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This is a topic that comes up all too often in comments, lambasting editors or praising them.
As it stands, editorial is a black box, they accept submissions, fettle them, then they appear as stories. Recently, the Original Submission link appeared on stories so you can see what went in and what appeared out of that black box, yet still the complaints come.
Just how much transparency is necessary? (This is an open question not rhetorical)
I like to believe that SoylentNews is the people that form it as a community, and the editing should reflect that.
Should we adopt some version control for subs so everyone can see who edited what through the pipeline that goes from sub to front page?
Thoughts on a postcard please.
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META: Editorial Transparency - What do you want?
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For recreational use only.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by q.kontinuum on Friday May 29 2015, @04:59AM
First and most of all, thanks to all the editors again for doing the editing in the first place. Since there was a severe shortage of editors some months ago (I don't know the situation right now), we, the readers, should make sure to not complain too easily. Improvement suggestions are always a good idea, and the difference is probably only the tone, but we should treasure the editors we have (and, of course, the other staff behind soylentnews).
That said, one of the improvement-suggestions I made in the past would be a mainly technical one: Could we crowdsource the screening of new submissions? E.g. there could be one article "Submission", new articles are submitted by posting a comment on this everlasting "Submission" article. Users can up- and downmod the initial submission-comment and propose editorial changes by replying to the original submission-comment.
There is a risk that people will start the full discussion already within this "Submission"-Threads, but this might be mitigated by some additional policies:
1. The comments here are not copied to the final article, therefore having less visibility, giving less incentive to post opinions here
2. Since this is editorial work, not the article-discussion, access to this section could be limited (if the codebase is flexible enough to allow such tweaks):
- Only accounts existing for > 3 month can participate in this editorial work, no anonymous users
- Stricter guidelines to mod non-editorial remarks off-topic
- Whole subthread to a submission is archived as tar-archive or moved to scm repository or whatever seems appropriate to satisfy the need for transparency; but it's not as accessible as the finally published story
Of course it would help if we could move modpoints, e.g. if we modded a submission "Interesting" I'd like to remove that rating again and move it to a later comment in the same thread to vote for a better, revised version.
Alternatively we could have an option in our journals to mark entries we would like to see published as stories. Marked stories could be listed in the submission pipeline, users could add editorial comments already. This would be even better if the journal entries could be voted for/moderated as well. For anonymous submissions, some other mechanism would be required.
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 2) by GungnirSniper on Friday May 29 2015, @05:12AM
This crowd-source idea is cool. Let's call it Firehose. :D
Your idea about the journal-to-main-page concept is pretty awesome, but it would likely require some significant backend changes to not overburden the editorial team.
Tips for better submissions to help our site grow. [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by q.kontinuum on Friday May 29 2015, @05:49AM
Yes, probably... Personally I'd prefer the other idea of having a "Submission" story. It inherently supports anonymous submissions, and I would think it's easier to implement. Even without setting special rules for comment section in "Submission" story, it might be helpful as long as the threads are always removed after the actual article was published.
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 29 2015, @05:55AM
q., did you miss the part about "on a postcard"? Brevity is the soul of wit, or so I have been told.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by frojack on Friday May 29 2015, @07:05AM
Wait, we haven't got enough editors, so we are going to all become editors?
We have trouble getting enough stories submitted, so we are going to take submitters and make them editors.
Then we are going to get together and vote stories up and down before the are posted?
And we are going to comment on them, before we comment on them, and pretend we didn't by deleting the comments?
So who is left to read these stories after all that?
You've essentially drafted everyone we have into the editing process? There is nobody left to submit, and nobody left to read!!?
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by q.kontinuum on Friday May 29 2015, @08:07AM
I you over-dramatize. Most people are going to the main-page and will see the regular stories. Those people who already liked to take a peek ahead at the submit list will continue to do that and additionally provide some feedback. I don't think this will stop anyone from submitting more stories or reading the regular stories.
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 2) by FakeBeldin on Friday May 29 2015, @11:34AM
I you over-dramatize.
I you get that a lot.
(Score: 3, Funny) by bzipitidoo on Friday May 29 2015, @12:54PM
Obviously the GP needs an editor.
Wait, maybe s/he is an editor? Who will edit the editors?!
(Score: 2) by q.kontinuum on Friday May 29 2015, @01:42PM
PANIC! DRAMA! We need an enhanced editor-staff to review comments before they go live! Immediately! And I need to take my time to write some journal entry on how to avoid such catastrophes in the future, and to apologize! Thanks for alerting me!
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 3, Insightful) by janrinok on Friday May 29 2015, @09:05AM
There is a possible problem with this approach. Having a relatively small community, it would be very easy for someone (or organisation) to enforce group-think by editing the submissions that they disagree with in to something very different. Some submitters are criticised not for what they have submitted, but because of their views (_gewg), or because they are simply disliked (SlimPickens/HughPickens/papasfritas). Unless a complete audit trail is put in place and effectively policed, it would be impossible to guarantee what the end result would be or identify who was making the changes. Who would police this task? How would they enforce the rules? Would it be a case of the last edit wins? I was recently castigated for putting 'words into the submitter's mouth'. Isn't this proposal simply a formal procedure to do just that? We have insufficient submissions now to justify prioritising which should go out when - if they are acceptable as submissions they have a very high chance of publication.
