Mastodawn

You don't need to use weird spellings or algospeak for any topics on the Fediverse ("unalived", "seggs" etc). There is no automated moderation or algorithm on here, moderation happens entirely through human beings and posts are shown in chronological order.

In fact it's better that you use the correct spellings for difficult topics so that people with genuine traumas related to them can filter them more easily.

@FediTips And #AudioMo starts tomorrow. So great to have audio in the mix. But definitely understand the topic you’re posting.

Fedi.Tips May 31

Hey, sorry, did you want a shoutout for AudioMo?

@FediTips Oooh hey there. That would be so cool 😎

Orion Ussner kidder May 31

@FediTips I saw an article last year lamenting that "the young people! they're so delicate! they can't say "dead," so they say "unalive"?!" And like, five minutes of research would tell you why, you dolt. Really seemed like it was just a big lie.

Fedi.Tips May 31

Yeah, the article totally misunderstands the situation if that's what they think is going on.

sidereal May 31

@OrionKidder @FediTips lmaooo ugh the takeaway should be "the children are being censored!" not "the children are wrong!"

Frank Casa May 31

It is mostly so they don't get demonetized on YouTube. If they say certain words, they can still post in most cases, they just won't get any ad revenue. Mastodon users, on the other hand, tend to be more delicate, requiring content warnings for a variety of topics, and being quick to block anyone they disagree with.

Edit: This post is providing additional information. The person who I am replying to already knows this information.

Orion Ussner kidder Jun 1

@frank I'm aware. That's why I wrote that post.

Frank Casa Jun 1

@Orion Ussner kidder
I saw an article last year lamenting that "the young people! they're so delicate! they can't say "dead," so they say "unalive"?!" And like, five minutes of research would tell you why, you dolt. Really seemed like it was just a big lie.
I was just adding to what you said above and agreeing with you. Since you did not mention what the five minutes of research would tell people, I spelled it out for them so they would not have to do five minutes of research.

So although you hinted at what I said, you never actually said it.

Orion Ussner kidder Jun 1

@frank You didn't add anything, though. You restated what I already said as if you were informing me. It's a style of post a lot of people do, and it's quite frustrating.

Frank Casa Jun 2

@Orion Ussner kidder I wasn't talking to you. When you hit the reply button, it adds your name automatically. My reply had nothing to do with you whatsoever and I was NOT trying to inform YOU. I was agreeing with you and adding additional information for OTHER PEOPLE. The world does not revolve around you. Stop thinking that everything is about you.

Orion Ussner kidder (@OrionKidder@mas.to)

1.75K Posts, 366 Following, 771 Followers · English prof at FDU Vancouver, specialize in composition and comics scholarship, dad, nerd, writer of SF/F fiction (see me on writing.exchange).

mas.to

Orion Ussner kidder Jun 2

@frank You were literally replying to me. You click "reply" under my post.

You repeated what I said in a tone that implies you were informing me of something I didn't know.

You were being rude. Full stop. I've seen it a hundred times. No amount of "I'm rubber, and you're glue" is going to change that.

And I'm blocking you now. Bye bye.

MostlyTato May 31

@FediTips
I find it somewhat disrespectful when people try to outwit other users' filters by mis-spelling common topics.
People filter things for good reason and its not up to anyone else to determine what someone else should be seeing.
Also, good use of hashtags (accurate, descriptive, but not too many) is really valuable as it allows both follows and blocks so people can curate their timelines properly.

@FediTips @MostlyTato I guess people have to use differnt behaviour when those imposing the filtersnare different to those effected by them.

Fedi.Tips May 31

It's a good point but I don't think most people are doing it to fool human filters?

I think they've just picked up these habits from commercial platforms that use automated moderation that suppresses anything mentioning specific words.

MostlyTato May 31

@FediTips
Maybe. Habits they don't need here though, especially when they do indeed fool human filters.

Baral'heia Stormdancer ΘΔ🐲Jun 1

@FediTips @MostlyTato This, 100%. I was fairly active on Twitter before it sold out, and you *had* to twist your words like that if you didn't want their algorithms limiting your reach, suspending you, or outright banning you. Basically all of the popular commercial platforms are like this nowadays. And once you get used to typing like that it can be hard to break the habit.

TatiMitStift Jun 1

@FediTips @MostlyTato
I recently heard a youtuber saying that you can't swear or show certain things in the first 30 seconds of your video otherwise it gets shadow banned or demonetized (don't remember whch of the two).

Operation: Puppet (he/him)May 31

@FediTips I honestly didn't even know that was a thing. Which means I'm (a) old and (b) spending the majority of my social media time on the Fediverse and I'm not unhappy about either of those things 😁

@FediTips @operationpuppet There are plenty of words / things you cant say / show on youtube.

