An Explanation for the Attitudes Here?

[Flayer]

5 Scientific Ways the Internet is Dividing Us - Cracked.com

User-Submitted News Sites That Create Thought Bubbles

...There's a scientific name for that, and we've mentioned it before -- the law of group polarization. Research shows that people become more extreme in their beliefs the more time they spend thinking or talking about them -- even if no new information is introduced. Just the act of repeating it makes you angrier. Well, when you get your news from user-submitted news sites, you get that same effect. This is why a conservative one like FreeRepublic.com is still absolutely full of the aforementioned "Obama birth certificate is fake" links, and why the Ron Paul subreddit is full of stories that make it sound like the fringe candidate is on the verge of winning the nomination.

...Again, it was the creation of a zealous opinion on a subject via sheer repetition, with everybody voicing the same opinion over and over, louder and louder. It's yet another type of bubble. An anger bubble. There are so many such sites on the Internet, representing such specific topics and points of view, that everyone can find their own little niche and dig themselves deeper and deeper into the trenches of whatever cause they latch onto. As one Harvard Law professor puts it, without "unanticipated encounters, involving unfamiliar and even irritating topics and points of view," democracy fails. Or at least it gets really annoying.

Discussion Formats That Encourage Us to Be Negative

...When time is short, we only give the negative feedback, because we assume the good ones will keep doing what they're doing if they don't hear otherwise -- this is why you only seem to hear from your boss when you screw up.

The Internet is like that. When you shop, you probably rely on online feedback to avoid a bad purchase. But the feedback skews negative -- people who are satisfied with their purchases usually just go about their lives enjoying their new Flowbee or whatever. They don't think about logging on to Amazon and telling the world about how tight their hair is now. But the people who are dissatisfied -- WATCH OUT. Researchers put it this way: "As online forums become more populated, for example, customers who are more positive and less involved tend to stick to the sidelines, while customers who are more involved and more critical take their place."

So online feedback tends to be either from people who are being negative or from people who are positive and see that other people are trashing the thing they're positive about. Now they have to speak up, just to try to negate the dickishness. One way or the other, the loudest, most negative people dictate the discussion. You've probably also seen this phenomenon in every single political discussion that has ever taken place online.

Take, for example, Facebook groups. We're talking about biased, like-minded people who specifically created their group in order to discuss their agenda. For the sake of argument, let's say the group was "We Want the Tupac Hologram to Make Out With the Freddie Mercury Hologram." So you know that some Tu-Fred love haters are going to make their way into the group and take over the conversation. In fact, researchers found that in a real political Facebook group, 17 percent of the posters were opposed to the very group they were participating in. They're just there to start shit, because they just couldn't leave it alone.

The Divisive Gap Between Internet Users and Everyone Else

Of course, we've been spending this whole article talking about all of the different opinions you find on the Internet, completely ignoring the fact that the Internet is not, in fact, the world. Two Internet users arguing over taxes or health care are, in the grand scheme of things, the equivalent of two rich dudes at a country club arguing over yacht brands. The digital divide is what they call the gap between Internet users (hi!) and non-Internet users (um ... hi?).

...No matter how open-minded you are, the sheer fact that you're able to read this means you're already in a bubble.

And if this is "tl;dr" to you, bear in mind that it's from one of the top comedy sites on the Internet and that more than 500,000 people had the time to take a look at it, so it's probably your problem, not theirs.

Edited June 10, 2012 by Flayer

[The Archer]

"As online forums become more populated, for example, customers who are more positive and less involved tend to stick to the sidelines, while customers who are more involved and more critical take their place."

So online feedback tends to be either from people who are being negative or from people who are positive and see that other people are trashing the thing they're positive about.

Now they have to speak up, just to try to negate the dickishness. One way or the other, the loudest, most negative people dictate the discussion.

This explains a lot of what goes on in D&N. Thank you. Flayer.

[Chewbacca]

Ah, yes, Cracked. Nice one, Flayer.

[Crash Diet]

tl;dr

[Rustycage]

What a valuable scientific analysis. For the next article, I hope they explain why kids hate vegetables.

[Flayer]

What a valuable scientific analysis. For the next article, I hope they explain why kids hate vegetables.

You can do it, funnyman.

Write for Cracked

Edited June 10, 2012 by Flayer

[Guest Broskirose]

Ban OP

[Kill Devil Hill]

Another thread about the users here instead of the band!

[AxlRose14]

Damn Flayer, been that long since ya been laid huh?

[Cosmo]

Nice post, Flayer! Just doesn't belong in the general discussion forum but still... fits like a glove!! :xmasssanta:

[Flayer]

Ban OP

[saber_]

Basically, this place is like a star wars message board.

[The Archer]

Basically, this place is like a star wars message board.

Who's Darth Vader?

[stumbleine]

interesting.good post.better than quite a few on this forum lately.

we're all fucked.

[Johnny Drama]

What a divisive topic.

[maynard]

it's axl's fault. if we had good things to talk about, the negativity would be much smaller. live shows are only good for the people who actually go to concerts, and i'm sure 90% of those people don't even know mygnrforum.com exists.

[The Linguini Occurrence]

it's axl's fault. if we had good things to talk about, the negativity would be much smaller. live shows are only good for the people who actually go to concerts, and i'm sure 90% of those people don't even know mygnrforum.com exists.

GNR getting inducted into the HOF was a good thing to talk about, and the negativity here was enormous.

[bran]

the reason for the attitudes is simple you have a large group of the forum that wants nothing but to see the original band get back together. then at the same time you have a large group of people who like the new band and have moved on from a reunion. and these 2 sides dig at eachother constantly and there are those on both sides who do it on purpose to start shit.

[Rustycage]

the reason for the attitudes is simple you have a large group of the forum that wants nothing but to see the original band get back together. then at the same time you have a large group of people who like the new band and have moved on from a reunion. and these 2 sides dig at eachother constantly and there are those on both sides who do it on purpose to start shit.

Yea, that sounded objective. When what were "New-GNR" fans were disappointed with the album and became more negative in response, does that make them reunion guys or those who moved on? It's in your mind.

[The_Universal_Sigh]

If we had more to talk about there'd be less arguments. Boredom and lack of conversation breeds arguments to supplement actual discussion.

There's only so much you can discuss each show when they're all the same and nothing else happens before you start arguing about Dj Ashba, a new album, Slash, etc etc etc.