skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I voted "yes, with caveats". The caveat is that my agreement is based on my understanding that these bans are justified because of terms of service (TOS) violations.

I'm pretty sure that Google Play, for example, has banned other apps in the past because of issues with "user-generated content" that was not sufficiently moderated.

If tech firms are enforcing TOS and doing it in an even-handed way, then I'm OK with that. Freedom of speech is important, big companies with lots of power also have lots of responsibility, but I think they should still be able to have TOS.

Whether it's truly even-handed is an important question. Even if a TOS agreement is written objectively, it's possible enforce it selectively. Personally, I don't see any clear sign that it isn't even-handed. Given the timing, it's obviously reactive, but that seems OK to me because there is new information to consider, and the app took on greater importance, so it's natural to look more closely at it (among all the many apps out there).
Yes, with caveats.

This whole episode reopens a conversation happening during the whole of the XX century, of how a free society defends itself against actors trying to subvert it.

Trump's mass movement got as far as performing a very botched putsch on Congress to try and stop the ratification of election results it denounced.

This was dangerous. The preceding years showed us that the rate at which people radicalized through social media was far greater than anything you could do to stop it, save from mass censorship it turns out and that still remains to be seen.

I think that society owes a great lot to freedom of expression and indeed the social progress that progressives seek wouldn't have happened without it. Trying to consolidate it over the years closing the barn door to what now is occupying their old place as provocative, non-conforming, "immoral" speech is shortsighted and a detriment to society.

But even with mild forms of deplatforming that already have caused much outrage, it came to this, a small abortive revolution playing out in Washington DC. You may disagree with revolutions or these revolutionaries in particular, but if you don't want one happening you must have the means to stop it from getting there, and you have to find a solution to unbridled social media radicalization.

I wouldn't want as a solution having the Great Powers among Tech's moneyed interests being the ones deciding based on profit, political favor, clout or whatever motivation they may ultimately have.
It may be a small point, but both Parler and Amazon make some income from advertising, so at least in this sense, they are competing.
Dealers for Trek and Specialized have not done as well here. I think this MAY be because those dealers are mostly all-in on whichever brand they carry. The shop I bought my Specialized Roubaix from in 2014, for example, HAS a very small number of non-Specialized bikes (maybe 4-6 AllCity plus a couple Moots), but the rest of the shop is ALL SPECIALIZED. You know what folks say about egg/basket redundancy.

The shop I mentioned that was clever and has done well as a result isn't a dealer for either. They carry BMC, Cervelo, Santa Cruz, Salsa, and some others, and they've managed to stay busy and stocked all year.
Even their own lawyers dropped them out of fear....
trying to discredit the nationwide BLM protests by painting them as violent

I’m only trying to discredit the violence, as I made clear in my original comment.

If you’ll casually assign me false motives and claim I’m “intellectually dishonest,” I see no reason to continue our discussion.
Idk, we talk again once it’s done
There's a big difference between protesting and domestic terrorism.
Why not decentralized/federated services run by by various communities all across the world?
turns out the billionaires love the CCP when that system/state sponsored companies is the source of their billions...
Can we stop being blind to possibilities? Unless you can prove that it originated in Italy you ought to stop silencing other views that make you uncomfortable.
When you make a new account and view a thread You post in for the first week to so, gour comments are absent absent unless you are logged in. That’s what a shadow ban is. It can be removed and it happens to every new hn account I’ve ever seen. It gets removed after a week or so. That “inflammatory” post about a game prototype you linked was not visible for even a second in that thread until a week or two had passed
Absolutely yes.

Morally, violent fascists have no place in society. This isn't a slippery slope. They're not coming for the Communists and Jews next. I have no sympathy for the poor, helpless Nazis being bullied by the big, bad liberals (as if the companies listed are even reliably liberal) when all they want to do is organize an overthrow or two of the US government. The big platforms have been obscenely deferent to the right wing for the past four years; ceasing to do business with them only after actual murder is about as limited a response as you can possibly imagine.

But, you say, companies are supposed to be amoral profit-generating machines? Ok, in that case, let's consider the cost-benefit analysis. Reputation matters. Continuing to do business with violent fascists is bad for reputation. How much money were they bringing in? Probably not much - Parler would have had a hard time getting advertisers, and it's not a system that will work well on a donation/subscription model. Easy decision.

Are we simply concerned in general that a few companies can "silence" certain kinds of speech? First, let's be very clear that if they're going to have that power at all, this is about the best and most restrained possible time for them to use it - relying on the rich and powerful to not abuse their power isn't a long-term strategy, but it's also not productive to whine when they use it in a way that benefits society. But also, it's not completely impossible for Parler to operate. They simply don't get to benefit from the infrastructure that those companies built. Should it be easier to be online and discoverable without those companies cooperating? Maybe, but I'm really hard pressed to imagine how decentralization, discoverability, and human laziness can all coexist. Keep in mind that part of what people like about app stores, for instance, is that they're curated. If Parler has to stay, is there anything beyond literal malware that you think could be removed?

