Gooey Posted March 25, 2002 Share Posted March 25, 2002 Phew! just read all these posts. It seems that a lot of people are serious about making Neowin better - which is good to see. If the Mods are having a hard time keeping up to date then would adding a few more actually help, or would it be a short term solution that requires reviewing in a month or so because even more people have joined? Yet if a warning system were to be used, to keep it as fair as possible, I think that no action should be taken until at least two mods have agreed on the situation - but this is obviously more work :( Maybe we just need to use the "Report this post to moderator" option more often, or have sub-moderators that have no power as such but are able to report posts. This way the task of keeping an eye on things is spread around, but without loads of people banning people left right and centre. :cheeky: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glowstick Posted March 25, 2002 Share Posted March 25, 2002 It's also possible the way around. Reminds me to the 20-DVD-on-a-CDR thread. I tried to straight the stuff out with facts, and the guy who doesn't have any clue about compression kept telling me I'm an idiot. (Which amused me tho) Balancing the rules and executing them is hard. You could screw up more than fixing it. Esp when it resorts into recursive treatenings a la "You banned him? Then I'll go with him" + "When he goes, I go too!" + "Same for me!" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Malechai Veteran Posted March 25, 2002 Veteran Share Posted March 25, 2002 Originally posted by Tom Servo Sometimes people try to trigger flaming. Even if it's unintentional. E.g. the usual Starwars postings here. - "w00t! there are new pictures of the EP2 set! cool! have a look, URL" - "star wars sucks, so does star trek! why did you even post it?" Something like that which happened multiple times here. If I were at the place of the thread starter, I would like reply in some harsh words which would however give me the ban. So it's all a circle. I reduced my posts anyway, so I hope I don't get affected by any changes. This is exactly what I don't understand or even why it happens. Using your example above, obviously the second person was at first stating their opinion, which they're entitled to. The second half of their comment is flamebait, I agree. But why let it burn you? Why reply with harsh words? Why is it impossible to either simply ignore it or reply with "Because I like Star Wars?" instead of flaming back? Its this kind of thing that is causing all of this in the first place. Instead of letting someone egg you on and you take the bait, just ignore the flamebait or reply in a calm, non-confrontational matter. I'm capable of this. I know others of you are capable of this because I've seen it, so I'm confident you're all capable of this. If everyone practiced some self restraint and none of us fed the trolls, this whole issue and thread wouldn't exist. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steven P. Administrators Posted March 25, 2002 Author Administrators Share Posted March 25, 2002 Yep I think if I just scale the post down a bit that I can agree with some people needing thicker skin. I mean if someone like Tom Servo outlines a reply or thread explaining close to detail his points I can only respect the man. Someone who replies: j00 is stoopid! and disregards Toms facts is immediately ignored (by me) but some reply to this person as if trying to talk sense to someone incapable of posting anything meaningful (on that thread at least). I dont think Neowin has a problem with flaming. I think we have a very opinionated discussion because of the sheer numbers. People who reply with some lamer comment are showing this community what they are (not) capable of IMHO. I also believe that some people are scared.. scared that the community or forums are out or beyond their control. We were small, now we are big (or bigger). A "normal" member would now find it difficult to keep track of most threads as they scroll off within a day. That also contributes to the personal qualities of any site. I am for reviewing the moderator status amd timdorr had a good one with the memberstatus hack (that we could possibly install for admin/mod viewing only) I am not happy about marking people so that people unaware of the persons wrong doing can take a poke at someone simply for their status. The Internet is many things, what it is not -is personal Can Neowin overcome 1000's of users all hiding behind a digital identity, can we all get along on this basis? I think we can. We have proven that this community has no place for people that attempt to disrupt it. Thanks everyone for your input. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TimeRider Posted March 25, 2002 Share Posted March 25, 2002 *chuckle* Allow me to apologize for my verbosity. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PabUK Veteran Posted March 25, 2002 Veteran Share Posted March 25, 2002 I am for reviewing the moderator status amd timdorr had a good one with the memberstatus hack (that we could possibly install for admin/mod viewing only) Wasn't that directly related to the thing I suggested over the last few pages??? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steven P. Administrators Posted March 25, 2002 Author Administrators Share Posted March 25, 2002 TimeRider: no need ;) :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Dorr Veteran Posted March 25, 2002 Veteran Share Posted March 25, 2002 Originally posted by PabUK Wasn't that directly related to the thing I suggested over the last few pages??? Yeah, I just found the vBulletin iteration (sorta) However, I like yours and I might patch it into some of my phpbb2 sites, so thanks for the link! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glowstick Posted March 25, 2002 Share Posted March 25, 2002 I mean if someone like Tom Servo outlines a reply or thread explaining close to detail his points I can only respect the man. Someone who replies: j00 is stoopid! and disregards Toms facts is immediately ignored (by me) but some reply to this person as if trying to talk sense to someone incapable of posting anything meaningful (on that thread at least). My experience is that a part of the readers will then also think "i iz stoopid!" then. Not that I would care anymore (yes i became more ignorant), but expand that on flame wars, you'll get sort of 'factions' (dont find better word to describe). People would start to flame each other due to a previous flamewar etc etc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
