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Google Businesses The Internet Government Politics

Hatemongering Becoming A Problem On Orkut 585

Posted by Zonk from the not-so-good dept.
jaquesparrow writes "Orkut is a well known beta experiment, an invite only environment based on social networks. Recently it has been reported that hate and racism is proliferating on Orkut. Besides the story in the Wilmington Star, the International Herald Tribune also has commentary on the situation." From the article: "For Google, the trouble on Orkut - which is still in beta, or test, form - could easily escalate. A prosecutor in Brazil, where the service is especially popular, has already initiated an investigation into some of the more virulent Orkut sites."
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Hatemongering Becoming A Problem On Orkut More

Hatemongering Becoming A Problem On Orkut

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  • Hatred (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 12, 2005 @06:22AM (#11650668)
    Inevitable as humanity continues to grow and expand. It's not a cause but a symptom of overpopulation.

    • Re:Hatred (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 12, 2005 @07:03AM (#11650811)
      Yes, but the number 1 cause of hate is insecurity. People who are comfortable with themselves don't go through life comparing themselves to others. People who find themselves lacking compare themselves to others in an attempt to find some real or imagined weakness they can exploit by saying, "I'm better than you because I'm this sex or this color and you aren't."
      • Sheesh, solved a cultural problem that had injured an killed countless. How about, beat up on the weak, then steal their property? Maybe opportunistic sociopaths using ignorance to rabble rouse? There are many reasons, all bad, all wrong, all pathetic.

      • Re:Hatred (Score:3, Insightful)

        by serutan ( 259622 )
        Whatever the reason for racism, it's pretty clear that governments can't stop people from feeling how they feel. Criminalizing hate speech only hides the problem so you don't have to deal with it, unless you're one of its victims. Then the fact that it's underground makes it harder to convince everybody else that there is a problem. They'll point to the censored world they see and call you a whiner.

        We won't understand why people are racist and how to change that situation if all we do is force them to shut

      • Re:Hatred (Score:3, Insightful)

        by argStyopa ( 232550 )
        Yes, but the number 1 cause of hate is insecurity.
        Possibly true, but what value to make such a statement? Then one could just rephrase the PP instead of saying 'hatred is endemic' to saying 'insecurity is endemic to the human animal'.

        One could also riposte by pointing out organisms that are secure never evolve, either. Not all evolution is improvement, of course. But it might be said that since the nature of organisms in a zero-sum world is to compete for resources, and the evolutionary advantage goes

    • Re:Hatred (Score:3, Interesting)

      by screwballicus ( 313964 )
      Inevitable as humanity continues to grow and expand. It's not a cause but a symptom of overpopulation.

      This is, I think, a word which we need to treat very carefully, with a mind to its historical use.

      I'm bound to ask:

      Was the upsurge in German nationalism and xenophobia in the wake of the First World War a product of overpopulation and overcrowding within an inadequate living space? Hitler certainly thought so, and made that idea crucial to his doctrine [wikipedia.org]. But I tend to think the real sources of sociolog

  • Why is it... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 12, 2005 @06:22AM (#11650669)
    no one takes the time to stop and smell the Orkuts?

  • Seen this before... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by jonbeckett73 ( 847732 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @06:23AM (#11650670) Homepage
    I used to run a website (ThoughtCafe) for writers where they could give feedback on each others work. I had to close it down in the end because a small minority wrecked it for everybody. It seems most "community" websites suffer from the same issue - the possiblity of one "rogue" person to pose as several personalities within the website - basically in order to start an argument with themselves in order to draw others in, and then feed the argument. We never found an adequate defence against it.

    • Re:Seen this before... (Score:5, Funny)

      by RichardX ( 457979 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @06:31AM (#11650691) Homepage
      This problem is very eloquently explained by Penny Arcade here [penny-arcade.com]
    • Maybe there isn't a technological solution. It's up to each member not to feed the arguments. By not feeding the arguments, I mean a single member shouldn't try replying repeatedly to a thread that's going out of control. One reply is enough, and if someone doesn't listen, that's it.

      • I am a troll and I agree (Score:2, Informative)

        by Anonymous Coward
        Maybe there isn't a technological solution. It's up to each member not to feed the arguments. By not feeding the arguments, I mean a single member shouldn't try replying repeatedly to a thread that's going out of control. One reply is enough, and if someone doesn't listen, that's it.

        As a long time internet troll I couldn't agree more. I don't troll because I like to write (I do like to write but that's not enough). I troll because I love to read responses. And that's pretty much all. No responses, no fun.

        • Re:I am a troll and I agree (Score:5, Insightful)

          by Just Some Guy ( 3352 ) <kirk+slashdot@strauser.com> on Saturday February 12, 2005 @12:18PM (#11651944) Homepage Journal
          I like to torture puppies. I don't torture puppies because I like to use power tools (I do lke to user power tools but that's not enough). I torture puppies because I love to inflict anguish.