(Full disclosure, I worked for one of those companies until recently.)
I'm very happy to see the ACLU take a stand on principles that are no doubt in conflict with those of people who have been increasing their donations since the election of Trump. That's the real sign of integrity IMO.
Free speech and the First Amendment are not the same thing.

Free speech is a moral principle/ideal that exists independently of the US Constitution.

The First Amendment guarantees a certain form of free speech in the United States.

Private-sector censorship / restriction of speech is not in violation of the First Amendment. However, it may still amount to a restriction on free speech.
Our government has the ability to do the same in the US. What's lacking is not ability. It's lawfulness and a consensus of what the goal should be. In China there is little need for lawfulness and certainly much less need than in the U.S. for consensus.
I discovered this yesterday trying to respond to a post on r/conservative about the CCP enforcing ideological conformity. I don't know whether to laugh or cry.
Will Apple smartphone sales decline?
Yes, Hunter Biden is under investigation. But the investigation Glenn wrote about was separate, and a transparent fraud.
> I personally don't this AWS is a utility / common carrier (I can go and buy a server and serve a website all on my own for the entire internet to access)

How? Where will the server be located? How will it be connected to the internet? ISPs are not common carriers so good luck...
At this point, they should just be forced to allow the software to be replaced without waiting for someone to find an exploit. To be clear, I'm not talking about backdoors or something like that, just exactly the same as a laptop: if I want to install a new OS, I should be able to if I want to.
Also, remember: the ratings, themselves, have different meanings to different K-means clusters.

This insane drive to change the meanings of words (eg. every traditionally conservative leaning person is now a Nazi, and everyone proud of their unique cultural heritage is now a Racist, so long as they are also white) is no problem!

A member of a brittle, sensitive, easily-triggered group will quickly find themselves isolated and hearing only the few people who almost exactly match their identical beliefs. And, even those won't last long (just until the first imagined slight or use of the wrong adjective).

This, too, is instructive. Coddling a lack of resilience is not helpful to someone -- but, whatever. Fill your boots! If it works for you, have a blast with your two currently-acceptable friends! ;)

But seriously, the current Kristallnacht purge of social media is the best thing that could happen, in my opinion. It'll force a Cambrian explosion of new platforms that more capably handle differences of belief and tolerance!
Radio free Asia has deep ties to US agencies.

"Deep ties to US agencies" is sensationalizing the facts. It's part of the United States government, and nobody has ever tried to keep that secret. Not RFA, not the U.S. Government. Nobody. "Deep ties" makes it seem like it's trying to be covert. It's not.

It isn’t really a credible source.

It's one of the more credible sources of news in Asia. Especially for more authoritarian countries. I used to know a number of its journalists, and they strive for neutrality and factual reporting in places where that is not allowed.

It's the Asian version of Radio Marti, or Radio Free Europe. Funded by the U.S. taxpayers, run by the U.S. government, to bring information to the world. There's nothing new here. This has been going on longer than most of us have been alive.

It's like BBC News, but without all of the sensationalism that has crept into the Beeb over the last couple of decades.

Trying to paint it as some kind of covert propaganda machine illustrates a lack of knowledge, or a personal political agenda.
I'm not 100% sure on that. I saw a lot of 'non-badged' accounts, meaning they weren't providing much info. I guess, though, presumably many (most?) were providing real phone numbers, but Twitter tries to force that from people, so perhaps not much more than Twitter?
> Your site admin shouldn't be the one deciding who you can DM, or which people can follow your feed.

That's a necessary affordance, given the technology. A mail server could indeed refuse to forward some of your emails, and this could even make some sense e.g. as part of spam prevention policy.
Podman for Buildpacks
Thanks for the image. Do you know if the account was active or unused? I guess that's why Glenn said "were active users" and not "were users".
Where's your proof of that? Do you think Zuckerberg is a zealous leftist?
> But thats on the people of the nation.

I think there is a very real concern that when the time comes, it will be impossible to organize a revolution against a tyrannical government due to reliance on centralized and regulated social media.
Alexa, search for colocation services in Russia.
You don't watch non-US news much, do you?
So is it legal to boot out a store from a plaza, selling offensive items?

