Reporting Mods.

The Hill Billy

Any PMs that are sent are private - not secret. They are no more 'secret' than the many private forums on this site.

There are some things that the general userbase are free to see. These are 'public'.

Other things are 'private'. Their visibility is restricted to certain users.

'Secret' stuff is for Hogwarts or Q's R&D facility.

Delirium

Brown Bomber wrote: »

I believe there is now a system in place where mod warning locations are listed in the thread title

Not unless it's serious problem in the thread. Mods definitely do not, nor would I suggest, update the OP with every warning/action that occurs in the thread.

Surely two individual offenses warrant individual responses rendering this irrelevant to what we are discussing. In any case, while I appreciate your efforts to explain things to me I believe we are walking in the mud here.

Nope. The mod could look at the two posts and possibly deem a single PM warning is fine in the scenario. Or the second reported post might warrant an infraction and the first post is ignored. Thus one reported post is "ignored" as only one post will be flagged in some fashion.

gozunda

The_Morrigan wrote: »

I'm talking about any user, not mods. If you are reporting a post in any forum and you expect every person who reported the post to be included in a sanction pm then this place will be destroyed.

Why do you say that?

In the case of no notification of any action -

Surely transparency in moderation is essential so that it can be seen that a report has actually been considered / acted upon and if there has been no action that the reporter has that knowledge to take any such report further if they so wish.

How do those posters who report a post for breaching a forums charter etc know if such a report has ever been acted on if there is no confirmation either by the relevant mod flagging the offending post or letting the reporter know the outcome?

I can see how this particular type of mod action could very well result in posters believing that a reported matter was not even considered or looked at by the relevant moderator. And may well cause posters to lose confidence in the reporting system.

Penn

Brown Bomber wrote: »

I believe there is now a system in place where mod warning locations are listed in the thread title

General warnings that all posters should be made aware of, not for individual warnings or ones only concerning one or two posters.

Brown Bomber wrote: »

Surely two individual offenses warrant individual responses rendering this irrelevant to what we are discussing.

The simple fact is that mod action might not always be visible. A reported post might result in a PM to the poster telling them to stop, or the mod might decide to just keep an eye on them, or inform their co-mods to keep an eye on them etc etc. Either way, if a poster hasn't seen any mod action taken and wants to query it, they can PM a mod, cmod or admin. There is a solution to this problem, and it's already there. CC'ing the person who reported a post in on a PM to the reported poster a) reveals them as having reported the post unless they were BCC'ed, b) doesn't change the fact that some mod actions are behind the scenes and don't involve a PM to the poster, and c) causes more work for the mods in the event that the reporter doesn't like or agree with the PM sent by the mod, causing even more PM's to be sent to try and deal with it.

You're trying to solve a problem for which there is already a solution, with a more complex and troublesome solution.

OldGoat

Brown Bomber wrote: »

I believe there is now a system in place where mod warning locations are listed in the thread title

This is not a system wide policy. It's something that some mods do in some threads. Absence of a mod-warnings edited into the OP is not license for people to have free rein and post in a dickish (infractable) mode.

The_Morrigan

gozunda wrote: »

Why do you say that?

In the case of no notification of any action -

Surely transparency in moderation is essential so that it can be seen that a report has actually been considered / acted upon and if there has been no action that the reporter has that knowledge to take any such report further if they so wish.

How do those posters who report a post for breaching a forums charter etc know if such a report has ever been acted on if there is no confirmation either by the relevant mod flagging the offending post or letting the reporter know the outcome?

I can see how this particular type of mod action could very well result in posters believing that a reported matter was not even considered or looked at by the relevant moderator. And may well cause posters to lose confidence in the reporting system.

If we remove the privacy of reporting posts and allowing the bold poster to know who reported them then it will lead to further bad behaviour probably against the person(s) who did the reporting.

This system is akin to whistle blowing, if you remove that element of protection from those doing the reporting then two things will happen;
1. Those reporting the posts will become targets; and
2. People will stop using the function for fear of retaliation.

