Apparently some people mistook Request For Comment to mean the same as it does for Internet RFCs, a settled matter. Not so much in our case; it meant exactly as it said. The proof is in the pudding though. Given the legitimate concerns of gamification of karma scores leading to lower quality comments raised by some users in regards to our RFC: Reworking Karma post, we agree and the idea has been scrapped.
It wasn't a difficult decision and we would have posted this the next day but there were a lot of very interesting ideas in the comments that we decided to work in to another RFC. Keep in mind these won't necessarily all go in at once even if everyone loves them all. Here's the list.
- Karma minimum to downmod
- Downmods cost the moderator karma, except the Spam mod
- Touché gets its missing accent
- Spam mods not to cost mod points but limiting it to 5/day
- The triumphant return of Overrated
- No karma hits for someone moderated Overrated/Underrated
- Require comments to be otherwise moderated before you can Overrated/Underrated them
- Organize moderation drop-down list
- Separate Spam in the drop-down list with a spacer
- Automated mod-bombing detection and manual resolution
- Add an Incorrect moderation that must be accompanied by a correction
Details below the fold.
1) Karma minimum to downmod
We're currently thinking a floor of 10-20 karma on the part of the moderator in order to downmod a comment. This would primarily be to keep puppet accounts that never contribute from being used to downmod people into oblivion.
2) Downmods cost the moderator karma
Combined with the karma minimum, this would be more effective at keeping puppet accounts from being used. It would also hopefully at least make us think before we downmod someone we simply disagree with.
3) Touché gets its missing accent
Okay, so leaving the accent off was me doing a minor bit of dev-trolling. I've gotten my laughs out of it though, so you can have your accent.
4) Spam mods not to cost mod points but limiting it to 5/day
Reasoning behind this is you lot should not be charged for helping us keep the signal to noise ratio high. The per day limit would be to keep someone from writing a script to moderate every bloody comment on the site Spam at once and make us manually de-Spam each and every one.
5) The triumphant return of Overrated
Yeah, removing it did little to nothing as people intent on being asshats just used Flamebait or Troll instead. No point in leaving it gone.
6) No karma hits for someone moderated Overrated/Underrated
Overrated/Underrated are supposed to be there for when you believe a comment is correctly moderated but slightly too far. You're essentially moderating the current moderations, not the comment. Thus, you shouldn't be affecting the user's karma.
7) Require comments to be otherwise moderated before you can Overrated/Underrated them
Since you're really moderating the previous moderations with these two, you they should not be usable unless previous moderations exist.
8) Organize moderation drop-down list
This is actually already done on dev and should not really require comment as it's not a functionality change, just a minor aesthetic one. It's mostly being mentioned because it was asked for.
9) Separate Spam in the drop-down list with a spacer
Ditto #8.
10) Automated mod-bombing detection and manual resolution
Potential mod-bombs are easily detected even in realtime, we just haven't written the code to do so and format a list for staff to keep an eye on yet. Fixing them, that should require human intervention and judgment; if the mods were just, it wasn't a mod-bomb. The main question here: Do you lot want a moderation ban to accompany the undo of the mod bombing?
11) Add an Incorrect moderation that must be accompanied by a correction
Incorrect would be for factually incorrect statements. The first use would only be allowed if you have already posted a correction in reply. Once one correction is posted and the comment is moderated by one person, others may then use this moderation as well. If this makes it in, make sure you actually post a correction with citation. If your "correction" is along the lines of "Ur wrong!" with no citation, I will personally take your birthday away, add four zeroes to your UID, and and change your sig to "I ♥ moose wang!".
So, that's pretty much it. If you've got a beef with or love one or more of them, speak up on which and why. If you don't get specific, folks will just assume you hate all change just because it's change and not lend much weight to your opinion.
Related Stories
Read past the break for more information.
(Score: 4, Touché) by ikanreed on Monday March 02 2015, @09:07PM
Focusing on the lack of negatives is pretty cynical, but I'd like to thank you for dropping the continual karma collection idea.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2015, @09:44PM
Careful.
Ron Swanson won't stand for accent marks if loading the site in the USA.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2015, @11:12PM
Some good ideas are missing, too. Like displaying the username of everybody who modded a comment alongside the moderation they gave it.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by hemocyanin on Monday March 02 2015, @11:50PM
I agree with this even though I'm one of the people prone to use negative mods. All mods are basically AC comments right now, and even though I always read at -1, and so see all AC comments, many people don't because they consider AC a waste of time. If AC comments are such a waste of time, it would also be true that AC comments on comments (AKA moderation) are also a waste of time.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday March 03 2015, @07:08AM
When moderating, I will occasionally mod and AC up. Especially if they make a good point.
If I reply to that AC's comment I'll mod them up, because it it was worth a comment it was by definition interesting.
I'm sure as hell not going to wast any Karma randomly modding ACs down, they got to be egregious for that.
If someone mods an AC down to -1, I've never found a reason to mod and AC up from -1. If they got that low
they probably deserve it.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:42PM
What I'm saying, a moderation is an AC comment in and of itself because the mods' identities are hidden.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:50PM
But it would engender a lot of tit-for-tat, and create more problems than it solves.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by pogostix on Tuesday March 03 2015, @02:18AM
This is a great idea.
One can already see all the mods applied, just add the moderator in another column.
Is there any downside to this?
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @02:27AM
See my reply just below.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @02:26AM
Admins already get this but it's intentionally not given out to users. My personal feelings on the matter are it would only lead to focused butthurt as opposed to unfocused butthurt and would cost the more timid of us the ability to moderate as their conscience dictates. Feel free to make your case for it though, nothing much is absolutely off the table.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday March 03 2015, @07:38AM
I agree, we don't need that.
Either for the Upmods or the Downmods. Nothing good will come of that.
If we needed that, we already have the friend / foe system, which seems uniformly ignored.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Hairyfeet on Tuesday March 03 2015, @04:16AM
I agree this seems to be well thought out, quite logical and well reasoned and seems to address any issues we had with the previous idea, quite well done and I applaud the admins for taking the time to come up with such a measured response system.
The only thing I would add is WRT modbombing? I suppose mod bans (and eventually actual bans) should really be based on whether the person is a repeat offender. Everybody can have a bad day and act like an ass,show me somebody who says they have never had a bad day and acted like a prick because of it and I'll show you a liar so if they are caught modbombing the first time? Just undo the mod and tell them knock that shit off. Its when they go after the same person or persons over. And over. AND OVER. That IMHO it crosses the line from just acting like an ass and starts moving into cyberstalking territory. When that kind of focused hateful behavior starts to be shown that is when increased focus on the modbomber and possible bans need to be brought in. Like I said they do it once? It could be they are having a shitty day and taking it out on others, its not right be were are human and humans sometimes do stupid shit, I bet a good 90% when given "the talk" from an admin about how this will not be tolerated? Will never cross that line again....its that other 10% you really gotta worry about.
So I think this kind of approach, with first offense just being given a talking to and the mods undone? Should be fine for most and a simple script that throws a flag if this person starts going right back at it really shouldn't be too hard to cook up. The key is to insure that we support free speech while accepting folks sometimes fuck up without allowing them to make a habit of it or encouraging cyberstalking, because as we've had sadly too much evidence of lately there are some seriously unbalanced people out there that tend to gravitate to forums and try to "claim" them for their own and the key is to weed them out from the ones just being an ass because their day is a big pile of suck.
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:20AM
Yes, if the id of the moderator were to be, um, exposed, Hairyfeet could no longer maintain that he has stalkers here on Soylent News. I, for one, think it is important to preserve persecution complexes of our members when we can. So keep the modding anonymous. (Wait, the devs know who mods what and how? I am going to have to be more generous, supportive, and loving of our Mighty Buzzard, in that case.)
(Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Tuesday March 03 2015, @06:10AM
WTF are you babbling about? Where did I say anything about modding being exposed or not? Some of your fellow soybeans have stated they don't like the idea as they think it will end up causing rivalries, I've not spend enough time thinking about the issue of modding identity so i don't have an opinion on that.
But if you have an issue of trusting the admins at this site now is the time to say it, since they and not the users will be in control of this system...or do you have a personal beef you'd like to address?
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Tuesday March 03 2015, @06:26AM
I love you, man! It doesn't matter that you are a microserf shill, you just meet me at the level I am on.
(Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Tuesday March 03 2015, @09:55PM
So you subscribe to the George Bush "You buy our bullshit or YOU ARE ONE OF THEM!", nice to know mindless flag waving will never die. Keep sucking down that GNUaid dude, maybe after Red Hat is done making Linux a third class citizen on its own platform you'll wake the fuck up and realize this isn't 1997 anymore. BTW just FYI in case you haven't kept up on current events, Gates and Ballmer are no longer there, the new guy has turned out to be customer focused, and oh yeah....Windows 10 has more users in Alpha than Linux has had in its entire 24 years of existence.
But you keep right on slurping that koolaid, why at this rate by 2034 Linux will overtake Windows XP, so be ready for a Linux Party! [ytmnd.com]
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 2) by Yog-Yogguth on Thursday March 05 2015, @02:06AM
So what you're saying is that you don't support that measure because it seems like it would work? I agree! Not joking :D Too easy for everyone to get trapped into groupthink expectations and keeping scores; to stop moderating content and start moderating people. The less of that the better for all.