          Trolling isn't power. It's the sign of a kid holed up in a basement since he's gotten his butt kicked ten too many times for being unable to keep his sociopathic mouth shut. You think it's cute. Everyone else on the planet thinks it's a maladjusted waste of time. That you find it to be high entertainment says much more about you than your "audience".

        • Perhaps. (Score:4, Interesting)

          by Grendel Drago ( 41496 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @08:17PM (#11655291) Homepage
          You know, I've recently begun to think of trolling as more than just trying to get a rise out of people. The truly successful trolls get people to betray their principles. This is why they're so often found in places like this, where folks have hoity-toity principles just waiting to be popped.

          Klerck was a successful troll, even though all he did was crapflood with that stupid "page widening" stuff. But it was because of him that the lameness filter was added.

          The Wikipedia article on the GNAA [wikipedia.org] (which mentions the structural changes the GNAA made to Slashdot by their trolling) has been put up for deletion more than any other article. If the article is deleted, they "win" by making Wikipedia betray its principles. If the article stays, they "win" by being advertised on Wikipedia.

          At least, that's what trolling seems like to me. As a troll, what's your take?

          --grendel drago

    • Re:Seen this before... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by General Alcazar ( 726259 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @06:36AM (#11650722)
      One possible solution that I see might be some fairly vigilant overseerers employed by Google to filter this stuff out. Currently, they have a sort of light weight version of this, in that contentious members get put in "jail" for a variable period of time depending on what, I do not know. However, this is obviously not working that well. They might need to keep a lot of censors employed in order to be effective. The problem with this is that they then may become liable.

      Why not implement a type of self-censorship by the memebers of the sort that Slashdot uses? There certainly is enough hatemongering going on here, and Slashdot is far from perfect, but it seems to be evolving towards something that sort of works. Thoughts?

      • Re:Seen this before... (Score:5, Insightful)

        by 1u3hr ( 530656 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @12:13PM (#11651916)
        Why not implement a type of self-censorship by the memebers of the sort that Slashdot uses? There certainly is enough hatemongering going on here, and Slashdot is far from perfect, but it seems to be evolving towards something that sort of works. Thoughts?

        Because there is one Slashdot community; but thousands of Orkuts. You choose which to belong to. So for instance, what kind of people would you find in the "All niggers/faggots/Arabs/Catholics/etc. must die" group? Not a normal cross-section of society who might moderate the views expressed.

        Actually, I don't see there is a need to censor these groups at all. They exist, the views expressed are repugnant; but they are not broadcast and are accessible only to the invited members of that group. Obviously law enforcement can infiltrate them to see if they're planning anythng in the real world.

    • Re:Seen this before... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by siliconjunkie ( 413706 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @06:41AM (#11650742)
      Unless you are talking about a huge community (such as /.) I can't see why a handful of mods and the ability to IP ban clients from within your CMS couldn't do the trick. It seems to work on most of the community sites I participate in. If you have a particularly unruly bunch trying to ruin it for everyone, then some aggressive mods are in order. Go over to the NetStumbler Forums [netstumbler.org] if you want to see a prime example of moderators who simply do not take ANY shit from ANYone.
    • We never found an adequate defence against it.

      I run a popular forum, and I find that picking the right moderators to keep the board clean of filth is not an easy task. Once you find the right folks to help moderate, it's all cake from there.
    • Well, there are defences, All coming down to control. You should have probably implemented some sort of moderation system and if the situation gets bad a registration system. In short, some sort of control, be it by the community or by picked moderators.

    • Re:Seen this before... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 12, 2005 @07:48AM (#11650940)
      Instead of banning someone from a forum, what about just flagging troublemakers and having their posts just be invisible to everyone else? The troll can still see their own posts and everything will appear normal, but it will seem like they are just being ignored.

      If you kick someone off, they'll find an alias and new IP and return for more attention. If they think they are just being ignored, they'll find somewhere else to play.

    • Re:Seen this before... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Chriscypher ( 409959 ) <{slashdot} {at} {metamedia.us}> on Saturday February 12, 2005 @09:29AM (#11651178) Homepage
      I've seen people do similar at parties. The 'rogue' joins a small group, steers the conversation towards some topic, then exits on to to the next small group to repeat. The party takes on the general tone of the agitator. I confronted one agitator who fessed up. He did it for fun. He liked to see how far he could turn the party. What I found distressing in this instance was he would steer conversations towards the morbid. Also, no one else at the party was aware of his actions.

      This also sounds a bit like what a friend used to do in chat rooms on AOL. People would go there looking for some hot chat, and he would deliberately weird them out for fun. He would weird them out with conversation so bizarre, they were incredulous they had found such a nutcase. I found this hilarious to read as a third-party, and it probably did the target some good, as they will be forewarned about anonymous fiends on the other side of their chat.

