Almost all large, successful social networks have a block function that completely prevents users from interacting with the posts of other users that block them. This is necessary for a variety of reasons - in the same way that we have doors on our houses and restraining orders in the courts, not everyone feels safe talking to everyone else. Hive doesn't have this and I would like to explore the topic here...
I started using social networks in 2006 and they were very basic back then, I don't recall there being any kind of block functions on the first sites I used and it was never a problem for me. The audience there were generally considerate and intelligent, so no problems ever arose. Once Facebook and Twitter took over, that changed drastically.
With the growth of Silicon Valley Web 2 apps, now we had all manner of 'bad actors' seemingly spending countless hours attacking people and doing anything they could to cause disruption. Whether these kinds of attacks are aimed at one person or at an entire movement, they cause problems and plenty of people therefore value the block features of these networks in order to be able to create social spaces that are free from the noise and disruption that can so often be a problem for them.
Initially, I viewed block features as being a problem in that they were likely to generate 'echo chambers' where people only hear the messages that they already agree with and also cause people to avoid facing their own errors by being challenged by others. However, as I have had more experiences and better understood the types of dysfunctions that exist within people, I recognise that the right to freedom of association which many hold so dear is as important as the right to freedom of speech.
Freedom of Association
The Wikipedia definition for 'Freedom of Association' begins:
Freedom of association encompasses both an individual's right to join or leave groups voluntarily, the right of the group to take collective action to pursue the interests of its members, and the right of an association to accept or decline membership based on certain criteria. It can be described as the right of a person coming together with other individuals to collectively express, promote, pursue and/or defend common interests
If we think about this it is apparent that this right is directly connected to Freedom of speech. We can't have freedom of speech if there is a fear that saying certain things will result in being attacked by those involved in the conversation. So if we are going to promote Hive as a freedom of speech network, we also need to think about how to enshrine support for freedom of association.
Freedom of Association on Hive
At present we have limited support for protection of this right on Hive. We can mute accounts, similar to the way that we can mute on Twitter/X, but we cannot currently completely block accounts in similar ways.
This has created a situation where anyone can speak on anyone's threads and the most that people can do to 'protect' their space is to effectively hold a mask over their own eyes to ensure they don't see the posts made by certain people. This is not truly support for freedom of association.
Paradoxically, the ability to block users from your own posts actually supports freedom of speech, despite it also involving blocking the speech of certain people! As has been stated many times, freedom of speech is not also the right to be heard - we all have the right to choose to hear what we want to hear.
Having looked through the tables in the Hive database, I can see that there is already a block table, though as far as I am aware it is so far unused. What if we were to activate this? Has this conversation even been had on Hive before?
Since the nature of the content on the blockchain is public, the most that a block feature could viably do at this point is to prevent people from commenting on threads owned by people who have opted to block them. Arguably, this is a middle ground between the kind of blocking feature that we see on X/Twitter that results in users being completely unable to view the posts/profile of people who have blocked them.. and having no blocking ability at all.
I wonder if adding this feature will be a 'low hanging fruit' improvement to the blockchain that can allay some of the concerns of users of Web 2 networks who like the idea of Hive, but who will not come here due to their concerns about troublesome users who have already hassled them on Web 2. It might not be obvious to many of us, but there are a surprisingly high number of people who get stalked, harassed and abused online to a degree that they simply can't use networks that have no blocking whatsoever.
Your Comments?
What do you think/feel about this? Do you want to see such a feature added to Hive? Do you have any thoughts on the technical feasibility and impact of it? Let us know in the comments!
Wishing you well,
Ura Soul
Read My User Guide for Hive Here
Powerful insights into the Hive blockchain are available at my website, Hive Alive.
Including the only way to track downvotes on Hive - The Untrending report
Would a block stop someone from downvoting? I believe that as long as we have downvotes (although I very rarely use them), a block should not prevent a potential downvote, otherwise it is a potential attack vector: someone blocks everyone except a circle of friends and starts posting sh*t on Hive.
There is no way to stop downvotes without specifically coding that into the blockchain. The block I am talking about wouldn't change the way downvotes work, no.
So the block would be at Hivemind level?
I would imagine the blocking would happen at the same level as muting, which I think is done at the blockchain level, but I'm not 100% sure. The block I am talking about it just stops people from writing comments and nothing else.
I think adding a block option on hive will be great.
I saw a great hiver leave the platform some time ago because her ex-partner won't stop stalking her. If there was a way to keep him off her business may be she would still be here blogging.