Anyway I think Hairyfeet nailed it; all the 11 suggestions seem like very good ones and the punishment for modbombing would ideally have an initial warning pointing out the futility of doing it again.
Bite harder Ouroboros, bite! tails.boum.org/ linux USB CD secure desktop IRC *crypt tor (not endorsements (XKeyScore))
(Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Sunday March 08 2015, @07:39AM
So You also can't read a sentence? Nice to know what kind of brain trust the FOSSie faction has, no wonder Ballmer could shit out Vista and Windows 8 and get more users in an hour than you fools have gotten in 2 decades!
Since you MIGHT be able to differentiate (feel free to look that word up BTW) between light and dark? I'll highlight the relevant (again look it up) part of the conversation for you... Some of your fellow soybeans have stated they don't like the idea as they think it will end up causing rivalries, I've not spend enough time thinking about the issue of modding identity so i don't have an opinion on that.
Now since you may not be able to tell light from dark and you've already demonstrated (again use a diction...better make that Google, you might not know what one of them are) you can't read a sentence allow me to break it down...."Fellow Soybeaners" MEANS OTHER PEOPLE, several on that thread said they didn't like that idea because they think guys like YOU would get all butthurt when somebody smacks you down for saying stupid shit. The second have "I don't have an opinion on that" obviously confuses you, seeing as it has a big word like "opinion" so I'll break it down again...DO NOT GIVE A SHIT EITHER WAY, because as I have said I have not looked into the positives and negatives and given it thought, something you should probably do next time you try writing without reading, don't you think?
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 2) by Yog-Yogguth on Sunday March 08 2015, @08:36AM
If you click the “Parent” link on my comment that you responded to you should see that the comment I replied to isn't yours but aristarchus' comment here [soylentnews.org].
In my comment I made gently fun of aristachus and myself while lauding your comment that he replied to. Other than that I put forward my own opinion on a topic and don't mind that you don't have an opinion on that specific topic at all. In fact I found that stance of yours admirable as well; good thing I didn't add that or you might have had a rage-induced heart attack. Even “worse” (better) I don't even mind that you use Windows (it's got nothing to do with me), and even more “worse” (better) than that (although I'm not going to bother trying to convince you about the following) I doubt anybody else truly does either.
Anyway you don't need to reply to this because only a few days or a week or so ago I managed to write a reply to someone that I afterwards couldn't make sense of in relation to the parent, I instantly assumed I had replied to the wrong parent post but after pointing out my mistake I couldn't even find the comment I thought I had replied to! XD
Bite harder Ouroboros, bite! tails.boum.org/ linux USB CD secure desktop IRC *crypt tor (not endorsements (XKeyScore))
(Score: 2) by Joe Desertrat on Tuesday March 03 2015, @04:48AM
Focusing on the lack of negatives is pretty cynical, but I'd like to thank you for dropping the continual karma collection idea.
I've only downmodded twice that I can recall, and both of those were AC's. If someone puts their name to it I would rather post a counter argument. I think the real issue is small user base. The community is still fairly small, at least from the few common names I see posting. Most of these issues will probably sort themselves out as the user base grows. I may be cynical, but I can't help but feel that the attempts at fixing the moderation system are in part due to the fact that some who continually take unpopular positions don't like the way they get modded.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:01AM
Don't look at me, I take it as a badge of honor when someone is losing an argument badly enough that they resort to moderation rather than reason. It means I win.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1) by said213 on Tuesday March 03 2015, @03:47PM
my first account on the slash site was down modded to hell by people searching through old comments and spending moderation points to drown my karma, rendering the account unusable... has there been any consideration given toward limiting the length of time moderation is possible?
all apologies if this comment is redundant... i'm very much new here. =)
18 years later.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:03PM
Already done. I think it's set to two weeks but I wouldn't swear it's not shorter.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:03AM
Somebody here should never fear getting censored merely for expressing an opinion that others may find "unpopular". That's what can really set this site apart from others, especially Hacker News and Reddit. Hacker News and Reddit suffer from extreme group-think thanks to the attitude that censorship is acceptable.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by mechanicjay on Monday March 02 2015, @09:12PM
I think #1 is a good idea, it should keep the S/N ratio strong. I think adding #2 to that is questionable. We already have a very positive modding environment here, with many more ups than downs. All I see this doing is preventing needed down mods. I think it's analogous to just turning up the gain without filtering out the noise. I don't want to be penalized for down modding a comment that deserves it, so perhaps I just won't down mod at all. If we had unlimited mod points everyday this might an effective measure, but since we limit to 5, it just seems like a needless restriction.
My VMS box beat up your Windows box.
(Score: 2) by tynin on Monday March 02 2015, @10:36PM
If we had unlimited mod points everyday this might an effective measure, but since we limit to 5, it just seems like a needless restriction.
I'm quoting the bit I'd like you to clarify. I figure you either mistyped, or misunderstood. #2 is about if you downmod someone, it costs you karma. It doesn't cost you an additional mod point. You and the person you downmod both lose 1 karma, which I take to mean that downmods should be taken more seriously (since the better course of action would be to just reply and show them the error of their ways).
(Score: 5, Insightful) by mechanicjay on Monday March 02 2015, @11:00PM
A down-mod currently "costs" you 1 mod point, so there is a cost involved. You can only spend 5 points/day, so it's a finite resource. If we had unlimited mod-points, a down-mod is free, you don't need to think about it, so having it cost a Karma-point would be a good way to make it "cost" something. I *might* also be okay with just #2, without #1. It just seems to me that if we're already requiring that someone has 20 Karma before being able to down mod, that has a cost too in that you've put in some time towards positive contributions to the site. To then charge 1 Karma and 1 mod point to issue a down-mod just seems excessively expensive to me, to the point where we risk seeing almost no down mods.
My VMS box beat up your Windows box.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday March 03 2015, @08:00AM
A down-mod currently "costs" you 1 mod point, so there is a cost involved. You can only spend 5 points/day,
Confusing....
How much does it cost the modder to down mod?
How much does it cost a poster to get down-modded?
My opinion:
It should cost the modder maybe 5 points to down mod. (Yes, you can burn through half of the maximum karma downmodding in one day).
It should cost the poster (who gets down modded) no more than 1 point.
Until we know all the terms in the equation, its hard to weigh #1 and #2 and come up with a thumbs up or thumbs down.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @11:20AM
I was thinking 1:1. I've no idea what the other staff had in mind though. At that rate it would take you six or seven days of doing nothing but downmodding with every point you get to hit the floor and have to build more karma back up. Not much of a hit and easily regained in a day if you downmod:upmod at a 1:4 ratio, which is far more in line with where I personally would like to see us.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:25PM
I still think it should be asymmetrical.
There is only one post, there are 4000+ modders.
We have to make it expensive to negatively mod (flamebait/troll), because one or two such mods, early, can disappear a post. Its a favorite ploy of the mod-armies.
Maybe 5 to 1 karma hit isn't the right formula. But 1 to 1 provides little disincentive IMHO.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by draconx on Monday March 02 2015, @11:06PM
Let's consider the "Troll" mod. It is not a better course of action to reply to trolls. The entire point of a troll post is to elicit this type of reply, usually resulting in more offtopic and heated discussion. #2 penalizes people for moderating troll posts as trolls. Probably then people will stop moderating troll posts as trolls, so they'll just sit at 1 forever.
So with our troll post sitting at 1, it's more likely people will reply. Those replies will probably be off-topic, but since there is a penalty to moderate them as off-topic, they'll probably also sit at 1 forever.
No thanks. Let's not penalize moderators for downmodding.
(Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Tuesday March 03 2015, @04:24AM
Hmmm...that is a damned good point,perhaps we need a "flag this post for attention" kind of deal? But that would probably put too much strain on the admins, so lets see...how about no penalty for marking troll IF the troll mod isn't undone by others or an admin? That way you could mark legitimate trolls without fear (because nobody likes trolls) while at the same time this would keep users from using troll as "I disagree".
BTW we ARE keeping the disagree button, yes? I thought that was a nice touch myself and kept users from using downmods for posts that they simply had a personal issue with, a nice compromise IMHO.
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 1) by soylentsandor on Tuesday March 03 2015, @11:45AM
Wouldn't that solicit a sort of meta-trolling whereby the troll uses a shill account to undo any downmods and hurt the downmodder in the process?
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @11:53AM
Yup, even without a shill account there are people who post only as AC just so they can moderate their own comments.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Tuesday March 03 2015, @01:49PM
Sorry I didn't think of that, I do apologize. The wife has been away for a few days babysitting the grandkids and I don't sleep worth a crap without her to snuggle up against so my brain probably isn't firing on all cylinders, so if I miss something? My bad.
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by frojack on Tuesday March 03 2015, @08:26AM
Let's consider the "Troll" mod. It is not a better course of action to reply to trolls. The entire point of a troll post is to elicit this type of reply,
You can just walk away from the trolls.
Besides, when you start defending the "troll mod", you are already on shaky ground, because, troll is the most over used and abused mod there is.
