You know that the other two words also exist though, right? Like, you can effect change in an organization, and there can be something strange in the affect of a psychopath. So there’s a verb “to effect” and a noun “affect” (although here the pronunciation is different–the accent is on the first syllable). It’s true that the most common usages follow the rules you’re laying out, but it genuinely is an oversimplification.
I still use reddit for some of the niche community-based subs that haven’t been replicated here, like What’s That Book?, a place where a while bunch of readers and librarians try to help people find books they remember a bit about, but not the title or author. That one is a lot of fun because people are so excited when they get an answer, and because the community is strong enough that most people do get answers. It seems like it would be hard to recreate that experience here. Similar is the Learn Math subreddit, where people ask about things they aren’t understanding or can’t figure out in their math studies, at pretty much any level, and the community comes up with multiple explanations and thoughts. The variety of questions and the in-depth answers are remarkable.
Generally it just feels a lot smaller and a fair bit more homogenous here. I like this site too, but it kinda feels like what reddit used to be is just gone now.
I wouldn’t really call it a favorite, but I definitely ended up liking Nier: Automata pretty well after bouncing off it really hard when trying it at a friend’s house. That’s because we were trying from the start, and it starts with a section that’s about half an hour long, with only two checkpoints, vastly harder than anything else in the game, and in which the first half isn’t even the same genre as the rest of the game. It’s seriously one of the worst intros I can think of in a video game. The rest of the game is, y’know, a pretty good third-person action RPG.
I dunno. It’s hard to separate the two roles of mods. One role is in preventing abuse–posting illegal content, hate speech, etc. But another role is in policing the content for what does and does not fit a forum’s purpose. You can do the first and keep section 230 protection, but the second is inherently and inextricably editorial in nature, and you can’t do that without losing protection. And I don’t think the lines between these are well-enough defined to enable you to make them two separate jobs without getting into trouble. Like, a lot of communities allow a little self promotion, but not spam. Managing that is a ton of work, but probably can’t be a paid role because it’s a judgment call. That sort of thing.
It’s frustrating, because it’s pretty clear at this point that this is one kind of web site that we really want to have exist. But the laws around this are really janky, and trying to revise them is a problem because the debate around them is even stupider than the laws themselves.
I mean, what this whole situation has shown us is the fragility that our reliance on that site creates. It would be a real mistake for us to go back at this point, because it means they (or their successors if they manage to actually sell the sinking platform) will eventually pull this stuff again. Trying to build a replacement community is a very difficult thing because of network effects, but this dramatic fracture has given us the opportunity to maybe pull it off.
So I see this as an attempt to create further disruption that prevents one of these alternate sites from solidifying as a true replacement, and little else.
Oh, thanks. I had totally missed that. That probably explains the widget on the site. And, as I say, it’s possible the other person had deleted the chat I was looking for.
I got mine today too (well, apparently it was ready yesterday, but I didn’t download it until today) and I was struck that the “chat history” doesn’t have all my chats in it. I was in particular looking for the exchanges I’d had with a representative of a company working on a VR headset. I guess maybe the other party deleted them. But I found at the same time that the chat widget on the site no longer has any of my chats in it. It just has a “start a new chat!” button. Super weird. The site really feels to me like it’s getting more janky.
Thanks for replying. Does that mean it’s just a backend thing? There’s nothing normal users can do to affect this, it’s just going to take time?
I still have an account there, though I’m not using it much and am considering my options for data takeout and deletion. It feels pretty different to me, though, honestly. I think seeing it as though “things are dying down” is short-sighted. With the mod teams wiped, BotDefense gone, and so forth, I don’t think things are going to stay “back to normal” for long, even if you think they’re there at the moment, which I kinda don’t.
That said, I’m not at all certain the fediverse can take its place. It’ll depend a lot on how many folks start to use it. It’s an uphill battle.
But Reddit, well, I expect it to head downhill pretty badly.
This makes me wonder how robust kbin and lemmy’s tools for this sort of thing are. Anyone know?
I mean, only a misdemeanor offense, and the caller ID thing only cost them $6 million. Sounds to me like this is definitely within budget for a bunch of candidates.