      Social manipulation is nothing new; this style of agitation once restricted to face-to-face interactions has become empowered in online social groups or forums.

      • Social manipulation is nothing new; this style of agitation once restricted to face-to-face interactions has become empowered in online social groups or forums.

        They're not empowered they're just an X-factor. In social settings people who agitate consistently are shunned from the group. Usually all it takes is someone to realise what that person is doing and then challenge them. That's Sociology 101. Betas quite often exhibit this behaviour just to get beat down by the Alpha.

        I think the behaviour is

    • Re:Seen this before... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Laebshade ( 643478 ) <laebshade@gmail.com> on Saturday February 12, 2005 @10:02AM (#11651269)
      Moderation. If I don't feel something is on-topic, and especially if it's spam (of course if it's spam), I delete the comment. Sometimes I edit it for grammar and spelling. I have never censored a post for it being crude or lewd, though I've never had to (and probably never will). The point is: it is MY website and I will do with it what I want to. Even if it becomes a giant mammoth like Slashdot (never will).

  • Hate and Racism.... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by lachlan76 ( 770870 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @06:30AM (#11650689)
    ....And this is different to real life how?

    Hate and racism exists, has always existed, and will always exist.

    As much as I hate racism, I don't think that trying to legislate people's beliefs is the answer.

    Sure, don't let them act on their beliefs, but if they want to say things, why shouldn't they?

    • Re:Hate and Racism.... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by MoonFog ( 586818 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @06:35AM (#11650712)
      Because a forum dedicated to a certain topic shouldn't be flooded by inane and pointless racist remarks. Such a forum is privately owned, and freedom of speech is up to the owner, and it can definitely stirr up and ruin the experience for regulars if the problem becomes too large.
      Hell, look at Slashdot. What if there weren't moderations, how many GNAA and Goatse ascii drawings wouldn't there be in every topic on the front page?
      • It's fair for them to just delete their accounts and posts (they're violating the TOS after all) but I don't think this kind of thing should be a criminal matter, as the summary seems to say.
        • That's bit different, I agree, I understodd your post as saying "if they want to post that stuff, let them". That's the part I don't agree with, I don't think criminalising it will lead to much good.

      • To make an example to this point: Just look what a mess Usenet Groups targeted to eastern cultures are (soc.culture.japan is no longer about japanese culture, but about chinese hateing japanese, japanese hateing chinese and koreans, americans hateing them all, and of course everyone has to troll around).

        Freedom of speech may be one of the integral principles of American heritage, but this certainly is FoS gone wrong.

      • You have a very valid point. It just doesn't have anything to do with the actual article (and presumably nothing to do with the problem).

        The article is stating that hate mongering groups are starting their own little clubs on google. They want to be flooded by inane and pointless racist remarks. Hasn't this mostly been the way of such groups? Exist in exclusive forms for a long time where the ugliness cannot be seen, and come out only when there is sufficient political power to destroy the object of ob

    • I don't think that trying to legislate people's beliefs is the answer.
      I agree with you, but where is anyone trying to legislate peoples beliefs? Brazil?

    • Re:Hate and Racism.... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by sgant ( 178166 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @08:00AM (#11650967) Homepage Journal
      The people that post racist remarks anonymously aren't really racists for the most part...they're simply trying to upset people and "rage" the forum ala myg0t.

      They want to piss people off and the quickest and most effective way is to post racial remarks.

      Real racists...and belive me I grew up in a racist environment with Klan rallies going on about a mile from my house...are usually up front about their racism and shout it out non-anonymously.

      Now, there are exceptions of course.

  • freedom of speech and all that (Score:5, Interesting)

    by rve ( 4436 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @06:32AM (#11650700)
    As I understand it from the article, these hate mongering forums on Orkut are invitation only private thingies where people express their private hate mongering expressions to their fellow hate mongers. What exactly is the problem here?

    Now if they were to barge in on other forums and express those opinions, it could be considered harassment, and that really is a problem, and probably also illegal is your country, but as far as I know expressing unpleasant opinions in private is considered legal.
    • The TOS says they can't.
    • RTFA. Many of the offending users aren't from the USA (which is not a surprise considering the majority of Orkut users in general aren't), and many countries outside the USA (Brazil, many European countries and so on) *do* have legislation against hate speech.

      Furthermore, as was already pointed out, it's also a violation of the TOS, so even in cases where there's no crime being committed, people are still abusing the service.
      • Canada has laws against hate speech too. They charged someone under these laws for trying to spread that the holocaust didn't actually happen, that it was all a hoax. You have to be spreading completely untrue fud. But I believe, even in the states there are laws about what you can say.
        • There definitely are. If you yell "FIRE" in a crowded theatre, for example, you won't be able to invoke freedom of speech as a defense afterwards...
        • But why not just let him say it? By banning it it actually gives what he's saying more weight to those who either already believed him or those who were on the line. The only cure for free speech is more free speech so let Zundel spout his crap and let him be. Besides, most of what he was saying was so ridiculous that it didn't need banning. He claimed the Nazis provided swimming pools for prisoners at Auschwitz for example. Do the Feds really need to step in to shut him up? He's obviously on the frin
  • Is it just me or are both those articles the same?

