies and evolution would
also be important once we recognize that, as a living process in
the midst of the revolution in digital communications, our
project will be going thru a lot of change (and a lot of
conflict) and will need feedback and guidance from our
readership. Having a separate section for this will help to
encourage reader participation in our evolution.
People who post would be asked to select a category--but our
editors could change the category as appropriate. We may also
want to allow some posts to exist in more than one category since
sometimes this will be appropriate.
Rating and filtering ideas
-------------------------
Rating and filtering go together. Readers should have the option
(like at Slashdot) of seeing only the posts that have been rated
above a certain threshold.
I don't think we need to put a rating system in place within the
next year. But we should recognize that it will eventually be
necessary. It is only of matter of time.
One possibility would be to give editor's ratings a "weight" of
10 (ie: an editor's rating would count as much as the rating of
10 anonymous users) and the ratings of registered users a weight
of 2 (ie: a registered user would count as much as two anonymous
users). Registered users would be expected to provide an email
address and a name or pseudonym. These are only suggestions for
how we would weight the ratings. Over time (ie: as we accumulate
a larger group of registered users who regularly rate posts) we
would be able to reduce the ratio between the weights of editors
and registered users.
Such a method would encourage readers to rate posts (and to
register). It will be better to have a lot of readers rate posts
for three reasons:
(1) Rating posts is a lot of work and takes a lot of time. Why
. not have our readers do most of this work?
(2) The choices made by a large group of readers will not only
. be more democratic than choices made by a small group
. of editors--but will better reflect the views of our
. reading audience
(3) The votes of a large group of readers will more easily
. overwhelm and neutralize the attempts of the few who
. manage to bypass our cheat-prevention methods.
. Having a large group of registered readers who regularly
. rate posts will also help to provide the foundation for
. more sophisticated forms of rating and filtering in the
. future. I believe that, in the long run (ie: sometime in
. the next decade) we can and must do far better than
. Slashdot in rating and filtering (see my Oct 27 post
. on this, link given below). For example I would most
. like to see posts that have been highly rated by people
. who tend to think like me--and with more
. sophisticated ratings systems--this becomes possible.
Leave the center column to the editors--for now
-------------------------------------------------
So far I have been discussing rating and filtering as applied to
the newswire. My thinking is that (for now) the decision
concerning what goes in the center column should be left to the
Seattle IMC editors. I say this even though I usually disagree
with the editorial judgement of the editors.
Eventually, the decisions of the Seattle IMC reading audience
should play a larger role in the deciding what articles appear in
the center column. I would certainly be enthusiastic about
seeing any steps in this direction. Learning how to make this
happen is the issue. Once we have developed methods of rating
and filtering newswire articles that are based on the actions of
our reading audience--we will be in a better position to assess
the next step forward. We will learn to walk after we learn to
crawl.
How do we prevent spamming of votes?
------------------------------------------
Most attempts to "cheat" the ratings system (ie: by a reader who
attempts to rate a post multiple times) can be defeated by
limiting voting on a rating to once per post per person per hour.
We don't actually know who anonymous readers are--but we could
capture a checksum based on the first three bytes of the IP
address (and maintain that checksum in a database for an hour or
so) to discourage cheating. Because we would store only
checksums of the first three bytes of the IP address (rather than
the IP address itself) and would purge this info from our
database after an hour--there would be little incentive for the
FBI (or any other of Ashcroft's minions) to seize IMC computers
in order to spy on activists--as they did a few years ago.
Giving posters greater control over comments
-----------------------------------------------
We should also consider allowing posters to have greater control
over the comments that are made to their post. This would allow
posters (or at least those who have the time) to filter out
comments from right-wing assholes and trolls and thereby maintain
a higher signal-to-noise ratio in the discussion of each post.
This is consistent with the principle that want to do everything
possible to encourage our readers and posters to help out with
the work, judgement and time involved in maintaining a high
signal-to-noise ratio in our newswire and newswire discussion.
Obviously, some posters would abuse this ability--and use it to
delete comments from anyone who disagrees with them. How could
we encourage more responsible behavior? Readers should be able
to easily see (at the bottom of the post-page, in a separate
section, maybe with different colored background) all comments
which have been filtered out by the owner of the post.
Posters who do a good job at filtering out troll comments (but
not filtering the comments which disagree with them in an
intelligently argued way) would find themselves rewarded with
higher ratings by the IMC reading audience--and their post would,
as a result, do better in the emerging, intense competition for
attention.
* * * * * *
That's it for now. I would be very interested in hearing any
thoughts in reply.
Sincerely,
Ben Seattle
----//-// 27.Dec.2003
http://struggle.net/Ben (my elists / theory / infrastructure)
-----------------------------------------------------------------
The contents and archived location of my three October posts
to the Seattle IMC editorial list are as follows:
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Oct25 * (1) Learning to work together (2) the content of localism
* working relationships that avoid unnecessary friction
* Who owns the newswire?
