It might be fiction, but it's definitely "On the money." Hive is the only platform I know of, and I've been on hundreds over the years; that's like that escape scene from The Temple of Doom.
image source
There's no T&C's when you sign up. No warning message that if you break any of the rules, you could find yourself with a lifetime black mark, and nobody will give you a definitive list of these so-called "Rules." anyway so how the hell are you supposed to know if you're doing anything wrong? Why are they not written down? Because a lot of it is made up on the fly as they go along with some of the interpretations of wrongdoing utterly bizarre! But more importantly, if it's not written down, you can't refute it plus, if a group put "Whistling on a Tuesday is not acceptable on Hive!" we'd all laugh our dangly bits off, surely? Whistling on Tuesday
Like you, I too think the only way to make Hive nicer and safer is to build a counterbalance of users, but there are two problems we would need to face up to if ever a project got off the ground.
- 1. It would need to go to war with HiveWatchers literally. Not only would it need to counteract the DV's but possibly make punitive downvotes of its own against HW and a lot of other self-appointed groups out there in an effort to bring a community spirit back on track.
- 2. There is a danger the 'New Group' could turn into what it set itself up to fight. (Shades of Animal Farm)
I spent the last three months initially lurking then contributing on the Discord HW channels in an effort to make it less aggressive; my god, it's like a bear pit on there sometimes and also offer people the most common basic of manners. Giving them a response, a.s.a.p. even if that response was "Look, I've no official capacity but....." that worked out well! Individuals who habitually plead innocence scream they have no official capacity decided they didn't like this new interloper nevermind HW wasn't bothered, had thanked me on numerous occasions for helping people and asked me to help out with reporting stolen funds etc. No, these individuals took it upon themselves to silence me. About the only insult that was missing was "TOXIC!" 🤣 what I found sad was the fact they just couldn't see it; they couldn't see how appalling their behaviour was, probably because they had spent so long bathing in the fake glory of BUSTING WRONDOERS. that they now can't distinguish between being part of the problem in a clumsy attempt at being associated with a poor solution.
Ooh! Sorry about that rant; I'm still pretty angry, TBH.
- A: In the classic UV seeking comment: Great post, love it.
- B: How are you doing, colours? Red
- C: Feel free to tag me in relevant posts.
- E: Surprised at one of your tag choices.