There's no doubt Reddit is cracking down and becoming more authoritarian like now. They are trying to control access to the most popular front pages etc. It's sickening and maddening.

...and that's why I love /r/conspiracy. Full of people who are adept at sniffing out bullshit.

and full of people who are adept at spouting it

you were probably making a poor quick attmept at humor what yousaid is actually bs.

there is more real news in r/conspiracy than anywhere else on reddit now. its stuff you can actually use or act on like which compnay is cheating you are which entity is paying off someone or which group is being censored so you know where you shouldn't waste your time.

Alas, that is the nature of the beast. But I've increasingly found that shit gets spouted everywhere (just as much in the MSM as here) so the ability to discern fact from crap is a valuable skill in the information age.

Can you demonstrate that your "full of" is anything other than complete shit?

Can you extend you list of examples of "spouting [bullshit]" to one, or - heavens! - two?

/r/worldnews is crazy. There are like 3 people that submit 99% of the content there. If it doesn't have the Maxwellhill or Solinvictus stamp of approval it won't get very much traffic. I don't know what happened there, but that's not how reddit was a year or 2 ago.

A lot of the big subreddits are driven by a small group of powerusers now. It kinda sucks. /r/conspiracy seems like it has a "classic" reddit feel where you get content from all sorts of different people from all corners of the internet. The mainstream subreddits are very much sanitized.

That is exactly what happened with Digg. Teams of power users took over and control was from top down instead of normal regular bottom up. Sucked.

I have not seen any evidence that this is the will of the admins. Moderators maybe. But not the admins.

Then how do you explain this new filter thing being implemented? The filter has gotten crazy the last few years. Many submissions don't even make it to the "new" page in a subreddit.

I understand what you are saying. But the current system is extremely vulnerable to moderator abuse. Besides being obvious, this has also been pointed out to the administrators numerous times, starting even before the subreddit system was deployed. When the only people in position to fix a broken system refuse to do so, they deserve a lot of blame.

http://www.reddit.com/r/jailbait

Yeah, shame on the reddit admins for closing down a subreddit that supplied users with child pornography. What an atrocity. What a horrible slight against free speech.

It had its own given right to exist such as r/horsefuckers would of if it was created. Cp was not allowed there and the rules even talked about reporting anyone sharing such. When it went down 20 popped up in its place. Reddit was created for absolute freedom, sadly it is being hosted in America where we dont have freedom but everyone hates us for it. Honestly, its existence was never anyones business, subreddits are there to be clicked or scrolled past.

Reddit was not created for "ultimate freedom", it was created to be a link aggregator, and whatever it morphed into past that has little or nothing to do with freedom. Anything that's illegal in the US is off-limits for reddit. You don't see any subreddits for the dissemination of torrents, do you? How about a subreddit for downloading movies, music or games? What about a subreddit for planning attacks on US soil or assassinating presidents? You won't find any of these subreddits, because they're against reddit policy and US law- same with propegation of child pornography. It matters exactly not at all that the mods of jailbait had rules against sharing child pornography when child pornography was being shared anyway. And yeah after the removal of jailbait, 20 new subreddits popped up, but now that the reddit admins have gotten their head out of their ass, they're all gone as well.

TLDR; Reddit has to follow certain laws and is not for "absolute freedom", and never has been.

Thats why i said its sadly hosted in the US, i don't disagree with anything you say. Its a goddamn shame it is or it would be a utopia of free thinking and interaction, something it is not. Regardless jailbait had nothing wrong that it was doing except being in a legal grey area, and again, of there was sharing it was not endorsed, it was done privately between people, something the entire subreddit shouldn't be punished for when they were following rules. Also child pornography is still being shared, you don't think r/jcpennykids would have nothing bad going on? Or maybe r/ deadkidpics? Or r/toddletsintiaras? Fighting this on the internet is useless, there is always a way and all this does is make you feel that you can sleep well at night knowing that ALL FORMS OF SHARING HAVE BEEN ELIMINATED when that is just unrealistic. So sleep well, nothing has been done.

Although my subreddits are 50 times smaller than world news, screw being authoritarian.

internet discourse is impossible to control. all you can do is interfere, but it's like swimming in a river made of piranhas.

"The Net interprets censorship as damage and routes around it." John Gilmore

absolutely.

geez, i wonder who's downvoting us.

Life.

