Sort your mods, seriously

LunarSea

Been done to death, but just look at this thread... guy locks it BEFORE anything happens. Justifies it by saying "this is only going to go one way". How about ye moderate appropriately if that happens.

I might just go outside and punch that guy incase he breaks into my house... sound logic :rolleyes:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2057627321

The Hill Billy

As this is a complaint - moved to Help Desk.

tHB

Tombi!

I'm not sure you really understand the whole fanboy thing, then.
The OP was asking for a console, between X1 and PS4. People would just tear themselves apart over the arguing. If you're a fan of football, it's a bit like asking "Rangers or Celtic" and a bloodbath begins. While the OP most likely didn't intend to start a war, one was sure brewing. X1 and PS4 share a lot of games. It comes down to exclusives at the end of the day and the OP most likely (I assume, I could be wrong here) started a thread in both the Xbox and PlayStation forums asking about what console offers what benefits for what they wanted instead of trying to compare them in a forum which, 99% of the time, ends up with giant arguments. And that isn't exclusive to this site. It's in general.

CiDeRmAn

The which console type threads pretty much always descend into.
The OP was first saying "This isn't a PS4 vs XB1 discussion" but then looks for help, essentially, on which one to get, which inevitably boils down to a PS4 vs XB1 conversation and, with the best will in the world, that winds up in a bunch of people with too much time on their hands trolling and flaming, resulting in thread closure and warnings/infractions all around.
And the reason the threads are shut down as they start is because they always descend into this madness.
Maybe, in the interest of free speech and interesting discussion, a strict time limit could apply to such threads, I'm not sure what the solution is.
Sure, the threads could be allowed stand until an infraction occurs and the moderators are forced to intervene, but if it always results from such threads must they just wait til that point or intervene prophylactically instead.

The question too is well answered all over the internet, and given the entirely subjective nature of what games you like and the experience you want, it's very difficult to establish what another person is bound to like. Furthermore, if a person is an owner of just one of the two major current gen consoles, it is again inevitable that they are going to sing the praises of their investment and less likely to proffer an objective, informed choice.

johnny_ultimate

The pre-emptive lock rule for those sort of threads is not one we wanted to introduce, but unfortunately a few particularly colourful threads forced our hand. For whatever reason, we have seen time and time again that this is just not a topic that allows for courteous, reasonable discussion. As strict a rule as it seems, it's one we've had plenty of debates about both as mods and with the users, and ultimately we feel it's best for the forum. I fully agree it would be nice to be able to mod such threads as they happen, but one thread in particular took up so much of our time & effort for so little gain that it just wasn't worth it for either us or the forum itself.

Personally, whenever I lock threads like that, I make sure to direct the OP to the Xbox, PS and PC forums as appropriate. Much more likely to get a straightforward response there without the huge risk of it turning into the chaos we've sadly seen on too many other occasions in the general forum. I'm a big believer in light touch moderation, and thankfully the gaming forum is one that 99% of the time allows for that. This subject is, sadly, the 1%.

LunarSea

Tombi! wrote: »

I'm not sure you really understand the whole fanboy thing, then.

I 100% understand the fanboy thing. Been playing games for 25 years and did a few years behind the tills in a particular game retailer while I was at college. This is a discussion forum. Shutting down threads in this manner doesn't encourage you know, discussion.

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

Maybe, in the interest of free speech and interesting discussion, a strict time limit could apply to such threads, I'm not sure what the solution is.
Sure, the threads could be allowed stand until an infraction occurs and the moderators are forced to intervene, but if it always results from such threads must they just wait til that point or intervene prophylactically instead.

The question too is well answered all over the internet, and given the entirely subjective nature of what games you like and the experience you want, it's very difficult to establish what another person is bound to like. Furthermore, if a person is an owner of just one of the two major current gen consoles, it is again inevitable that they are going to sing the praises of their investment and less likely to proffer an objective, informed choice.

Maybe in the interest of a discussion forum being allowed to work as a discussion forum, ye let threads plod along and moderate accordingly? Ye're taking the lazy way out by shutting things down like this. You say stuff like "moderators are forced to intervene" - it's not the Cuban Missile Crisis here lads, it's an internet forum you're policing, and being completely overzealous about it.

