In my last post, some AI-fuelled Substack novelty featured decided it would be fun to hide various replies and to locate these hidden replies under a special "Hidden Replies" menu, thereby highlighting them. I didn't know this feature existed and I've disabled it.
Thank you. It's a stupid feature, all right, and quite a few Substack authors that I follow have disabled it.
The whole point of Substack is free speech, right? I think SS might be feeling pressure from the hordes of liberal refugees that have fled here as corporate media continues its inexorable decay. Ordinarily I avoid ascribing things to political tribes, but liberals sure do enjoy their "moderation".
„moderation”, but not in the real sense. Was a volunteer mod on 2 occasions. Break up flamewars, keep things on-topic: a vital and honourable job to make a good community. And Iwe were always accountable.
That, of course, is not what „moderation” means now. It means Crush the Wrong Opinions.
That's great news! I assumed it was yet another "feature" of our UK "Online SAAAAAAFETY Act" kicking in for me. Making the UK SAAAAAFE for mainstream politicians to never have to experience disagreement, one comment at a time!
It shows how to disable it, samples of what types of comments violate SS's "community standards" that all Stacks were default set to until authors discovered the change and disabled it, called "automatic moderation."
And the even bigger takeaway from the investigation is that SS's "community standards" they applied to comment sections are also in effect platform wide. Which makes Stacks like this one also hidden from users of the platform. Minus the "Stacks hidden" feature that individual blogs have for "replies hidden.' The proverbial 'forbidden fruit' temptation to peek behind the veil would be too powerful a draw.
So Stacks like this one are similarly shadow-banned. Takes specific searches to find it, those searching for Stacks on subjects they are interested in will not be notified that this one exists. No boosting or recommendations, I call it the Substack Ghetto. All unapproved by the official narrative Stacks that don't use proper DEI/Woke protocols, "deny" climate, vaccines, approved medical narratives, Ukraine wars, election integrity, use naughty words, challenge government authority, etc are In SS's Ghetto. And have been there since sometime in 2022-2024. As the EU's censorship laws took effect.
That's the big picture revelation of the censorship of comments 'feature' informs us of.
Be warned. It still operates on mine even when disabled. I have no idea what Substack are doing. Word on the street is it will ultimately remove the ability to disable it, so your comments will be "moderated" whether you like it or not.
datarepublican is a must follow. and i don't follow most. thx for sharing with everyone. she's really not even political. that's what i like about her is she often points out that most of today's issues would've never been considered political 20 years ago. i didn't know she had a substack, but i do follow her on x
Yes, it was rolled out a few weeks ago. I think I saw the first mention of it by Josh Slocum. It is just as irritating for the reader - the number of comments listed not the same as what you can see. There's something new now- some kind of automated translation service and it has offered to translate your post!
Of course reading the hidden comments is irresistible. Sometimes you can see why a particular comment was hidden, but the cause for many if not most is mysterious.
Thank you. They are catering to what has become their most profitable constituency, though I don't complain about that too much since the people with views I despise are paying the rent for me to present any views at all under my own Substack.
Before the leftoids showed up, Substack felt like a really precarious place that might get banned or shut down at any time, so I too am basically happy they're around.
Hate to see this. I used to think Substack was pretty good on standing up for free speech. Looks like they are caving in to the censorship-thru-moderation virus. Probably to Keep The Children Safe, too. Very disappointing, I actually thought things were moving in a better direction for liberty and freedom, ha ha ha, silly me!
Watch out for gmail doing this sort of thing too. The AI summarized a thread w/ a lot of circus people about my (deceased) sister, who decided it would be lucrative after 911 to make and sell Osama Bin Laden toilet paper at events in the San Francisco area, and she railroaded all her circus and writing students into helping her do this, which, then, was a pretty standard normal response, but I realized the invasive summarizing AI might easily red flag this as who knows what. I don't think we have any privacy at all, and gmail or Gemini might be reading all the mail anyway, but it just felt like engulfing doppleganging tech. I just thought better to go to another email program just in case or at least not to feel violated, which we all feel pretty much hourly. Glad you didn't set that feature up. I'm really careful not to say anything against, for instance, the beautiful German marshmallow woman etc. so you don't get flagged, especially w/ the crazed C.J. Hopkins persecution being so relentless.
What a beautiful, two-fold scenario - for an outsider who ha given up hope in their own uniparty government which is just in the process of crowing a 'new' leader - 'call-me-Andy'.
They are mere puppets. They are globalists. If they step out of line they are replaced. The only thing that can challenge globalists who wish to erase nation-states is people who want to retain their nation. In Germany that is currently AfD. Hence the panic.
Surely there is some great business opportunity to supply shredders, hard disk erasing services, and whatnot to various such ministries? No doubt some minister has a boyfriend who knows someone who can provide this at a competitive price? Obviously 2 months is far too short notice to hold a public bidding process. It's a matter of public safety.
