SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
After my last SN post the topic of moderation was brought up. Since its been quite awhile since we last openly discussed the state of moderation, I want to give the community a venue to discuss their feelings on it, and if the system needs further refinement. As a reminder, here's a review for how the system is currently setup:
- 5 mod points are handed out to at 00:10 UTC to users with positive karma
- ACs start at +0, users with karma less than 40 post at +1, users above that can post at +2
- You need 10 karma to mark some spam or troll
- Under normal circumstances, the staff do *not* have unlimited mod points, but can (and have) banned abusers of the moderation system
Please also review our SoylentNews Moderation Guidelines.
As always, we are willing to make changes to the system, but please post examples *with* links to any cases of suspected mod abuse. It's a lot easier to justify changing the system when evidence is in black and white. I also recommend that users make serious proposals on changes we can make. I'm not going to color the discussion with my own opinions, but as always, I will respond inline with comments when this goes live, and post a follow up article a few days after this one
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
Do not use if foil seal is broken.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Marand on Wednesday May 20 2015, @11:29AM
The current set of tweaks to the mod system seem to work fine. Giving everybody points daily takes away some of the "MUST USE POINTS" pressure, which makes moderation more enjoyable, especially combined with the post-and-mod system. Moderation is something you can do while reading, if something is interesting, rather than feeling like something you have to weigh the pros and cons of before you can act. The area that needs improvement is user mindset when moderating, I think.
Not because of abuses -- I'm not seeing much down mod abuse, really -- but because I think there aren't enough people using their modpoints to fix the occasional bad mod. Maybe they used their points already, or maybe they commented and don't realise they can still mod, I don't know. I also think there aren't enough people browsing at 0 to downmod the bad posts and upmod the good AC comments that deserve it. I understand that people don't want to dig through the crap, but when everybody browses at 1+ expecting someone else to deal with the downmodding, there aren't enough modpoints among the remaining people to fix everything.
Oh! That actually gave me an idea for an improvement: maybe the system could be tweaked to give people extra mod points that can only be used to moderate 0/-1 posts. Gives the people fighting in the trenches (in a manner of speaking) extra ammunition without having any real effect on most of the users.
The only other thing I can think of is making the differences in the mod system here clearer for casual readers. I still see occasional comments from people that think posting undoes moderation, for example.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2015, @05:58PM
Giving more mod points out per account gives dedicated trolls more karma-manipulating firepower. If your idea is limited to previously unmoderated posts only (so, 0-point posts only), then I agree that you seem to have a good idea there.
I always browse at zero, and usually browse at -1, nested. My display laziness is conflicting with my login laziness.
It is already stated in the moderation FAQ [soylentnews.org] that "Moderators can participate in the same discussion as both a moderator and a poster. You are only prevented from modding your own posts." If potential mods don't bother to read the FAQ, then maybe it's better their ignorance keeps them from participating.