What is being proposed does not save any effort on the part of the editors, indeed it could well increase their workload as they would have to try to balance every input into a single story. There is no benefit to the editing system that we now have in place. Of course, if you feel that this is the problem then you simply have to say. I will step aside if I am not fulfilling the wishes of the community.
The submissions are meant to be draft summaries of existing factual material and reporting, to which links are provided. They should not contain personal views, a bias or contain speculative material - that is the purpose of the comments after each summary. They should accurately convey the contents of the linked material and that alone, although we do permit a small degree of leeway in this (e.g we allow submitters to pose 'what if' questions etc). Adding additional information below a submission (e.g. additional links, updated material) I can support. Permitting changes to the original submission I cannot.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by q.kontinuum on Friday May 29 2015, @09:58AM
As I mentioned, I'm thankful for the efforts of the editors as it is, without reservations, and I definitely have neither the time nor the ambition to usurp any of you. Also I highly appreciate the quality of articles the way they are now. It was only once that I had a feeling my submission was changed to the worse, and even in that case it was a matter of opinion and for me only a minor issue anyway.
Juggs asked what could be improved in regards to transparency. I took it as an opportunity to bring in an idea I'd consider an improvement, as it would make the process of offering additions to the original submission more transparent. My idea would be that the original submitter gets the karma-bonus and credit, but the editor gets a chance to pick some supplementary links / additional information from the comments. Also, the moderation system would provide some hint if a story is in high demand or probably a troll. I'm not saying the community should get the final decision, just proposals.
If you think this makes the job of the editor harder, don't do it. As I see it, we don't have a problem, so no need to fix it.
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Friday May 29 2015, @10:51AM
I hope that you didn't think that I was suggesting that was your intention - I wasn't. Thanks for your kind words. I will confess that I wish that this entire sequence of events had never occurred (I will have to be more careful with my edits in future).
I was simply intending to give an alternative point of view regarding the possibility of the community taking some role in the editing of stories. While I am pleased to see suggestions that will both enhance the quality of this site and involve the community more, in this instance I feel that the extra editorial workload, additional coding effort and the establishing of the appropriate procedures and controls are not justified by the perceived benefits. That is only my view however - I am not speaking for other editors nor for SN.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 29 2015, @05:03PM
First, janrinok, thanks for all your hard work! In large measure I agree with your concerns about "crowdsourcing" the submissions process. It sounds like a whole lot more work for the editors with benefits that are, at best, doubtful. I think the job of the editors should be to, well, edit submissions. They should clean up grammar, spelling, and edit for brevity and clarity; they should also check all links to make sure they work properly, perhaps even go looking for better links (assuming any exist). The one thing that I think editors do need to improve on is to edit out any cheerleading of the submitter to promote an agenda. I can't tell you how annoying and condescending it is, for example, when the submitter or the editor ask loaded questions that are designed to lead the reader to what is obviously their own preferred conclusion on the story. If the original submitter or the editor want to push an agenda they should do that in the comments like everybody else. In fact I would think that, alone, would go a long way to stifling groupthink on the site. Other than that, I wouldn't really change much else.
(Score: 3, Informative) by janrinok on Friday May 29 2015, @05:58PM
Thank you.
Another part of our job is editing those stories that do contain bias, personal agendas, or are unbalanced or unfair, because they do not comply with the requirements stated in the submission guidelines. We can do this in one of two ways. We can simply reject the submission. While we do not hesitate to do so, it results in even fewer submissions to work with. Or we can edit the existing submission - remove the bias and personal agendas, and ensure that the summary is balanced and fair. We try, wherever possible, to provide links to additional material to do this task for us but, in some cases, such material does not exist or simply cannot be found. We therefore have to adopt a neutral standpoint and try to view the submission from another angle. It is this that has been misconstrued as 'editors pushing their own points of view'. We are simply looking at the problem from a different aspect to provide material that is suitable for release. Otherwise, all the work that has been done is simply wasted effort.
As you are probably aware, all summaries are reviewed by at least 2 different editors during routine operations. Any individual bias introduced by an editor would be detected by another and the summary would not be released. Any editor - no matter how junior or inexperienced - can stop the release of any story to the front page. They are all told to do so if they have any doubts whatsoever about a summary's suitability for release. However, both editors understand that we are often struggling to provide enough stories for the front page and that discarding submissions not only wastes existing material but quickly dissuades others from making their own submissions too. If we can edit a submission to make it acceptable then I feel that we should at least try to do so. Again, I stress, this is not editors trying to force any particular viewpoint but simply trying to ensure that the submissions is edited until it complies with the submission guidelines [soylentnews.org]. Such action is bound to be the polar opposite of any bias shown by the original submitter which is why they tend to get annoyed. The final summary, however, is balanced and neutral.