  • 1st Amendment (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I dislike bigotry as much as the next person. But... I'll still defend the rights of bigots to say whatever they want. Just don't disturb the peace on my street corner with that crap. At the same time, I expect the bigots to back me up on MY right to tell them their fuckin stupid.
    • hmmm. lets see now...
      ...you are going to go up to a large group of angry bigots protesting about something [lack of manufacturing jobs/muslim terrorists/women bosses] and you *expect* them to back you up on your rights to tell them that they are dumbasses?

      1. I admire your conviction
      2. I agree with you totally
      3. I hope you have medical insurance.

      (unfortunately, in this case there is no *profit*)

  • I've wondered. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 12, 2005 @06:37AM (#11650725)
    With all the GNAA posts, the randomness and what not if it would be possible to impliment something like a futures market for comments. Where moderation could be done in terms of each user being allowed to carry a limited portfolio of say 10 to 20 comments at any one time with either buy or sell style settings. Then letting a market determine which is good and bad, the writers of the comments would get "points" based on the market consensus as would the people who got in early, where the people who got out late would lose points. If people went bankrupt they'd have to be interesting. Those with positive points would have them carry over some period perhaps quarterly, and the points them selves could be used like raffle entries for a modest Thinkgeek prize budget. The people who maintained the site would be able to perform an SEC like function, (blah blah censorship), and undo/kill abuse as it arises. I think such a system, which would have to be good at killing bots, would be extremely hard to game. While much that a buys site would rather not have would still be present, it'd be confined to the relative obscurity where those who are into it can wallow in it. Not unlike alt.nuke.the-USA and the like.

    • Re:I've wondered. (Score:3, Insightful)

      by ikkonoishi ( 674762 )
      An echo chamber would form quickly.

      The majority that agreed with each other would soon eliminate the minority of opposing views. Soon each person would begin to express more and more of a biased perspective as they saw no opinions other than their own. Anyone with a divergent opinion that joined would soon either be acclimated into the overall group mind or be modded down until they stopped posting.

      Soon the overall level of rhetoric in the forum would lead it participants to stage a bloody riot of canniba

  • identifying people to monitor (Score:3, Insightful)

    by lkcl ( 517947 ) <lkcl@lkcl.net> on Saturday February 12, 2005 @06:39AM (#11650733) Homepage
    nah, i think it's _great_ that people set up these sites.

    they are identifying themselves to the world and to the intelligence services "come and get me, we're dumb enough to tell you who we are and dumb enough to _write down_ what we _really_ think".

    • Re:identifying people to monitor (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Guppy06 ( 410832 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @07:47AM (#11650936)
      they are identifying themselves to the world and to the intelligence services "come and get me, we're dumb enough to tell you who we are and dumb enough to _write down_ what we _really_ think".

      You're all for the prosecutions of thought crimes, I see.

      I'm living in a country whose founding act was 56 people doing exactly what you're laughing at: listing exactly what they thought and putting their names on it, all but asking to be punished for the document. Part of what they believed in was that everybody had the same right to find happiness as the next guy, which means that holding an opinion, no matter how detestable, shouldn't be a crime and shouldn't be punished.

      It would appear that you are not of the same belief.
      • who says i'm laughing? did you see any smileys or comments indicating "laughter"?

        did i say "to think is to commit a crime"?

        no - what i implied was that there now exists a place where what people say is recorded - evidence that could be used if they ACTED or CAUSED people to act on what they are thinking.

        thinking is fine. incitement to violence, racial hatred or other criminal acts is not fine.

      • Re:identifying people to monitor (Score:4, Insightful)

        by ky11x ( 668132 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @03:05PM (#11653184)

        I applaud you, sir, for this wonderful bit of troll. This is what is called a "holier-than-thou" troll where the poster cleverly reveals that the other person's position can be twisted and misunderstood in a way that would make it the very opposite of motherhood, baseball, and apple pie. All right-thinking Americans ought to despise anyone who holds the other person's opinion.

        Except of course the other side said nothing of the sort that you pretend they said. There's nothing about prosecution of thought crimes in there.

  • Do You Have Stairs In Your House? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Phybersyk0 ( 513618 ) <phybersyko@NOspaM.stormdesign.org> on Saturday February 12, 2005 @06:39AM (#11650735)
    somethingawful.com actually has a great method of controlling this:

    1. It's free to browse the forums.
    2. If you wanna post/reply - it'll cost you $10
    3. Custom Titles & avatars -- another $10
    4. If you make a "shit post" (among which blatant racism i.e. "post pictures of black people eating cliche' foods") or even single-word posts will automatically result in your message thread being "gassed" and your account being banned -- resulting in YOU having to pay another $10.

