The new Politics Cafe charter

hatrickpatrick

The new charter for the Politics Cafe has been posted here:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2057591263

Out of curiosity, what has actually been changed? This doesn't seem to be a new charter so much as the old one, but with the caveat that civility rules are going to be enforced more thoroughly - or am I missing something?

Stheno

Main change is the move from "light" moderation, with an emphasis on a requirement to be civil at all times, calling out specifics in relation to the forum, and referencing the boards ts and cs

Lovely Bloke

could you consider outlawing terms like "xxx-bot" and the likes.

Alf Stewart.

Stheno wrote: »

Main change is the move from "light" moderation, with an emphasis on a requirement to be civil at all times, calling out specifics in relation to the forum, and referencing the boards ts and cs

How will a line be drawn between what's civil and what's not?

Lets be honest here i do be flabbergasted at what seems to cross the line, and what doesn't in the current caf at times. Just seems to be down to the individual mods mood at the time.

Just an observation.

Timberrrrrrrr

Was there really a need to go full Nuclear on the forum and wipe out all of the threads? (or is it just me that can't see any?)

Alf Stewart.

Timberrrrrrrr wrote: »

Was there really a need to go full Nuclear on the forum and wipe out all of the threads? (or is it just me that can't see any?)

I reckon they zapped them (temporarily) due to the glitch that was allowing people to post n it still.

Stheno

Timberrrrrrrr wrote: »

Was there really a need to go full Nuclear on the forum and wipe out all of the threads? (or is it just me that can't see any?)

If you read the update that was posted this afternoon, that was done to enable the forum reopening more quickly.

All of the threads are still there and being reviewed, as referenced in the update

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=99546638&postcount=3

ThisRegard

Don't know why they have to close all previous threads as they don't have the time to 'prune' them, rather than just enforce the new rules from this point on.

gallag

Well that's one of your busiest forums killed! Good job guys.

KERSPLAT!

gallag wrote: »

Well that's one of your busiest forums killed! Good job guys.

Jaysus, don't be so dramatic.

Taltos

ThisRegard wrote: »

Don't know why they have to close all previous threads as they don't have the time to 'prune' them, rather than just enforce the new rules from this point on.

Because you'll get some muppet who'll link back or quote a previous thread that should have been left alone or equally in a year or two a newbie will refer to it unknowingly and then wonder why the mods clamp down.

Doing otherwise would just invite failure as opposed to just making things difficult for a while. Choice of the lesser evil.

The Hill Billy

Alf Stewart. wrote: »

How will a line be drawn between what's civil and what's not?

In the same way that the line is drawn in many, many other forums across the rest of the site.

Don't be a dick.

ThisRegard

Taltos wrote: »

Because you'll get some muppet who'll link back or quote a previous thread that should have been left alone or equally in a year or two a newbie will refer to it unknowingly and then wonder why the mods clamp down.

Doing otherwise would just invite failure as opposed to just making things difficult for a while. Choice of the lesser evil.

You're opening up a Pandoras box of groundhog days.

KERSPLAT!

There are thousands of threads throughout boards that go untouched when new rules were or are brought in, why the change now? Makes no sense to me.

A big, charter updated on 28/4/16, post should be more than enough. 'Pruning' all previous threads seems like over kill and a lot of extra mod work.

Is it being suggested that all threads will be reviewed!?

ThisRegard

KERSPLAT! wrote: »

Is it being suggested that all threads will be reviewed!?

That's how the alternative they put forward reads to me.

gallag

KERSPLAT! wrote: »

Jaysus, don't be so dramatic.

Oh, sorry, didn't think I was being dramatic lol, just pointing out that modelling the politics cafe moderation on the other political forums will kill traffic to it, afterall for what reason do you believe the cafe was so popular, at least compared to the others? Look at international politics, probaly the most stringently moderated forum and days can pass without a post! Still, I could be wrong, I guess we will find out!

Myrddin

KERSPLAT! wrote: »

A big, charter updated on 28/4/16, post should be more than enough.

You'd think wouldn't you? That is, until you look at the old charter being updated & the all the trouble continuing on post-updates & warnings.

'Pruning' all previous threads seems like over kill and a lot of extra mod work.

Far from it, it's by far the lesser of two evils. As explained, it gives the mods and forum a clean slate to work from, no previous baggage to handle, & sets the right tone from the get go. Seriously, much of the previous content was looked at, & the standard of a lot of it was well below par. That type of stuff had to go, there was no choice in that matter. Considering then there was 80 pages of threads, pruning what had to go would have been a monumental task, & kept the forum closed for far longer than it was.