* Localism represents a retreat from the goal
of providing an alternative news service
Oct 26 * Solutions to newswire spam (reply to J)
Oct 27 * (1) political overview, (2) going beyond slashdot
http://Struggle.net/Ben/2003/1025-Sea-IMC.htm
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Also of potential interest to IMC activists
and readers is the following::
-----------------------------------------------------------------
What is to be done? (reply to Wilhelmina, Nov 11)
Of all the tasks which are decisive for the
antiwar movement one stands out at this time:
An interactive news site fueled by the energy
of activists and readers is too important
to be left in the hands of social-democracy
http://Struggle.net/Ben/2003/1111-wilhelmina.htm
-----------------------------------------------------------------
============================================================
Leading not setting on version 1.0
Posted by: a3m>>> at Dec 27, 2003 21:55
============================================================
Why should readers do the rates and selection? because that is
direct democracy and most transparently NOT controled. There is
that interesting article hanging in the space from a recent
glossy mag. democratic editorial decisions in practice online.
We need that to offset our selection of activism driven center
column contents.
My personal agenda is to have more than just a "local news"
aggregate page. I'd like space for others to post directly into
the labor or environmental or police issues, as registered
presspassholders.
No open content would go there without their acceptance to their
piece of the site. Several autonomous "beats" could control a
"local" only page.
At first I was taken back but, upon reflection, liked the idea of
having even sports and business news. You know, we don't have to
empower some of it. But it IS FAIR grist !!
I want somebody breathing down the Police and Safety Committee. I
want somebody breathing down the desire named streetcar guy- paul
whosit at Vulcan destruction Inc.
RSS huh??
============================================================
sportS!>????!
Posted by: mikus at Dec 28, 2003 03:13
============================================================
ehhe well uhhh
id like to hear analysis on the effectivess of sports in teaching
people about and preparing people for what seems to be constant
competition.
or even sports teaching ACCEPTANCE of these behaviours on a
societal level...and pros / cons
im not sure if the seahawks score is relevant to me, but then
again im the type of human that makes sure that i dont catch
myself thinking that my team is inherently better than anyone
elses team.
as far as user voting on validity of articles; there is no 100%
troll proof system so it could go south if someone found a way to
vote repeatedly...
like howsabout logging into every computer in the college or
library and voting the fascist articles up... i wouldnt put it
past some ppl...
categories is a good idea.....but if you wanna see a HAVEN for
garbage posts, go look at the guerrilla news networks 'conspiracy
theories' forum section...
it kinda seems like the 'rants' section if there was one risks
slipping into that sad hell of confused ideas and paranoid
conclusions without facts..
it would clear up other sections of the site...
im sure some of the seattl indy activists have thought of a dump
section before...
but if i could get an actual activist from the site to respond;
arent these things you discuss in meetings or is the site the
main forum?
============================================================
to MIKUS
Posted by: a3m, at the space and on the line at Dec 28, 2003
10:28
============================================================
well, 4 years ago I wanted a "gutter" category for the stuff that
belonged there. I was outvoted because others thought the term
offensive/confrontational. Lets not upset the trolls and spamers
and what, ever.
I cant remember the last time we were complimented on the
friendly usefull and safe space for commnity news.
WE have an oportunity to correct this. Please join us. Join the
seattle editorial list serve and come to the meetings. Be
patient- it took been 6-8 weeks for his request to be acted on.
Meanwhile you should be able to review the archive of that list
by going to the <
http://lists.indymedia.org/mailman/listinfo/seattle-editorial
find the section re archives, click the link and go here:
http://lists.indymedia.org/pipermail/seattle-editorial/
Read away !!!!!!!!
/oh and come to a meeting. As soon as people come back from the
yule, honnika,christmass , kwanza and wild turkey
speccials........we will perhaps all set togather and divy a
workload for the next stage of coming out of a four year sleep.
SEE YOU THERE!!!
============================================================
We don't need a 100% troll proof system
Posted by: Ben at Dec 28, 2003 11:59
============================================================
Hi there Mikus
> as far as user voting on validity of articles;
> there is no 100% troll proof system so it
> could go south if someone found a way to
> vote repeatedly...
Thanks for your comments. We don't actually
need a 100% troll proof system. If we create
something that is 95% effective--that will be
good enough.
> like hows about logging into every computer
> in the college or library and voting the
> fascist articles up... i wouldnt put it
> past some ppl...
If someone goes to every computer in a library
or internet cafe, etc--they will be out of luck
because the first three bytes of the IP address
will be the same for all machines.
Of course there will always be ways for any
determined person to evade our cheat prevention
methods. But all we need to be successful is
a combination of two factors:
(1) make it difficult to cheat--so that most
of the trolls (who tend to be lazy jerks)
will find it to be too much trouble
(2) make sure that plenty of other (ie: honest)
readers are voting.
All we need to make this a successful system
is that the _majority_ of votes are honest.
