Topic: Moderator deletion of serious discussion in the Wall Observer - page 3. (Read 961 times)

I (YMMV) would try not to make a big deal of it. While we do, indeed, have "special rules" in the WO that gives us some flexibility... the context in which that exception was granted is also important.

By context I mean the time in which we risked losing the WO because of the conflict between its ermmm "ample scope way beyond the OP" and "standard" moderation rules.

Thus, in a genious move, Theymos not only allowed us to propose/elect a new active "OP" but also decided to create that rule as some sort of "patch" that would let the WO-as-we-knew-it to continue its existence under the condition that it would not "become problematic again".

Such "patch" (along with disabling personal signatures to avoid account farmers spamming the thread) did wonders and have allowed to keep enjoying our "little space" for several years already without much problems.

So... consider it what it is (a "patch") and do not expect 100% reliability nor a totally unlimited "license-to-post" offtopic. As you well said, this is a "private forum" in the end.

That being said... Well... Yeah, seems that maybe you crossed your path with an overzelous moderator. Still I would not make a big deal if one (or several) of my off-topic/shitposts were to be deleted unless the occurrence of it suggested some sort of focused discrimination/censorship.

Infofront could go and start removing ALL offtopic posts if he wanted to, as that would be in compliance even with the "special rules". Forum moderators should not... or at least it is not their job anymore (see "special rules") but... well... Shit happens.

Now back to the "important things": $16K again. This is fine.

Idiots are free to report all they want.  That is why moderators have a neat little widget that marks reports as “bad”.

(Or they can just leave borderline reports unhandled; but none of these three posts is anywhere even close to violating forum rules for the Wall Observer.)


n00bs and angry retards, I can understand.  Moderators are supposed to be better than that.

I am surprised that you sometimes get posts deleted.  I never have in WO—only a few in Reputation, and in the Russian Reputation thread.

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That actually doesn’t matter.  As screenshotted in OP here, with red letters and boldface in the original, with my highlighting added:


The topic is infofront’s call.  infofront did not delete my posts.  As can be seen from the self-moderation banner at the top of every WO page, infofront rarely deletes anything at all; I think that most WO people like it that way.  It is a part of the WO appeal as a sort of forum-within-a-forum.

Very likely reported by an 'enemy'. Mine often got deleted moments after tussling with a high-up scammer. Just maybe by a noob who doesn't know or care for the rules, or a regular who doesn't like your stuff. Snitches lol.
Lazy/high handed deletion by mod. Plox restore and mind your own business.

Not sure why this one was deleted.
Seems like it has relatability to BTC and BTC price.


Hey mods why did you delete this one?

reserved

Subject:  [WO] E pur si muove

For those who do not understand the subject, and its relation to Galileo (discussed below):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E_pur_si_muove!

Deleted Post
« Sent to: nullius on: Today at 07:06:43 AM »

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     Twitter is for bird-brains.

Dumb twits.  Good satire; however, I do need to make some corrections and additions.

Quote from: Phil_S on November 13, 2020, 05:19:39 AM

     America is not the world-police!

Evil Empires:  “Commie, and very Commie.”

Just had to say it.  I don’t see an argument here; I think that Ron Paul would agree with me at least on the “no world police” part, and on the importance of national sovereignty.  Pseudo-Paul’s tweet is, of course, deadly correct.

Quote from: Phil_S on November 13, 2020, 05:19:39 AM

     Galileo was not popular.

He stood against not only the Church, but also society itself.  Accordingly, he was about as popular as I am:  A few intelligent people appreciated him, such as the Medici duke who was his primary supporter at the end of his life; he even had supporters high within the Church.  But he was otherwise considered scandalous, and even criminal.

The ignorant modern mind tends to assume that rebelling against the Church was always super-cool.  Whereas in 1632, heresy was like racism, sexism, or social class discrimination are today.  (n.b.)

Galileo’s wife was so embarrassed and angry at his sins, she burnt his papers after he died.  Unknown works of irreplaceable genius were thus irretrievably destroyed.  Because:  Unpopular.  The notion that he would have received 2.3K retweets and 18.6K “likes” is wildly implausible.

     Galileo is cancelled.

If Galileo actually said, “But it moves!”, such was the classic protest of a man who attempts to move the world.

Also, per the above, Galileo’s sentencing by the Inquisition occurred in a course of events in 1632–33.  He was persecuted in 1615–16 (when Copernicus’ De Revolutionibus was added to the Index Librorum Prohibitorum), so that is not incorrect; but 1633 was when he was actually forced to recant, and condemned to house arrest for the rest of his life.  —If the date of 15 May 1615 has a special significance, I don’t know it off the top of my head; accordingly, I would congratulate the satirist for having exceeded me on that particular point.

Quote from: Phil_S on November 13, 2020, 05:19:39 AM

     Paul Revere did not actually say this.  And in April of 1775, the American colonists still identified themselves as British.  Such use of the term “the British” is a widely revered anachronism.

If Americans were to warn each other of an impending BATF raid today, they would not shout, “The Americans are coming!”

Most of the colonists of early 1775 were proud Englishmen, standing up for the rights accorded to every free British subject by law and custom.  Their attitude was not unlike that of the American Patriots who today seek to “restore the Constitution”—who “love their country, but fear their government”.