If people want to own up to reporting a post then that is there choice, but painting a big target on their back because they are trying to make the site better is just bad for everyone.

gozunda

The_Morrigan wrote: »

If we remove the privacy of reporting posts and allowing the bold poster to know who reported them then it will lead to further bad behaviour probably against the person(s) who did the reporting.

This system is akin to whistle blowing, if you remove that element of protection from those doing the reporting then two things will happen;
1. Those reporting the posts will become targets; and
2. People will stop using the function for fear of retaliation.

If people want to own up to reporting a post then that is there choice, but painting a big target on their back because they are trying to make the site better is just bad for everyone.

No my apologies crossed wires.

There would be no need to notify the 'bold' poster imo. The call to transparency for some form of notification (eg bcc / flag on post) as to what mod action was taken if any would allow the reporter to take the matter further if they wish to do so. It would also increase posters confidence that reported matters were considered.

The_Morrigan

gozunda wrote: »

No my apologies crossed wires.

There would be no need to notify the 'bold' poster imo. The call to transparency for some form of notification (eg bcc / flag on post) as to what mod action was taken if any would allow the reporter to take the matter further if they wish to do so. It would also increase posters confidence that reported matters were considered.

I'm not going to bcc in multiple users to a pm or send a follow up pm to every user who reports the post after action may/may not have been taken, I also can't do that via the app or touch site and I tend to mod on the go.

All reported matters are considered, they may not be actioned though. No mod has the time or resources to explain their actions to every single user who reports a post or sends a pm highlighting an issue.

My forums are relatively quiet and it takes up a lot of time when some threads kick off. I can't imagine how the busier forums manage as it is, let alone have some posters requesting more unnecessary workload on top of it.

OldGoat

gozunda wrote: »

No my apologies crossed wires.

There would be no need to notify the 'bold' poster imo. The call to transparency for some form of notification (eg bcc / flag on post) as to what mod action was taken if any would allow the reporter to take the matter further if they wish to do so. It would also increase posters confidence that reported matters were considered.

This puts the mod in the precarious position of having to debate their decision with either the reporter or the reportee. That is a whole heap of grief for anyone to undertake.

Nor would it make anything clearer for users. The same breach of could result in two totally different decisions by the mods.

As an example conceder a noob posting on a zombie thread and an established poster doing the same.

For the noob I would PM with reasons why we don't dig up the zombies and recommend that they start a new thread instead.

For the established user with a history of raising zombies I would see they get short shrift with a forum ban.

The reporter would see two reported posts but only one of which has been actioned.

At that point (if your above want were in place) I would probably have to engage with the reporter and explain why the noob was not infracted.

At the same time I would have to engage with the established user explaining why he's been banned but another user was let away with it.

You should also remember that if 10 people were to report the zombie threads then the mod has to deal with each of those reporters individually.

What you are asking for is simply beyond the bounds of what is feasible and all for the want of knowing that your click of the button has actually been read by one of the (minimum of) four people that receives an email directly to their phone.

Dav

Since it didn't seem to sink in the first time, here it is again. This time I'm closing this thread cause we're done here.

Dav wrote: »

To answer the OP's question - if you wish to report ANY post, you click the report button and that that. If you wish to report a mod's actions for review, you contact their CMod. If you wish to report a CMod, you contact an Admin, you wish to report an Admin, you contact Niamh or I. You wish to report us - close you're account, we're the top of the site's chain of command We are NEVER going to have some manner of system to tell people that something they reported is being actioned or that they have ANY sort of right to be included in any kind of moderation process. That applies equally to members and mods alike.

We've been doing this for 16 years. Believe me, we know what we're at. There is literally nothing good about a reporter being included in a discussion or review of a potential disciplinary process. It causes hostility and one-upmanship and none of that is anything we're interested in promoting.

Moderators do not work here, they help. I'd happily help a friend move house on a weekend, but I would not help them move house every weekend because he keeps getting kicked out of his flat for being an arse. The only time moderation feels like a job is when we're having to deal with constant nitpickers and trouble makers. Usually the same sorts of people who seem to think that it's a "job" whether it be voluntary or not.

Funny that...