  • NO one noticed they reside on /. ? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by djsmiley ( 752149 ) <djsmiley2k@gmail.com> on Saturday February 12, 2005 @06:42AM (#11650744) Homepage Journal
    Hey, everyones saying...

    "oh i saw them on blogs", "i saw them on site x, y and z"....

    No ones noticed that we have this ALL the time on slashdot? How do we fix it? We leave a warning for all, and then we ignore it. Simple as pie.

    The fact is racistism, and all *ism's will NEVER go away, but this doesn't mean that you can't choose to not care about them. These people have nothing better to do with their lifes, pity them, they are the ones that become nothing.

    Slashdot, would be totally, totally ruined (far worse than people claim it is) if people took any notice of the trolls, but the whole fact that we DONT means they dont get anywhere.

    People are racist in the streets, some people do it without even thinking about it, and would never do it if they realised they were. It happens, why can't humanity get over it?

    Because humanity, wishes to be pefect, when people finally accept that we ARE a flawed race, then we might finally start bonding together.

    Someone said "its from the cause of overpopulation". Nope, your wrong... Its from people creating value of other people. Its from people having something, someone else wants. No person really hated someone else for the colour of their skin, they hated them for some other reason, yet people are stupid and they look for hte easilest flaw to blame, which in most cases is the fact that someone has differently coloured skin.

    I ware glasses, and people used to use this as a method of getting to me, it was actually the fact that i did damn well in school, even when i had only 50%~ attendance, and they were jelious. Yet the only way they could get at me, would be making jokes about my glasses. They couldn't cope when i made jokes about my glasses too, when i would turn around and use them as an aerial for the radio which wouldn't work. It would confuse them to have someone putting them selfs down.

    Im not saying that anyone should go "Hey look, im black, i might as well set my self on fire" or anything stupid like this. This isn't the point, the point is there is many underlying issues, which causes this hatrid, most of the time, the person effected cannot change this either, as they mostly didn't cause the problem in the first place. So they have to look on and say "What can i do? Nothing.... so i ignore it".

    it might anger them to see someone writing these things, but its not like they could ever change this person, so why waste time worrying about it. It wont change the world, it wont stop kids bullying others over stupid little things like this.

    Ignore it, it might not go away, but at least then it wont effect you?

    • Re:NO one noticed they reside on /. ? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Homology ( 639438 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @07:13AM (#11650843)
      No ones noticed that we have this ALL the time on slashdot? How do we fix it? We leave a warning for all, and then we ignore it. Simple as pie.

      Go read the comments of any outsouring story on Slashdot, and you'll find many racist comments moderated Insightful or Informative. It's a real disappointment that so many Slashdotters are nothing more than bigots.

      The fact is racistism, and all *ism's will NEVER go away, but this doesn't mean that you can't choose to not care about them. These people have nothing better to do with their lifes, pity them, they are the ones that become nothing.

      "All what the good men have to do for Evil to triumf is to do nothing".


    • it was actually the fact that i did damn well in school, even when i had only 50%~ attendance, and they were jelious
      You just might want to check your spelling, grammar, etc before you start talking about how smart you are.

      it might anger them to see someone writing these things, but its not like they could ever change this person, so why waste time worrying about it. It wont change the world, it wont stop kids bullying others over stupid little things like this.
      Google worries about it because they don
    • I ware glasses, and people used to use this as a method of getting to me, it was actually the fact that i did damn well in school, even when i had only 50%~ attendance, and they were jelious. Yet the only way they could get at me, would be making jokes about my glasses. They couldn't cope when i made jokes about my glasses too, when i would turn around and use them as an aerial for the radio which wouldn't work. It would confuse them to have someone putting them selfs down.

      I know what you mean, and I d

    • Grammar hate (Score:2, Funny)

      by orzetto ( 545509 )

      If you were so "good at school", why exactly is that you misspell:

      • everyones (everyone's)
      • racistism (racism)
      • lifes (lives)
      • Its (it's)
      • ware (wear)
      • i (I)
      • jelious (jealous)
      • them selfs (themselves)
      • Im (I'm)
      • hatrid (hatred)
      • wont (won't)
      (and I did not consider the typos).

      Did you go to Yale and sit next to Dubya? Or are you simply trolling|karmawhoring?

