Proposal: How to tackle inflammatory posting with a minimally invasive approach

[sanahtlig]

This is not a response to any particular incident, but rather an approach to handling and preventing future incidents.  Technical hurdles may be involved.  I still think it's worth looking into.

Current approach: Suspend/ban the user(s), lock the thread, hide/delete posts

Why this is not ideal: It chills discussion and obstructs the exploration of alternative viewpoints.  It becomes difficult to discuss potentially controversial topics, which are often the most interesting and worthwhile discussions to have.

Proposed approach: Ban the offending individual(s) from posting in that specific thread

Why this is better:

• It punishes those who deserve it and does not affect everyone else (unlike thread locking).
• It removes the offending individual(s) derailing the thread and allows the discussion to continue (as opposed to locking the thread).
• It's a more permanent solution than hiding/deleting posts, which can allow the fight to continue.
• The punishment is lighter than a total suspension so it can be used more liberally.

For these reasons, I think this would be a useful tool in the moderator toolbox.

 

[Yuuko]

But is it possible to ban certain users from specific threads because  ?

[Kurisu-Chan]

4 minutes ago, sanahtlig said:

This is not a response to any particular incident, but rather an approach to handling and preventing future incidents.  Technical hurdles may be involved.  I still think it's worth looking into.

Current approach: Suspend/ban the user(s), lock the thread, hide/delete posts

Why this is not ideal: It chills discussion and obstructs the exploration of alternative viewpoints.  It becomes difficult to discuss potentially controversial topics, which are often the most interesting and worthwhile discussions to have.

Proposed approach: Ban the offending individual(s) from posting in that specific thread

Why this is better:

• It punishes those who deserve it and does not affect everyone else (unlike thread locking).
• It removes the offending individual(s) derailing the thread and allows the discussion to continue (as opposed to locking the thread).
• It's a more permanent solution than hiding/deleting posts, which can allow the fight to continue.
• The punishment is lighter than a total suspension so it can be used more liberally.

For these reasons, I think this would be a useful tool in the moderator toolbox.

 

A troll will simply create more and more account with a dynamic IP, did you think about that? 

[solidbatman]

Trolling within threads here really isn't a big enough of an issue to be worth the trouble of doing this, even if the software had this ability. 

[sanahtlig]

14 minutes ago, Kurisu-Chan said:

A troll will simply create more and more account with a dynamic IP, did you think about that? 

I used the word "troll" in the title, but this is actually an intermediate measure aimed as much at regular users who have occasional difficulties engaging in civilized discussion.

[ExtraMana]

4 minutes ago, solidbatman said:

Trolling within threads here really isn't a big enough of an issue to be worth the trouble of doing this, even if the software had this ability. 

This. No one makes an account in an obscure community to troll the days, it's probably more likely to be a few forum posters in a lousy mood. Never seen anything that bad here.

[Nosebleed]

31 minutes ago, Kiriririri said:

But is it possible to ban certain users from specific threads because  ?

This basically. IPB doesn't have this kind of functionality.

The only thing you can do is restrict a user from posting on the website in its entirety.

[sanahtlig]

4 minutes ago, Nosebleed said:

This basically. IPB doesn't have this kind of functionality.

The only thing you can do is restrict a user from posting on the website in its entirety.

If my proposal is impossible, perhaps moderators could consider suspending the offending users / instigators before locking threads?  I really don't like seeing threads being locked.  Punish the culprits, not the bystanders.

[Nosebleed]

Actually, we rarely suspend people (or at least I don't), I usually just restrict offending users from posting on the forums (unless it's something severe like hate speech), which means their account is still active and they can still view the site, but they can't post in threads for X amount of time.

I don't like locking threads tbh, but leaving all the inflammatory posts up is also not ideal, hence why most of the time the solution is to hide the posts and leave a warning in the thread in hopes of avoiding the discussion to go in that direction again.

Locking to me is a last resource, but I don't know how the other mods feel about it.

I actually don't dislike your proposal, it's just impossible to implement.

[sanahtlig]

19 minutes ago, Nosebleed said:

Actually, we rarely suspend people (or at least I don't), I usually just restrict offending users from posting on the forums (unless it's something severe like hate speech), which means their account is still active and they can still view the site, but they can't post in threads for X amount of time.