Thanks for letting us know, yes, there are a variety of situations where this causes problems in ways that many people don't notice.
I agree with all of your points above. We have something really special with Hive, and the addition of a block feature will become more important as Hive grows. It will also be an important part of attracting others to Hive.
As for the technical feasibility of it? That's well outside of my wheelhouse, but I'm always impressed with what folks are able to develop here, so I'm sure that once the community demands it, someone will be able to make it happen.
Thanks for sharing!
It's an interesting point you bring up. I haven't encountered a situation in which I've felt the need to block someone, except some crazy guy from Texas that would spam everybody's blog with conspiracy theories; can't remember his name.
I feel like mute does a good enough job.
I also think there are other developments that need priority like onboarding, a proper reputation system and analytics.
I've been using X more lately and the larger audience there brings up very different issues to those we find on Hive. There are users make up networks of paid agents carrying out a variety of agendas, plus just a larger array of dysfunctional people. They have both mute and block, so I have been thinking about why/when to mute and why/when to block. There are some people who I don't mind commenting on what I say and seeing what I post, but who I don't want to be seeing in my feed - but there are also people who I don't want to add comments to my posts too because they are of ill intent and they just take up time and distract/disrupt deliberately. Sometimes it's obvious that they are doing this for some political or economic reason and other times it's unclear.. but either way, the block is needed there.
Another category that's obvious on X is the bots that post adverts for various things or the porn accounts that 'follow' and 'comment' from time to time. I just block all of these immediately. Having a block feature is also a way to reduce the requirement for any kind of organised 'policing' via downvotes, since it gives people a way to reject spammers themselves.
Hello @ura-soul I think the block feature should be allowed. I totally understand that Hive wants to offer complete freedom to it's users. I feel that hateful users attacking and stalking others is very dangerous. Hateful and cruel behavior such as being bullied can cause others to become suicidal. This is very dangerous in my opinion. Hive shouldn't be a place that allows this. I think the line needs to be drawn so people can block these kinds of stalkers. It doesn't seem right to allow this kind of behavior to someone that does not want hateful and cruel behavior unloaded onto their mind-brain. I think Hive would be even a better place to offer this block feature. Hive would have more people comeback and rejoin which would be a huge plus for Hive. Have a great week! Barb !BBH !CTP
Thanks for your comment. Previously, the system tried to rely on stakeholders taking police action, but this is unrealistic and unnatural since we need to be empowered ourselves.
You're most welcome @ura-soul and yes police action is unrealistic and unnatural. Yes we should be able to have the choice to block others that are unrulily and cruel. !BBH !CTP
I have long thought we needed a block feature here, but it was my understanding that it would be too difficult to make work on a blockchain (don't ask me how, I am not techie enough to understand the details of it, but someone who knows how to code said so at some point). But for safety reasons, I think it's important. There are stalkers and trolls and the like that people might need to protect themselves from; like, people who have escaped abuse, for example, might never feel safe coming to a public blockchain because their abuser might find them.
Yes, though it's not possible to completely hide someone using a block feature here at the moment because the blockchain will always be public at it's core. However, that could change through the introduction of real privacy onchain through encryption - which I think is also necessary.
Hivewatchers would be the most blocked account 😂
Well, from what I have seen it's pretty common for them to downvote and not even leave an explanation - so maybe not.
Any frontend could add a block function if they wanted to.
Just like any frontend could ignore the 'mute' function if they willed it.
They could, yes, however since we have a mute feature already at the blockchain level and the table already present on the blockchain level for blocking, why not engrain it as default too? If the feature is only at the Dapp level it won't follow you around different Dapps.
The mute feature is not on the blockchain level, it's on the Condenser level.
Adding a block feature to Condenser will only work on frontends that use that code.
My knowledge on this topic is limited so maybe I'm missing something.
There is both a mute and block table in the Hive SQL database. I haven't run any queries to check their contents yet though.
My mute list in peakd seems to be the same mute list as i have in hive.blog.. so i think its likely they are accessing it from the same place.
n.b. this post now correctly refers to my mute list and not my mute lust. thanks auto correction!
If a block feature was implemented, couldn't a hypothetical someone, once so blocked, get around this by creating a new account? Granted, a perfect solution is not likely to be your goal —but have you considered this?
Yes, so the worst that can happen is that someone has to keep blocking the same person via their different accounts. This kind of situation is still better than the status quo.
Fair enough
I think the mute feature is enough.