    • The difference (Score:4, Interesting)

      by D4C5CE ( 578304 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @09:38AM (#11651194)
      Hey, everyones saying... "oh i saw them on blogs", "i saw them on site x, y and z".... No ones noticed that we have this ALL the time on slashdot? How do we fix it? We leave a warning for all, and then we ignore it. Simple (...)
      The problem on Orkut (besides performing as if it was suffering from a ceaseless Slashdot effect) seems to be that the moderation is not working quite as well. Posts and people don't go to -1 and disappear into oblivion. Rather, those who feel offended have to refrain from reporting too many incidents to avoid being sent to "jail" themselves.

      Although the model of Orkut depends on everyone being a real person (and an adult as well), release from jail seems to occur automatically even for fake accounts.

      If you punish users for moderation rather than encourage it as /. does, and if you tolerate bogus identities in a social networking system (i.e. many miscreants don't get kicked out, as it does not really matter if they play by the same rules as everyone else), it becomes too easy for malicious participants to keep their hate speech visible on equal footing with honest, real people, while hiding behind forged profiles that are no better than anonymous avatars.

      Actually, some apparent "fake users" have been allowed to exist for long enough on Orkut to see "fan" or "hate" communities being set up for "themselves".

      In other words, on ./ and in real life (or even Usenet for that matter), the simple rule is this:
      Whether you are using your true name or not, if you choose to be a troll, expect no better than to be treated as a troll.
      On Orkut, everyone is expected to use their true identity and stand by their opinions, but because none of this is sufficiently well enforced, trolls have surprisingly little to fear.
      There is no better way to undermine the moral standards in a community than allowing this to happen.

    • No broken glasses? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by sammyo ( 166904 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @10:10AM (#11651298) Journal
      Defusing mean jokes is great, but you were lucky. The jokes would have hurt more if you had been beat up or had the glasses grabbed and stomped.

      Does happen and that is the problem with hate talk.

  • Surprised? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Duncan3 ( 10537 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @06:43AM (#11650750) Homepage
    When all other technology is moving to isolate us into our own cozy little worlds, you are surprised?

    Blogs give you the news you already agree with. IM has only your buddies. Cellphones let you walk around the world talking to people you already know, avoiding all new people. I could go on.

    Cozy isn't it. Problem is, now noone has ANY need for real social skills, personality, or the ability to deal with different views.

    Why in my day, we telnet'd into a BBS and met people from all over the world! "Chatrooms" (read: bot nests) only come in local and special interest these days.

    At least here on Slashdot all us geeks are safe in our dupe friendly Microsoft unfriendly world :)
    • Don't blame technology or isolationistic behavior for any of this. Hate is hate. People are looking to belong. These sad souls simply have twisted values, and those values are most often passed on from family members. End of story.

      Bringing these people attention is the last thing I'd do. Bullys and hate-mongers? They don't deserve the attention. Leave them alone. Let them have their private discussions. The rest of the planet sees them for what they are.

    • Re:Surprised? (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Why in my day, we telnet'd into a BBS and met people from all over the world! "Chatrooms" (read: bot nests) only come in local and special interest these days.

      Yeah, right. Back in those days, everybody that was on a BBS was a member of a small special interest group...the few with the tech savvy, money, free time, and geek desire to chat over a slow-ass modem.

      Don't delude yourself into believing it the crowd was more diverse back then.
    • I run commedore 64 you insensitive clod.

  • The "problem"? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Seehund ( 86897 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @06:43AM (#11650751) Homepage Journal
    People are saying what they want. What's the problem? You don't agree? So debate with them, or start your own Orkut or whatever forums/communities.

    And why is this not posted as the usual indignated rant under YRO, instead of this rehash of hysterical mainstream fear-mongering articles?

    I'm not agreeing with eg. the IMO nutty racist Iranian gentleman mentioned in TFA, but that doesn't mean I want him to be banned from saying what he wants in his own online communities.

    BTW, everyone is welcome to join the Flashback forums [flashback.info], no matter what OPINIONS you hold or wish to discuss. The English speaking forum could use more members too. (Ironically, I seem to have difficulties reaching the site at the moment, but I hope that's temporary. They've had problems with the Swedish authorities before.)
    • The problem is you can't debate these people. Orkut communities are invite only. This isn't a public forum. In other words the "problem" is Google doesn't want to (or at least I hope they don't) provide resources to a group of people to just insight more hate. If it were a public forum, it might be another story.. but then the whole point of Orkut is that it's private.

  • Regarding Orkut (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Jugalator ( 259273 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @06:53AM (#11650782) Journal
    Why would anyone want to become member of a small randomly put together community by invitations? What do they discuss? Won't the discussions get more feedback in more open communities? Is it because they feel the added privacy makes it easier to reveal private information? But then you need to trust all Orkut members, and many will have been invited by persons you don't even know.