I'm so sorry for Germans; but I can't relax and think "at least it's not here"... because this is _exactly_ what our so-called 'government' over here in the UK would _love_ to do over here as well. And even though they've got a lot of catching up to do to be as insane as the German government, they're trying hard!
Did anyone say "flailing regime, losing legitimacy by the second, desperately trying to hold on"?
Oh you poor delusional thing...the UK government has been bat-shit insane for some time, it is simply lacking an effective challenger to push it over the edge - and that challenger CERTAINLY is NOT the electorate - yet.
Structures matter but honesty and culture matter more. As we see in Britain dishonest and anti-democratic politicians have bent the rules, ignored convention and recently they have changed the law in an attempt to slow down Reform UK.
Here is what I don't understand. Why should those in power in Germany fear a victory by the AfD in Sachen-Anhalt when all they have to do is rig the ballot box to get the result that they want? That is how most elections in the US are determined although increasingly many in the US are sick of all the election fraud we are exposed to. Of course electoral cheating is morally reprehensible but that does not stop those for whom the only thing that matters is winning. As Yosef Stalin once put it, it is not the votes that count but who counts the votes.
In my last post, some AI-fuelled Substack novelty featured decided it would be fun to hide various replies and to locate these hidden replies under a special "Hidden Replies" menu, thereby highlighting them. I didn't know this feature existed and I've disabled it.
Thank you. It's a stupid feature, all right, and quite a few Substack authors that I follow have disabled it.
The whole point of Substack is free speech, right? I think SS might be feeling pressure from the hordes of liberal refugees that have fled here as corporate media continues its inexorable decay. Ordinarily I avoid ascribing things to political tribes, but liberals sure do enjoy their "moderation".
„moderation”, but not in the real sense. Was a volunteer mod on 2 occasions. Break up flamewars, keep things on-topic: a vital and honourable job to make a good community. And Iwe were always accountable.
That, of course, is not what „moderation” means now. It means Crush the Wrong Opinions.
That's great news! I assumed it was yet another "feature" of our UK "Online SAAAAAAFETY Act" kicking in for me. Making the UK SAAAAAFE for mainstream politicians to never have to experience disagreement, one comment at a time!
Yes. I tried to alert authors about it two days after I noticed what was happening and shared this Stack.
https://freedomfox.substack.com/p/alert-substack-shadow-banning-deployed
It shows how to disable it, samples of what types of comments violate SS's "community standards" that all Stacks were default set to until authors discovered the change and disabled it, called "automatic moderation."
And the even bigger takeaway from the investigation is that SS's "community standards" they applied to comment sections are also in effect platform wide. Which makes Stacks like this one also hidden from users of the platform. Minus the "Stacks hidden" feature that individual blogs have for "replies hidden.' The proverbial 'forbidden fruit' temptation to peek behind the veil would be too powerful a draw.
So Stacks like this one are similarly shadow-banned. Takes specific searches to find it, those searching for Stacks on subjects they are interested in will not be notified that this one exists. No boosting or recommendations, I call it the Substack Ghetto. All unapproved by the official narrative Stacks that don't use proper DEI/Woke protocols, "deny" climate, vaccines, approved medical narratives, Ukraine wars, election integrity, use naughty words, challenge government authority, etc are In SS's Ghetto. And have been there since sometime in 2022-2024. As the EU's censorship laws took effect.
That's the big picture revelation of the censorship of comments 'feature' informs us of.
Substack is embracing censorship.
Be warned. It still operates on mine even when disabled. I have no idea what Substack are doing. Word on the street is it will ultimately remove the ability to disable it, so your comments will be "moderated" whether you like it or not.
Just like the universe, systems have entropy. They might start out great, but inevitably suffer enshittification.
Coincidentally, just ran across this relevant article from the excellent Data Republican. Autopoeisis!
https://datarepublican.substack.com/p/minnesota-as-a-systems-failure
An excellent word for a reality most sane people can recognize as soon as it's pointed out.
datarepublican is a must follow. and i don't follow most. thx for sharing with everyone. she's really not even political. that's what i like about her is she often points out that most of today's issues would've never been considered political 20 years ago. i didn't know she had a substack, but i do follow her on x
Same here. Isn't she great? Now we can follow her Substack too.
Thanks for this -- Data Republican is amazing, and I didn't realize she was on Substack. I've been following her on X for some time now.
What a fascinating idea.
I think a simple synonym for "autopoietic" is "self-licking ice cream cone." But in the NGO context, maybe a better synonym is self-pooping diaper.
Lolol.
I wonder if it's different in the UK/EU from here in the US.
There seems to be no official announcement. It is pretty sinister.
Yes, it was rolled out a few weeks ago. I think I saw the first mention of it by Josh Slocum. It is just as irritating for the reader - the number of comments listed not the same as what you can see. There's something new now- some kind of automated translation service and it has offered to translate your post!
