Heavy-handed moderation in Accommodation and Property?

__Alex__

Hi, this is a thread I've been thinking about starting for a while but demurred before now. It took a general warning in my direction to push me to start it. I just wanted to start a discussion on the subject of the moderation of Accommodation and Property. I've been on this site under a few name and have frequently found the moderation of the forum to be heavy-handed and skittish. There's frequently been times where I've been reading a thread in the forum with interest, only for it to be closed or for a mod warning to change the direction of the thread. If it's just me that finds this, I'll accept it and move on, but I was wanted to know if anyone else has this issue with the forum.

The general warning this evening is post #35 of the following thread:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2057728732

I actually responded to post #35 (I know, I know!) but it was deleted. Not actioned, mind. I pointed out that my posts were very much intended to help the OP. And they were! I feel like they were on-topic. I won't go into that any more here, as people can take a look at the thread in question.

I just find that conversations tend to get cut off in a very hair-trigger manner. Discussions just don't seem to be allowed to develop and that's a shame. That's what makes boards.ie interesting to me, where threads can lead. It just seems like unnecessarily punitive moderation to me. I recall a thread from A&P coming up in another feedback thread maybe a year ago, I think it was a thread discussing house values. It was an interesting, lively thread that got closed because the OP hadn't posted in it in a while. I dont know why that meant that a busy thread should have to be closed. Isn't it good that discussion was sparked? Isn't that the raison d'être of boards.ie?

I guess I'm just trying to gauge opinion here and maybe ask if the moderation is too stringent in the forum.

KyussBeeshop

Ya I've had this experience myself, for a while I've had to avoid the A&P forum entirely, and have had lengthy PM interactions with mods before disputing mod action there - but this was a long time ago now, and my experience now is things seem to have settled down (from my own point of view), and having discussed things with mods directly before, seems (just my impression) to have led to a right balance between me and mods, where unexpected/hair-trigger mod action is not likely now.

The mods have said they have to keep political discussion off of that forum and stuff, but with the housing/rental crisis being one of the no.1 political issues at the moment, that can be a very difficult thing to draw the line on now - so I sympathise in that regard - but there are some recurring topics there, like AirBnB (something I'm active on a lot), things like lack of social housing building, reasons for lack of housing supply increases (turns political very fast - e.g. debates over regulations, again on social housing, ideas for land tax etc. etc.) - so yea, it seems very hard to draw the line on the forum there, on that stuff.

So, while my personal experience is that mod action has cooled down a lot now and seems ok to me - I've definitely experienced hair-trigger type mod action in the past, and some level of heavy-handedness and lack of willingness to compromise with posters initially - while, for me, I don't notice that anymore - I will say that it's never a bad thing for mods to talk things through with a poster, and reverse/reduce-severity-of mod action if a posters intent wasn't bad (without telling them to go through the whole DRP process to achieve that, as that's an incredible pain in the hole which no posters will enjoy experiencing), and if it's a recurring thing, then slowly ratchet up - some mods do seem to have been quite heavy handed (but again disclaimerizing, that I don't see this much myself anymore).

Yourself isit

This shows one of the problems with moderation in boards. The mods can "instruct" a discussion and after that there's a whole new set of rules and potential infractions.

a&p is particularly bad. either it's going to have debates on rent and housing or its not. If not then move them immediately into politics of AH, rather than say "you can't get political".

Dial Hard

I don't find the in-thread modding particularly heavy handed but their constant editing of thread titles is extremely annoying.

dr.bollocko

It is about the best moderated forum on boards.

Yourself isit

dr.bollocko wrote: »

It is about the best moderated forum on boards.

If boards mods think that kind of moderation is good and to be copied, the company will collapse.

Mrs OBumble

This is the forum with the charter that's an incredible eight posts long.

At one point it had a mod who had serious power issues: if you looked at their post history, something like 99% of all posts were giving out infractions. They did cute things like give out warnings for swearing (eg "oh bloody hell") - when in another thread one of their co-mods said something similar without any action taken. This person is no longer a mod of A&P, and the current mods seem positively reasonable in comparison. But their approach has left a certain tone about the place.