Is it being suggested that all threads will be reviewed!?

Whatever is relevant & appropriate will be reviewed & brought back if necessary. Give that some time though, there has been a lot of work done over the last few days behind the scenes by the mods there, & things needs time to settle down after today.

For what it's worth, the mods there were very passionate about bringing this forum back from the brink. It would have been all too easy to call it a day on the Cafe, But the mods made a solid case for having another bash at it. While the timing of all of this was unfortunate, you should all know that the mods have put in some serious effort to make sure the cafe returned to you. It's obviously looks very bare now, but it won't take long to become as active as it was before.

K-9

The tone is very different from the original cafe charter though, which was beautiful in its simplicity. This one is still pretty short but to the point.

I think the mod team would be open to constructive suggestions. Personally I'd ban bot, shinner, blueshirt etc. but it may be too strict, or we are so uses to seeing them at this stage.

Ideally the charter shouldn't be a consideration for 95% of the posters in the cafe.

gallag

Myrddin wrote: »

For what it's worth, the mods there were very passionate about bringing this forum back from the brink.

The brink? One of your busiest forums and certainly by many thousand percent your busiest politics forum on a site that requires traffic to generate revenue and is losing money and traffic every year? The brink of what?

K-9

gallag wrote: »

Oh, sorry, didn't think I was being dramatic lol, just pointing out that modelling the politics cafe moderation on the other political forums will kill traffic to it, afterall for what reason do you believe the cafe was so popular, at least compared to the others? Look at international politics, probaly the most stringently moderated forum and days can pass without a post! Still, I could be wrong, I guess we will find out!

You haven't even posted yet gallag, give it a chance, and no, it will not be the same as the general forum.

LuckyLloyd

I agree a change in direction was needed. I'd second a specific ban of 'xxx-bot' posts also. Ultimately threads have been getting clogged up with attacks on the poster and blanket sweeping 'anyone who disagrees is a scrounger' type nonsense.

The decision to purge the previous content is a bold move that makes sense too. Those genuinely interested in discussion will back these changes in my view. Many regulars have seemed primarily interested in aggressively hammering the same narrow range of points over and over at every opportunity. I would shed no tears if these changes fail to impress them.

Good job.

gallag

K-9 wrote: »

You haven't even posted yet gallag, give it a chance, and no, it will not be the same as the general forum.

Haha, I just about survived the cafe with the light touch moderation, I don't think I'll bother, anyway I figure that's kinda the point? My time will be better spent finally figuring out reddit than appealing bans here, good luck with it though, some good mods in the cafe, probaly the best on boards! Thanks.

The Hill Billy

gallag wrote: »

Oh, sorry, didn't think I was being dramatic lol, just pointing out that modelling the politics cafe moderation on the other political forums will kill traffic to it, afterall for what reason do you believe the cafe was so popular, at least compared to the others? Look at international politics, probaly the most stringently moderated forum and days can pass without a post! Still, I could be wrong, I guess we will find out!

The new charter does not model itself on the other forums' charters. Read it again. It lays the ground rules for how it will run in the future - more relaxed than the more seruiz forums, but less tolerance for the behaviour that was ruining the forum for many of its regulars.

DeadHand

Over moderation has reached the point where entire forums are getting torn down now.

And the hemorrhaging of users continues unstaunched...

Fairly soon the moderators will have no-one to moderate but each other.

tomwaterford

gallag wrote: »

The brink? One of your busiest forums and certainly by many thousand percent your busiest politics forum on a site that requires traffic to generate revenue and is losing money and traffic every year? The brink of what?

In all fairness it was a pure mess and not the worst idea to start from scratch again


Though maybe as a sign of good fate they should resind bans/cards issued?

Iwasfrozen

The Hill Billy wrote: »

In the same way that the line is drawn in many, many other forums across the rest of the site.

Don't be a dick.

"Don't be a dick" is too vauge to be a rule.

Iwasfrozen

I like this site, I've been a member for years but I fear over moderation will be the death of it.

Obviously some moderation is needed, but as long as users aren't openly supporting illegal activity ( which, to be fair to the mods some users were) I would leave well enough alone

The Hill Billy

DeadHand wrote: »

Over moderation has reached the point where entire forums are getting torn down now.

And the hemorrhaging of users continues unstaunched...

Fairly soon the moderators will have no-one to moderate but each other.

Yet, you & many, many others are still here. And still need moderation to boot.

Permabear

This post has been deleted.

hullaballoo

People forget very easily that the level of moderation on this site is and has always been community driven.