superbeast Posted March 26, 2002 Share Posted March 26, 2002 Tightning the rules would be merely result in more work for the mods. I propose a 3 tier moderation system, as follows; 1.) Anyone who is flamed within a thread can and should bring it to the attention of the mod for whichever forum section they are in. 2.) Anyone who starts a thread should follow it and watch for any flaming. Which should be reported to the section moderator. 3.) Any section moderator that sees flaming or discovers flaming through whatever means should take appropriate action, as designated by NeoWin forum rules. For this to work flaming would have to be defined by NeoWin within its posted rules. This way the responsibility to keep these forums moderated is spread around, ensuring that those who would flame know they will be wasting their own time. A wall of shame sounds nice, but won't really work. (I would like to see one, but that doesn't mean its a good idea...) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cheekymonkey Posted March 26, 2002 Share Posted March 26, 2002 Here's my thoughts: I honestly don't think that vastly increasing the number of mods is a good idea.... the team put together by Neobond and Redmak largely works well cos it's a tight unit with a common sense of purpose and - on the whole - the same way of handling things. Expanding this team could, and I stress, could - lead to a dilution of the overall way in which things are handled and reponses made: More mods = more opinions = a *possible* lack of clarity. The proposed card system would be excellent, and hopefully get it across to newer Neowinians / flamers that certain behavours are unacceptable, hopefully leading to people moderating themselves once they realise that others aren't going to rise to them and that their posts will be deleted and them barred. What I would not like to see is a situation whereby flamers and trolls realise that they are being noticed and push things further still to get a reaction. I remember a rather sad and overweight individual doing just this a month or so ago (he shall remain nameless here). I think that all the helpful posters in this forum have to step up and be counted wherever possible by posting to help people out with their questions, and give the high standard of advice that made these boards such a pleasure to read and contribute to. Unfortunately, at much pains to myself I have come to realise that the larger this community gets, the more *undesirables* we are going to get on these boards. I just hope that rather quickly the wheat gets separated from the chaff, the **** sinks and the cream rises to the top. Just my thoughts people. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bunnios Posted March 26, 2002 Share Posted March 26, 2002 I honestly don't think that vastly increasing the number of mods is a good idea.... the team put together by Neobond and Redmak largely works well cos it's a tight unit with a common sense of purpose and - on the whole - the same way of handling things couldnt agree more i agree with the "one strike and you are out" system largely ... some people just dont learn...., personally i dont post very often but tend to hover around reading ... but i have noticed more flames, most were pointless.. peeps just need to learn to argue in a civil manner ... but unfortunately thats not gonna happen... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tesseract Posted March 26, 2002 Share Posted March 26, 2002 Originally posted by cheekymonkey Here's my thoughts: I honestly don't think that vastly increasing the number of mods is a good idea.... the team put together by Neobond and Redmak largely works well cos it's a tight unit with a common sense of purpose and - on the whole - the same way of handling things. Expanding this team could, and I stress, could - lead to a dilution of the overall way in which things are handled and reponses made: More mods = more opinions = a *possible* lack of clarity. The proposed card system would be excellent, and hopefully get it across to newer Neowinians / flamers that certain behavours are unacceptable, hopefully leading to people moderating themselves once they realise that others aren't going to rise to them and that their posts will be deleted and them barred. What I would not like to see is a situation whereby flamers and trolls realise that they are being noticed and push things further still to get a reaction. I remember a rather sad and overweight individual doing just this a month or so ago (he shall remain nameless here). I think that all the helpful posters in this forum have to step up and be counted wherever possible by posting to help people out with their questions, and give the high standard of advice that made these boards such a pleasure to read and contribute to. Unfortunately, at much pains to myself I have come to realise that the larger this community gets, the more *undesirables* we are going to get on these boards. I just hope that rather quickly the wheat gets separated from the chaff, the **** sinks and the cream rises to the top. Just my thoughts people. Exactly. I just want to expand on your first point: the more mods, the more opinions (as you said). You said that it is possible; it is PROBABLE AND LIKELY that as the number of mods increases, the opinions diverge and the mod's points of view become more diverged as a result. Let's say that mod "a" has one opinion, we will call "A." Let's go on to say that mod "b" has opinion "B." We will say that the opinions between one mod and the other differ slightly. This means that as the number of mods increases (lets say that we add 5 more mods: c, d, e, f, and g), the number of opinions increase (C, D, E, F, and G). The difference between the opinion of mod "a" and mod "b" may differ slightly, but as we apply the rule that the opinion between one mod and the other may differ slightly to all of the mods, the cumulative difference of opinion between mods "a" and "g" would therefore be large. This would lead to a conflict of opinion, which would not be good and would create more problems that it would solve. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dARKSTAr Posted March 26, 2002 Share Posted March 26, 2002 codyg11...i understand your points and they make good sense. however, it's become obvious that Neowin has grown to the state where it is nearly unmanageable for the mods. Not they don't do a great job, but read Neobond's original post. This site is not his business, it's a hobby and i can see where this site must come to dominate his and the other mods time to the point where no matter how much they love it, it's a cumbersome burden. It simply makes sense that they have no choice but to add more moderators. It's just that they have to be careful in who they add, which i'm confident they will do, and i'm sure that they will to an admirable job. On your points about the moderators having differing opinions, well of course they will, which is why i think that offenders to Neowin's rules should go on a list viewable only by the moderators. And if they are going to make decisions about banning an offensive poster that it should be by some sort of majority vote by the moderators so a mod that has a beef with someone couldn't just toss someone out because they disagreed with them on what was a better OS in a thread. Of course, i trust the moderators judgement in this area, as i think we all should. Neowin is a place we come to for one reason. And it's not because of the tech news or the forums or whatever. The reason we come here is because it is a great site run by some great people, plain and simple. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tesseract Posted March 26, 2002 Share Posted March 26, 2002 It simply makes sense that they have no choice but to add more moderators. Yes and no. I think that they should add A FEW moderators, but I think that the members of the Neowin community should help out the existing mods by reporting flaming or spamming posts to moderators. After all, this is OUR community, so shouldn't we all pitch in in order to improve the image of the Neowin community? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MulletRobZ Posted March 26, 2002 Share Posted March 26, 2002 I say that the forums should be more strict, but not TOO strict! Too strict as in that many turn against Neowin.net all of a sudden, which we wouldn't want happening! :) Also, a few more mods could be necessary and I agree with codyg11 about making sure that the other members help us mods and admins out in times of crisis. That way, we can avoid any of these issues. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dARKSTAr Posted March 26, 2002 Share Posted March 26, 2002 Originally posted by codyg11 Yes and no. I think that they should add A FEW moderators, but I think that the members of the Neowin community should help out the existing mods by reporting flaming or spamming posts to moderators. After all, this is OUR community, so shouldn't we all pitch in in order to improve the image of the Neowin community? couldn't agree with you more. and i agree that they shouldn't add too many mods, i made that point in my first post about this matter. and i think from the intelligent responses to this thread that we have many people who are willing to help out in keeping neowin a great place. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flyers Posted March 26, 2002 Share Posted March 26, 2002 Originally posted by codyg11 Yes and no. I think that they should add A FEW moderators, but I think that the members of the Neowin community should help out the existing mods by reporting flaming or spamming posts to moderators. After all, this is OUR community, so shouldn't we all pitch in in order to improve the image of the Neowin community? Yep yep. How about adding prominent reminders in strategic places that it's up to ALL of us to keep it smooth. Those of us who just want to help/learn/get cool themes... need to do our part. How many times have you read a recently posted thread and said to yourselves, "This can't go anywhere good..." ?? That's when to report it and [hopefully] squash that crap before it's really ugly. You suggest undercover mods? We all can be, really. It's OUR community. Let's all try to take a more pro-active approach. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
divinatum Posted March 26, 2002 Share Posted March 26, 2002 Originally posted by codyg11 Well said. The part about the themes being restricted to only a ss and a link is a good idea, but the one problem with that is that would pretty much require more modding since every thread with a theme must be locked. There could be an option that would designate that thread as being theme-releated, and the thread would be automatically locked, but some would not follow. Therefore, mods would have to patrol the themes section all the time just to see if they designate their posts as "theme" posts. there are scripts for vBulletin i belive or it can be made Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Dorr Veteran Posted March 26, 2002 Veteran Share Posted March 26, 2002 You know what would be a good idea and an EASY mod. As I'm typing this, the rules are off-screen, and out of my direct line of vision. Why copy them to be right above this reply box that I'm typing in? Make it more promintent (they really blend in right now) so people think before they post? May not fix everyone's problem, but I'm sure it can do no harm... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PM5K Posted March 26, 2002 Share Posted March 26, 2002 Originally posted by timdorr You know what would be a good idea and an EASY mod. As I'm typing this, the rules are off-screen, and out of my direct line of vision. Why copy them to be right above this reply box that I'm typing in? Make it more promintent (they really blend in right now) so people think before they post? May not fix everyone's problem, but I'm sure it can do no harm... I just wanted to say something quickly: People have common sense, and know what the general rules for forums are, I think more often that not people break the rules on purpose, knowng full well that they shouldn't be doing what they are doing, I'd venture a guess that very few of the people that break the rules do it accidentally. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StimpyX Posted March 26, 2002 Share Posted March 26, 2002 Originally posted by PM5K People have common sense, and know what the general rules for forums are, I think more often that not people break the rules on purpose, knowng full well that they shouldn't be doing what they are doing, I'd venture a guess that very few of the people that break the rules do it accidentally. Quite likely that's true, but the issue of making the rules more prevalent would more appropriately aim to remove the *excuse* of being unaware of them. If they command your attention at some point it's harder to claim ignorance, which people do now I assume with some frequency. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TimeRider Posted March 26, 2002 Share Posted March 26, 2002 Stimpy . . . I don't think it's that people claim ingnorance in as much as they don't feel their comments constitute a "flame." In many circumstances they are probably correct. For example . . . If I were to say: "Geez Stimpy . . . Get a life for crying out loud. We can't post every rule everwhere, the damn page wuld be full of rules and that would look like s**t. Don't be such a Nazi!" Is that a flame? Or how about this . . . "Geez Stimpy . . . Get real for crying out loud. We can't post every rule everwhere, the damn page wuld be full of rules and that would look like crap. Don't be such a facist ":) Or is it this . . . "That's perhaps the most moronic idea that I've ever heard. F***ing idiot." You be the judge! Which are flames and which are not? -TR Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steven P. Administrators Posted March 26, 2002 Author Administrators Share Posted March 26, 2002 TimeRider: I would consider them to be personal attacks (ie: Flames) we dont need that kind of talk here and that is the whole problem. Its the attitude of some people that is the underlying problem and unfortunatly Admin cannot "censor" the bad taste and word choosing of many individuals. I think that we have then proven that Neowin is bigger than its abilities to moderate because the userbase is beyond that of acceptable moderation. (for the nr of mods currently present) The only thing (which seems to be failing) is to call on the "civil and social" good in everyone to respect the fellow posters. I mean a good example is the blatency of some individuals, (that will go un-named) When an admin or mod closes a thread, the person in question immediately starts a new thread deriving from the old topic. does this constitute a ban? should we be harsh in our decisions? I dont know.. all I do know is that we have a small number of people here I would rather see the back of because of their ability to go against the admin/mod decisions making this communities moderation in effect weak to say the least. EDIT: but being an admin I am supposed to be civil all the time which makes bringing my point over very difficult indeed. If you are smart you may know what I am talking about and the actions of some members that are less than complimentary to the admin. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TimeRider Posted March 26, 2002 Share Posted March 26, 2002 I am aware Neobond. . . and please don't misunderstand my examples here merely because they reflect an actual post. I don't think that Stimpy's idea is the answer, but I appreciate the suggestion and it is certainly not beyond consideration. Personally I don't think it would make any difference. But then again my opinion and 50 cents won't get you coffee! I only made those examples to show the subtle distinctions that are made by some, as to what is and what is not a flame. I would really be curious to see what others thought. It seems to me that many of the authors here have addressed that issue . . . What constitutes a flame? From my perspective, the first and third are flames, but the second I don't see as a flame. There is no foul language and the little jab about being a facist is followed by a smilie emoticon, which to me would mean that it was intended to be taken tongue in cheek. I think my point is made however, in that what is or is not a flame can be a matter of interpretation. If I were a mod, and I received a complaint about this response I would react differently to each. To number one I might simply warn the author that his comments are getting a bit too personal and they should be toned down. To number three, I would warn the author that Neowin will not tolerate such posts and additional posts of this nature will result in him or her being banned from Neowin. To number two, I might tell Stimpy not to take things too personally and that the author probably didn't mean anything by it. But in all instances, I'd keep an eye on subsequent posts and perhaps lock the thread if things started to get "randy." JMHO -TR Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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