All we need to improve the signal-to-noise
ratio of the newswire are methods which
eliminate _most_ of the noise and do it in
a _democratic_ way that relies on our readers
rather than the (in my view) flawed judgement
of the Seattle IMC editors.
Also--if an article is genuinely fascist
(ie: promotes neo-nazi or KKK groups) or
is openly and aggressively racist--then
the editorial group could simply hide it.
If a few troll-like articles do get voted up
--well we would still be far better off than
we are today. And the continued irritation
(caused by the occasional situations where
a right-wing article gets lots of votes)
can help inspire us to develop more powerful
and sophisticated rating systems (for example
see my October 27 post to the Seattle Indymedia
list which describes the need to have a better
system than that at http://slashdot.org at:
http://Struggle.net/Ben/2003/1025-Sea-IMC.htm
The "Rants" section
--------------------
Not all the articles in the rants section will be
mind-numbingly stupid conspiracy nonsense. "Rants"
is simply a more current usage of the more
old-fashioned word "soapbox". For example the Seattle
Sunday Times (as well as the Stranger) has a similar
section and both are quite popular. The main thing
would be that posts in this section would be visible
from the main page on the same basis as posts from
all other sections.
I imagine that once a rating system is implemented
that allows readers to vote in a democratic way --
that the Rants section would be quite popular.
There are a lot of people who feel that they have
something to say. Why not use this to our advantage
instead of constantly fighting it?
Dealing with the IMC activists
------------------------------
> aren't these things you discuss in meetings
> or is the site the main forum?
I have been to a few meetings but have not found them
to be very useful as far as influencing the direction
of IMC. There is always too much other stuff that
needs to be discussed for my concerns to be addressed.
But the meetings have been useful in helping me to
better understand the politics and personalities and
agendas of various IMC people. I still disagree with
most of the IMC editoral folks but, having met them,
find that it is less irritating to deal with them online.
I post to the Seattle IMC lists that A3M (who is an editor)
described above and I also post here. Right now (ie: for
the next week or so) there is little activity on the IMC
email lists because (as I noted above) the people are
exhausted and agreed not to email one another for a while
so that they could recharge their batteries and become
human again.
I believe it is useful to have discussion of IMC principles,
policies and evolution here on the newswire because the
audience and the potential for comment is much larger.
This is why I believe it is necessary to have a separate
newswire section focused on IMC policies.
My experience in attempting to deal with and criticize
IMC people is that, for the most part, I feel ignored.
At the same time, by making my criticisms (and suggestions)
public and being both patient and persistent, I hope to
eventually make some kind of connection with a section of
the IMC activists.
Whether or not the Seattle IMC can be successfully
encouraged to "do the right thing" is unclear. But I
will make the effort. If the Seattle IMC proves unable,
for political reasons, to become the kind of interactive
news site that Seattle needs (ie: where readers have a
strong, and often decisive, voice in establishing
principles, policies and evolution) then eventually
a group of activists will recognize the need to create
a news site that is more democratic and which better
serves the needs of the Seattle activist community.
Sincerely,
Ben Seattle
----//-// 28.Dec.2003
http://struggle.net/Ben (my elists / theory / infrastructure)
============================================================
time to rub my eyes
Posted by: mikus at Dec 28, 2003 14:30
============================================================
thanks for the link to the list a3m! its time to do some reading
indeed! and ben i see your point on the rating system (altho not
completely yet- its quite articulate ill look at it some more)~~
so i feel like im headed in th' right direction now
ill see what i can cook up to contribute to the editorial list
after i learn enough about everything involved to be a
constructive member; i appreciate the dialog u two , later!
============================================================
And also ...
Posted by: Ben at Dec 29, 2003 07:31
============================================================
Hi Mikus,
My experience is that most of the archived postings
in the Seattle editorial list serve are difficult
to browse thru because they consist mostly of
details and it is difficult to get an understanding
of the politics and the larger issues that
determine how the local editorial group works.
It may be useful for you to take a look at my
postings to that list on October 25, 26 and 27
(see below) or my November 11 reply to
Wilhelmina (posted on the newswire).
Unfortunately, my postings did not result
in a substantive reply.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
The contents and archived location of my three October posts
to the Seattle IMC editorial list are as follows:
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Oct25 * (1) Learning to work together (2) the content of localism
* working relationships that avoid unnecessary friction
* Who owns the newswire?
* Localism represents a retreat from the goal
of providing an alternative news service
Oct 26 * Solutions to newswire spam (reply to J)
Oct 27 * (1) political overview, (2) going beyond slashdot
http://Struggle.net/Ben/2003/1025-Sea-IMC.htm
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Also of potential interest to IMC activists
and readers is the following::
-----------------------------------------------------------------
What is to be done? (reply to Wilhelmina, Nov 11)
Of all the tasks which are decisive for the
antiwar movement one stands out at this time:
An interactive news site fueled by the energy
of activists and readers is too important
to be left in the hands of social-democracy
http://Struggle.net/Ben/2003/1111-wilhelmina.htm
-----------------------------------------------------------------
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