What sets this site apart from similar sites is that discussions here have rules to prevent them being wildly off topic or having dominant personalities taking over or having threads of pure vitriol being spat at one another etc.

Over the years, through constant feedback and internal discussions, varying levels of moderation have been decided upon in various forums. The busiest forums naturally end up with stricter moderation under this model and that means strictly moderated forums are more visible and then the whole site gets branded as overly moderated.

In my limited experience of reddit etc., although the moderators are not as visible or prolific, the site is heavily moderated because the community does the moderator's job by effectively hiding posts the community doesn't like or rewarding posts that fit their world view by putting them first after the op.

The alternative is zero moderation, tbh. Imagine the siht-show that would be here.

I quite like a site that doesn't let me come in and just shout abuse at people and forces me to add a little reason and civility to what I have to say.

Zaph

Permabear wrote: »

This post had been deleted.

A few changes made (highlighted above)

K-9

Zaph wrote: »

A few changes made (highlighted above)

Cheers permabear and Zaph, should have spotted a few of those.

Semi colons and stuff, I'll get somebody more qualified. Bluewolf must be about here somewhere.

Just on the over all change, as I said before, I doubt 95% of the posters will be effected. The same very good mod team are there and are open to suggestions. The mods, or c-mods for that matter, really don't want to see people getting banned.

weisses

What about my thread in the help desk ? ... I made my case and now Every post I referred to is gone.

dudara

Don't worry, the Admins and CMods /Mods for the forum can still see the relevant posts. They are not available to regular users, or Mods/CMods not linked to the forum.

gandalf

I am very uncomfortable with the apparent removal of threads. I am not aware of something of this nature happening before on boards. When I asked for the soccer forum to be closed and then reopened as a access grant to post forum we never deleted threads retrospectively, if something was deemed out of order it was deleted there and then and that typically rarely happened.

I have seen the arguement that a new user might see a thread from the past and think that is the norm. If people read the charters then that arguement is null and void. I think you are setting a very dangerous precedent in retrospectively removing threads especially as boards is asserting it's commercial persona more. What next a new sponsor signs up and any negative posts about them in the past disappears. I suggest that all the pre-closure threads are restored but locked so no new posts can't be added. They are part of the history of boards and even though I don't like Politics Cafe and I didn't agree with it being set up I would support its posts being restored.

Again I will reiterate retrospective deletion of threads is setting a very dangerous precedent for boards and just diminishes the site further from it's roots.

weisses

dudara wrote: »

Don't worry, the Admins and CMods /Mods for the forum can still see the relevant posts. They are not available to regular users, or Mods/CMods not linked to the forum.

In this case they are relevant to me as well ... It's becoming a bit of a farce tbh

tomwaterford

weisses wrote: »

In this case they are relevant to me as well ... It's becoming a bit of a farce tbh

Just post the same/similar again??
(So long as it's within the rules)



Do people seriously thing it was gone anything other than a complete mess and ridiculous for large parts

Who in reality is going to read over some what were complete train wreaks of threads....I do hope it's moderated to some degree anyway now

Pintman Paddy Losty

Just see theres a thread here too about it. Just want to register my concern at threads being retrospectively 'pruned'. Very bad idea in my opinion.

Pintman Paddy Losty wrote: »

I'm back down to 18 posts (19 after this one) from hundreds because almost all of mine were in here.

I honestly think you're wasting your time trying to read through and sanitise thousands upon thousands of posts. Its a pointless endeavour.

Just lock them and restore them. What's the fear? That people will try and use old posts that weren't carded as some kind of precedent?

I think it's a terrible idea. Those posts are essentially part of the public record. It can be interesting to see how people reacted to political events as the happened.

For example, you can still see how people were reacting to 9/11 the day it unfolded. It's fascinating.

Don't go trying to re-write history because someone called a poster a dirty shinner for standing up for Gerry Adams during the Slab Murphy affair. Just leave things as they are.

Pintman Paddy Losty wrote: »

I'm totally on board with the new Café. I agree that it was overdue and hoping that the new forum prospers.

But what do you think about my point of those threads being an interesting insight in to what people were saying about daily political events? Maybe I'm just an anorak, but I think it's very interesting that we have a public record of exactly how the citizens of Ireland, or at least those ones that post on boards, discussed major political events. It won't be long until these events become history and I think it's important that the record remain intact, warts and all.

As you said, what's done is done. Everyone is aware of the new standards, so I don't see the harm in the old threads remaining intact, provided they are locked.

Dyr

hullaballoo wrote: »

People forget very easily that the level of moderation on this site is and has always been community driven.

