
Website idea to combat censorship on major platforms - creatorbytes
After seeing many platforms attempt to silence content creators either explicitly, or silently, I grew frustrated that in order to see certain view points on specific subjects, it was enormously difficult to find these creators. Typically its either via word-of-mouth, or some niche forum that mentions where to look. (note this was long before the current pandemic)<p>I wanted to find a site where I could find these lesser known content creators. These platforms paint with a broad brush, and categorize many &#x27;dissidents&#x27; with the same rhetoric.<p>My idea is CreatorBytes.com<p>I&#x27;m still fleshing out the details, but essentially the site will allow content creators to create a page where users can find all of their content linked from a single site. Further, they can notify their users who choose to follow their page, in case the content creator&#x27;s typical communication channel is compromised.<p>Users can find creator&#x27;s library of content, without the chance of the creator being silenced on their other distribution channels.<p>Eventually, with enough creator pages, users can also use the site to discover similar creators.<p>The website aims to serve a few functions:<p>One, as a backup in case the content creator&#x27;s main communication channel goes down. 
Two, as a centralized place for users to find content across a variety of platforms. 
Three, a place for content creators to share their content with a wider audience, and for users to find new content they otherwise couldn&#x27;t see.<p>Further, Creator Bytes is oriented towards privacy, transparency, and value, without compromise.<p>If you&#x27;re interested in learning more, and being notified once the alpha site is active, sign up for an email notification at https:&#x2F;&#x2F;creatorbytes.com&#x2F;alpha<p>If you have any questions, or comments, you can reach me on this thread, or at creatorbytes@protonmail.com<p>I would greatly appreciate any and all feedback from the HN community. Thanks!
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verdverm
This has been heavily debated here. I would encourage you to check out the
search with time filters for recency

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badRNG
There is significant overlap between those who are censored on major platforms
and those who either advocate violence against people, distribute hate speech,
or are otherwise abusive on those platforms.

How would "creatorbytes" respond to a content creator who is interested in
having a platform to advocate for eugenics or genocide? What about a
phrenologist or otherwise "scientific racist?" How about anti-LGBTQ creators?

I'm not saying there has to be an answer for every "what if" question out
there, but the problem of censorship is a hard one, and these questions are
the ones society is currently struggling with. I don't know what kind of
perception you want to foster, but if your site is the known haven of these
sorts of viewpoints, you might run into the same issues that 8chan did:
[https://blog.cloudflare.com/terminating-service-
for-8chan/](https://blog.cloudflare.com/terminating-service-for-8chan/)

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creatorbytes
Those are good points, some solutions that I've seen sites like BitChute use,
or one that Twitter is contemplating, could be a combination of the following:

* Any illegal content would be removed

* Content that is more fringe, can be required to have a flag, where users must opt-in to see such content (bitchute's strategy)

* Non-logged in users by default don't see specific content. But this is made clear to the user, and content creator. Users logged in can elect what level of fringe they would like to see, or not see (sort of like twitter's banned words list concept)

The site would essentially aggregate links, and statistics of the platforms
onto one page. So unlike 8chan, users aren't actually posting content, and I'm
not hosting the creator's content. Maybe a MOTD from the creator, but I think
that's manageable

I would like to hear what you think. It is a hard line to draw, my thinking is
the site would be a sort of meta-site, aggregating the hosting platforms to
one place, thereby removing the burden from creatorbytes. Domains will go
through a manual process as to not be malicious/illegal, and once approved,
are whitelisted.

Edit: All users will be able to see all creator pages, but previews for their
content feed, or links with titles that are too fringe, etc, would have some
sort of filter, and require log in.

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badRNG
I certainly appreciate your principled stance against censorship.

I do have to wonder who this site is for. Who's viewpoint is censored on major
platforms, but is also not "malicious/illegal?" What can a content creator
host on "creatorbytes" that would otherwise be censored by major platforms?

It seems like a lot of platforms have tried to capitalize on providing a space
for users banned from major platforms (Voat, 4chan, 8chan, etc.) and they all
seem to face similar issues, and don't seem to foster any meaningful
discussion that couldn't otherwise exist elsewhere.

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creatorbytes
I'm going for less the egregiously banned crowd, more of the soft-banned
crowd. So creators who are de ranked, shadow banned, or what not, but aren't
removed completely from the platform. That isn't to say all content not on the
platforms are too egregious for the market creatorbytes is going for, but
there are cases where after abuse of YT's copyright strike system, the
creators are off the platform for no fault of their own. Rather the abuse was
from competing creators. Yet they're too small to make a fuss, and largely go
unheard.

Typically I've seen this with conservative views. Though I understand I'll
inherently be attracting more extreme ones as well.

Again I'd try not to foster discussion on the platform, but aggregate links to
other platforms for their discussions to take place, hopefully removing the
liability, at least partially.

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badRNG
>I'm going for less the egregiously banned crowd, more of the soft-banned
crowd. So creators who are de ranked, shadow banned, or what not, but aren't
removed completely from the platform.

I'll admit this is an area that I don't know much about. Are there any
creators you'd currently recommend who have been soft-banned from larger
platforms?

And while I can certainly agree that YT's copyright system needs fixing, that
seems like an issue that can't be fixed here, other than linking to another
site who will have a different mechanism to prevent copyright infringement.

Is this meant to be like a curated list of content that one might not have
seen otherwise?

