Martin Shkreli offers a bailout to ailing 4chan

The way I heard it, notch was a member of the 4chan community and started developing Minecraft with feedback from probably /v/ or /g/ or both, but then distanced himself from that fact once the dough started rolling in.

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The problem is that it isn’t working as
a containment board at all

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Yeah, Minecraft is bought and sold.

Though also remember there is a LOT more to 4chan than racist memes, horribly anonymous shit posting, and random child porn being posted. They also have pages devoted to origami. And porn. Lots and lots of porn. And furries.

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You could say the same about reddit and that place is somewhere I don’t wanna bother with either.
Maybe in my younger dumber days sure but god no not now. Even if not visiting the dark corners I am now in the refuse to support it indirectly mindset.

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exactly. but is it a leak or a flood presently? will deletion beget just more of the same (maybe with an eventual tapering off?) or will it be a tsunami?

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True, but Notch also kinda went full gamergater a little while back on Twitter, and I haven’t cared to pay any attention to him since then.

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Counterpoint: who cares? Closing toxic subreddits displaced the hateful, but they haven’t found good homes outside Reddit, and Reddit is still better for it.

You don’t have to solve a human problem to improve the user experience noticeably.

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And similarly, it’s better than it was. Which isn’t saying much, but Moot et all at least tried, which is more than we can say for most sites and forums without active moderation.

And seriously, BoingBoing and other sites are better off without the “MAH FREE SPEECH! HYPOCRITES AND CENSORS!” ruleslawyers. They’re not as bad as the racists and hatemongers, but they definitely have their sympathies and far, far more time than they possess sincerity.

Also, they’re unlikely to ever empathize with anyone who has run a site and had to choose the community over the right for any thirtysomething with the brain of an adolescent who just wants to post gore and n-bombs.

There’s a lot of federally protected “speech” I would argue to protect but do not want in my house and daily life, nor would I want those voices in my vicinity.

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At no point did banning something not remove it from 4chan, it’s just been unpopular and not actually do anything to the traffic after a few months. It just means the janitors and mods will have a lot of work to do for a while as IPs are banned.

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4chan is a mixed bag. I encounter many people who have never been there wanting to nuke the place only because there are some right-wing trolls there. I think that’s a counter-productive attitude. That’s like avoiding or demolishing your town hall because there are trolls in it! Lefties cannot (in any practical way) lament the disappearance of public space while also insisting that people are obliged to hide ideology they don’t approve of. I can understand it, but it seems in no way realistic. Public life means engagement, including and especially with those one disagrees with. Getting along with those who already share your views is so trivial it hardly bears mention.

As usual, the liberal left lacks any teeth and prefers to complain and wish away problems instead of dealing with things directly. If you think that money and/or hierarchical control is the only viable fix, then the only differences between you and the right are superficial. The content of the message is different, but the underlying social methodology remains the same - that is precisely what needs to change to make a meaningful difference. Direct action and engagement does not allow for cherry-picking a la Trump who you are willing to talk with or what you are willing to debate. You people know enough that you could talk circles around these asshats, rather than give up at every turn because “it’s not pleasant” or “you can’t win”, or “I’ll be late for my indentured servitude”.

Also I have doubts about ad funding of social (most, as in non-commercial) websites. They are not a product, they produce “value” precisely because they are forums for social activity, and that is reason enough for them to exist without any further excuses.

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I had always assumed Shkreli was one of 4chan’s less believable and more obnoxious creations.

Perhaps he can find a role as their mascot goblin.

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Notch has been gross for a while now. The fedora is no longer just a terrible fashion statement. He’s gone full MRA. To feel better about it, I recommend this piece: http://www.pointandclickbait.com/2016/05/notch-silenced-by-women/

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I assume Palmer Luckey would like a piece as well.

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Well sure, when you just craft things from whole cloth, I’m sure that statement almost makes sense.

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The internet’s a big place. Really, really big. One might say ‘nearly infinite’.

4chan is a cancerous boil. There’s other places to chat productively about, say, origami without hanging out in the same virtual building as actual Klansmen and child pornographers.

I’d say “go elsewhere” is a pretty good response without it being politicized.

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Feel free to explain how exactly it doesn’t make sense. I provided some context for the statement. Is it more honest to say that my post was meaningless, or that you happened to disagree with it?

I agree that I would not like to need to socialize in those places exclusively! But I think that it is also important to go where the trouble is. If sunshine is the best disinfectant, it can’t do its work when subcultures are isolated as a little pocket universe. Going elsewhere is in a very real way giving up ground. Expecting others to fix it - be they mods, the marketplace, government, etc - just seems unrealistic and irresponsible to me.

It’s like C-SPAN. In direct democracy, debating social issues in daily life IS government. The other alternative is to “leave it to the professionals”, and we’ve seen how well that turns out.

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True; why have an all in one imageboard when you can have several for each subject.

Though you could remove the most offensive board and hire mods to keep te klansmen out, but that brings us back to the major topic: what can we do to bring down the cost of maintaining such a site. Some of the boards have to be either merged, or gotten rid of entirely.

Well, to be fair, some of us shouldn’t talk to those asshats, because we can’t take their viewpoints seriously enough to be less than sneeringly condescending, and that just reinforces them psychologically.   One should know when it’s time to not make things worse.

Agreed, but it’s important to be in the right mood for it, or you just end up encouraging them.

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Most Shkreli memes originated on /b/.

But that’s most memes overall.

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I think 4chan at this day has gotten too self important for what the scope of that place was suppose to be, dumb stream of consciousness of anything goes. But I guess any self contained echo chamber grows stale without an outside input to keep things fresh.

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