Someone posts an opinion, and you jump up and scream TROLL. You are purposely trying to end the discussion, because their opinion isn't your opinion. You assume they are just trying to start an argument, and your ONLY evidence of that is because YOU hate their opinion so much you just want to silence them before they even get heard by the members.
If you think you can decide that "entire point of a post" is to troll, I think you are exactly the kind of person I want to penalize heavily for using the troll mod. If you think you can read other people's mind, and determine their rationale for posting, you are already on your way to being a petty tyrant.
We don't need people shutting down conversations. We need more people sustaining them.
So I think
a) modding someone troll, should cost you 5 karma.
b) the person getting modded troll should only lose 1 karma.
It should defninately hurt the modder more than the moddee.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by FatPhil on Tuesday March 03 2015, @01:50PM
Beware the law of unintended consequences, and try to keep the system as simple as possible, so that it has as few weird corner cases as possible.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @03:06PM
Well, at one point per downmod you could afford to downmod a lot of people before you had to contribute for more karma. Anyone participating regularly would likely never go below the 40s.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:43PM
Yikes, no - that will just encourage trolls who know that people can no longer afford to mod them down.
That's ok, I'm more concerned with rampant down-modding than an occasional post the YOU don't happen to agree with it.
I'm not saying 5 to 1 karma penalties is the correct mix. Just saying it should be asymmetric, penalizing down posters more than posters. Remember, its already 4000+ against One right from the get go.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Reziac on Tuesday March 03 2015, @04:25PM
I generally agree, tho I'm not sure 5 karma points isn't too harsh. We shouldn't be focusing on punishment, either.
Still, "troll" is too often used to mean "shut the fuck up".
And you can't just yell "Troll!" in a crowded forum and expect there not to be consequences.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Tuesday March 03 2015, @04:19PM
Problem is, I've too often seen "troll" mods used as "disagree". Should there be no cost to that?
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:11PM
We've thought of every way we can come up with to discourage this but there just isn't one without putting someone or more likely a group of someones as elite final arbiters of what is and isn't a good mod and therefore good speech. It's taken a while but I've finally come around to the position that the best thing to do is simply make sure everyone has mod points enough to correct bad moderations and hope they do so. If we reach the point that we feel we need an elite group of super-moderators, we've already failed at building the community I hope most of us want.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Tuesday March 03 2015, @06:42PM
I agree -- we're not doing so bad that we need mommy standing over us waiting to rap our knuckles.
I think it's going all right. I usually come in a little late and browse at 0, and frankly the worst thing I see around here is not enough of the good 0-rated comments gaining notice. (I've peered at -1 occasionally, but usually by the time I arrive that's already been sorted for cesspittery.) It's rather nice to have mod points regularly ready to hand.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2015, @10:57PM
What determines if a comment is "signal", and what determines if a comment is "noise"?
Time and time again I see comments that somebody has deemed to be "noise", and downmodded, but they end up being among the most insightful comments.
Just because a comment, say, offends your sensitive mind, it does not mean that it's "noise".
(Score: 2) by mechanicjay on Monday March 02 2015, @11:03PM
I see that too, and then I up-mod that post, which if you logged in, you could do to. Many times I'll come back to see that comment at a +2 or +3. By this measure, the moderation system works perfectly -- a good comment has had it's signal boosted to rise above the noise. That doesn't mean that everyone need agree, but in aggregate it works out.
My VMS box beat up your Windows box.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday March 03 2015, @12:13AM
Let me point the reverse is also true: it doesn't make that comment a "signal", even if you like a comment.
Since the problem is fuzzy (there can't be a "the right way" in general), then a penalty on any of the choices will always result in having instances of "unfair punishment".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 3, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @02:33AM
Aggregate opinion of the users of the site along with them having available mod points.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by dyingtolive on Monday March 02 2015, @11:45PM
I don't mind it. I mean, I hover around 45-50 most of the time, so I got the karma to burn, but even if I couldn't mod something down, someone else probably could.
The beauty of something like this is that if it doesn't work out because everyone's afraid of losing karma, they can always change it.
Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!
(Score: 3, Insightful) by frojack on Tuesday March 03 2015, @07:32AM
I think adding #2 to that is questionable. ... I don't want to be penalized for down modding a comment that deserves it
On the other side, I WANT you to THINK TWICE before you spend your Karma down-modding someone because you disagree.
Modding troll or flamebait just because you disagree with someone's political leanings is EXACTLY the type of things we need to make painful.
You need to just leave those comments you disagree with alone, move on. They will die or soar based on their own merit. Not modding at all is a mod in and of itself. Withholding approval works just as well as down-modding when all you really want is to express your opinion.
The ACTUAL occurrences of flamebait and trolling, are rare. So rare that you might see one a week. Surely your karma can handle that, and if not, well #1 steps in, and you take a vacation from down modding.
Just spend your karma carefully, and you will be fine.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2015, @09:16PM
How are you addressing moderation inflation?
Comments early in a conversation tend to over-dominate the conversation as they tend to go +5/-1. The reason I think is because it is what people see. Someone on another thread suggested a logarithmic sort of number of votes before you would get to +5. Not saying that is the right way but is a possible suggestion to fix it?
It is my only grievance against the current system. You get lots of 'me too' votes. So you see a lot of comments that are probably a +3 ending up at +5. Other sites that use a +/- sort of system see this same effect. Top comments get more votes and comments later in the conversation languish at 0/1. So the only way to get a good score (or the bad one you deserve) is to comment early.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by buswolley on Monday March 02 2015, @09:35PM
Two potential solutions:
1. With exception of the spam mod, moderation cannot occur during the first half hour (or some other t).
and
2. Site default to presenting newest parent (lvl 1) threads at the top of the page (obviously individual preference parameters rule) .
subicular junctures
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 03 2015, @12:11AM
> 2. Site default to presenting newest parent (lvl 1) threads at the top of the page (obviously individual preference parameters rule) .
That's like one line of code? Do that.
I don't think the problem is a particularly serious one, if it exists at all, but a change like that is so trivial that we waste nothing doing it and if it pacifies some complainers, then win-win or at least win-neutral.
(Score: 2) by iamjacksusername on Tuesday March 03 2015, @10:14PM
I like that idea! Maybe make it a preference or a quick-sort link? I know that, if I am modding, I do not really want to see the discussions that are already +3 since they have been modded already; I want to see the ones that have not been modded but I do not necessarily want to set my threshold to 0 though. That would correlate strongly to new posts by non-AC.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Tuesday March 03 2015, @04:33PM
Trouble is, that makes the discussion hard to read, and anyone coming in late is going to see only the trailing trolls since now they'll be on top of the page.
I agree there's a mod imbalance toward early commenters, but I can think of drawbacks to every mitigation that would probably net as worse than the problem. Such as a delay -- will that discourage the early commenters who also tend to jumpstart a discussion?
I think this one might be best left to encouraging moderators to sow their points slowly, so if they find something better further down, they still have points to give.
Or maybe give us an UNMOD option so we can change our minds should we later see a good comment languishing at a zero score.
Or maybe give us a 'scoreboard' where we can mark comments we want to mod up when we get more points tomorrow, so by then when we've forgotten about 'em, we can look 'em up. Assuming there's enough readership by then to care??
I dunno. I'm inclined to think it's less broken now than if we tried to fix it.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by iamjacksusername on Tuesday March 03 2015, @10:06PM
I think it has gotten better as the volume of comments has increased. A few months ago, a lot of stories were not getting comments so you ended up with a story with 10 comments, half with +5. I think it also has to do with the lifespan of the story - are people still leaving comments at +3 days after posting? Is it worthwhile to build a system to incentivize discussions lasting days? It would be interesting to know what the half-life of stories are in terms of comment activity.
Maybe this is another way to differentiate SN from the other site. Posting there in a story more than a few hours was basically pointless as it would be lost in the sea of spammers, trolls and other noise. Make the moderation system incentivize discussions lasting days or even longer; you could have discussions that rise pass the me too! or groupthink trap the other site eventually fell into.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday March 03 2015, @12:16AM
And why do you think that limiting the number of mod points available is a solution to "me too" problem?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @03:01AM
Honestly, we're not yet. It hasn't been that big a problem that we've seen. Not as big as speech getting hidden by bad downmods anyway. Overrated coming back should help some though.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 5, Funny) by WillR on Monday March 02 2015, @09:19PM
(Score: 2) by rts008 on Tuesday March 03 2015, @02:49AM
What you need to do then, is mod your own systemd troll posts down.[1]
This solves two problems:
1.) Your karma stays stable...you are basically paying yourself back the karma you just lost.
2.) You get credit for perpetual motion...on a computer+on the network...the patent troll potential is Awesome!
Heck, who knows...this may even be the '2.) ?' in the old '1.) x, 2.) ?, 3.) Profit!!!' equation!!!
[1] Some sockpuppetry, or some other shady technique may be required...YMMV.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2015, @09:27PM
This is why I post as AC even though I have an account. Karma has become so complicated I don't want to have to worry about it. I moderate occasionally but who can keep track of these (new/changing) rules without a regular refresher?