I think Amazon is in a very difficult position, do or don't, it is doomed. But I guess it will have to make a call on this one, to avoid looking like standing on the wrong side by the coming administration.
I'm in the process of moving family and friends. For my friends who I believe are more than capable of moving, I just said them that I'm leaving WhatsApp, you can still reach me on Signal. Then I block them on WhatsApp, so I don't relapse. Almost all of them have moved across so far. I installed Signal for my mom and then blocked my myself on WhatsApp on her phone, so she's forced to use Signal to contact me. If someone can use WhatsApp they can definitely use Signal. It's more secure and it's cleaner.
In my experience, they get paid more.
Google and Facebook being two of the most valuable companies along with hundreds of billions of dollars and petabytes per hour.

What kind of evidence are you looking for exactly?
Unreservedly yes.

The Capitol riots killed 6 people, including two police officers. The crowd was armed to the teeth with guns, pipebombs, and ziptie handcuffs. They constructed a gallows. They coordinated with police sympathizers to gain access to the building, while one GOP congresswoman live-tweeted the known whereabouts of Nancy Pelosi.

They were planning to murder political opposition and violently overthrow a fair democratic election to appoint their leader instead.

If not for the plan devolving into a disorganized mob, and a quick thinking capitol officer who lead rioters away from the chamber where House Reps had been evacuated, rioters may have claimed many more lives.

Kudos for Amazon, Apple, Google, and all other tech companies for deplatforming violent neo-fascists and their enablers.
Parler have actually said they don't use any of the proprietary AWS Services because of the danger of lock in - so I think they could. They just have to move 50TB+ of data to a new provider, which is not something that can be done quickly.
I was just thinking about "customizable moderation" that this article mentioned earlier today. I came up with a similar idea of lists that you can opt into following just like AdBlock filter lists or Twitter shared blocklists just like he mentioned. In terms of feature set I had a couple ideas this this post didn't mention. There could be two levels of blocking that filter lists could set, warm before showing and never show. Also blocking could be applied on a per user or a per post basis.
A friend of mine got permanently suspended from twitter because she and a friend were bantering with each other and she made a joking threat. Her friend who the "threat" was directed at has tried to petition twitter to undo her suspension, but they've just ignored her.

Twitter regularly bans people for anything that smells of violence, even when the "threat" is one person joking with their friend.
Unreservedly yes, and anyone who votes "unreservedly no" on this poll should be per-banned from this site.
For an interesting comparison, consider the first person to be charged under CFAA. He's a co-founder and partner at YC. Both defendants were the children of parents who were involved with early UNIX, one at Bell Labs and NSA, and the other as founder of the Mark Williams Company. One kid got probation, community service and a fine. The other was not so fortunate. If we compare the actual damages caused by each, the result seems to violate any notion of proportionality.
https://github.com/buildpacks/pack/issues/564 Open
"disgusting" like what? Can you give a few examples? (legit ask, not denying it)
It's really not complicated at all.

Move your body -> get better/stronger at the movements while burning calories -> eat healthy to take in high quality calories -> sleep/recover well to progress.

Moves: running, lifting, yoga, biking, swimming.

Quality: low intensity, medium, high, sprinting, max power

That's it, just do it.
Some ideas:

1. Install the app when you visit, go to the process together (difficult these days, I know...)

2. If you have many iPhone users in your family, answer on iMessage whenever they send you a WhatsApp. This way you can pull them over slowly

3. If Android users send you a WhatsApp, check if they have Signal installed and answer there instead.

It is "Salami tactics", but works for me.
The Web does not really have any such mechanisms (and certainly didn't have them back in the times where we had more search engines). Do you think Web is different in a way that makes it not require them, or that it suffers from their lack?
It's amazing how arbitrarily lines are drawn in this thread. I'd be eager to see people that disapprove AWS's actions what they would say in the following situation:

1) Parler banning some of its own users for trolling.

2) Their own employer/company banning people that use it to distribute child porn.

3) A utility company disconnecting users that continuously disrupt its electrical grid.

Of course you'd be fine with 1, 2 because neither your company nor Parler are common carriers, as defined by law, and have no obligation to provide their service to anyone. Guess what - AWS is not a common carrier either. But even a common carrier such as the electric company can terminate users that purposefully violate its terms of service.

At the end of the day, we all know this. We know that private services have no First Amendment obligation. And yet, thread after thread, its all the same fake outrage that's masking a much simple emotion - "I hate it when my guys lose".
The whole claim by Parlor (read the linked complaint) is that AWS is doing this in coordination with Twitter to stop the flood of conservative people (including Trump himself, allegedly) moving from Twitter to Parlor after Twitter banned Trump (this is substantiated with links from media claiming that could happen and by the fact Parlor had become the most downloaded app on the AppStore after Twitter announced the Trump ban)... they claim AWS and Twitter are basically trying to kill Twitter's competition.