Fedi.Tips May 31

@abeorch @operationpuppet

Yeah, lots of YouTube videos weirdly fade out the sound or distort it if certain words ("murder", "drugs" etc) are used. They are trying to avoid being demoted by YouTube's algorithm.

Same goes for Instagram, Tiktok, Facebook etc etc.

grassfox86 May 31

@operationpuppet When I was on TikTok it was such a thing. It SUCKS when people use these and even worse when people bring the same language into the real world.

Scott M. Stolz May 31

@Operation: Puppet (he/him) You see a lot of this on YouTube and other video platforms where if you use certain words, advertisers don't want their ads on your video, which demonetized the video. It is also used when someone can't say certain things without having their content flagged for moderation. On these large platforms, you have to tip toe around their rules, or else your channel and entire identity can be deleted, and you can't take your audience with you.

@FediTips considering "seggs" as a filter evasion always makes me pause for a moment since I was frequenting circles that sometimes replaces hard consonants with soft ones because it sounded funny.
For example "Gadse" instead of "Katze" (german for "cat") and I kinda took it for a much more widespread phenomenon than it probably was.

Fedi.Tips May 31

Ah yeah I didn't mean the weird spellings for fun 🙂 Just the ones on serious posts that want to avoid being suppressed.

@FediTips agreeeeee, I mean agreed.

Catherine is not giving up.Jun 1

@FediTips language constantly evolves.
100 years from now how we spoke in the 19th and 20th centuries will be viewed as quaint and antiquated.

Fedi.Tips Jun 1

Slang does constantly change, definitely! 🙂

The post was meant to be about something a bit different through? It's not about slang but phrases that people don't really want to use, but feel forced to use just to avoid being suppressed by automated moderation.

@FediTips @CatDragon Indeed.

@CatDragon @FediTips Sure but having language manipulated by algorithm via both social media and AI prompt writing, that's very Newspeak where you're speaking the language of the robots, not the humans.

@FediTips there is technically an automod, on mastodon at least, which try to look for spam posts from the posts of its home server, and creates a report for a person to look at.
It's so effective it triggered once in the years it's been a thing here.
So yeah, people are the most important factor here. As it should be.

@FediTips And of course, yes you can swear! Don't censor yourself!

I usually add some common typos to my filters when I can.
Essentially its just a word blacklist

@FediTips
Also, you look like less of a dick.

Barry Rowlingson Jun 1

@FediTips it does stop creepybros searching for those keywords, although there's a lot fewer bots after you if you say "bitcoin cryptocurrency" here. let's see...

Pteryx the Puzzle Secretary Jun 2

@FediTips I've taken to capitalizing "The Algorithm" in the sense of the manipulative sorts of algorithms referred to here. After all, people are referring to a very specific phenomenon with a very specific design goal when they say that, and not to algorithms generally, without which computers simply wouldn't function.

Fedi.Tips Jun 2

I think it's useful to treat technical vocab separately in general and technical contexts? Quite often technical terms migrate into a general use with a related but slightly different meaning.

When non-tech people say "algorithm" they almost always mean a manipulative opaque system that messes around with their timeline in unclear ways.

Another example is "computer", which almost always means a laptop or desktop but technically it could mean a phone, watch, microwave etc etc.

Admiral Memo Jun 2

@FediTips The fact that some of the terms have gone from algospeak to full-on slang that people use is interesting, though.

June T. Michael Jun 2

@FediTips Weird spelling or the use of emoji may also impact screenreader use. I haven't tested out myself what "patr€on" sounds like, and while 🍏🍏 may be obvious to (some) sighted users, I'm not sure about anyone else. (Though honestly, it wasn't obvious to me without the context of the post.)

Fedi.Tips Jun 2

@june_thalia_michael

It's a really bad idea to use non-standard characters for stylistic reasons, it does affect screen readers significantly.

I think patr€on would sound like "patr" "euro sign" "on".

June T. Michael Jun 2

@FediTips Yeah. I know about the "please don't use unicode for prettier fonds" thing, but it also affects on the smaller scale.
That's awful. (And really not necessary here, as posts containing the word are not shadowbanned or restricted or anything.)

@june_thalia_michael @FediTips As a screen reader user, the voice I use reads this as "patter-E-yur-on". Any nonstandard character has a 95% chance of either making a screen reader say something weird or making it avoid reading the character entirely. It can read emojis, the one you posted reads as "green apple", but anything that's not a qwerty letter or an emoji is highly likely to break

June T. Michael Jun 4

@Kaliah Thanks for the insight!

@june_thalia_michael @FediTips Of course, I'm happy to clarify.