    Hmm, it just feels like a community for people who wish to be "cool" to me, but regardless how I look at it, I always end up as seeing it as a useless idea? :-)

    • Mixi.jp (Re:Regarding Orkut) (Score:5, Interesting)

      by interactive_civilian ( 205158 ) <mamoru&gmail,com> on Saturday February 12, 2005 @07:26AM (#11650887) Homepage Journal
      Jugalator said:
      Why would anyone want to become member of a small randomly put together community by invitations? What do they discuss?
      Well...I am a member of Mixi.jp [mixi.jp], a Japanese inivitation-only social networking site. It is a bit exclusive in that you really can't use the site unless you can read Japanese, but perhaps that keeps a lot of would-be trolls out (though there are plenty of Japanese trolls out there).

      Anyway, it seems to me like a successful version of what Orkut should be. I use it almost religiously and it works well because the majority of users are actually rather close to each other (few hours by train at the most in most cases) so we can actually meet in real life. My list of friends is a little small (32 at the moment) but I have met all but 3 of those people IRL. Of those three, one lives in the US, one lives in Hokkkaido (I'm in Tokyo) and the other...well, timing just hasn't worked out yet.

      Anyway, the point of my post is that in some cases, these "small randomly put together communities" work quite well and can be an excellent supplement to IRL (note: I did NOT say replacement). I've gotten some good snowboarding buddies, some good music buddies, some good photography buddies, etc. Hell, I even met a really attractive girl that will hopefully be my next girlfriend (2 months without getting any is starting to drive me crazy...broke up last december ;_; )

      So, these sites can work. I think Orkut's problem is that it is just too big and unfocused.

      • So, these sites can work. I think Orkut's problem is that it is just too big and unfocused.

        Yes, that's what I thought too. I can certainly see the point of a community like the one you're member of, since you can both meet each other and has a system so you're more willing to leave out sensitive private details that can't be read by any freak in the world. :-) It makes a lot more sense than having a loosly knit community spread out all over the world like Orkut. That's when I stop seeing the point of it.
  • a valuable lesson from this. "Building Communities Course 101", page one, paragraph one could read

    "Thou shalt not close the community at the expense of diversity of opinion".

    I'm not sure why it took them so long to work this one out. Just goes to show that there's nothing common about common sense.

  • An insider's view (Score:5, Insightful)

    by the_mighty_$ ( 726261 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @07:08AM (#11650826)
    Here is a post from an insider giving some of his oppinions about what's going on:

    http://media.orkut.com/articles/0100.html [orkut.com]

  • Is this news? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by t_allardyce ( 48447 )
    So wait.. Google starts some sort of forum/chat site based on invitation (like gmail), everyone wants in, and now, on the Internet, the have discovered people being racist? So what? this happens on the Internet! just because the site is a friends network doesn't mean you're not going to get this sort of thing - most people in the world are friends of friends of friends etc. If Google doesn't like it they can just kick these people like every other forum, whats the big deal?

  • People are missing the point (Score:5, Interesting)

    by 26199 ( 577806 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @07:24AM (#11650881) Homepage

    These groups are formed and peopled by people who share an extremist viewpoint. In normal society, extremists are moderated by contact with people who aren't extremists. In a society like Orkut, extremists come into contact with more and more people who share the same view. This could potentially cause them to become even more extreme in their views or even spur them to action.

    This is the problem. It's not really about free speech and censorship; it's about what happens when you have a social system which encourages extremism, instead of one which works to moderate behaviour.

    • This could potentially cause them to become even more extreme in their views or even spur them to action.


      Until such action actually takes place, there is no justification for censorship. If we retaliate against potential threats, where does it end?

      I think it is much more reasonable to let this take its natural course and if objectionable actions do take place we can punish the offenders.

    • One man's extremism... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Baldrson ( 78598 ) * on Saturday February 12, 2005 @10:46AM (#11651439) Homepage Journal
      Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people to peaceably assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

      Look at the history of interference with peacable assembly for a clue as to why the Founders put this clause as the first of the rights they considered most likely for the government to usurp from the people.

      Yes you read that right... the Bill of Rights is not an enumeration of the rights guaranteed to the people by the government -- but an enumeration of the rights that the people possess by "the laws of nature and nature's god" in the order most likely to be usruped by government.

      Moreover, what this means is that the Bill of Rights is a declaration of natural rights meaning that if any government violates them that government cannot be considered consistent with the laws of nature.

      This is an "extremist" stand. Indeed, any stand of integrity means adhering to the principles stated in the face even of death. That is the essence of "extremism". Can you think why powerful people might consider any integrity exhibited by those without power as "extremist" and seek to have "extremism" suppressed through social, cultural, legal, economic, police and any other means necessary?

      Indeed, when weaseling courts mockingly refer to "the penumbra of the Constitution [google.com]" what they are in fact saying is that the government is like the light of the Sun itself and the people's rights are like the shadow of the moon on the earth during a total eclipse of the sun -- absolute only at a single point.