What I call "suspension" is what you call "restriction".

[Fiddle]

If your primary concern is the locking of threads, I think all we need to do is topple Führer Adolf Kaguya.

[Nosebleed]

55 minutes ago, sanahtlig said:

What I call "suspension" is what you call "restriction".

Well it's not my fault they mean different things

There is one other option though, and one we never use, which is put a user in the moderator queue. Essentially, any post the user makes will go on a queue that needs to be manually approved by one of us. We never make use of this feature because it just seems too convoluted for the tasks at hand, but it could be an alternative venue I guess. But I don't see how it could really improve things versus what we already do.

[sanahtlig]

10 minutes ago, Nosebleed said:

Essentially, any post the user makes will go on a queue that needs to be manually approved by one of us.

Micromanaging users like this doesn't seem like a viable or scalable solution.  It's too much of a burden on the moderators.

[Nosebleed]

33 minutes ago, sanahtlig said:

Micromanaging users like this doesn't seem like a viable or scalable solution.  It's too much of a burden on the moderators.

Exactly why we never use the feature. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
But I figured I'd mention it anyway so you know all the things IPB can do.

[ittaku]

What about when the troll in question was the opening poster?

[Nosebleed]

51 minutes ago, ittaku said:

What about when the troll in question was the opening poster?

We ban them and leave their thread up as a memento, just like Vlad the Impaler left his enemies' heads on a spike, to warn future trolls they're not safe.

[ittaku]

1 minute ago, Nosebleed said:

We ban them and leave their thread up as a memento, just like Vlad the Impaler left his enemies' heads on a spike, to warn future trolls they're not safe.

That question was more directed @sanahtlig to see how it would work with his idea.

[sanahtlig]

1 hour ago, ittaku said:

What about when the troll in question was the opening poster?

Depends on the specific context and if the original topic itself had merit. The OP could certainly be ejected from his own topic if he didn't follow the rules, and the discussion could continue without him.  For example, MangaGamer's forums had a rule against promoting piracy, and I discovered that MangaGamer was funding a well-known eroge piracy site.  That would be grounds for ejecting them from their position of "authority", similar to the OP of a topic.

[ittaku]

38 minutes ago, sanahtlig said:

Depends on the specific context and if the original topic itself had merit. The OP could certainly be ejected from his own topic if he didn't follow the rules, and the discussion could continue without him.  For example, MangaGamer's forums had a rule against promoting piracy, and I discovered that MangaGamer was funding a well-known eroge piracy site.  That would be grounds for ejecting them from their position of "authority", similar to the OP of a topic.

Fair enough. The thread I had in mind as an example, the opening poster (allegedly) ragequit the thread himself so I guess it would have worked there equally well to have banned him from it earlier...

[Narcosis]

IPB can be modded.

I can't see how anything from this couldn't be implemented, but people nowadays are just plain lazy and mostly don't want to be bothered ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ It's true often the most interesting discussions were usually locked in the past; I'm not a fan of that kind of approach, either.

[solidbatman]

1 hour ago, Narcosis said:

IPB can be modded.

I can't see how anything from this couldn't be implemented, but people nowadays are just plain lazy and mostly don't want to be bothered ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ It's true often the most interesting discussions were usually locked in the past; I'm not a fan of that kind of approach, either.

or perhaps, like I said, it simply isn't worth the effort for something we may use once in a blue moon, and those efforts could be better used elsewhere on the site? Its almost like the main staff of the site have other jobs, and are in school or something and don't have time to devote 40 hours a week adding features that will barely see use. 

[Nayleen]

I'm not a big fan of IPB since they don't follow any proper and modern standards (starting with pretty much simple SOLID principles, and ending with basic OOP practices), hence why I won't touch its code with a 50-foot pole.

It doesn't allow extension in any sane way, their hook system is an entirely undocumented mess, and its updater likes to completely overwrite huge parts of the code base in a minor update.

Any changes to moderation should be done with the tools at hand instead of trying to hack the software in unimaginable ways.

[Forgetful Frank]

18 hours ago, Nosebleed said:

We ban them and leave their thread up as a memento, just like Vlad the Impaler left his enemies' heads on a spike, to warn future trolls they're not safe.

This gave me a good chuckle, it was poetically beautiful.