I do appreciate all the work the SN staff puts into the site, as well as all the thought that goes into these RFCs. You guys (and gals?) really want to make this site better. I just want to read the conversations and toss out my 2¢ a few times a day.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by buswolley on Monday March 02 2015, @09:38PM
Not to contradict, but I barely think about Karma. I comment. My karma stays within a couple points of 50.
The last time I started cashing in on my karma was at /. when I began throwing the first (maybe one of the first) fuck betas.
subicular junctures
(Score: 4, Touché) by The Archon V2.0 on Monday March 02 2015, @09:49PM
> The last time I started cashing in on my karma was at /. when I began throwing the first (maybe one of the first) fuck betas.
The last time I cashed in my karma was for a two-headed squirrel burger.
(Too obscure?)
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday March 03 2015, @12:18AM
Yes. (and feels like I'm lazy enough to google)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2015, @10:30PM
> Not to contradict, but I barely think about Karma. I comment.
Bingo. All this complexity is surely counterproductive - karmawhores are unlikely to make more than the most superficial of contributions to the discussion. You simply can not automate good judgement. You certainly can discourage good judgement with bad system design, but good design just gets out of the way - the opposite of this micro-managing crap.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday March 03 2015, @06:41PM
karmawhores are unlikely to make more than the most superficial of contributions to the discussion.
I suspect karma whores make far more than contributions than the average poster. They probably submit stories. They probably achieve plus 5 mods more frequently than the average.
(Didn't the karma get a boost from story submission? I thought I read that somewhere, but can't find it now).
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 1) by Yog-Yogguth on Thursday March 05 2015, @02:33AM
Reasonably sure it was +2 karma last time I submitted a bit over a month ago.
Bite harder Ouroboros, bite! tails.boum.org/ linux USB CD secure desktop IRC *crypt tor (not endorsements (XKeyScore))
(Score: 2, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2015, @09:29PM
Yet another solution in search of a problem.
All this fixing stuff that ain't broke because a handful of discontents had nothing better to complain about is getting depressing. When this is done the same type of people will just find other non-issues to worked up about.
I guess this means slashcode is now ship-shape, so I guess that's a positive sign.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2015, @09:54PM
Moderation is a pretty important part of this site as it raises the standards of discussion. The system does not need to be broken in order for it to be improved.
(Score: 2) by zafiro17 on Monday March 02 2015, @10:00PM
I happen to agree with my anonymously cowardly friend. It's fun to experiment. There's probably room for improvement, and I always thought /.'s point system had gotten a bit stale. Let's see what works, methinks. I'm glad to see people actively putting their talent and energy into finding better ways to run these systems.
Dad always thought laughter was the best medicine, which I guess is why several of us died of tuberculosis - Jack Handey
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2015, @10:25PM
> Let's see what works,
How will you know it works?
There are only two outcomes.
(1) Either a fuckup so bad that everything goes off the rails making it plain that something is gravely wrong.
(2) Everybody just evaluating it on their own personal feelings and the handful of loudmouth complainers will get precedence over the couple of orders of magnitude larger number of people who think everything is fine.
It just fucking around to fuck around and kill time, because this site has so much largess it can totally afford that.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 03 2015, @04:45PM
The scoring of posts better agrees with their quality. Duh.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:14PM
As judged by the community, yes. Which is exactly how it should be.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by iamjacksusername on Tuesday March 03 2015, @10:20PM
The reality is this moderation system came from /. (yes I said its name) and it has been creaking along for a lot of years through what could charitably be called "benign neglect". Now, we have a new site trying to be something different. So, the moderation system needs to change to accommodate that goal.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2015, @09:30PM
1. Good idea. It can't be too hard to build 10-20 karma (it's easy to sit at 50) so it's a low bar. Keep it at 10?
2. Tough call. It would solve the problem of sitting at 50 karma. Burn the karma downmodding as much as you usually do, while building it back up naturally. Slow down if you get to 10-20. Plus you have to uncheck AC more to get more karma.
3. You bastard.
4. Yes.
5. I used it and I missed it.
6. Sounds fair.
7. Sometimes I just use underrated on a 0 AC. I guess it's fine.
8 and 9. Nice.
10. If it's as easy to spot as you say, why not. I have my doubts that it is so easy.
11. This could be a lot of fact checking work and a lot of incorrect incorrect modding. What are the stats on the amount of times the Spam mod has been used incorrectly?
(Score: 4, Informative) by paulej72 on Monday March 02 2015, @10:00PM
10. If it's as easy to spot as you say, why not. I have my doubts that it is so easy.
We would just count the number of downmods made to each uid for a given period of time. If the number reaches some threshold, we would list them on a report. It would be up to an editor or admin to determine if the mods were coming from a single user or a bunch of users and if they were sock puppets (usually sock puppets come from the same ip address which is tracked as md5 hash). If the admins find something stinky, we could ban the bombers.
Team Leader for SN Development
(Score: 1) by TLA on Monday March 02 2015, @10:48PM
I am liking this. I keep getting modbombed over at Slashdot, last week some AC actually jumped a thread and stated his intent to modbomb me. My response? "I'm fucking heartbroken. FOAD you sycophant." Last I looked *that* comment was modded +5 insightful. Didn't do my bombed karma much good over there, I'm just back up to 25 posts/day again.
Excuse me, I think I need to reboot my horse. - NCommander
(Score: 2) by q.kontinuum on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:48AM
Why do you do that? As long as IPv4 is widely used, there are only 256^4 IP addresses (minus private networks). Getting a rainbow-table, or just brute-forcing to get the cleartext IP for an especially offensive post is trivial. Using md5 in this scenario looks like snake oil to me, you could store the IPs as well in clear text.
Also, do you consider proxies, e.g. multiple users coming from the same university/company/??
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 3, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday March 02 2015, @11:27PM
Total that we've undone, about 6-8. That we've handed out bans for, three I think; four tops. If there's a doubt based on the moderator not generally having a history of malicious downmodding, we've been giving them the benefit of the doubt that they could have hit the wrong item in the dropdown list. We're probably going to cease doing this after it's got a separator between it and the rest of the mods though.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by VLM on Monday March 02 2015, @09:41PM
Let me relate you a meatspace discussion that displays a problem with factually incorrect mod
"Sports, they're dying"
"LMFGIFY Gallup poll says 3/4 of young men declare themselves sports fans as do 2/3 of the general population"
"LMFGIFY try images.google.com and world series viewers, we've gone from 60 million viewers when I was a kid and the population was only 200M to rapidly approaching a mere 10 megaviewers and a population of 319M"
The reality of course is sports is becoming religion, "I'm a true believer, go ahead ask me our shibboleths and I'll give you the carefully practiced Pavlovian answers, but I never go to church and don't actually believe any of that stuff and it has no impact on my life, I'm just a joiner". Its weird to think that we live in a nation where 210 million of us call ourselves sports fans, of which almost 200 million can't be bothered to watch the world series, for a 95% "approval" rating of the biggest game in major league baseball. Isn't that just crazy?
Anyway how could my meatspace argument be moderated if it happened here?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by moondrake on Monday March 02 2015, @10:36PM
Not sure I actually completely understand what is said in your example (but then, I do not view sports) but I completely agree with your point.
My own somewhat teasing example: I appreciate The Mighty Buzzard for his hard work here and his insightful comments on many posts. However, as soon as we would talk about climate change, I am doubtful we will agree about facts....I shudder at the thought of having an AGW discussion here with this modding ability activated! (and Buzzard being the ultimate referee).
I was thinking about other mods trying to judge the "correctness" of corrections, but in the end, any such endeavor seems susceptible to opinion (besides, it basically amounts to metamodding, which we perhaps decided not to want?).
That said, it is undeniable that there are posts that many will agree are factually incorrec, and still occasionally get modded up, and it would certainly be nice if something could be done to point this out. The only way I can see it is if the original upmodder sees a comment pointing out the problem reconsider his mod, and undoes it (do a -1 incorrect only in case you did a +1 first). Probably this should not give you your point back (but neither cost you something). Trouble is, it would require us to read replies on comments that were moderated (perhaps we can get a pm in such case?).
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday March 02 2015, @11:36PM
Pffft, I get 5 points same as you and paulej72, NCommander, and juggs would take turns smacking me down if I went and gave myself extra. I don't even have a separate secret ninja account; I'm entirely too lazy to keep up with more logins than I have to. The bit about the I ♥ Moose Wang and such was entirely for comedic value and to see if I could get the phrase Moose Wang past the editors.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by moondrake on Tuesday March 03 2015, @09:31AM
OK, I fell in the Moose trap... but if you are not metamodding, how to guard against incorrect "corrections" (i.e. variations of "Ur wrong") in that case?
Reading your post again it seems you hope that a single "incorrect" (will it be -1) will not hurt much, but allow others to apply the same. Perhaps that is worth a try indeed.
(Score: 3, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @11:29AM
By giving out points to most everyone who cares to use them it's easy to get bad mods corrected. By limiting them to five a day we keep any one person from doing too much damage. That's the theory anyway.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by TLA on Monday March 02 2015, @10:51PM
how many Machester United fans (subscribers, natch!) have actually BEEN to Old Trafford??
I rest my case. Not that I'm sure what it was in the first place. Oh, right, that was it. Spectator_sports=>religion/militant_fanaticism.
