I’m curious what, if any, guidelines people self-impose to try and engage in a productive way online (both on Lemmy and elsewhere). “Netiquette” if you will.
A couple of rules that I think are good practices, but still see too often, are:
- don’t pile onto the most downvoted comment. Kinda like don’t feed the trolls, but it’s more about not letting yourself get rage baited. Instead, downvote them and move on.
- don’t give a non-answer to someone’s question. Ex. if someone asks how to do X, don’t answer with, “Why are you trying to do X? You shouldn’t want to do X. Do Y instead.” Instead, explain what it would take to do X, and then offer Y as a possible alternative and why it may be a better option. But assume they already know about Y, and it doesn’t fit their use-case.
For that last one, finding a thread where someone has asked the exact question you want answered, only to find a thread full of upvoted non-answers is up there with the dreaded “nvm, I figured it out - 10y ago”.
i try not to say anything i wouldnt say to that persons face if they were standing on my front porch.
i dont delete things for the same reason you cant ‘take things back’ when verbally talking to someone.
Now really, get off my porch.
I also follow this in offline interactions.
I’ll engage if two of the three can be answered with a “yes”.
1 - Is it kind?
2 - Is it true?
3 - Is it necessary?
For online-only conversations, assume that everything you say is public.
Downvotes are not for disagreements.
What are they for? Like/dislike?
Downvotes are for low-quality content, bad-faith content, etc.
Most bright-line example of this is: if OP asks “what’s your favourite fruit” and somebody says “bananas,” don’t downvote it just because you dislike bananas.
It gets harder when somebody says something you disagree with politically, but argues it well and in good faith. I would still not downvote in this circumstance.
For an example of when I would downvote: if OP asks “do bananas contain potassium?” and commenter says “No, only potatoes contain potassium.” – this is low quality content, they could have confirmed their answer with a quick google search.
I only downvote when something is blatantly factually false or posted in bad faith (i.e. obviously trolling and I can’t think of a good-faith reason why someone would post this).
If I merely disagree with something, I write an answer explaining why, or if there already is one that I agree with, I upvote that.
don’t give a non-answer to someone’s question. Ex. if someone asks how to do X, don’t answer with, “Why are you trying to do X? You shouldn’t want to do X. Do Y instead.” Instead, explain what it would take to do X, and then offer Y as a possible alternative and why it may be a better option. But assume they already know about Y, and it doesn’t fit their use-case.
I can get behind the spirit of this, but often times this is caused by people taking the wrong first steps to solve an issue and then getting lost in the weeds while asking for the solution to where they’re stuck, rather than asking about the original problem. In this case, usually both X and Y are bad answers, and asking why they aren’t doing Y can elucidate more about the whole situation.
Yes, the XY Problem (or in this case, the YX Problem).
I think it’s still better to abide by the rule as I wrote it, because IMO it is actually more elucidating for someone to be able to explain how to do X as it is written, and then provide Y as a possibly preferable alternative, than for someone who maybe really doesn’t know how to do X just propose Y instead.
It might even be the case that Y is the solution OP should be asking for, but 10y later when someone else finds that same thread, and Y isn’t an option for them, the thread is much less useful.
At a bare minimum, don’t say “you shouldn’t want to do X”, either explain how to do X, or be clear about the fact that you don’t know how.
If you have to absolutely, positively, immediately, reply right now for reasons … don’t.
I try to be patient.
treat everyone as if they’re actual people behind the screen. because they are
Well…there was a time when that was true. Now we’ve got a mostly dead internet. But yeah, if you’re going to bother engaging because you believe they’re real, then treat them like a person.
kinda forgot there are bots, even on lemmy 😅
I think Lemmy has the capacity to have even more bots, because moderation is so inconsistent and underfunded. The big sites have the resources to fight bots, but ironically have an incentive to embrace them because it reflects well on DAU. IMO the only thing keeping bots off lemmy is a lack of ROI. Great, you spent how much to influence the views of a minuscule userbase in the corner of the internet no one goes to?
Still, it does feel sometimes like our share of braindead group think is higher than it should be…
I think it flies under the commercialization radar so it isn’t worth a lot of scammers and attention getter’s time.
If I’ve tagged them as “DNE” (don’t engage), then trust I tagged them for a reason and don’t engage.
For political disagreements, be wary of fruitless endeavors. 20 replies back and forth are pointless. Most of the time, my goal isn’t to change that person’s mind; it’s to be the voice of disagreement so that others can either be exposed to my views and their rationalization or so that others who silently agree with me can see that these views aren’t unpopular. After enough time passes, I tend to state that I’m disengaging because it’s no longer going to catch the eye of many of these people.
