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[Update 20190127_200249 UTC: corrected number of downmods to qualify for mod bomb from 4 to 5. Clarified that no mod bans have been handed out in a long while. --martyb]
Our primary goal at SoylentNews is to provide a forum for the community; In as much as is reasonably possible, we try to take a hands-off approach.
The infrastructure provides a means by which the community can (among other things) vote on polls, publish journal articles, submit comments, and perform moderations.
There are, however, some things that require an active role by the admins.
One of these is dealing with moderation abuse, something which can come in different forms. See the FAQ for some background. Addressed there are "mod bombs" and "spam mods". A mod bomb is deemed to have happened when one user (user1) has performed 4 5 or more downmods against comments by another user (user2). Upon review, if a mod bomb has been found to occur, then the moderator (user1) gets a 1-month mod ban on the first occasion; 6 months on the second and subsequent times. Mod bans have not been issued in a LONG while; extra mods are reversed.
Sockpuppets: And now we come to the focus of this article: there is another form of moderation abuse: sockpuppet accounts. Wikipedia has a suitable description:
A sockpuppet is an online identity used for purposes of deception. The term, a reference to the manipulation of a simple hand puppet made from a sock, originally referred to a false identity assumed by a member of an Internet community who spoke to, or about, themselves while pretending to be another person.[1]
The term now includes other misleading uses of online identities, such as those created to praise, defend or support a person or organization,[2] to manipulate public opinion,[3] or to circumvent a suspension or ban from a website. A significant difference between the use of a pseudonym[4] and the creation of a sockpuppet is that the sockpuppet poses as an independent third-party unaffiliated with the puppeteer. Sockpuppets are unwelcome in many online communities and may be blocked.
Right here I'll admit that I was sorely tempted to take unilateral action. Name names. Apply mod bans. And... you get the idea. Instead, I'm trying to take the high road. So, instead, I chose to present what I found to the community, solicit input, and then see what, if anything, needs to be done.
There may well be other cases, but the one I have discovered shows this history of upmods. Out of the 100 most recent moderations performed by "user1", 80 of those have been upmods of the same user "user2". And of these, there have been 10 upmods on January 21, 10 more on January 22, and yet 10 more on January 23. (For those keeping score that is 30 points in 3 days).
I cannot imagine in any way that 30 upmods in three days by "user1" on "user2" is reasonable or desirable.
This would be purely academic except that comment moderation affects a user's karma. All registered users start with a karma of 0. Submitting a story that is accepted on the site earns 3 points. Each upmod to a comment of yours earns a point. Similarly, each downmod deducts a point from your karma. Get enough karma and when posting a comment you can give it extra visibility so that it starts at a score of 2 instead of at 1. (Comments posted anonymously or by ACs start at 0.) Get a low enough karma and you earn a "timeout" against posting comments for a month.
Inasmuch as "user1" was able to perform 80 upmods of "user2" in 19 days ("user2" had hovered near the karma cap of 50 when this all started), that means that "user2" received approximately 80 downmods from the community. Excluding the actions of our sockpuppet ("user1"), "user2" should have been in negative karma and thus in a month-long "timeout".
What I see is that the community has spoken (the comments posted by "user2" are not of the kind the community wants to see on the site) and that has been intentionally countered by the sockpuppet activity of "user1".
Rather than the admins taking a unilateral action, I am asking the community what should be done in this case (and any others like it that may come up)?
I offer a proposal that is analogous to our handling of a "mod bomb."
What is a mod bomb? Four (4) or more downmods in 24 hours by "user1" against comments posted by "user2". qualifies as a mod bomb and earns "user1" a 1-month moderation ban (initially; subsequent mod bombs earn a 6-month mod ban) It's been a long time since mod bans have been issued..
Proposed: Four (4) or more upmods in 24 hours should also be considered a mod bomb (sock bomb?) and should receive the same treatment.
The point of moderation is not to bestow karma points, it is to help improve the visibility of well-written comments and reduce the visibility of the lesser ones. The karma is simply an incentive to actually perform the moderations.
I've toyed with various values for number of upmods per unit of time (4 per day? 20 per week?) I keep coming back to the same metric we use for our existing "mod bomb" definition: 4 down mods in one 24-hour span that commences when mod points are handed out at 00:10 UTC.
So, now it's your turn. I'd appreciate your feedback and thoughts on this. If we should choose to implement it, it would probably have a soft launch with any "violations" being met with a warning.
Ultimately, it's your site. How do you want us to deal with sockpuppets?
(Score: -1, Spam) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 25 2019, @04:26PM
Hey, you're right, AC doesn't need to login!
OVERSOCIALIZATION
24. Psychologists use the term “socialization” to designate
the process by which children are trained to think
and act as society demands. A person is said to be well
socialized if he believes in and obeys the moral code of
his society and fits in well as a functioning part of that
society. It may seem senseless to say that many leftists are
over-socialized, since the leftist is perceived as a rebel. Nevertheless,
the position can be defended. Many leftists are
not such rebels as they seem.
25. The moral code of our society is so demanding that
no one can think, feel and act in a completely moral way.