At the end of the day, though, boards is a sandpit belonging to the owners/admins. If you don't like playing by their rules, supervised by their appointees, then just find another place to play in. Arguing about a mod action is pretty much a waste of keystrokes.

Toots

I think with A&P there has to be a limit to the amount of "chat" allowed in threads. It's a bit like the banking forum in that most times someone will start a thread looking for advice on a specific issue. If the thread gets overwhelmed with chat, that makes it harder to find the actual information the OP was trying to get in the first place.

padd b1975

dr.bollocko wrote: »

It is about the best moderated forum on boards.

Maybe not the best, but definitely the most knowledgeable and informed about their ever-changing subject matter.

Getting a bit of a raw deal on this thread so far in my opinion.

athtrasna

Dial Hard wrote: »

I don't find the in-thread modding particularly heavy handed but their constant editing of thread titles is extremely annoying.

The forum charter requires meaningful titles. "Advice please," or "ll query" (as examples) don't fit that requirement. Posts get more replies when their title is clear, people with experience or expertise are more likely to reply when the thread has a specific title.

ThisRegard

I agree with the sentiment, I've always felt the same. Threads are often needlessly interrupted with warnings or directions, the slightest segue will often result in them which stifles the forum​.

The_Conductor

If people have a different point of view on how any subject should be interpreted- I absolutely have no issue with it- on the contrary- I think its great to see opposing viewpoints- as its very educational for us all. However- where there is one group of people being tarred with a brush, or indeed a group of people with a persecution complex- it becomes incredibly difficult to try and steer a discussion in such a manner that its helpful to visitors to the forum- without picking a fight with either other posters- or a demographic that a poster might have an issue with.

I always try to tell people- if they have an issue with a post- to attack or refute the post- without attacking the poster- which can be a very difficult thing to do sometimes- and if a poster is incapable of refuting a post without attacking a poster- the better course of action is simply to use the 'report post' function to bring it to the attention of moderators.

Unfortunately (or fortunately- depending on your point of view)- the Accommodation and Property forum is incredibly busy- which is great in some respects (if you post a query or start a discussion its not going to languish unseen/unanswered for days on end)- however, the flipside of the coin is the moderators are volunteers who may not be permanently on line- and things can and do slip through the cracks.

The moderators are also very different as people- and indeed, the manner in which we moderate can, and does, change over time. When I started moderating on boards (almost 20 years ago at this stage)- I was a skittish moderator who was always jumping into threads and using the various implements at my disposal- whereas these days I've a far more laissez faire attitude- however, this is only something that I've developed over time.

Yes- the accommodation topic is hugely devisive- and there are very different opinions and viewpoints held by different people who post in the forum. Once posters remain civil towards one another- even when we may have diametrically oppossed viewpoints- it can be massively educational to get a better understanding of how or why people have the opinions and views that they have. Its once people start a 'I'm right and you're wrong' type argument and start bludeoning each other over the head, convinced of the absolute right or correctness of their viewpoint, to the exclusion of trying of getting an understanding of the other person's point of view- that not only do the moderators need to step in- but its also late in the day for us to step (though better late than never).

The big thing I'd highlight though- is if you have a problem with a particular action a moderator has taken- or even just a query on why a particular course of action was taken- instead of going in all guns blazing- the better action is to pop the moderator a short PM- normally we'll get back to you fairly promptly. If you still disagree- there are escalation processes and procedures (such as this thread)- however, escalating something is normally not the first course of action.

Hopefully this helps explain a little.

Wibbs

dr.bollocko wrote: »

It is about the best moderated forum on boards.

I've gone in there the odd time and I'd agree with this TBH. Great spread of info with few enough shenanigans.

ThisRegard

Wibbs wrote: »

I've gone in there the odd time and I'd agree with this TBH. Great spread of info with few enough shenanigans.

You said yourself you're only in there the odd time so you wouldn't notice it. It's not mod instructions calling out shenanigans that's an issue as you rarely get any of that anyway.

Yourself isit

A&p is well run in general for its normal operations (talking about landlord, tenant and house buying issues) but it's heavy-handed on the more "political" threads. It's hard to talk about the recent housing price increases without engaging in criticising ( or definitely mentioning) Coveney in my opinion and the mods then call that "too political". Maybe don't allow them?