Excuse me, I think I need to reboot my horse. - NCommander
(Score: 4, Insightful) by bradley13 on Monday March 02 2015, @09:44PM
1) Karma minimum to downmod ... primarily be to keep puppet accounts that never contribute from being used to downmod people into oblivion.
People do that? Gawd, some people have no lives...
2) Downmods cost the moderator karma
Combined with the karma minimum, this would be more effective at keeping puppet accounts from being used. It would also hopefully at least make us think before we downmod someone we simply disagree with.
I've always assumed most readers either do nothing, and stay at zero karma, or else participate, get to 50 karma, and stay there. Ok, I'm at 49, what the heck did I do? Someone who spends their time wandering around in mid-level karmas is spending too much time being a jerk (see #1, people who need to get a life).
5) The triumphant return of Overrated
Yeah, removing it did little to nothing as people intent on being asshats just used Flamebait or Troll instead. No point in leaving it gone.
No point in leaving it gone, but is there a point in putting it back? In practice, people mostly use it as a synonym for "disagree".
6) No karma hits for someone moderated Overrated/Underrated
Yes, makes sense.
10) Automated mod-bombing detection and manual resolution... The main question here: Do you lot want a moderation ban to accompany the undo of the mod bombing?
People with too much time, again? If this is a genuine problem, yes, abuse ought to have consequences. But there needs to be a way to appeal, in case it somehow hits an innocent Soylentil by accident.
11) Add an Incorrect moderation that must be accompanied by a correction...
Sounds overly complicated - is this really workable?
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Tuesday March 03 2015, @12:20AM
Or have it expire rather than last for ever. I mod-bombed cold_fjord on slashdot a couple times a couple years ago and despite my excellent karma, haven't had mod points since. He was one of the NSA's most vocal and least reasonable shills. I'd do it again if I had the chance. But nobody and /. knows that, and my no-mod-point sentence should have an end point.
(Score: 5, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @12:47AM
Surprisingly, easy really. One little database query to find out if any comment has the moderator's uid and the parent comment's cid as its pid. Mind you that doesn't tell us if it was a correction and citation or a bunch of 💩 glyphs.
As for the are they a problem questions? Yeah. Not a huge one cause we're a pretty good crowd compared to most sites if I do say so myself. It's still a regular if sparse problem though.
Most just stay at zero. We have around 3-500 people each at 30, 40, and 50. The down side is most of the community could no longer downmod. The up side is enough still could and sock puppets would have to have contributed to the site to go on a downmod spree.
It and Underrated can function as a moderation check without having to say anything but "this is scored wrong". Not insanely useful but useful nonetheless.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2015, @09:55PM
"The infighting is fierce because the stakes are so low".
- Randell Jarrell
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @12:49AM
I can't tell if that's Offtopic or whoosh. I think I need more caffeine.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by zafiro17 on Monday March 02 2015, @10:03PM
I must be missing some inside joke, but I can't figure out for the life of me why this article would come from the 'lingerie' department. Unless we're airing dirty laundry here. Or the Mighty Buzzard is posting while wearing a thong and stockings. Or karma is just the lacy stuff on top of the real meat. Or ... I seem to be out of metaphors here.
I would've called it 'you get what you give' department, or 'you get what you deserve' department, or something like that.
Dad always thought laughter was the best medicine, which I guess is why several of us died of tuberculosis - Jack Handey
(Score: 2) by tynin on Monday March 02 2015, @11:08PM
My take on the dept name would be that the "body" of the content is what makes a good comment. Karma would be the lingerie. It adds a bit of a nice dressing to those who manage to provide a good comment.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @12:52AM
Mostly I just didn't take the time to think of a better one. Little things like that are why I'm a dev not an editor.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Touché) by Ethanol-fueled on Tuesday March 03 2015, @02:29AM
I thought that's because you have a pale, hairy ass. Get a tan and a Brazilian wax and they might promote you to editor!
Of course, some lingerie probably wouldn't hurt.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Tuesday March 03 2015, @08:57AM
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @11:27AM
Fame and riches? Pffft! I was promised beer for dev work!
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by mrcoolbp on Tuesday March 03 2015, @04:04PM
I'm still willing to fulfill that promise buzz.
(Score:1^½, Radical)
(Score: 5, Informative) by jmorris on Monday March 02 2015, @10:25PM
The general gist seems to be an attempt to build a fully automated system to allow crowdsourced moderation, free from the need for human oversight. Not happening. Trolls exist. People actually earn livings now posting to fora like this and ensuring their master's image in maintained, their discussion points get out, etc. Lots of human brainpower is being thrown at the problem of subverting online forums like this for various ends. No, assuming current tech, automated solution is likely to beat a human in this problem space.
Given these facts, that aren't likely to be seriously disputed, are there solutions likely to work? Yes. Get ten or so humans who you can trust to look at a posting or moderation record and decide if the account is obeying the stated (and perhaps unstated?) ground rules for the sort of site you are trying to create. Task one of these humans to look in on any particular account at predetermined (but most certainly not published) times and judge. Say at comment #20, 250 and 1000, moderation #25, 100 and 1000, when they hit the karma cap or drop negative. Then drop a classifier on that user: Sockpuppet, spammer, troll - useless(gnaa, etc), troll - funny/useful, good mod, clueless mod, controversial - distractor, controversial - comment generator, knowledgeable, etc. Apply mods to karma accumulation, mod points, etc. based on the current class.
Use automation to identify the automated users, always consider those as hostile, accounts and ghost ban them. But to stop humans you need humans.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2015, @10:35PM
I'm pretty much in agreement with all of that, except ghost-banning.
Ghost-banning an automated poster doesn't deter them, they are automated. They don't "care" if their post made it through, they don't try some new tactic because it didn't work. The value of ghost-banning versus outright banning them is marginal at best. But if you mistakenly ghost-ban a real person, that's just cruel because they won't even know there is a problem, much less be able to appeal/fix it, especially if the ban was the result of a bug in the system and not the content of their posts.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by jmorris on Monday March 02 2015, @11:09PM
That is the point behind ghost banning, causing automated processes to waste their time posting to themselves instead of realizing they have been banned and creating a fresh account or shifting their activity to a different zombie/vpn account. Is any automated system dangerous? Probably, but if it is watched over by human now and then the collateral damage can be minimized. No system is going t be perfect and making perfection a design requirement is a fatal mistake.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2015, @11:31PM
That is the point behind ghost banning, causing automated processes to waste their time posting to themselves instead of realizing they have been banned and creating a fresh account or shifting their activity to a different zombie/vpn account
If you can automate the recognition of them one time, then you can recognize them every time - they don't change tactics in the time span that a ghost-ban is effective. We gain nothing by making them "waste their time" -- they are probably botnets anyway with unlimited time.
(Score: 2) by fliptop on Tuesday March 03 2015, @01:43AM
Amen. My Dad always said "perfect is the opposite of done."
Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2015, @11:14PM
No, assuming current tech, automated solution is likely to beat a human in this problem space.
If the automated solution raises the difficulty above low-hanging fruit, then it can cut out a lot of noise. You do not need to be the fastest in the heard to avoid becoming dinner.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @01:01AM
Speaking for myself, I'm not really worried about humans spreading psyops propaganda here. Everyone's entitled to their say, even if they're being paid to have it. Trolls? You can't stop trolls and allow AC commenting, you can just downmod them.
Mostly though we never want to be in the position of telling the community what they can and can't say or read. We're not overlords, just members who for some insane reason or other decided we had enough spare time to help make the site go.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Tuesday March 03 2015, @04:58AM
Dude if you can't spot the difference between a fanboi and an actual shill? You REALLY need to go back and read Slash articles during the Win 8 beta or when Apple was having the whole "ur holding it wrong" or Bumpgate debacles because actual shills? Sooooo easy to spot! The reason why is the reason why any of us that has worked corporate LOVE to read Dilbert, the always present PHB. The PHB can't just leave well enough alone, they have to "extract maximum value" and "insure corporate focus and branding identity" so it never fails they make them "stay on message" and come off with a shitload of buzzword bingo. You read the post of actual fanboys? They aren't writing about "vertical synergy" or "consumer focused design" or any of that shit that read like your average corporate press release but with the shills it never fails because the PHB will make sure that shit gets in!
As for your other idea? I really don't know if that will work, simply because if you grab 3 posts at random because its actual random you could paint a VERY different picture of that user when they are as a whole VERY different! Lets say the 3 posts you grabbed ended up being either political or climate change articles...there are several posters here that on any. other.topic. their posts are VERY well rounded, logical, well thought out, but you get them talking politics? All that goes right out the window and its appeal to emotion city and flag waving to the billionth power!
So I think we should try what has been proposed and THEN if that doesn't improve things? Perhaps your sampling idea should be given a run or at least a trial just to see if it produces a more even outcome that what is proposed.
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by MrGuy on Monday March 02 2015, @10:48PM
There is no greater fuel for flamewars, trolling, and pedantry than allowing people to call one another "Incorrect."
Also, I believe your system on this is broken in concept. While I like the need to post a "correction" first, I worry that in practice this will only work for settled debates or purely factual matters (e.g. "Netscape Navigator was the first graphical web browser!" "Incorrect - Mosaic preceded it.")
