[serious] Off Topic Moderation Input - Part 2

[Wezil]

I was lied to.

[ZEE]

So it isn't just that we are between Civ releases? You mean this place won't be hopping busy when Civ5 comes out? Say it ain't so.

its so. Nothing will change

[Wezil]

There are a huge amount of factors that have caused the decline of Poly.

So it isn't just that we are between Civ releases? You mean this place won't be hopping busy when Civ5 comes out? Say it ain't so.

I've been amused by the tune being whistled by the graveyard.

[MikeH]

Eventis and CG seem to be a dream land lacking any moderation, and yet they aren't exactly successful communities.

Are you equating "successful" with "populous"? You wouldn't say a city had a better community because it was larger. CG is hugely successful as a community. It is a site which exists purely to support it's community. There is no focus on a game or whatever, just a bunch of mostly like minded people many of whom have become firm lifetime friends.

The more poly became similar to them moderation wise, the more it shrunk poster wise.

There are a huge amount of factors that have caused the decline of Poly. The strength of off topic moderation is a trivial factor, if it is even a factor. CFC is massively popular despite having utterly ridiculous moderation standards because it's a really good site.

Let me ask you this, what scenarios do you see as justifying your action?

What I'm mostly doing at the moment is banning spammers, deleting images that break the T&Cs and closing threads that quite obviously need to be closed. If someone was persistently posting porn or something and didn't respond to warnings to stop I'd probably permaban them.

A couple of times when I think people have really been crossing the line in personal attacks I've said something and they've stopped. So far the posters have been pretty good, they haven't given me hard decisions to make.

Some of the other mods have given users temporary bans when they've been drunk and acting like idiots, for their own protection more than anything. I don't tend to get that due to time zones, but I think that's reasonable.

Other than that I think temporary bans just postpone the problem a few days until the poster comes back, so if someone's persistently behaving in an unacceptable way I reckon they should be permabanned (I don't think anyone is anywhere close to that now).

[Theben]

OMFG!!

Free Asher!

[Asher]

Antifascism. But really, what's the difference?



MODERATOR'S NOTE: Asher has been banned for 9 months for speaking ill of Hitler.

[Ben Kenobi]

[action=Ben Kenobi]pushes report button[/action]

Reason: Antisemitism

[Asher]

Despite all the self proclaimed tough guys in the OT, poly advertises itself as a gaming oriented site, and not \b\.

There's plenty of other Poly forums that you can post in if you don't like the OT, you crybaby.

I don't even think Siro is thinking about what he's posting, to be honest.

The whine whine, I want a firm hand to guide the discussion schtick makes no sense. There's already a Civ site with strict, ridiculous moderation. If you want that, go over there. It exists.

Don't ask this site to change to suit your deficiencies, Siro. Not everybody wants to live in a country like Israel, and not everybody wants to post on a site that is moderated like it either. Some of us enjoy living a life where there's not some gun-toting soldier or some power-hungry mod telling us how to behave.

[Nikolai]

I spent a couple of years posting at a site that had more active moderation than what Ming did here. It was a frustrating experience, I was never quite sure what was allowed discussion and what wasn't. It seemed to be what wasn't was whatever was complained about.

JM

If you don't mind me asking, what site was this?

[Ben Kenobi]

Eventis and CG seem to be a dream land lacking any moderation, and yet they aren't exactly successful communities.

Hmm? Eventis was never large, just a place for a few friends to post and hang out. People left when eventis stopped being that friendly community, not because of the moderation.

[Jon Miller]

We, at least I, do ban for some stuff.

Just I don't see the point in arguing about what is and is not trolling or a personal attack. If you outlaw attacks, you just have a bunch of pointless moderation of things that may or may not be a personal attack (generally due to it being reported), because it is a judgement call at some level.

Yeah, you can ban some and not others. But that is a bit arbitrary and pointless too.

I spent a couple of years posting at a site that had more active moderation than what Ming did here. It was a frustrating experience, I was never quite sure what was allowed discussion and what wasn't. It seemed to be what wasn't was whatever was complained about.

JM

[Drake Tungsten]

Despite all the self proclaimed tough guys in the OT, poly advertises itself as a gaming oriented site, and not \b\.

There's plenty of other Poly forums that you can post in if you don't like the OT, you crybaby.

[Sirotnikov]

You've totally misunderstood my post. I don't give a crap if people say **** about me on the internet. I also generally think that people using a message board need to understand the environment and not expect a moderator to hold their hand through passionate debate in case they hear something they don't like.

My point was that it's bad for the forum if all there is on the forum is loads of abuse aimed at one poster, sure. But it's equally bad for the forum if all there is on the forum is loads of abuse aimed at the moderators for what people deem to be bad moderation decisions.

To add to that I guarantee that there is a massive difference in who different posters consider to be the "troublesome" posters. Siding with any faction would be the wrong decision IMO. There's also a huge range of views on what constitutes abuse. Often on a single issue it can just down to what one poster believes.

I don't see how turning an argument between 2 posters into one of those big Apolyton "OMG why was he banned?!" scandals is beneficial for the forum. The argument will usually peter out much faster than a ban scandal. And I really don't think there is a problem on the Off Topic with lots of personal abuse. Banter, arguments, passionate disagreements, personality clashes, ideological differences, yes. Get rid of that there'd be no posts.

I didn't mean to suggest you're afraid of being namecalled. But I was correct that you'd rather not stir up popular backlash. I do think that mod actions should often be taken without fear of popular backlash, if they are consistent with site rules.

"why was he banned" scandals only became popular when bannings became rare, and unusual even for major things. Assuming moderating action was taken in accordance with site rules, and within reason, public backlash goes on only as far as it is allowed to.

Good judgement has its place, and you have to know a short high tone argument from an actual disturbance. I don't question that and call for blind auto-moding.

And yet, some arguments don't settle down as quick as you suggest, and some create more drama and side-taking than is positive, often becoming quite large and becoming prolonged vendettas between posters. I doubt this is good for poly, despite proclamations such as "It's good X has left, he was a dumbass".

Eventis and CG seem to be a dream land lacking any moderation, and yet they aren't exactly successful communities. The more poly became similar to them moderation wise, the more it shrunk poster wise.

Despite all the self proclaimed tough guys in the OT, poly advertises itself as a gaming oriented site, and not \b\. So **** should be moderated, even in the OT, and all passionate arguments, banter and disagreements should be only passionate up to a certain limit.

Let me ask you this, what scenarios do you see as justifying your action?

[ZEE]

You got that right.

I can't wait to see how hopping this place is going to be after the release of Civ5.

nothing will change. CFC will get all the traffic.

[SlowwHand]

OT has nothing to do with Civ. At max, only half of the OT posters even know what Civ is.
That's because they're turd buckets.