ThisRegard

Here's a recent example of a thread closed pending review for some reason

http://touch.boards.ie/thread/2057730387/4

athtrasna

ThisRegard wrote: »

Here's a recent example of a thread closed pending review for some reason

http://touch.boards.ie/thread/2057730387/4

No decision has been taken about that thread, the mods are discussing it. Locked threads may be reopened, left locked or moved. We will make a collective decision. It is clear that a number of posts on that thread have no place on an Accommodation and Property forum.

J.pilkington

I think it's terribly moderated, very ban heavy, a users history / contribution to the site is not taken into account, the same heavy handed approach which is infraction heavy is applied to all users, i.e. a new user to the forum (as I was) was treated then same contempt as a known troll and given zero leeway / benefit of the doubt, it was straight in and heavy overreaction.

About 4 mths ago I started a thread asking for advice on a topic which I know would be useful to loads of posters, knew their was a huge risk it would go off in a particular direction and turn into an argument between some posters, when it enevitably did I politely asked for it to go back on topic and was given an infraction for back seat modding (yes that rule in the t&cs which mods can use to justify any infraction)! An absolute joke. An absolute no reasoning with her. I haven't been back since and have no intention of doing so as long as that rude ban happy mod is still about

The end result is a sub forum dominated by a handful of posters bickering among themselves because the bully mod scares away genuine posters!

.......

This post has been deleted.

ThisRegard

The mod doesn't seem to want to engage anyway, only interested in thanking everyone who says they're doing a great job.

There was a reply to one of my posts in the forum yesterday from them which can only be said to be snarky, and I guess was a result of my input to this thread. They never returned to my response when it was pointed out it was incorrect.

CIARAN_BOYLE

A&P is a help desk for people looking for advice or for help it's not really a forum where discussion is welcome.

To me that's not an issue.

Political discussion can migrate over to Politics or the Cafe easily enough.

Dial Hard

athtrasna wrote:

The forum charter requires meaningful titles. "Advice please," or "ll query" (as examples) don't fit that requirement. Posts get more replies when their title is clear, people with experience or expertise are more likely to reply when the thread has a specific title.

I understand that, but perfectly legible thread titles are often changed to overly literal word-for-word translations unnecessarily and it definitely seems to have become more commonplace recently.

It's needless and kind of patronising, imo.

andekwarhola

Always found it OK (and a useful resource) myself although I'm not a regular user. Think I may have been warned (verbally) once or twice but think I was being rude to somebody so it was fair enough.

testaccount123

Terrible moderation in A&P, seems like every second post is a moderator decree. People just want to discuss the property market in peace, not to have to jump through a million hoops and be directed down some narrow conversation path which is acceptable to the mods to do so.

Michael D Not Higgins

CIARAN_BOYLE wrote: »

A&P is a help desk for people looking for advice or for help it's not really a forum where discussion is welcome.

I wouldn't agree with that. There are plenty of discussions related to housing in many threads through the forum. It's certainly the type of forum that attracts a lot of people with questions about how their rent increases work, how buying a house works, how their rights and responsibilities work for tenancies, etc.

It's also the type of forum that has had discussions on Central Bank policy and extended in-depth discussions on the property market itself. Our Property Market 2015 thread had nearly 4000 posts, 2016 attracted only about 2000 posts and so far this year it's below 200. That doesn't mean the discussion has stifled, rather it has switched into discussion on mortgages, buying properties, new builds, rent pressure zones and other legislative changes as the property industry has changed gear across the country.

The discussion around these topics is coupled with politics and has at times descended into a political point scoring event, with the tangents veering wildly off any semblance of a connection to property or a topic at hand. As an example, this happens when the discussion starts bringing comparisons to the UK or German property market and suddenly there's a discussion on the effective tax rates on corporations in respective EU countries.

We are able to identify most of the time when a particular tangent is going to spiral and nip it in the bud before that happens. We'd rather not start modding discussions about politics, except insofar as they're limited to housing policy in Ireland.

The Hill Billy

Post regarding ongoing DRP deleted.

tHB