In general, be courteous. Most people aren’t assholes. Some people will have a bad day and maybe will take it out in you, but gently asking them to be courteous and not take their bad day out on you usually spurs some introspection and improves the interaction. If it doesn’t, then they’re really not mature enough to further engage with. Respect yourself and don’t allow anybody excessive opportunity to ruin your day.
Spot-on with how and why to engage and when to drop.
The main rule I try to adhere to:
If I think someone who responded to my comment did not read the whole thing, I should not reply.
- Read the room. If it looks like a glorified echo chamber you’ll get downvoted to oblivion. If you try to debate you might get banned. This is usually the case with news and political groups.
- Don’t get pulled into pointless fights with trolls. You can usually spot them because they try to take the discussion on a radical detour or pointless pick a fight. Don’t let yourself get baited.
- Don’t tell people to “google it”. They are probably looking for other’s insights. If you can’t answer their question or add to it then don’t respond.
- If a topic is upsetting and you feel the urge to rant it is best to just walk away from it.
- Try to take the high road and be polite even if they aren’t. Win by being nice, others will notice it.
- Finally, if someone is just totally unreasonable or even sounds nuts don’t engage them. Block them if necessary.
Plenty, though it’s a general thing rather than some rigid code. And these are my rules, not necessarily things that everyone should be doing. When it comes to that, Wheaton’s law covers everything well enough lol.
First, in full honesty, I sometimes will break my rules and engage with assholes, trolls, or other bad actors out of sheer boredom to entertain myself, and I’ll often throw all my other rules out the window if they’re enough of an asshole.
So, my number one rule is honesty. I refuse to lie. For one, I’ve come to value the freedom of being exactly who I am too much to fuck around. For another, I’m too fucking old to keep track of bullshit, so I’d fuck up eventually anyway. Now, I’m not saying I’ll never wrap a truth up in fancy clothes for entertainment sake, I enjoy telling stories for my own fun and I’ll tell them in a way that pleases me. The facts are always true, though the way they’re expressed might make it seem otherwise.
Like, I sometimes break out stories about my friend Spider. If I just say that he mouthed off in a bar and got me into a fight, that’s fucking boring. If I say that he pulled out his penis because the was worried he broke it, that’s less boring, but telling the story in one line is a waste when describing said penis is so much more fun. Same with my stories about my cousin, Fucking Ryan. I’m not ruining a good story by writing it down using minimalism, I’m going to tart that bitch up and make it a ride, you dig? It’s all true, but if I say Fucking Ryan stole a hamburger from me, that’s not as entertaining as describing the ketchup leaking from his pocket.
Second, if I choose to answer a question, I try to answer it to the best of my knowledge, without too much in the way of judging that it was asked. You ask about how to tell if you broke your dick, the answer is going to be about how you tell, with no more than a return question about why you need to know. That is negated when the person asking is a douche, where I will give them shit about them being a douche, but I’ll still answer.
Third, I try to remember that I’m talking to other humans. Sometimes the bots and ai generated stuff makes that hard. Other times, I fall into the trap of reacting to what’s on the screen rather than the fact that a human put it there. This is the rule I fail to follow the most. A lot of the time, that doesn’t matter because humans are assholes, and some of the shit they say is worth some backlash. But I try to take a second and think about what might have caused someone to say something shitty that is out of character even if I don’t know them.
Which leads into the fourth. There’s a limit on how many slaps I’ll go into a slap fight. I figure that if I can’t either redirect the person into a real conversation in three or four comments that also include not taking their bullshit, it isn’t worth continuing. That means that I may tell someone they’re acting like an asshole, but I’ll also be trying to get them to break out of it and move on. Believe it or not, it works. Not all the time, but it amazes me how often just telling someone they’re being a dick, and that I’m just another human trying to interact makes them stop and think for a second. Works best with folks that are already attacking an idea instead of a person, but are just being dicks to the person as a side thing.
What it all boils down to is extensions of Wheaton’s law. Ways to not be a dick, or to be less of a dick.
I only comment when I feel I am adding something to the conversation that nobody else has added. On many contentious topics, nearly everything that can be said has already been said by someone, so I usually don’t comment on them.
Do not entertain an argument of any kind. We’re no longer in a realm where people can be reasoned or rationalized. People mostly just want you to be wrong and will break you down in trying to make you feel wrong. Block the moment someone starts swinging back at you.
If you see someone out in the open giving someone else a hard time, you can bet that they’ll do it to you so block them also.
Never go too open with someone beyond your comfort level. People online can be notorious for abusing sensitive information for ammo, personal gain or to do with as they see fit.
You should read False Witnesses, it explains a phenomena you’re touching on here. People normally don’t actually care if what they believe is true, they want to feel virtuous and license themselves to believe the unbelievable in order to do so. I think you’ll find the essay interesting.