In the interest of open disclosure, there ought to be a once-a-week thread with collated links to all submissions that were rejected. Either by the 'spam filter' or by a moderator applying discretion. It should apply to r/politics r/worldnews r/conspiracy etc. I can almost guarantee it would be one of the most popular and interesting threads.

The /r/politics moderators constantly refuse any request to make the moderation more transparent.

I've attempted to create such a log of removals here: /r/politicalmoderation

This obviously disproves the myth that goldfish have a two second memory span. Thanks!

you are a fucking genius.

Reddit should provide a site wide feature for all sub-reddits showing all rejected links for a specified sub-reddit. It would provide transparency with no overhead on the moderators.

Proving an optional feature for this would be: "such an easy thing for us [admins] to add to the mod log", but has been delayed at the request of many moderators:

http://www.reddit.com/r/modnews/comments/ov7rt/moderators_feedback_requested_on_enabling_public/c3ktd2i

Sadly. most moderators are cowards. You may not like me, but I never hide my mod actions, or reasons for taking them. I believe in 100% mod transparency.

It shouldn't be optional though. If the moderators want to be the gatekeepers, their decisions should be transparent at all times. Maybe their would need to be some consideration for illegal content, but that could be dealt with, but probably subject to a small level of abuse.

Reddit has always been sly about how deletions and bans work to confuse spammers. This really confuses legitimate users though when they are moderated because, well, they don't really know it.

Making their audit log public would be awesome, but it will probably never happen because then they would have a million people bothering them now that they realize they were moderated. Nobody ever logs out to look and see if their submissions and comments are showing up, so you would never know that you have been moderated, so you never complain. Imagine if you actually knew when they deleted your post.

Basically, they would have to face the consequences of censoring (rightfully or wrongfully). They don't want that. It means being held accountable for their actions. Moderators don't moderate to be held accountable, especially those who are looking for a minor position of power they can abuse to make themselves feel superior.

It's a shame that a site that purports to be anti-censorship (jailbait saga, black out etc) is so scared of being transparent and holding the mods accountable.

I agree the mods don't want the hassle, but I also don't care what the mods want 8)

I tend to agree. If you want to be a moderator you should be held accountable for censorship. The way to do that is transparency.

If you want to hold a low-level position of power then you have to be willing to adhere to basic levels of accountability for your actions. You don't get authority with no accountability. That's authoritarianism.

Basically, reddit mods pretend they like democratic processes while arguing for authoritarianism. That is why asking the mods what they want is stupid. Of course authorities are going to argue for authoritarianism, because it benefits them. If you want to know how reddit should be moderated, ask the USERS.

I have heard USERS say time and time again that they want to see the moderation log, especially for these big subreddits. I think it should be for every subreddit. Again, you don't get authority without being responsible for your actions, that is just absurd. And you don't ask the authorities how much power they want to have, you ask the governed what they would consent to.

I agree, but as that link shows, that wont be happening.

Pro-secrecy moderators are preventing others from even having the option, because they are afraid people will request that they be open and honest to their subscribers about removals.

Why don't the admins step in and mandate it? It's obviously in the interest of the users. Someone should get that info to the front page. There seems to be very strong anti censorship support among the users, and this is such a simple solution.

If you feel strongly about it you should suggest this to /r/ideasfortheadmins

Done.

There are some reasons to hide rejected posts. My momentary guesses:

1. posts revealing personal information
   
2. posts too gross for public
   
3. posts that are obviously slander

just saying...

Good points.

There is a lot of overlap in moderation between /r/politics and /r/worldnews

To view a colleciton of removed politcal stories from across reddit (including /r/worldnews and /r/politics ) see /r/politicalmoderation

I just requested a listing in the sidebar, so we'll see what happens.

I changed my mind. I support it. This post helped me change my mind. Fuck em.

Actually, there should be very little over-lap between r/politics and r/worldnews since r/politics is for US politics ONLY. There may be however, some over-lap between r/worldnews and r/worldpolitics.

In the case of the OPs original submission, I agree with the mod that it more appropriately belongs elsewhere, like r/worldpolitics, but obviously not for the reason he cited.

By overlap, I mean the moderators themselves, as in many of the same moderators of /r/worldnews also moderate /r/politics

I'm a mod on r/worldnews and while I wasn't the one who removed the post I can assure you we do remove posts that are direct links to videos or image galleries. I'm not sure why we do it, it was a rule the mods enforced since long before I became a mod there. If you'd like to try finding an article that goes along with the video (like the second link) you can resubmit and it should get through fine.

