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Comment by petewailes | Hacker News Reader

In a world where the Trump bid for the Whitehouse has popular support, and a lot of it, and where things like Fox News and Buzzfeed exist, it's reasonably clear that people care more about being entertained and having their opinions validated and reinforced, more than being right.

It's a difficult question - should information be censored, to make sure it's actually correct?

Personally, I struggle with this one. My default reaction would be yes, a curated internet, fact checked for accuracy would be better. But at the same time, I know that people interpret unbiased information with their own prejudices, to reinforce their own views. So simply curating and only reporting truth, I suspect, isn't enough.

My own feeling is that the issue at its root is societal in nature - how do you get people to care more about being right than about holding opinions that fit their narrative of the world, or their own ego? I'm not sure there's an answer to that.

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> "Personally, I struggle with this one. My default reaction would be yes, a curated internet, fact checked for accuracy would be better."

And now you've made the problem worse. This is the idea of a benign monarchy. Who fact checks? Who is the gate keeper? Who keeps out content that doesn't meet the standards? This is censorship. You may think it's beneficial censorship but all censors believe their censorship is beneficial.

All power has the potential to be used maliciously, and then it becomes far more damaging than the benefit of it being used benignly ever created. The only checks that seem to work against such things are individual freedoms and democratic governance. They're far from perfect but the alternatives are all much worse.

My default reaction would be yes, a curated internet, fact checked for accuracy would be better.

I'm the opposite. I'd rather have a free, open web that's full of lies and misinformation, but with a population who understand it's like that and question what they see.

Something based on your default position is probably easier to implement.

How would you educate people to fact check and question? I'd love a good mechanism for this.

At Mozilla we are running a program to teach Web Literacy and new digital skills called "Mozilla Clubs" [1] it is based on hands-on activities that are participatory in nature. Basically a group of people that meets regularly to learn and teach about the web in an inclusive and fun way.

Here is our activity aimed to teach about fact checking and credibility:

http://mozilla.github.io/mozilla-club-activity-kraken-the-co...

Be aware that this is aimed at a young crowd but it works with any group. It is a very simple activity but it has all the basis needed to understand that not all the stuff online is gold.

This is just one activity in our "Web Basics I" curriculum. This set of activities aim to teach the basics of Web/Internet understanding and mechanics.

[1]: more info about Mozilla Clubs at: http://teach.mozilla.org/clubs

I think the real answer is why not both... A curated, peer reviewed, fact checked network of sites that adhere to strong standards would be a nice improvement to single site attempts (like Wikipedia).

In my opinion, this preference should be additionally reinforced by noticing that "older" means of communication actually do also "suffer" from the same issue: reading books, papers, leaflets pre-Internet, you too should have been aware they can be/are full of lies and misinformation. In other words, propaganda did sure exist pre-Internet (like, from the dawn of mankind, I presume). And even ignoring conscious and systematic propaganda, people were always subjective.

> My default reaction would be yes, a curated internet, fact checked for accuracy would be better.

The biggest issue is, who decides what's true. Did the Tiananmen Sq Massacre happen? Did PRISM exist? Are my thoughts and rants about how the TSA and DHS are evil and vividly represent the wrong in the US, correct? (What does correct even mean here?)

> My own feeling is that the issue at its root is societal in nature - how do you get people to care more about being right than about holding opinions that fit their narrative of the world, or their own ego? I'm not sure there's an answer to that.

I agree that it's a social issue. It's the same reason Trump can say Muslims need to register themselves with the state and be cheered. Most people are just idiots. We, as a society, need to (attempt?) to make most people less idiotic.

(Yes, I consider myself an idiot much of the time as well. I'm not as well versed in politics and current affairs as I should be. I try to keep up, but part of the problem is the amount of energy and time it requires.)

You start by wanting to be correct, not right, and there is a difference.

What is Truth?

“History is written by the victors.” Walter Benjamin

Thought this was an appropriate quote.

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