Welcome, new trolls! We're pleased as punch to have you aboard, unfortunately as you may have noticed our moderators are unable to give you the moderations you've been working so hard for. Since we can't really do much about people not moderating more, we're going to be giving out more points so that the ones that do can give you the attention you so desperately crave.
Moderators: Starting a little after midnight UTC tonight, everyone will be getting ten points a day instead of five. The threshold for a mod-bomb, however, is going to remain at five. This change is not so you can pursue an agenda against registered users more effectively but so we can collectively handle the rather large uptick in anonymous trolling recently while still being able to have points remaining for upmodding quality comments. This is not an invitation to go wild downmodding; it's helping you to be able to stick to the "concentrate more on upmodding than downmodding" bit of the guidelines.
Also, this is not a heavily thought-out or permanent change. It is a quick, dirty adjustment that will be reviewed, tweaked, and likely changed before year's end. Questions? Comments?
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Foobar Bazbot on Saturday August 26 2017, @02:23AM (2 children)
You know, sometimes I'll run across something on some random website where I feel (rightly or not, Dunning-Kruger being what it is...) that I have something of value to add, and I'll try to post a comment.
If the site demands I create an account in order to post comments, I do not go to the account creation page, to find out if they ask for my real name, or whether they attempt to forbid throwaway emails; I just GTFO and take whatever value I might add with me. My first contact with a site, I'm not typically thinking "I want to be a member, hope they don't demand too much information", but more like "I want to say something, not jump through hoops." So while it's great that our account creation is nonintrusive, it's beside the point.
So I'm telling you that requiring an account has stopped me, and will more than likely stop others, from posting real, good-faith comments. What's worse, I see no reason to think it would prevent spam -- spammers are only too happy to make accounts, in fact we've had several create accounts just so they can post spam in journal entries. It doesn't prevent trolls -- trolls are also happy to make accounts. And since you're not proposing any extra user verification processes or probation periods, spammers and trolls can just keep creating new accounts to get around any bans.
It sure doesn't look like a good idea from here.
(Score: 2) by lentilla on Saturday August 26 2017, @01:13PM (1 child)
Thus we must make it crystal clear, at each anonymous posting, exactly what hoops need to be jumped through. If it's quick, simple and anonymous (throwaway email is allowed, right?) then let's make this known.
Many is the time I have wanted to participate in a discussion (Dunning-Kruger be damned!) and I have baulked at the onerous or opaque requirements. We don't do that here, we just need to advertise that fact a little better.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by urza9814 on Monday August 28 2017, @12:44PM
That's still questionable.
For example, the first time they come, they create some throwaway account, and post their comment. Then a week/month/year later they come back, want to comment again, and...nope, the account handle is already taken. And they don't remember the password. And they don't know which throwaway email address they used, and might not have access to it anymore since that's kinda the point of such accounts. And then they get frustrated and leave. That's happened to me numerous times.