On matters of opinion, or one where there are experts on both sides, I expect the ability to call the other side "incorrect" while citing my side's expert is asking for trouble. "Given the current pace of global warming, cities like New York need to invest more heavily in infrastructure that's resiliant to rising sea levels and potentially increased storm surges." "Incorrect! Here's a study that says there's no provable relationship between global warming and higher sea levels globally." "Incorrect! Here's a study that shows sea levels in major port cities (including New York) have risen on average 0.1" per year over the past 50 years." "Incorrect! The cited study does not reference any causal linkage definitively, so asserting it as proof of global warming is misplaced." and so on.
"Incorrect" is begging nerd sniping and pissing contests. Please, don't sanction it. Ban the word, ban the concept, ban the idea.
Incorrect. Wrong for you. Wrong for me. Wrong for Soylent News.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2015, @11:22PM
Seconded.
The "Incorrect" mod is a good idea in theory but I do not think that it will work properly in practice.
Maybe add it as a self-mod option. If someone is willing to admit that their post is incorrect then by all means let them mod themselves incorrect and strike-through the offending statement.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by hemocyanin on Tuesday March 03 2015, @12:27AM
"incorrect" is almost exactly like posting a reply and saying "incorrect." Then, one would presume the mods would sort out which is right, which is wrong, and mod accordingly. But if "incorrect" becomes a mod, then the last person to mark it gets to make a huge qualitative statement on the content of the post, which may in fact not be incorrect. This can have an effect as people read, giving the correct answer less weight due the erroneous incorrect mod.
Anyway, if something is incorrect, post a correction as a reply and let the mods sort it out. Don't give the person doing the correction the job of prosecutor AND judge.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday March 03 2015, @08:41AM
Agreed, I DO NOT think we need a mod of incorrect.
Just post your correction, site your sources, and try to avoid the word "moron" which seems to be the calling card of that green site.
So No on #11 would be my vote.
(When you have to post the penalty for misuse on the proposal, its a clue you might be on the wrong track).
Someone can be wrong about some tangential point in an otherwise interesting and informative post, and the whole post does not reserved to be modded to hell just because 5 people recognized that 3.17159 is not pi to 5 decimal places.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @11:25AM
The "penalty" was entirely a joke. There is probably going to remain no penalty for bad downmodding except that others overwrite your mod with Underrated for the entirety of our existence. Except in the case of mod-bombing of course.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:47PM
I know it was a joke, so was my comment about it.
My main point is that I just don't think it adds anything for which we have a strong need.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:15PM
So I got done reading this page of comments and switched to my next tab, and what was it about?
"Google Wants to Rank Websites Based on Facts not Links"
Please, ghu, let's not go there.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by moondrake on Tuesday March 03 2015, @09:44AM
s/incorrect/disputed ? But you raise an important point. I dislike that correctly post are flagged as "insightful", even although they may have 2x trolls, 5x disagree, etc. I am not even sure whether it is the last modding that counts, or some other algorithm.
Can we not display the full stats in a nice way? Or have scale indicators (correct incorrect, Insightful Moronic, LeftwingRightwing...ducks :P)
(Score: 3, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @11:33AM
The most common moderation, regardless of up/down/neutral. I forget what the ordering is on a tie, likely random given that perl randomly (more or less) orders its hashes.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by mrcoolbp on Tuesday March 03 2015, @06:44PM
Could we look into showing all the "categories" of moderation performed on a comment? Is this a terrible idea?
(crappy) Example:
Re:The Mighty Buzzard is a foobarbaz (Score:3, Informative, Troll, Interesting)
(Score:1^½, Radical)
(Score: 3, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @08:10PM
Would be less complicated than picking just one but it could get kinda long and they're listed below if you select just that comment anyway.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @01:05AM
That's actually exactly why it was proposed.
As for the rest, I do see your point but this already happens with Flamebait and Troll. Is your worry that Incorrect would increase the frequency? I could see that, it would really depend on the community though and we're kind of hard to second guess as a group.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by NotSanguine on Monday March 02 2015, @11:02PM
It seems to me that none of these ideas are particularly bad, nor will they harm the discussions in any major way.
However, I'm of the opinion that putting effort into changing aspects of the moderation system is only worthwhile if the changes improve the quality of discussions. What is more, while I haven't seen any statistics, on the whole I haven't seen a whole lot of moderation abuse. Is abuse of the moderation system actually a problem, or is it just that we have a bad taste in our mouths from the shenanigans that go on over at /.?
In any case, here's my take on the proposed changes:
1. Not necessarily a bad idea to force users to build up some credibility before impacting the posts of other users. As such, why just downmods? Why not require users to build up a certain amount of karma before being allowed to mod *at all*? Barring downmods may limit "mod-bombing" someone (or some topic) down, but upmods can artificially inflate undeserving comments. Perhaps it's just my symmetry fetish rearing its head, but I think not.
2. I have the same argument as for #1. It seems to me that we shouldn't penalize people for downmodding unless they abuse their moderation privileges. If someone acts in a way that shows they are not capable of exercising good judgement in moderations, then perhaps some sort of back-off algorithm can be used to restrict abusers from moderating, with increasing penalties if their bad behavior continues. If you guys are dead set on this, I still say that symmetry is a good thing.
3. Boo-Yah! I'd rather see the accent than have some folks assume it's a mis-spelling of "touchy."
4. Reasonable. Although limits on spam mods seem kind of dumb. I read at -1 all the time and I haven't seen much spam at all. If we start getting spam, why limit the mods on it? If someone abuses it, then perhaps they should lose their moderation privileges for a while (see my response to #2).
5/6/7. That works for me. It's a useful tool to address moderation issues.
8/9. Whatever blows your skirt up (or pleases your sense of esthetics -- or both).
10. Definitely. See #2 above.
11. Sounds like it could be a good idea. However, there are facts and then there are "facts." cf. this article [soylentnews.org]. I would trust us more than google, but as I've pointed out in other discussions, isn't the best remedy for "bad" (including incorrect) speech, more speech rather than censorship (downmods would hide that speech from folks who don't read at low scores)? I suggest we trust users enough to decide what is factual and what isn't. Folks around here aren't exactly shy about pointing out the errors of others.
All that said, I'm really appreciative of all the hard work you guys have done/are doing. You've made SN a good place to be. Thanks!
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @02:12AM
1) This was to stop puppet accounts from downmodding. Upmodding is not as destructive to a conversation as downmodding. It only increases the signal to noise ratio slightly while downmods can entirely silence speech given the default settings that most of our community run on.
2) I was thinking it would give karma a useful purpose since so many people, myself included, sit at max all the time. And encourage more upmodding than downmodding like we're supposed to be doing anyway. And keep puppet accounts from being used unless they contribute to the conversation regularly. Valid opinion though and duly noted.
4) Imagine: some jackass like me spends ten minutes and codes up a quick script that mods every single comment Spam in a single day. Undoing that on tens of thousands of comments would be a LOT of work for all us poor staff guys.
11) Yeah, misuse is expected as with any mod. Some people just wasn't raised with any sense of decency I guess.
Anyway, that's my thinking on the above. YMMV.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Tuesday March 03 2015, @04:28AM
4) Imagine: some jackass like me spends ten minutes and codes up a quick script that mods every single comment Spam in a single day. Undoing that on tens of thousands of comments would be a LOT of work for all us poor staff guys.
I guess I misunderstood. I was thinking that a 'spam' mod would eat a moderation point, thus limiting someone to just five a day. If it doesn't count against one's mod points, then the limit makes a lot of sense.
Then again, if you have 'spam' mods actually eat mod points, that would limit the damage a single user could do. If the 'spam' mod turns out to be valid (presumably each 'spam' mod would be reviewed since it carries a -10 karma hit), the mod point could be restored to the user.
This limits the ability of some jackass like me to abuse the spam mod and might give them pause in case they're grumpy, knowing that if it's not a valid spam mod they've just wasted mod points.
I don't know if that would be more difficult to accomplish than just limiting spam mods, but it's a thought. Perhaps even a good one. Either way, having the spam mod is a good thing. Given how you folks have done so far, I imagine you'll implement this in a workable, reasonable fashion.
11) Yeah, misuse is expected as with any mod. Some people just wasn't raised with any sense of decency I guess.
As you've seen from my other post, I'm not real high on the 'incorrect' mod. I appreciate your point, but isn't discussion and debate (ala the Marketplace of Ideas [wikipedia.org]) the best way to tease out the truth, rather than anointing "the facts" with a mod?
Thanks for your feedback on my comments. I appreciate that we're being asked for input and I hope it will help you guys hone the environment to make SN even better.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:12AM
Question: Do you have some sort of system to spot the sockpuppets? The reason I ask is it would probably be quite easy for somebody to create multiple socks and then "shill for karma" by posting easy upmods ("I think (insert X) is just great!" in threads about some popular product or something with a rabid fanbase for example) and then once they had built up plenty of karma on their puppets going on a bombing spree. I know back on Slash this was a pretty big issue, with some users like Mickey(insert increment number) being pretty blatant about how many accounts he was cranking off.