I agree that if a rule like no direct links to videos/pictures is going to be enforced it should be listed clearly on the sidebar. Otherwise it seems as though the mods are just pulling rules out of their ass and could lead users to believe that we're censoring posts, as has happened here.

To the best of my knowledge we don't pick and choose what is a reputable source so as long as you repost as it as I suggested with an accompanying article it should be fine. If it doesn't appear in the queue send a modmail and I'll see what's going on.

If you have any other questions I should be available to answer them in about an hour or so, got some grocery shopping to do but after that I'll be close by the computer for a while.

So you are consistently applying secret rules?

Either the policy should change, or it should be mentioned in the sidebar.

Are there any other secret rules we should know about?

I agree the rule should be in the sidebar. I've said to other mods before that not only is it difficult for the user to know what's going on, it's difficult for me as a mod to know what to remove and what to not remove if the rules aren't clearly posted. I'm one of the most junior mods on the subreddit, though, and can't edit the sidebar myself.

I think the only other rule we enforce that isn't posted on the sidebar is removing hate speech, and it has to be pretty hateful to get it removed. Not like criticizing Israel, more like having a block of all caps racial slurs.

An idea I've seen floated here was a list of removed links for the users to see what's being removed and why. I don't see anything wrong with that but it'd be the admins who'd have to get that running and I have no clue how that process works, I imagine it's whenever they get the time for it.

Sorry I can't be more helpful, I'm a pretty new moderator and am still learning the ropes.

Yeah not to mention the censorship over anti-Israeli news.

Out of 5 or 6 I tried to post in February, only one of them managed to pass through.

I contacted the mod, he said to post it in /r/worldpolitics, I asked why not in /r/worldnews he never replied back.

Please report every post that gets filtered this way to /r/politicalmoderation

Yup.

They are pretty active in the comment sections as well.

Funny thing: lately Im getting most of my world news here.

Unfortunately, the way reddit is set up, mods have absolute, unchallengeable power with no appeal whatsoever.

The worst is that if you try to politely claim that this is unreasonable, you'll get hordes of people explaining it to you again as if you're a moron who doesn't speak proper English. Yes, I get it, mods have unlimited power, I just don't like that fact, it's not that I don't understand it...

This is big news. Not the fact that worldnews is censored - I think we all know that - but that there are French troops operating in Syria.

I saw some footage from a few weeks ago of snipers firing on both pro- and anti-Assad demonstrators, and that reconfirmed my suspicions that the whole thing was just another setup.

Let's see if he answers this time...

/r/politics and /r/worldnews is so full of misinfo and censorship. I've been censored several times now, for no reason whatsoever. I actually find /r/conspiracy having more info.

I don't mind people spouting crap because it's their right. Intelligent people can do what they want with the info, that's what's cool about Reddit. But the censorship from the MODS and USG/Intel is out of control.

Please document your post removals at /r/PoliticalModeration to add to the record.

Not to advertise my own subreddit or anything, but there is no censorship in /r/worldpolitics.

I don't recall seeing anything get caught in the spam filter either.

Yes, we have conditioned it well enough :)

Nowadays we even have a bot that approves what still gets caught.

This may come as a shock to you but many people don't see RT as a credible news source.

While you may disagree, others see it as biased in the same way most people see Fox News as biased.

i actually really like RT. it's very unbiased journalism, at least as far as U.S. and global politics goes.

I prefer RT as a new source, but alas it IS biased, but on the other side/the side many who would frequent this subreddit prefer. I find the best way to form an opinion on an issue is to mix your sources, and form a judgement based on what seems like the most plausible scenario or has the best information on a subject. Just relying on RT will give you a biased. It is naive to suggest that there is no agenda on their behalf (not saying you did, just a general thing).

You're not alone.

Many people are attracted to their message.

I just happen to look at the world in a different way.

If worldnews claimed they moderate with regards to the credibility of the source, this would be a legitimate reason for the removal.

They don't.

All news is biased towards a particular viewpoint or ideology depending on where and from whom it gets its funding. RT is good because it calls out a lot of bullshit, especially with regards to foreign policy.

All news is biased towards a particular viewpoint or ideology...

Agreed.

RT is good because it calls out a lot of bullshit...

I'm sure you're aware that it also adds a layer of it's own.

RT is owned by the Russian government, Fox News tilts to the right, there is a world of difference there.

I think you are underestimating the difference.

Fox News is bought and paid for by the Republican establishment and does far more than tilt. The Democrats tilt to the right, the Republicans are the right.

