After all these years I still love that place. Poole should get a medal for standing up so strong for free speech, free thoughts and anonymity. One of the last places on the web where nobody has to filter their thoughts.
Props to Poole for doing what he loves, but I do wonder how much of the nasty misogyny and cultural problems that have infected our industry and hobbies (gaming, anyone?) comes from 4Chan.
None of it comes from 4chan. I dialed into bbs that were that awful in the 80s. A generation of computer dudes who grew up listening to Howard Stern dominated the internet in the 90s. It's baked right into the culture, it's baked right into the real world culture that makes the people who made the old internet culture.
I'm glad people are working to get rid of it now so more people can play. It's good that they're making a lot of noise and shaking up the video games industry, because 40% of their customers are women. It's a shame how little a dent that will make in tech at large.
I just don't remember seeing the hate on slashdot or kuro5hin that we see on reddit today. Then again, I remember being squicked about the way gamers would use the word "raped" to mean "soundly defeated" back in Quake 2. So i guess i cant really pretend the problem is recent.
