The Troll Experiment
Do unfed trolls revert to human?
Weave lets you speak your mind on anything, but it's aimed at deeper friendships. You start behind an alias to keep everything safe. But how are trolls controlled?
Weave includes three main features to prevent anonymous conversations from turning nasty, especially on controversial topics.
What we're doing
Who you're speaking with—the other people are either your friends or people we think you'll like. Does this eliminate random meanness?
Respect functionality: The only way to see real names is to build mutual respect. Will this goal encourage people to write more respectfully?
Mute functionality: When someone is a jerk, you can stop seeing each other with a click. This feature is temporary the first few times (in case someone is having a bad day).
How it's working
The conversation is starting to take off, so I am still judging. Early indications from users (both Left and Right) are that the conversation is respectful and interesting. Yay!
But that's not the complete answer. Weave has yet to experience real heat. Many posts have friendly topics (like the screenshot below).
The real test is when people start working out their frustrations, like on Facebook or Reddit. Will it:
blow up into a hatefest?
separate the warring sides?
gradually teach people to argue well together again?
prove enjoyable?
What do you expect to happen? If you want to see for yourself, stop by https://hiweave.com/