In the same way that Fox repeats the talking points of the party, RT provides exactly the message the Russian government feels will generate the most dissent in the US.

Is there a difference? Of course. Are they both fundamentally lacking objectivity? Yes.

It's debatable which is more effective as they cater to different demographics. But they are both unquestionably propaganda machines.

Fox News is bought and paid for by the Republican establishment and does far more than tilt. The Democrats tilt to the right, the Republicans are the right.

You might believe that but in reality Fox News is a privately held company.

In the same way that Fox repeats the talking points of the party, RT provides exactly the message the Russian government feels will generate the most dissent in the US.

RT is owned by the Russian government in the same way the CIA is "owned" by the US government. If RT is like anything in the US it is like the White House pressroom....and you guys believe it like it's gospel.

It's debatable which is more effective as they cater to different demographics. But they are both unquestionably propaganda machines.

They cater to the same demographic, people who like their news spoon fed to them while they claim to be free thinkers.

Fox News is a privately held company.

What do you think the Republican party is?

and you guys believe it like it's gospel.

What guys?

They cater to the same demographic, people who like their news spoon fed to them while they claim to be free thinkers.

The sheep need to be led. There are different demographics amongst the sheep. But they remain sheep.

Not to worry, I'm sure the other four times you posted it will ensure no one misses it.

That RT video doesn't appraise viewers of any facts as far as I can tell. Where are these 120 french soldiers? Where is the footage of them? Why on earth would there be HUNDRED AND TWENTY french soldiers loitering around homs? Hell, if you try to google around a bit, all the results are abovetopsecret, blogs, or conspiracy sites. Not a single trustworthy news source has reported on this- and RT as a Russian government propaganda machine definitely does not count as trustworthy.

I am 99% certain this is bullshit, and probably the last we'll hear of it, and not because it's "hushed down", but because it simply didn't happen.

E; Downvoting this post won't make the news story any more valid or true. Feel free to come back and upvote it once a couple of weeks have passed without anyone mentioning this "breaking news" ever again.

Do you also treat US and French and BBC and Al Jazeera news with such a critical eye? If so, ymust be convinced that there is no credible news of any kind coming out of Syria at ALL.

Having spent three years studying media, I treat ALL media with a critical eye, be it entertainment, advertisement or news. In this specific case, the difference between a lot of the media reporting out of Syria is that there are several independant sources alongside the international media reporting the exact same thing, namely Assad slaughtering civillians, and ONE reporting on these french soldiers being captured, with every other source referring back to the RT newspiece. When that one source of information (in this case RT) is known to hold a strong pro-Assad bias, there's reason to worry about the authencity of the news being reported- which should be the default way to look at a state owned news organ. It's exactly the same as not trusting CNN/Fox/whatever when they're posting their umpteenth article about Iran's "nuclear program" while using that same old picture of Ahmadinejad standing in a nuclear reactor. It's obvious propaganda!

E; For the record, while Al Jazeera is owned by the state of Qatar, they have a pretty good record for being objective in their international news coverage. As for "french media", that isn't very specific, but as far as I know the french state doesn't own any french media groups. E2: And the BBC is very obviously biased-- but not neccesarily towards the government, but towards the left. The BBC, while state owned, spent a lot of time and energy in the 80s defaming Thatcher and friends, and if I'm to believe conservative complaints coming out of britain to this day, they're still very, very leftist. :) I'd rather have a news network that sticks to its guns in a single political direction to the point of it being silly than a news network that blindly reports whatver the government wants it to report, like RT. Let me just quote RT's editor in chief, here;

"Margarita Simonyan, the channel's editor-in-chief, has rejected the allegation that RT broadcasts "Kremlin propaganda" but acknowledged that it strives for a "Russian viewpoint". She has claimed the channel welcomes controversy, as it "provides an alternative to mainstream media." She has said the network "takes a pro-Russian position" and has been unrepentant about RT's pro-Russian coverage of the 2008 Russian-Georgian war."

With Syria being within the Russian sphere of interest and Assad being a friend of Putin, it's not really surprising that RT takes a pro-Syrian govt stance. Hell, they'd probably admit it.

Well of course all the sources reporting that Assad is murdering his own people are politically aligned NATO members or their affiliates / bitches.

Al Jazeera has been caught with its pants down before, but I'm sure you know this already.

