Tell HN: t.co is adding a five-second delay to some domains

>>xslowz+(OP)
I think that HN itself also shadow flags submissions from a list of domains it doesn't like.

Try submitting a URL from the following domains, and it will be automatically flagged (but you can't see it's flagged unless you log out):

  - archive.is
  - watcher.guru
  - stacker.news
  - zerohedge.com
  - freebeacon.com
  - thefederalist.com
  - breitbart.com

>>mutant+l1
Well, yes, many sites are banned on HN. Others are penalized (see e.g. https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...). None of this is secret, though we don't publish the lists themselves.

Edit: about 67k sites are banned on HN. Here's a random selection of 10 of them:

  vodlockertv.com
  biggboss.org
  infoocode.com
  newyorkpersonalinjuryattorneyblog.com
  moringajuice.wordpress.com
  surrogacymumbai.com
  maximizedlivingdrlabrecque.com
  radio.com
  gossipcare.com
  tecteem.com

>>dang+p1
Do you have get-out-of-jail or N-strikes-and-you're-out policies? What if someone's legitimate website gets caught in this? I've also long wondered about user specific shadow bans. Can you please shed light on this?

>>bravog+zE1
There's no automatic unban. That would require writing code that knows how to tell a good (for HN) site apart from a bad one, and if we could write such code, we wouldn't need to keep a list of banned sites in the first place. However, we're always happy to unban a site when we notice that it's actually fine for HN, or when someone points this out to us.

Re shadowbanning (i.e. banning a user without telling them), see the past explanations at https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que... and let me know if you still have questions. The short version is that when an account has an established history, we tell them we're banning them and why. We only shadowban when it's a spammer or a new account that we have reason to guess is a serial abuser.

>>dang+ZZ1
You forgot to mention that you are also shadowbanning the ability of users to upvote or downvote things when you dislike their upvotes or downvotes—instances that you perceive as not contributing to the discussion or that are escalating the conversation.

>>lossol+V22
I didn't forget to mention that - it's simply not what the word shadowban means, as I've always understood and used it.

This is a big problem with trying to explain these things - people mean very different things by the same words, and it leads to misunderstanding.

>>dang+H82
Which other word do you think would be suitable here? In my view, 'shadowban' aligns with the definition in this context, as you aren't notifying people about it (hence 'shadow') and their actions of upvoting or downvoting have no impact (so same as shadowbanning comments or submissions etc).

>>lossol+Wf2
I would call it either a penalty or a loss of voting privileges, depending on the specific case. It's not a ban because the account is not excluded from participating in other ways. In the same way, downweighted or penalized sites aren't the same as banned sites.

>>dang+hT5
Well, it seems wikipedia has different definition than yours, it matches to what I wrote before.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_banning

> Shadow banning, also called stealth banning, hellbanning, ghost banning, and comment ghosting, is the practice of blocking or partially blocking a user or the user's content from some areas of an online community in such a way that the ban is not readily apparent to the user, regardless of whether the action is taken by an individual or an algorithm. For example, shadow-banned comments posted to a blog or media website would be visible to the sender, but not to other users accessing the site.

This part matches shadow banning voting and is basically the same what I wrote in my previous comment just using different words:

> partially blocking a user or the user's content from some areas of an online community in such a way that the ban is not readily apparent to the user

And this part, which contradicts what you wrote in your last comment:

> More recently, the term has come to apply to alternative measures, particularly visibility measures like delisting and downranking.

zlacker