Of course reading the hidden comments is irresistible. Sometimes you can see why a particular comment was hidden, but the cause for many if not most is mysterious.
Thank you. They are catering to what has become their most profitable constituency, though I don't complain about that too much since the people with views I despise are paying the rent for me to present any views at all under my own Substack.
Before the leftoids showed up, Substack felt like a really precarious place that might get banned or shut down at any time, so I too am basically happy they're around.
Hate to see this. I used to think Substack was pretty good on standing up for free speech. Looks like they are caving in to the censorship-thru-moderation virus. Probably to Keep The Children Safe, too. Very disappointing, I actually thought things were moving in a better direction for liberty and freedom, ha ha ha, silly me!
Watch out for gmail doing this sort of thing too. The AI summarized a thread w/ a lot of circus people about my (deceased) sister, who decided it would be lucrative after 911 to make and sell Osama Bin Laden toilet paper at events in the San Francisco area, and she railroaded all her circus and writing students into helping her do this, which, then, was a pretty standard normal response, but I realized the invasive summarizing AI might easily red flag this as who knows what. I don't think we have any privacy at all, and gmail or Gemini might be reading all the mail anyway, but it just felt like engulfing doppleganging tech. I just thought better to go to another email program just in case or at least not to feel violated, which we all feel pretty much hourly. Glad you didn't set that feature up. I'm really careful not to say anything against, for instance, the beautiful German marshmallow woman etc. so you don't get flagged, especially w/ the crazed C.J. Hopkins persecution being so relentless.
All throughout the West it is the same conversation over and over.
“Why won’t these angry voters just go away already?”
“Have you tried addressing the issues we are angry about yet?”
“No, we don’t think you have any right to be angry.”
“Then we are not going away!”
"We've conducted extensive polling on why you're angry and determined the correct response is for you to not be angry."
"Then we must be silence and intimidate you."
This is literally the Alberta secession debate in Canada.
"We are anticipating that the voters are about to speak in a way we don't like, damn them."
What a beautiful, two-fold scenario - for an outsider who ha given up hope in their own uniparty government which is just in the process of crowing a 'new' leader - 'call-me-Andy'.
I can't wait ...
It's not the system that's retarded, it's that retarded politicians are running it.
They are mere puppets. They are globalists. If they step out of line they are replaced. The only thing that can challenge globalists who wish to erase nation-states is people who want to retain their nation. In Germany that is currently AfD. Hence the panic.
Surely there is some great business opportunity to supply shredders, hard disk erasing services, and whatnot to various such ministries? No doubt some minister has a boyfriend who knows someone who can provide this at a competitive price? Obviously 2 months is far too short notice to hold a public bidding process. It's a matter of public safety.
For extra impact the bills don't come due until after the election, creating a ticking time bomb scandal for the event that the EFNHP is in power.
This. Is. Insane!
I'm so sorry for Germans; but I can't relax and think "at least it's not here"... because this is _exactly_ what our so-called 'government' over here in the UK would _love_ to do over here as well. And even though they've got a lot of catching up to do to be as insane as the German government, they're trying hard!
Did anyone say "flailing regime, losing legitimacy by the second, desperately trying to hold on"?
Oh you poor delusional thing...the UK government has been bat-shit insane for some time, it is simply lacking an effective challenger to push it over the edge - and that challenger CERTAINLY is NOT the electorate - yet.
Most interesting and a glimmer of hope please please keep us updated!
The crisis of Our Democracy deepens as voters refuse to cast their ballots for the correct candidates".
What is a correct candidate? Please define.
"Not AfD"
In Britain we call it Uniparty
Just download the latest Approved Opinion-Update into your mind every day, and you won’t need an opinion! It’s so _convenient_
CDU living through The Tragical History of Dr. Faustus in real time
How much of Germany's current state structure was overseen by the Allies after WW2
Structures matter but honesty and culture matter more. As we see in Britain dishonest and anti-democratic politicians have bent the rules, ignored convention and recently they have changed the law in an attempt to slow down Reform UK.
Germany is lost.
But not the German people.
Really, exactly how do you think it's come to be this way, alien intervention?
Yes. Although the preferred term is immigrant.
I admire that you can sort this out and present it to us in comprehensible language. It's almost beyond parody.
Come on AfD lead Europe out of the woke socialist madness that has wreaked havoc over our lives for 50 years.
The Deep State will stop at nothing to cling to power, nothing. Remember that it is, at its core, Leninist.
Glad to see you using the "our democracy" phrase. We all know that "our" doesn't include you , me of the average German voter.
Here is what I don't understand. Why should those in power in Germany fear a victory by the AfD in Sachen-Anhalt when all they have to do is rig the ballot box to get the result that they want? That is how most elections in the US are determined although increasingly many in the US are sick of all the election fraud we are exposed to. Of course electoral cheating is morally reprehensible but that does not stop those for whom the only thing that matters is winning. As Yosef Stalin once put it, it is not the votes that count but who counts the votes.