The problem with comparing what is true and what isn't by counting sources it obvious. If there is an effort underway in the NATO affiliated countries' journalistic outlets to shush up this information, something that we both know has been done many times in the past, we won't hear about it from anybody except the Russians and maybe Iran.

I guess my point is that, while I acknowledge RT's pro-Russian slant, I also (unlike you) see a nationalistic slant in the BBC, in the French media, and especially in the American media. The difference is that at least RT has the honesty to admit it.

You're wrong. Most of the sources reporting Assad's murdering has absolutely nothing to do with NATO, considering that the vast majority of these sources are Syrian.

There is no over-arching conspiracy among all nato-affilated countries to hush down what's going on in Syria. Most news outlets are not state owned, and not all the news coming out of Syria has anything to do with international professional media. If you seriously buy Assad's angle on Syria then I just don't know what to say to convince you. There's hundreds of non-western news videos out there of Syrians in homs being murdered by its own government. It's not some huge conspiracy plot to discredit Assad, it's just a corrupt government cracking down on its own citizens in the most violent way possible.

Of course there's a degree of nationalistic slant to every media, but there's a huge difference between that and being an outright propaganda machine.

Hating America doesn't mean you have to support its "enemies", especially not when they're monstrously in the wrong. Do you really think America is the only nation with international interests? What makes you think Russia is above lying to protect and promote its interests?

Same with Iran, I completely support their right to a nuclear program and I think it's abhorrent that the international community sanctions a country (and threatens war) for wanting to expand their energy availability and efficiency; that does NOT mean I take their news at face value, and nor should you.

I think one would have a hard time proving that twitter messages and Youtube videos are actually coming from any particular point on the globe. There are already some pretty damning videos from "somewhere" that show Syrians constructing fake massacres, and other videos purporting to be from Syria that have been shown to have been from Lebanon during the Israeli aggression there a few years back. All of this makes it somewhat difficult to believe the media outlets and take their reportage at face value, and it makes it especially difficult to believe the Syrians who are agitating for revolution there. Who knows where they even are?

I find your conclusion that there is no over-arching conspiracy strange, in that there is evidence of manipulation of facts and wholesale creation of narratives going on all the time in the Middle East. Of course, Homs has had its difficulties with Assad's father in the past, and it is only natural for them to be a bit agitated. Their proximity to a foreign nation that has serious relationship problems with Syria and a good relationship with the West makes it the perfect stage for a foreign-supported insurgency.

You do betray yourself with your comment about "hating America" though. I thought this conversation would be genuine until I read that particular tired old bit of slander.

Did you catch the Russian accent of the reporter? RT is a Kremlin propaganda mouthpiece and thus has about as much credibility as the Assad regime's official propaganda outlets. Did you notice the total lack of any video of the French troops captured? I can show you IED videos of rebels hitting Assad's forces but they can't produce any kind of video?

Don't get butthurt, your submission was marked as spam because it is. It lacks any kind of verifiability and is coming from a party with a clear vested interest in the situation. RT is literally owned by the Russian government. Say what you will about the American media, they are all privately held companies.

If worldnews claimed they moderate with regards to the credibility of the source, this would be a legitimate reason for the removal.

They don't.

RT is a Kremlin propaganda mouthpiece and thus has about as much credibility as their counterparts in the USA, namely the propaganda outlets CNN and Fox News.

FTFY.

The big difference being Fox and CNN are privately held companies some people think tilt to the left and some people think tilt to the right. RT is LITERALLY owned by the government. Not figuratively, not "they kinda tilt towards to government", no the funds that pay the salaries come indirectly from the Russian government.

so, we're in the cold war, still?

Are you refering to all your sock puppets downvoting me son?

uh, no, i'm referring to how you're trying to discredit a news source by calling it a "Kremlin propaganda mouthpiece".

....and you think it isn't? The Russian government has editorial control over RT, say what you will about CNN but that simply isnt the case for them.

well, it's remarkable that RT has such journalistic integrity when reporting about U.S. news, then.

Psssst. It's the Jews keeping you down, Occi. You know they do it on purpose just to aggravate you.

http://bible.cc/revelation/2-9.htm

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_5kv8QeBBc&t=0m6s

well, at least you understand where you are. the tricky part is getting back.

Why are you such a racist NotCOINTELPROAgent?

It's the Jews' fault, they're keeping me down, man!

Naw, it's all Obama's fault. /r/enoughobamaspam son!

By overlap, I mean the moderators themselves, as in many of the same moderators of /r/worldnews also moderate /r/politics