What sets this site apart from similar sites is that discussions here have rules to prevent them being wildly off topic or having dominant personalities taking over or having threads of pure vitriol being spat at one another etc.

Over the years, through constant feedback and internal discussions, varying levels of moderation have been decided upon in various forums. The busiest forums naturally end up with stricter moderation under this model and that means strictly moderated forums are more visible and then the whole site gets branded as overly moderated.

Easy on self back slapping there, you'll do your rotator cuff in. That might have been the case once but those days are long, long gone. You sound like the branch davidians at this stage, holed up in a compound conversing only with your fellow kool aid drinkers, ignoring the outside world.

hatrickpatrick

Just want to point out that even though I made this thread, I personally have no issue with the new charter and have been fortunate enough to have been very rarely modded in the Cafe over the years. Essentially just asking here because as this charter is so similar to the last one, I wasn't sure what if any changes in behaviour would be required to continue my streak of rarely getting banhammered.

There's only one thing personally that I'd change about the Cafe as it is (was?), and that is that I wish people would stop using deliberately inflammatory phrases such as "SF/IRA", "loony left", "blueshirt" and so on to refer to politicians they don't like. It's very clearly not intended to actually make a point, it's intended purely and unequivocally to piss other posters off and goad them into a silly slagging competition.

hatrickpatrick

With regard to the moving of posts, could a compromise not be to perhaps set up a forum a bit like the Politics Archive which was created at forum 99 when the main politics forum was split? A closed forum which just preserves all the old posts from the Cafe, but is itself separate from the Cafe. Could give it a totally separate name so as not to confuse it with the reincarnated cafe (Call it the Dail Bar Archives for the craic )

Stheno

hatrickpatrick wrote: »

With regard to the moving of posts, could a compromise not be to perhaps set up a forum a bit like the Politics Archive which was created at forum 99 when the main politics forum was split? A closed forum which just preserves all the old posts from the Cafe, but is itself separate from the Cafe. Could give it a totally separate name so as not to confuse it with the reincarnated cafe (Call it the Dail Bar Archives for the craic )

That's under discussion at the moment

hatrickpatrick

Stheno wrote: »

That's under discussion at the moment

Lies. I expect some kind of shrine acknowledging that it was all my idea if that's the way ye decide to go

Stheno

hatrickpatrick wrote: »

Lies. I expect some kind of shrine acknowledging that it was all my idea if that's the way ye decide to go

Sure. You can volunteer to be a mod there :pac:

hatrickpatrick

Stheno wrote: »

Sure. You can volunteer to be a mod there :pac:

On second thoughts, I'm pretty sure some imposter posted that message from my account - I for one think it's a terrible suggestion.

CabanSail

While this has been unprecedented it has been coming for a long time. The closure was necessary and I assumed it was going to be a while before being opened again. It was due to a lot of work by the whole team which made the closure as short as it was. As has been stated many times we opted to reopen sooner and all the old threads are just soft deleted. The discussion on how they will be managed is still under discussion. Let me make one thing clear. There has been no push to delete anything because of any viewpoint or political affiliation etc. It has all been about the level of muppetry expressed by some.

weisses

tomwaterford wrote: »

Just post the same/similar again??
(So long as it's within the rules)

Not possible in regards to other people's posts ... Just read that thread and you understand

weisses

CabanSail wrote: »

While this has been unprecedented it has been coming for a long time. The closure was necessary and I assumed it was going to be a while before being opened again. It was due to a lot of work by the whole team which made the closure as short as it was. As has been stated many times we opted to reopen sooner and all the old threads are just soft deleted. The discussion on how they will be managed is still under discussion. Let me make one thing clear. There has been no push to delete anything because of any viewpoint or political affiliation etc. It has all been about the level of muppetry expressed by some.

Mods needed a reset because of how they moderated, not of some muppetry by some posters.

You can ban people, close threads... Etc But you choose the nuclear option all because some posters behaving badly ???

my help desk thread explains perfectly what is wrong .. But even there the point I made is avoided ....

CabanSail

The forum, in it's past incarnation, was "light touch moderation" to allow some banter. We were moderating it as such. This was an experiment which was not not successful. That has now changed and the moderation style can now be adjusted accordingly. It has been explained why there was drastic action taken. It was to draw a line and so that forum can be relaunched in the new format.

Permabear

This post has been deleted.

weisses

CabanSail wrote: »

The forum, in it's past incarnation, was "light touch moderation" to allow some banter. We were moderating it as such.

It was not all banter that was allowed .... Just look at the immigration thread alone.