If there is something in place to spot when somebody is trying to build a puppet army? then I agree 100%, this all sounds VERY well thought out and reasonable, great job MB, thumbs up.
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @06:08AM
To some degree, yeah, but that's an arms race that IRC has shown us you can never really win. I won't go into specifics right now; there's no sense in drawing anyone a map on how to get around what provisions we do have in place. We do have some though and can have more in short order without throwing anything in the way of ordinary users.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @03:34AM
Sorry, missed the first question. Yeah, bad downmodding and mod-bombing are legit problems here even if they are sparse compared to other sites. I don't particularly mind them happening to me but it really chaps my ass when I see them happen to someone else and there's nothing I can do about it except spend my mod points to correct it. Frankly, I'd rather get a few tools in the old tool belt before the site grows to where we can't handle researching individual cases manually like we've been doing.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Tuesday March 03 2015, @04:58AM
Yeah, bad downmodding and mod-bombing are legit problems here even if they are sparse compared to other sites.
I hadn't noticed that so much, even as I read at -1 all the time. Then again, I don't see moderation patterns in the detail that you guys can. I agree that we should try to make moderation as personal agenda-free as possible.
Frankly, I'd rather get a few tools in the old tool belt before the site grows to where we can't handle researching individual cases manually like we've been doing.
Absolutely. Anything that gives you folks more time for improving the site and participating in discussions is a good thing. Not to mention that it's annoying to be forced to spend time cleaning up after the closed-minded and ill-mannered.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 1) by nitehawk214 on Monday March 02 2015, @11:45PM
What if someone does ♥ moose wang?
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 3, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @02:14AM
It takes all kinds, I won't judge.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Appalbarry on Tuesday March 03 2015, @12:05AM
More seriously, I find that the Soylent mod choices work a lot better for me than the old Slashdot ones. I always found that when moderating over there I had to choose from a set of options that didn't really fit what I felt.
I actually like the "Incorrect" option, as long as there's a requirement for a citation to back it up. Despite what the creationists, Gamergate guys, Climate warming deniers, anti-vaxxers, and Republicans might say, most things you would discuss on a tech site like this actually have some scientific research to prove or disprove what's being claimed.
With the endless flood of mis- and dis-information that surrounds us - especially from the idiots that keep getting elected to office - I'm in favour of anything that presents facts and science to shut up the lying idiots.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by NotSanguine on Tuesday March 03 2015, @12:26AM
I actually like the "Incorrect" option, as long as there's a requirement for a citation to back it up. Despite what the creationists, Gamergate guys, Climate warming deniers, anti-vaxxers, and Republicans might say, most things you would discuss on a tech site like this actually have some scientific research to prove or disprove what's being claimed.
I hear you. It is quite annoying when false or misleading information is presented as "fact."
However, it seems to me that all an "Incorrect" mod (citations notwithstanding) would accomplish is to add a moderation component to flame wars.
Consider this: Even if you are uninformed about a particular topic, would you prefer that other folks decide what is true and what isn't, or would you prefer to decide for yourself?
Allowing downmods for "incorrect" information opens the door for endless bickering over who is right and why. I suspect that this would detract from the quality of discussions rather than add to it.
What is more, we already have an effective means to counter mis/dis-information and straight-up idiocy. It's called posting a reply. Even better, posting a reply with citations supporting your argument. As such, why involve the moderation system in that process?
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @02:21AM
I share some of the same worries but I have hope that it'll lead to more citations that we can then discuss the credibility of. Right now we tend not to put our citation where our mouth is more often than not. See, even I did it right there on account of being entirely too lazy to analyze a gerzillion comments to find out if I'm right.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Tuesday March 03 2015, @04:49AM
I share some of the same worries but I have hope that it'll lead to more citations that we can then discuss the credibility of. Right now we tend not to put our citation where our mouth is more often than not. See, even I did it right there on account of being entirely too lazy to analyze a gerzillion comments to find out if I'm right.
An excellent point. However, it seems to me that if one wants their point of view to be taken seriously, they should use whatever tools they can to present a convincing argument. This includes citations which support one's argument. The effort made in enhancing the quality of an argument is a key factor in getting one's point across and provoking discussion and re-evaluation of positions, IMHO. I think that if one isn't willing to put in the effort to make a convincing argument, that speaks for itself.
Perhaps you're right that the 'incorrect' mod will lead to more citations and presumably more informed discussion. If such a mod is implemented, I hope you are right.
If not, we may stir up animosities and angry, off-topic posts from people who feel they're being shown up. This could lower the signal to noise ratio significantly.
I guess time will tell which will be the more pronounced effect.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:06AM
Oh I'm not married to the idea. I'm in fact about half convinced it could use a good scrapping. I'm just explaining the reasoning that went into putting it in the RFC to get feedback on.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:08PM
Citations can derive from wrong information themselves, as Wikipedia occasionally demonstrates. If you're not an expert in a given field, how do you know which viewpoint is correct?? See also what I said in another post about how sometimes the "well informed average joe" actually does not know what he's talking about, and can drown out the expert by way of tons of citations that sound good but also don't know what they're talking about. (I work in a field where this is a chronic problem.)
Usenet was full of flame wars where both sides were commonly believed 'correct' and where both had plenty of citations to back themselves up.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by iamjacksusername on Tuesday March 03 2015, @10:33PM
I think I agree. The use case being that someone posts a comment that is factually wrong but they posted it in good faith. Should that be modded as such or is just part of the discussion? Modding Disagree is essentially the same as replying Disagree but not including a rebuttal. I don't know if there is a good answer on this.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by c0lo on Tuesday March 03 2015, @12:27AM
<pedantic hat="on">"Claiming" a matter of opinion doesn't play well with "Incorrect"; this becomes important given that SN is not exclusively a tech site
E.g., suppose a comment that says: "I think that Putin is the champion of free speech", cannot attract a correct "Incorrect" mod: one will never be able disprove that the poster thinks so. </pedantic>
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by Appalbarry on Tuesday March 03 2015, @02:12AM
"I think that Putin is the champion of free speech", cannot attract a correct "Incorrect" mod: one will never be able disprove that the poster thinks so.
I'll split that hair a bit further and suggest that what you can do is say "Incorrect" and offer (verifiable) evidence which supports the assertion.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday March 03 2015, @02:34AM
Given at least that humans enjoy the liberty of changing their minds, no, you can not (and still be correct).
In the context of the example, at most you can say is "You used to think otherwise, here's the proof". With the continuation of "Did you change your mind, is it a case of cognitive dissonance or what?" probably being the fairest.
(I assert the above will hold true until the unreserved telepathy will be the norm in inter-human communication)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 03 2015, @03:16AM
Please, no.. I don't want to read your mind...! (Especially if there are moose wangs)
(Score: 2) by q.kontinuum on Tuesday March 03 2015, @07:48AM
I like the idea as well. I see some problems for implementation, though. What is a valid citation? Wikipedia has some good rules, but distinguishing a valid source from an invalid one according to their standards is not a trivial task, and probably not the level of expertise we want to require our moderators to have. Can I mod comments asserting evolution as incorrect [biblegateway.com]? Or can I mod any comment asserting a religion other than the pastafarian as incorrect [soylentnews.org]?
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @11:49AM
Yeah, the merit of your citation is judged by anyone else who cares to post a counter-citation and mod you incorrect, same as with any argument. The more I think about it though the more I think Incorrect might be better as a +0 moderation with or without the citation requirement; like Disagree but slightly different. The core issue is really: do we want posts hidden because they made a factually incorrect statement or do we want to preserve them for the sake of being able to see what's being argued against?
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by q.kontinuum on Tuesday March 03 2015, @01:36PM
I don't think we need too more "+0" moderation. I did use the "disagree" once, but I didn't see much of a point; usually it isn't even visible to others when the post is already rated, and rate it "disagree" just knowing the poster will get an email that someone on the internet somehow disagrees with him didn't seem to be valuable feedback to the poster as well. As a poster, receiving such a moderation would annoy me more than "-1 Troll", because I know "-1 Troll" might spawn some support from others while "Disagree" is just some invisible anonymous nagger.
Sometimes there are just posts that need to get down-modded; not to "punish" the poster or anything, but just because a comment that appears to be correct on the first glance and is modded up accordingly just turns out to be utterly wrong after some consideration, and deserves to be down-modded again. Overrated would be ok for that purpose in some cases, but generally -1 Incorrect looks like the appropriate pendant to +1 Insightful to me as well. I like the idea to tie this moderation to a mandatory comment as well. Just scrap the citation-requirement, and let the fellow moderators sort it out. E.g.
user1: "Evolution is the base of human development from far more primitive life forms."
user2: System message: ***user2 modded above post -1 incorrect*** "You are a monkey, but I'm not!"
Give it some time, and I bet user2 would be modded "-1 Troll" while user1 would regain karma by being modded up "+1 Insightful" at least to previous level.
On the other hand, if user2 has some valuable contribution, it will also be rated accordingly.
If you want to get more focus on positive moderations, maybe make it possible to retract negative mods later on? Like, if I mod someone "Troll" and later notice he might actually have a point, I can go back on my previous rating? (I think I never modded anyone troll, because if it's dumb trolling it's usually not rated very high anyway, and if it's clever trolling it would deserve "+1 Troll" ;-))
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @02:44PM
That was the general idea. We have neither the time, patience, nor desire to police every comment or moderation. The over the top threat was entirely made up of joke particles.
