I went thru the profiles of 10 different users whose comments were on top of the most popular subreddits and none of them seemed like bot profiles. I’m quite confident in my original statement.

I don’t think that being incorrect about something is bad in itself as long as one is not intentionally spreading disinformation. If one is confidently incorrect then they’re probably going to get a reply from someone else who is confidently correct. I’m not so much imagining a tool like this to create a social media experience free of mis- and disinformation but rather just make it a nicer place for people to be while at the same time encouragining reasonability and intellectual honesty.

I get that people don’t like Reddit but to claim it’s “mostly bots” is almost certainly false.

I’ve often thought about how social media might change if we had a fair way to rank users based on the quality of the content they post - perhaps with the help of a benign and truly competent AI for example. This AI could analyze everyone’s post history to assess how they engage with others. People who are intellectually honest and participate in good faith would be ranked higher, while those making broad generalizations, demonizing others, being mean, or just low-effort shitposting would rank lower.

If enough people fed up with online toxicity enabled such a filter, the most toxic users would suddenly find themselves shouting into the void. This would discourage toxic behavior and encourage users to put more thought and effort into their contributions. Unlike the current system, where saying popular things can easily rack up upvotes, this tool would hold people accountable for the actual quality of their engagement.

Ideally, everyone should be faced with information every day that they feel is a little uncomfortable and goes against their prior beliefs but also realise is probably true.