Although succession from Britain was definitely on the table in early 1775 (cf. Patrick Henry, et al.), it took some time for the increasingly radical British protesters fully to form a separate identity as Americans—socially, culturally, and politically as declared on 2 July 1776 (celebrated 4 July, because Americans are not very good with dates and times).  Of course, the Battles of Lexington and Concord marked a major milestone in that process of radicalization; but it must be viewed in its historical context, as indeed the major turning point between the conciliatory attitude of the First Continental Congress, and the rebellious attitude of the Second.

Subject: [WO] Communism and Covid

Deleted Post
« Sent to: nullius on: Today at 07:06:51 AM »

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With quote slightly re-arranged for clarity of reply:

At a glance, it is much more true than that.  The Communists developed specific methods of brainwashing which, of course, have in varying degrees now been spread far and wide.

Awhile back, I actually intended to write something approaching Communism and Covid from another direction, which converges with what you just posted; so...


I think that that word is way overused and abused.  Well, I am an authoritarian.


How many pages do you want me to add to the Wall Observer?  :-/


“Be your own authority.” — nullius

Subject: [WO] Blockseer, U.S. OFAC, and attacks on Bitcoin fungibility

Deleted Post
« Sent to: nullius on: Today at 07:06:49 AM »

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Nullian coredump, Part 1/2.  h/t johhnyUA for a link to an article dated 12 November 2020.

Red alert:  Imminent plans for a mining pool with transaction blacklisting, based on blockchain analysis and, of course, the Diktat of the American world-police OFAC.

Does anyone have more info on this?

Via the Russian bits.media article, I find that fluffypony thus speaks:

https://twitter.com/fluffypony/status/1326594121797087238


fluffypony’s source link (a press release, not a news article—the bits.media article quoted/translated a different part of this):


I couldn’t have said it better myself.

I am not generally wont to complain about moderation; to the contrary, I think that there should be more of it.  However, there is a real and perhaps unprecedented problem whereas the following posts, fully reposted below, were deleted by a Bitcoin Forum moderator (not by infofront) from the Wall Observer:

All timestamps are UTC.  Listed in reverse chronological order of when each post was made.

• [WO] Blockseer, U.S. OFAC, and attacks on Bitcoin fungibility (A post about Bitcoin transaction censorship by a new mining pool.) • Post timestamp: 2020-11-14 00:49:51 • Deleted at: 2020-11-14 07:06:49
• [WO] Communism and Covid (Re Communist thought-control.) • Post timestamp: 2020-11-13 23:59:15 • Deleted at: 2020-11-14 07:06:51
• [WO] E pur si muove (A post about Twitter’s suppression of free discussion.) • Post timestamp: 2020-11-13 18:05:22 • Deleted at: 2020-11-14 07:06:43

Note:  Due to the ugliness of this forum’s quoting, especially for extended texts, I have broken my posts out of quotes.  The moderation PM message, and a correct tag suitable for each original post, are above the unaltered post text from the moderation PM.

As I myself recently discovered, there are officially “Special Wall Observer rules” in bright red letters that would have been seen by whatever anonymous coward reported my posts:


Thus, the “on-topicness” of my posts cannot even allegeably be an issue.  At this juncture, I observe that:

• None of my posts violated those of the forum rules that apply everywhere, including WO.  (At a vast stretch, trying to puzzle out what rule I allegedly violated, I have a suspicion about what an idiot hell-bent on rules-lawyering may say about one of them; but that would be ridiculous, and anyway, it could not apply to the other two that were deleted at the same time.)
• All three of these posts contained serious discussion.  Whether one agrees with me or not, only a fool would accuse me of shitposting.  Anyway, shitposting in WO is not to be handled by the forum moderators (if at all).
• Ironically, one of my deleted posts replied to a satire about the suppression of free discussion by Twitter.  Did I perhaps peeve a moderator who wishes to turn this place in Twitter?  
• Ironically, one of my deleted posts replied briefly to a list of Communist thought-control techniques (with comparison to government handling of exploitation of Covid).
• One of my deleted posts was about a serious Bitcoin issue, i.e. a new mining pool that does transaction censorship and blacklisting.  I believe that this is an existential threat to Bitcoin (as I intended to explain in part 2/2 of my “coredump”).  If serious Bitcoin issues cannot be discussed in the Wall Observer, then—I am at a loss for words to complete this sentence.

This is a privately owned forum.  If theymos didn’t want me here, he could kick me out with the push of a button.  I will not go off into some liberal whine in the manner of “Help!  Help!  I’m being repressed!”

This is a forum with a high reputation for free discussion.  It thus invites the value of “user-generated content”—which I myself usually would never give to any site that I do not own, as a matter of principle (n.b. an argument that would fall flat if propounded by those whose scribblings are not valued by others).  And as such, this forum has attracted a community of the type that cannot be found in the sheep-grazing wastelands of Twitter and Facebook.  I don’t think I am going out on a limb in positing that some people here will want to know about these deleted posts!

For my part, I am usually supportive of the moderators; they have a hard job, and I have no wish to make it harder.  However, if I were to say nothing about this publicly, then I would hereafter need perpetually to second-guess myself on whether I have permission to discuss Big Tech censorship (!) and Bitcoin transaction censorship (!!) on this forum.  Inter alia.
I would feel thus a chill wind blow over my ability to engage in serious discussion here, if I did not place the individual who deleted my posts on notice that I will call out exceptionally stupid moderation decisions.