Technically doable now but I'd need to ponder on it a while to form a proper opinion. Haven't thought about any potential downsides yet.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:13PM
Maybe just a more generalized "unmod" choice, visible only after modding that comment. Cuz moderators change their minds too. Also could let us 'move' mod points to a more-deserving or less-visible post.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Reziac on Tuesday March 03 2015, @04:51PM
Wikipedia articles that attract opposing opinions should show us the danger of "incorrect". Incorrect according to whom? Who's got the right facts here?? Do you know enough to tell which is right??
Problem arises when you get fields where every Joe thinks he's an expert, but in fact knows just enough to be dangerous. I work in such a field. I'm the expert. Yet I'm the one who'd get modded "incorrect" most often, because the average Joe has the wrong picture but thinks he's right, and can toss out all sorts of citations -- citations that are factually wrong, nonetheless popularly approved as correct. Now what? All that's done is to promote wrong info while shutting up the expert.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday March 03 2015, @03:41AM
If you don't get specific, folks will just assume you hate all change just because it's change and not lend much weight to your opinion.
Why exactly is "don't change a system that does it's job" an invalid opinion?
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday March 03 2015, @04:06AM
How about this if you want a project:
A simple GUI comment editor.
1. Knowing a markup language shouldn't be a requirement to post a well formatted comment.
2. It would presumably be opt-in, satisfying the "get off my lawn" crowd.
3. Less daunting for newbies.
I think something along these lines would be a lot less controversial...
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @04:25AM
We can live with a bit of controversy but your idea doesn't suck. It's out of my particular bailiwick though as that's way deeper javascript than I can comfortably manage with any quickness. Feel free to come on team or just submit a pull request if it's within the realm of your chops though.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @04:19AM
Because just as perfect is the enemy of good, good is the enemy of better. We've already seen where slashdot-like moderation leads and we don't want that for this site. Is it better than say reddit? Sure but it's not quite good enough for us. If we can tweak in a few minor changes that cumulatively have a significant impact for the better, that's exactly what we should do. If some of them are worse, well code is a lot easier to remove than it is to create.
We're a new site, guy, we're doing our best to both learn from what's been done before and try a few new things that haven't been tried before because none of us would be here if slashdot were good enough for us. If you're looking for this to be the site's final-ish form, you're a year or two early in that desire. We still have the Apache2/mod_perl2 upgrade coming, the nexuses upgrade that we haven't entirely decided what to do with yet, inline commenting, return where you were after moderation, and sixty-some-odd bugs and feature requests to address on the issues tracker.
The pace of change will settle down but if we can't do better than 2009-era slashdot, we may as well just hang it up now.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Tuesday March 03 2015, @09:17AM
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:11PM
Have you thought about handling these threads as Polls instead of Articles? If you did a small feature set at a time and voted along a desire axis (e.g. want/no opinion/don't want) you could at least test the Null hypothesis.
People can still hammer it out in the comments...
I would probably even vote for a few.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:21PM
I considered it until I remembered how I used to script /. vote stuffing when I was an annoying noob. Our polls aren't just unscientific, they're downright silly. Only way we could really do that with any confidence at all in the results is limit it to registered users and that would cut out at my guess 80% of our community.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 03 2015, @10:57AM
Sorry if this has already been raised, but I have an issue with 1 and 2.
I login and mod frequently, I do not think I am abusive in my mods, however I rarely post and whilst I submit articles its usually as AC. 1 and 2 would mean I could not be as effective a mod as my karma would soon run out. Maybe this wouldnt affect many but I thought I'd raise it.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @11:42AM
No need for a sorry, the more opinions the better even if they're only "what he said". This here is our voting booth and soapbox rolled together, use it as either as you feel the need.
That's a pretty valid point as well; we have plenty of people in that position. Anecdotal evidence from IRC would have about a quarter of all registered users doing exactly the same. Which I don't get; why not stay logged in even if just for the saved comment reading settings? I'm entirely too lazy to keep switching them for every story I read.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 03 2015, @12:15PM
>Which I don't get; why not stay logged in even if just for the saved comment reading settings?
A variety of reasons. For instance, I might not want a particular story submission linked to my uid. Thanks for the response.
(Score: 2) by Open4D on Tuesday March 03 2015, @12:48PM
... This is to reduce the chance of moderation mistakes, which reminds me of the idea of moderation previews. If it was an option, I would enable it. (Maybe you should run a vote about how many other moderators would do so too?)
Here is a previous sub-discussion about moderation previews: http://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=1205&cid=29287 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @01:09PM
Yeah, it's not a bad idea but it's also not quite as straightforward and easy to implement as the ideas listed. Also, if we do that I don't think it will require an RFC as I can't see a reason to not do it aside from it having a worse priority to work required ratio than some of the other things we have going or slated to go soon.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by martyb on Tuesday March 03 2015, @01:57PM
Here is something I mentioned [soylentnews.org] in the earlier RFC: Reworking Karma [soylentnews.org] story that I did not see mentioned here. I think it bears repeating and consideration.
What if I had to use a Karma point in order to apply the Karma Bonus on a comment?
Basically, once I get past a certain number of karma points, I am now able to post comments 'louder' than other users. I believe I can set that as my default in my user preferences; at least that is the default that is available to me when I am writing this very comment: "[ ] No Karma Bonus". I have to go out of my way to NOT 'speak louder', and I can do that an infinite number of times at no 'cost' to me.
The more I 'shout' the less Karma I would have. In theory, that would mean I'd need to do something positive for the site (submit an Informative/interesting/etc. comment or submit a story that gets accepted.) I can no longer rest on my laurels at the Karma Cap.
It is entirely *my* choice whether or not I want to 'speak up', but I could no longer do so with abandon.
Compared to some of the other suggestions I've seen here, it also benefits from being (relatively) easy to implement.
Implementation detail: please do not just deduct the karma point directly; this should be something tracked in the DB so we can later analyze how useful [or not] it was to implement this. Ideally, it should be a value someplace in the admin vars: "Deduction for using Karma Bonus: number" where zero means do not deduct, "1" means deduct one point; could conceivably make it "0.5" or somesuch, too.
Wit is intellect, dancing.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @02:59PM
Interesting idea. Dunno that it's a good one yet but it's definitely interesting.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1) by martyb on Wednesday March 04 2015, @03:18AM
Thanks! I appreciate it being taken under consideration. It's interesting to think of what the follow-on effects might be.
Wit is intellect, dancing.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Tuesday March 03 2015, @04:14PM
I'm good with 1 thru 9. Except that I would also separator-line the modtypes list into upmods and downmods. Upmods on top. :)
Also I like someone's suggestion that overrated/underrated should not change points unless the comment already has an up/down mod. I've seen overrated used to obliterate comments. I'm not sure disagree should downpoint a comment either, for the same reason.
I like Hairyfeet's suggestion re 'modbombing' -- assuming it means "mod-kill everything someone posts". But I've often had occasion to dredge upward some informative poster and thus spend all my mod points on one person. I hope that's not considered a 'modbomb'. Since you can see all, know all -- I'm sure you can pick out egregious repeat offenders without some karma-related Rule. We should not be a Zero Tolerance community at any level.
I don't like the "incorrect" option at all. All that will happen is we get more flamewars between people who espouse conflicting facts. It becomes "incorrect according to whom?" I think "disagree" adequately covers it without passing judgment on whose facts are more true, or are expressed more convincingly. Might be they're ALL wrong, if only because no actual experts have weighed in. (I've seen that often enough in my own field.)
I've also thought about Mod IDs being visible to all, and tho it sounds good on the surface, what I suspect will really happen is "I see X modding up stuff I disagree with, so I'm going to mod down everything X says."
Now going off to read more comments. :)
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:06PM
Disagree isn't a -1, it's a +0. Has no effect on karma or score of the comment except to mean Disagree will pop up as the mod reason if it is the most used mod.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Tuesday March 03 2015, @06:33PM
And that's another reason it covers a world of argument: it just states that fact and moves on. (I've actually been noting "disagree" modded posts as "interesting to consider".)
"Incorrect", tho, that's a can of worms.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by AudioGuy on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:18PM
Some aspects of the changes seem to be very much along the lines of creating a 'Self-Enforcing Protocol' as described here:
https://www.schneier.com/essays/archives/2009/08/the_value_of_self-en.html [schneier.com]
I thought this an interesting way of looking at the problem.
(Score: 1) by quixote on Wednesday March 04 2015, @04:41AM
1) Karma minimum to downmod: ............ an excellent idea.
2) Downmods cost the moderator karma ............. not sure you want to make it costly to point out BS. It really depends on what the Soylent balance is between frivolous downmods and real ones. I have noticed some problems with stupid downmodding (especially -- shh, put your head down -- in systemd discussions). So maybe it's necessary. But you don't want to encourage happy-clappy modding either.
The rest all okay up to
10). I don't understand 10. If you're saying that people caught mod-bombing should be banned from moderating, at least for some time, then I agree.
Also, I appreciate the genuine effort to talk to the community about this!