Perhaps we could require large for-profit platforms to hire trust-and-safety teams to monitor things? I believe that's how it used to be done.

That's even more expensive than AI, though, so it has to apply only to big companies that can afford it.

Also, I'm under the impression that this kind of work tends to be traumatic for the trust-and-safety team…

@Elizafox @camertron

Seriously?!

Well, yes, sites certainly should be required to have a report button and ban people who get reported and are doing clearly illegal stuff.

But word filtering? Yeah, it's cheap, but it doesn't work. It'll drown the admins in false reports, depopulate the site with false bans, or if it simply deletes/censors content without further punishment, then it's easy to evade. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scunthorpe_problem

Some think AI will solve this problem, but, well, see above.

@Elizafox @camertron

Bleh. Literal pedophiles describe themselves as such in Discord without getting in any trouble.

You don't need AI, you literally just have to filter messages for strings, it's cheap af.

The lack of safety isn't because it's technically hard, it's because nobody cares.

And this isn't speculation. Big platforms like TikTok are actively attempting to use AI to stop bullying, hate, etc. They are failing miserably.

All they're actually accomplishing is forcing people to make up Newspeak-ish words like “unalive” in order to discuss political issues of the day without getting banned. This protects no one.

@camertron

But for how long? If platforms are commanded to employ AI to stop bullying, that will:

1. Not work. Bullying can and often does happen right under the noses of highly intelligent schoolteachers. If even they can't reliably identify bullying, AI doesn't stand a chance.

2. Make all of the alternatives illegal. AI is staggeringly expensive to create and use. Only billion-dollar companies can afford it. You can kiss Mastodon goodbye, and we aren't part of the problem!

@camertron

That's what I heard! Apparently some kids figured out that they can fool the bot into thinking they're adults just by scrunching up their faces.

Among many, many other strategies.

@Elizafox @camertron

That seems to be Australia's approach, but so far it isn't working. Kids easily evade the age checks with scrunched-up faces, video game characters, fake IDs, whatever it takes.

Must every generation learn the hard way that keeping kids from chatting and exploring is impossible? I thought we learned this in the 1990s. Must we burn the entire Internet to ashes, leaving no trace of what was once humanity's crowning achievement, before we give up on this fool's errand?

@camertron

I wish it was only Boomers saying that. From what I hear, Gen Z is of that opinion now. I can't even. They of all people should know better than this; they just got finished with their own childhood!

@camertron

Yeah. I remember when people were blaming Doom for the Columbine shooting. It was and remains absolutely baffling.

I played Doom. The player character is a heroic Marine battling an invasion of demons from hell. At no point does the game involve shooting defenseless children or anything similarly immoral.

And yet, somehow, it was the subject of public outrage.

No doubt stoked by interests with media connections, back in the bad old days before Internet fact checking…

@camertron

The world has been unkind and polarized since our distant ancestors were fashioning clubs from fallen branches and using them on rival tribes. None of this is new. It has come and gone in cycles, and this is one of them.

Yes, that culture of “efficiency” should be tossed out in favor of a culture of calm cooperation. Fortunately, quite a lot of people agree with you, and that is exactly what seems to be slowly happening.

Maybe this time it'll be permanent.

@camertron

Why is it that whenever one kid is abusive toward another, so many people's first and only impulse is to punish the victim?

Because that's what's happening here. First a kid gets bullied at school, and then the government takes away Internet chat. The victim suffers the psychological torture of what is basically solitary confinement while the bullies walk free.

This is not right. This is what the baddies do.

@camertron

I'm not hearing people scream to ban kids from Facebook and TikTok. I'm hearing people scream to ban kids from absolutely everything—search engines, video games, forums, Mastodon, Wikipedia, even their own computers.

That's not how you protect children from harm. That's how you *cause* terrible harm, to children and adults alike.

@camertron

The best way to address this is to call their bluff with a general strike.

"Oh youre gonna replace us with AI? Ok, go ahead and do it."

Can't confirm. These machines made my life possible at all. When I got bullied in school, Internet chat became my only available form of social contact. Without it, I'd have had no one but my parents to talk to.

That was when I was 12.

Which is why it absolutely breaks my heart to hear people say kids should be kicked out of social media. What an awful idea! They're going to ruin a lot of innocent children's lives and mental health that way.

(The undisputed #1 being correct horse battery staple.)

"Entschleunigung" is negative acceleration, i.e. a continuous decrease in speed.