Why AWS would help Twitter is unclear to me, though.
Software Fix for M1 Mac Bluetooth Connectivity Issues Reportedly on the Way
> He was murdered by armed "anti-fascist" protestors.

It appears that that link has not been confirmed, as of an August 2020 WaPo article[0], which points out that many of the deaths at the protests can not be conclusively linked to the demonstrators.

[0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/08/26/almost-no...
I generally agree, but imho there is no way to put the genie back to the bottle. Unless we all want it, or becomes mandatory.
SetSketch: Filling the Gap Between MinHash and HyperLogLog
I made up a hypothetical future where political winds and morals shift to something you disagree with to expose the flaw in your logic.
I partially agree with you. Right now the people most likely to switch are going to be the people who have no home. The crackdown has started, but it's pretty early. The people kicked, or leaving at this point are not the ones you want to be the early founders of your social network. Remember, the first users set the tone for the community.
Brake pads wear out after thousands of miles. Most of the neglected bikes in the US got parked long before they accumulated enough miles to wear out brake pads. I've got maybe 4000 miles of mostly urban commuting (i.e. much harder on brake pads than rides in the country) on my nice road bike and I haven't changed them yet. For casual cyclists, brake pads are a lifetime part.

Possible exception: glazed brake pads, but still relatively uncommon. Cables and housing are much bigger wear items for most bikes. Mostly because they aren't stainless at the low end and rust.

Chains will also rust, but it's pretty hard to end up with an unsalvageable chain unless a bike has been left outside for a long time. Source: left my beater road bike outside at the curb for 9 years in Boston, including winters. Lubed the chain a couple times a year. It still runs.
> Are the phone companies allowed to lock me out if they don't like what I'm saying?

Possibly, although... you're paying for your phone service. You're not paying for parler, facebook, twitter, etc.
Sure, once you master the art of eradicating ideas of basic human rights and using authoritarian methods to control an entire nation with literally no independent bodies to check the power.
You control the banks, the businesses, the army, the judiciary, the media, the internet, literally every sphere of a society. It becomes an easy peasy thing to do what you say is worth learning.
I feel like the AWS lawyer is going to make the following claims:

1- This action (dropping Parler) is within the actions established in our ToS.
2- Parler's very goal is to attract these sort of demographics and similar actions have been taken in the past (Stormfront comes to mind)

The only chance this has is if Parler has language in their contract requiring that 30-day notice of service termination. My guess is that they don't. They also spend a LOT of time in this filing pointing out that AWS is a very big share of the market (the court won't care) and that they host Twitter (the court will again, not care) in an effort to say that AWS was worried the shift to Parler from Twitter would financially hurt Twitter and then AWS (which doesn't make sense, since AWS is hosting both so 6 million people shifting just means one check gets smaller and the other larger).

This is the quality of legal filings I've begun to expect surrounding these issues. "They're bad, and it's pretty obvious to everyone, duh!" doesn't actually hold up in court though...
> But my argument is this is not often done. I've seen tons of giant IO functions wrapped in do notation. Generally, no big attempt is made to segregate IO or side effects away from pure logic. Everyone just writes a monad and starts using do notation.

Yeah, "functional core/imperative shell" or "pushing IO to the edges" is a weird myth. Really the strength of Haskell is "functional core/IO code carefully threaded through functional core".

What's a good descriptive slogan for that? "Functional pipework/imperative reactants", invoking chemical engineering?

To cycle back to your point, I don't think the failure of this slogan actually points to any weakness in Haskell.
Three and a bit years ago, someone who'd been radicalized by Facebook actually shot at members of Congress after asking about their party affiliation. This wasn't some hypothetical, it actually happened. Not only was there not this kind of concern about Facebook radicalization back then, the House Minority Leader Pelosi and most of the press outright lied and falsely claimed that the party whose Congressman was in hospital fighting for his life were the ones who had incited the attempted murder of a member of Congress, pointing at the shooting of Gabrielle Giffords. This was almost the exact, precise opposite of reality; that was inspired by a really bizarre personal disagreement with her which had nothing to do with national politics, whereas the shooting of Scalise seems to have been entirely about that. Nonetheless, the entire mainstream establishment pushed this bogus line.

Bizarrely, the FBI even concluded Scalise's shooting wasn't politically motivated because the assailant was a wife-beater whose wife had got fed up with him and left him, and everyone in the press went along with it - even though if we applied this principle to domestic terrorists in general, the US probably wouldn't have anyone who counted as a domestic terrorist.
Yes, they do. While it took years, the falsehoods he spread during the pandemic and during the run-up to the election convinced many newsmedia outlets to cut him off. In other words, they learned. Consistency is not to be desired above all else---it is healthy to change one's mind and behavior when presented with new evidence or circumstances, which is what those outlets did.