      Well, if there is a single point to the Constitution, it is reflected in the first paragraph of the document forming the foundation for the creation of the Constitution:

      When in the Course of human events,
      it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

      It is clearly stated:

      The whole point of freedom, the single point made by the whole of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the original Bill of Rights, is recognition of the primordial freedom to choose those with whom one will associate.

  • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) *
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • The concept of orkut draws facism (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Qbertino ( 265505 ) <moiraNO@SPAMmodparlor.com> on Saturday February 12, 2005 @07:54AM (#11650956)
    Actually, in a way, the concept of orkut ist facist in itself. Creating artifical borders were there are none. I remeber running into orkut when it was just anounced. After reading what it all was about it came across to me as a very unsympathetic concept of a web community. Very much the kind you find in religious sects or, extremer, in facist communities. Artificially bordering a group of people and in unison with that, blurring the individuals in to one big group. We, the "orkuts", are something special.

    I personally react extremely allergic to stuff like that, due to personal experiences with latent synthetic elitism in the past. Weak personalities (which racists and facists usually are) much easier see orkut as their chance to feel special for no true reason whatsoever.

    Bottom line:
    Orkuts basic concept actually is an emotional and spiritual groundwork for facisim and thus flawed. Google would be best of shutting it down or dropping the concept of 'invitation only'.
  • I was running BBS's in the 80s.

    There is always a few clowns who like to post crap - they get real tough safe in their rooms. I call it 'modem machismo'.

    The way to handle this is to hammer the offensive message immediately. No need to kick the guy, unless he is incorrigible.

    Works for flame wars too. (Which must be discouraged immediately)

    It's a little like being the bouncer in a bar. How long do you think the bouncer would tolerate a punch up?

  • Theresa Neilson Hayden, who maintains a lively, smart, community on her Making Light [nielsenhayden.com] blog, was invited by the South by Southwest Conference [sxsw.com] to sit on their "Spammers, Trolls and Stalkers: The Pandora's Box of Community" panel. Instead she submitted her suggestions, a magnificent set of common-sense policies for maintaining a virtual community from the host's viewpoint:

    Some things I know about moderating conversations in virtual space [nielsenhayden.com] .

    Suggestions include:

    1. There can be no ongoing discourse without some degree of moderation, if only to kill off the hardcore trolls. It takes rather more moderation than that to create a complex, nuanced, civil discourse. If you want that to happen, you have to give of yourself. Providing the space but not tending the conversation is like expecting that your front yard will automatically turn itself into a garden.

    5. Over-specific rules are an invitation to people who get off on gaming the system.

    6. Civil speech and impassioned speech are not opposed and mutually exclusive sets. Being interesting trumps any amount of conventional politeness.

    The rest of the list [nielsenhayden.com] is also quite good, including a comment on /.

  • These People are Mostly Thick (Score:3, Insightful)

    by fuzzybunny ( 112938 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @11:37AM (#11651685) Homepage Journal
    The founder of that group, Kiarash Poursaleh, who described himself in his profile as an 18-year-old living in Tehran, also listed "Mein Kampf" by Hitler as a favorite book...

    You know, I'm more worried about the rise of organized groups, such as the German NPD [npd.de] or the Russian democratic party. Gentlemen such as Mr. Poursaleh somehow, deep down, seem to missing a somewhat fundamental point about how the people whose policies he's advocating might view his own particular ethnic group.

    Crackpot pseudoscientific about racial biology and what defines "aryan", as a sometime student of history I'm not aware of Mr. Hilter & his merry gang of pirates ever planning to set up an division of Persian SS stormtroopers...

  • Keep in mind (Score:4, Insightful)

    by hkb ( 777908 ) on Saturday February 12, 2005 @01:10PM (#11652287)
    Keep in mind that "hate and racism" is covered by the first amendment, no matter how tasteless. These people have a right to what they're doing and thinking.

    I worry that this recent witch hunt trend against racist movements will supercede the country's recognition of the Constitution.

    These people have a right to their thoughts and ideas as long as they aren't harming others, killing, assaulting, etc.

    If you want to properly combat these people, you are going to have to listen to their concerns. I believe that they have legitimate concerns that are skewed by blanket ideology and a fascination with nazism and ephemera. Shunning them only makes them stronger.

    Diversity counselors are well-versed in this, as they're always lecturing us about this shit, but seem unwilling when the tables are turned.

    Shouldn't this be a "Your Rights Online" post?

  • Is anyone still using Orkut? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by pez ( 54 ) * on Saturday February 12, 2005 @01:27PM (#11652405) Journal
    In direct contrast with Google's rock-solid reliability, Orkut works for me approximately 1 in 10 times that I try to use it. And by "works for me" I mean just the most simplistic, basic functions like returning a page instead of a server error. They've had this problem for months, and it only seems to be getting worse.

    Why people are using this service and not some of the alternatives, I have no idea. Were I google, I'd jettison it quickly before it more seriously erodes my brand.

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