If the question is "well answered on the internet" what's the bloody point in having a boards account? It's almost as if ye don't want site traffic. I someone only ones one console, then yes, they can still make an objective opinion as that objective opinion led to their purchase in the first place, no?

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

The pre-emptive lock rule for those sort of threads is not one we wanted to introduce, but unfortunately a few particularly colourful threads forced our hand.

Again, ye seem to be mistaking a chat forum for some life or death situation. "Forced your hand" - you're a moderating a videogame thread, talk about ideas above your station.

Mods should be able to stop people completely derailing a thread with BS (not as some others do on this site, have a hissy fit if the conversation isn't discussing the title to the letter) and use a bit of discretion, not the absolute farce of the moderation around here. I honestly might just piss off to reddit, this place is a mess.

Tombi!

But there is good discussion and bad discussion.
Bad discussion is just a bunch of people starting flame wars.
Good discussion would be discussing the benefits of the consoles which you rarely can do online.

LunarSea

Tombi! wrote: »

But there is good discussion and bad discussion.
Bad discussion is just a bunch of people starting flame wars.
Good discussion would be discussing the benefits of the consoles which you rarely can do online.

There's good discussion and bad discussion sure, but there's also locking threads before ANY discussion happens.

Moderate the resultant discussion, not "ah people are jerks, they will invariably be jerks therefore let's lock the thread before they show up so they can't ruin it!".

If you can't seen the glaring flaw in that logic maybe you shouldn't be allowed to moderate in the first place?

Tombi!

I'm not a mod on gaming. But my point is this: when you know, literally, know from many, many topics, how the same topic will go and it ends up badly? Then yes, you shut it down. It's not like the OP was carded. In fact, the closing mod apologized. So it's more of a "fanboys need to stop being fanboys".

LunarSea

It still reeks of an utterly lazy and backwards approach to moderation though, doesn't it? Not that anyone in the "help desk" (aka mod funtimehappyplace) is going to agree.

Ah look, whatever, this place reeks of "we the mods" and it's a chore to read, I'm better off just logging in to check the one or two bits I need to and then spending my time on the web elsewhere.

Mission accomplished for ye, I guess (one less person to **** up yer threads)

Star Lord

LunarSea wrote: »

Moderate the resultant discussion, not "ah people are jerks, they will invariably be jerks therefore let's lock the thread before they show up so they can't ruin it!".

If you can't seen the glaring flaw in that logic maybe you shouldn't be allowed to moderate in the first place?

It's not as simple as that. When you get people stirring trouble, the 'clever trolls' as it were, that know how to provoke people and stay just on the safe side of the line, yet wind people up so that otherwise good, sane posters end up goaded into posting stuff that's way over the line, resulting in warnings/infractions/bans for posters that usually contribute positively to the forums.

As the saying (incorrectly attributed to Einstein most of the time) goes:
“The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results”

LunarSea

Star Lord wrote: »

It's not as simple as that. When you get people stirring trouble, the 'clever trolls' as it were, that know how to provoke people and stay just on the safe side of the line, yet wind people up so that otherwise good, sane posters end up goaded into posting stuff that's way over the line, resulting in warnings/infractions/bans for posters that usually contribute positively to the forums.

As the saying (incorrectly attributed to Einstein most of the time) goes:
“The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results”

Again, you're not trying to enforce world peace here, it's an internet forum.

It really is that easy. Let discussion flow, a bit off topic too (stuff will swing back on topic eventually), use discretion and shut down the trolls that are derailing the threads with abuse, idiocy, etc.? Not hard, is it?

"Now ye're talking" me hole.

The Hill Billy

As the OP has closed their account - this complaint is no longer active.

In the interests of completeness - Mods are generally assigned to a forum as the have a good understanding of the dynamics of that forum. Bitter experience allows them to see trouble coming & it would seem that was what happened in this instance. Many threads on the same/similar topic have resulted in arguments & cards/bans being issued & mod time wasted clearing up the wreckage. They headed that off at the pass & prevented the same for happening again.

That's good modding.

tHB

The Hill Billy

Update: While I stand by my point that mod experience of past discussions leading to the closure of threads is good in that it can head off bickering/flaming & needless mod action - I agree that in this instance the closing post does not clearly convey the rationale for closing the thread.

We should strive to be clearer in future when providing reasons for thread closure & this feedback will be given to the forum Mods.

tHB