For example, we are not supposed to hate anyone, yet
almost everyone hates somebody at some time or other,
whether he admits it to himself or not. Some people are
so highly socialized that the attempt to think, feel and
act morally imposes a severe burden on them. In order
to avoid feelings of guilt, they continually have to deceive
themselves about their own motives and find moral explanations
for feelings and actions that in reality have a
nonmoral origin. We use the term “oversocialized” to describe
such people. [2]
26. Oversocialization can lead to low self-esteem, a
sense of powerlessness, defeatism, guilt, etc. One of the
most important means by which our society socializes
children is by making them feel ashamed of behavior or
speech that is contrary to society’s expectations. If this is
overdone, or if a particular child is especially susceptible
to such feelings, he ends by feeling ashamed of HIMSELF.
Moreover the thought and the behavior of the oversocialized
person are more restricted by society’s expectations
than are those of the lightly socialized person. The majority
of people engage in a significant amount of naughty
behavior. They lie, they commit petty thefts, they break
traffic laws, they goof off at work, they hate someone, they
say spiteful things or they use some underhanded trick to
get ahead of the other guy. The oversocialized person cannot
do these things, or if he does do them he generates
in himself a sense of shame and self-hatred. The oversocialized
person cannot even experience, without guilt,
thoughts or feelings that are contrary to the accepted morality;
he cannot think “unclean” thoughts. And socialization
is not just a matter of morality; we are socialized to
conform to many norms of behavior that do not fall under
the heading of morality. Thus the oversocialized person is
kept on a psychological leash and spends his life running
on rails that society has laid down for him. In many oversocialized
people this results in a sense of constraint and
powerlessness that can be a severe hardship. We suggest
that oversocialization is among the more serious cruelties
that human being inflict on one another.
27. We argue that a very important and influential segment
of the modern left is oversocialized and that their
oversocialization is of great importance in determining
the direction of modern leftism. Leftists of the oversocialized
type tend to be intellectuals or members of the
upper-middle class. Notice that university intellectuals [3]
constitute the most highly socialized segment of our society
and also the most leftwing segment.
28. The leftist of the oversocialized type tries to get off
his psychological leash and assert his autonomy by rebelling.
But usually he is not strong enough to rebel against
the most basic values of society. Generally speaking, the
goals of today’s leftists are NOT in conflict with the accepted
morality. On the contrary, the left takes an accepted
moral principle, adopts it as its own, and then accuses
mainstream society of violating that principle. Examples:
racial equality, equality of the sexes, helping poor people,
peace as opposed to war, nonviolence generally, freedom
of expression, kindness to animals. More fundamentally,
the duty of the individual to serve society and the duty
of society to take care of the individual. All these have
been deeply rooted values of our society (or at least of its
middle and upper classes [4] for a long time. These values
are explicitly or implicitly expressed or presupposed
in most of the material presented to us by the mainstream
communications media and the educational system. Lef3
tists, especially those of the oversocialized type, usually
do not rebel against these principles but justify their hostility
to society by claiming (with some degree of truth)
that society is not living up to these principles.
29. Here is an illustration of the way in which the oversocialized
leftist shows his real attachment to the conventional
attitudes of our society while pretending to be in
rebellion aginst it. Many leftists push for affirmative action,
for moving black people into high-prestige jobs, for
improved education in black schools and more money for
such schools; the way of life of the black “underclass” they
regard as a social disgrace. They want to integrate the
black man into the system, make him a business executive,
a lawyer, a scientist just like upper-middle-class white
people. The leftists will reply that the last thing they want
is to make the black man into a copy of the white man; instead,
they want to preserve African American culture. But
in what does this preservation of African American culture
consist? It can hardly consist in anything more than eating
black-style food, listening to black-style music, wearing
black-style clothing and going to a black-style church
or mosque. In other words, it can express itself only in superficial
matters. In all ESSENTIAL respects most leftists
of the oversocialized type want to make the black man
conform to white, middle-class ideals. They want to make
him study technical subjects, become an executive or a
scientist, spend his life climbing the status ladder to prove
that black people are as good as white. They want to make
black fathers “responsible,” they want black gangs to become
nonviolent, etc. But these are exactly the values of
the industrial- technological system. The system couldn’t
care less what kind of music a man listens to, what kind
of clothes he wears or what religion he believes in as long
as he studies in school, holds a respectable job, climbs the
status ladder, is a “responsible” parent, is nonviolent and
so forth. In effect, however much he may deny it, the oversocialized
leftist wants to integrate the black man into the
system and make him adopt its values.
30. We certainly do not claim that leftists, even of the
oversocialized type, NEVER rebel against the fundamental
values of our society. Clearly they sometimes do. Some
oversocialized leftists have gone so far as to rebel against
one of modern society’s most important principles by engaging
in physical violence. By their own account, violence
is for them a form of “liberation.” In other words,
by committing violence they break through the psychological
restraints that have been trained into them. Because
they are oversocialized these restraints have been more
confining for them than for others; hence their need to
break free of them. But they usually justify their rebellion
in terms of mainstream values. If they engage in violence
they claim to be fighting against racism or the like.
31. We realize that many objections could be raised to
the foregoing thumbnail sketch of leftist psychology. The
real situation is complex, and anything like a complete
description of it would take several volumes even if the
necessary data were available. We claim only to have indicated
very roughly the two most important tendencies
in the psychology of modern leftism.
32. The problems of the leftist are indicative of the problems
of our society as a whole. Low self-esteem, depressive
tendencies and defeatism are not restricted to the left.
Though they are especially noticeable in the left, they are
widespread in our society. And today’s society tries to socialize
us to a greater extent than any previous society. We
are even told by experts how to eat, how to exercise, how
to make love, how to raise our kids and so forth.