To Moderate Or Not?
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Right now The Listology is a fairly intimate community that is high on mutual respect. Should it become popular, this will change. All popular discussion sites are either overrun with offensive or off-topic posts or they have implemented some kind of moderation to prevent that from happening.
While I don't think we're at that point yet (so far everyone has handled confrontation here quite gracefully), it seems to me like it might be a good idea to have the "how to implement moderation" conversation now instead of if/when our signal-to-noise ratio becomes bad enough that valuable contributors stop coming back.
Here are some possibilities:
- Don't moderate at all.
Any thoughts you have--even incomplete ones--are welcome, as I try to keep us on track. It is most important to me that the folks that love Listology continue to love it.
I think you are doing a great job thus far, but I of course have no idea how practical your intimate moderation would be if the site should suddenly explode with users. I tend towards the free speech side of the issue, although I do think that all blatant spam (advertisements, for example) should be washed off. If someone reports an abusive post that is entirely off-subject and solely aimed at devastating a user (which has rarely happened, if ever, so far as I know), I wouldn't have a problem with taking that comment off either. Any post, however harsh, that actually addressed the list or a current discussion, I would allow to stand, although you might "bleep" out extreme obscenities if you want the youngsters to cruise here.
Just a few thoughts...
Shalom, y'all!
L. Bangs
Maybe an extension of the endorsing program could be used? Something that doesn't necessariy measure how much you endorse the other people's views, but more if you think they are generally valuable or not. Then users could set an option to only see postings of users of a certain rating (slashdot uses something similar). Then, individual users could see the "quality" of content that they want. Of course, if users don't get rated, that might make it tough.
On an aside, in your member directory, would it be possible to list the 20 newest members or so? Just curious.
I should append that I agree with lbangs that there shouldn't be any censorship. Maybe users can have personal killfiles, users who's posts just don't show up. An anti-endorsee list, maybe.
Another alternative is to give trusted members moderation capabilities - in other words, allow them to delete posts by other people. As long as the privelege isn't given to too many people, it would work OK. And If you had a dozen or so people, most discussions would get looked at.
Jim, censorship is underirable, but we should not tolerate people who are obviously just trying to get their kicks by ruining things for others. So I reject your first possibility.
If there is to be censorship, there should be only one censor and that person's ruling should be law. If you have more than one censor the likelihood of inconsistant rulings, and thus disatisfaction, becomes greatly increased. So if, as I undestand it, your second possibilty is multiple censors, I reject that too.
A probationary period for new users sounds okay, but it might discourage some who we would want to have. Worth trying.
Can't see Listology as "Invitation Only". I get the impression that many members (e.g. myself) were just 'drop ins', few got here by invitation, I think.
Jim, we need to do what we can, I feel, to make listology a free site. Paying would be bad for members..especially poor ones like me. However, donations from people should be a possibly made available. I would donate cash to keep the best site on the internet up and running, and I'm sure others would as well. I think you've done a great job with this site.
Great feedback, folks! Based on this, it certainly sounds we don't have a need for any action now or in the immediate future. So I am relying on you folks to e-mail me if you change your minds in the future, or if you feel a degrading signal-to-noise ratio is affecting your enjoyment of the site. At that time I'll revisit approaches to take (but this conversation has given me good ideas of which way to lean).
OK, so I'm posting 8.5 months later than everyone else. (See my list on procrastination, that should explain it!).
Just one note--I'm a cheap b*stard, and the pay method would keep most of the casual users away, and possibly open the door to advertisers looking for cheap ins. Just a thought...
As for automated moderation, this rarely works as desired.
As for manual moderation, this is a good idea for moderating on a case-by-case basis, on posts reported by users. If the site hits a growth spurt, you might consider adding a 'Report abusive post' link on the form for each page. Also doing away with anonymous posting would help avoid such stuff, too.
Cool, thanks for the feedback! I still haven't decided what I'm going to do. I'll add more features next, then figure out how I'm going to pay for them. :-)
I like what you did with that Avril Lavigne comment. Maybe you could write code for an R-rated comment that works similarly to the "spoiler" comment. As for comments that are not constructive criticism but are more just outright flaming, perhaps you could review those and delete them, and possibly penalize the offender.
But please don't adopt either of the last two suggestions on the list.
Thanks for the feedback AJ. The "invitation only" thing won't happen. If I go to making Listology a paid service what I'd probably do is have a "Listology Pro" version with additional features. I would try to keep all the current features free. The fee would be something like $5 or $10 a year for "Listology Pro" (although I need a more original name :-).
How about, instead of "Listology Pro", you use the name (drumroll and spoiler tags for dramatic effect): "Listology PRO®"? :P
As an aside, I like the idea of being able to remove posts from my own lists, even apart from 'moderation'. For instance, in my "Movies to See" list, I have a ton of posts, none of which I want on there any more. Many of them are suggestions of stuff for me to add...and these movies have been added...AND watched, AND removed. Kind of annoying to have the posts there 2 years later :)
Sounds good! Anybody else have thoughts on the pros and cons of letting users delete posts from their own lists?
I don't like the idea, but I could live with it.
If I don't old post on my list, I can always clone the list and archive the old one. If I just don't like post, I can always not allow them. Once it is up for comments, I think the comments should stick.
But, honestly, I could probably live with that.
Shalom, y'all!
L. Bangs (Two cents poorer... ;) )
P.S. I like the idea of a separate <TASTELESS> tag, or something like that. The only problem is that to implement the SPOILER tag I basically have to do a big find/replace anytime anybody views anything. This is an acceptable expense, performance-wise, but I'd prefer not to incur it twice. I also don't know what would upset me more - a proliferation of its use, or folks not using it when they should. :-) As it stands now I'm mulling over several changes, notably returning to moderating the home page (although folks will continue to be able to post anything to their own weblogs), expanding the "endorse" feature, and including the evil twin of the "endorse" feature: "ignore." Ah well, I suppose it was inevitable.
In an attempt to resurrect this discussion, I believe that moderation should be done in a combination of a limit to new users (such as myself) and a spot-checking/reporting system such as implemented by Amazon.com, where you can report a post as obscene. I'm completely new to listology and I'm currently learning and loving it, so there's the 2 cents from the newbie.
Cool, hope to see more of you around here! What you have described is happily pretty much what I have in place currently. New users are moderated for a brief period just too weed out the drive-by trolls and flamers. Offensive posts can be removed upon request.