Dial back the moderation a notch please

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Kim O'Hara
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by Kim O'Hara »

boda wrote:Of course it would be unreasonable, at least in my opinion, to have moderators that were not interested in the subject matter. But ideally a moderator should have the capacity to separate their personal beliefs and opinions from their moderation duties. It's plain to see when moderators fail to do this, because they break the terms of service themselves. They make ad hominem personal attacks and engage in meta-discussion about members.
The whole of this particular thread is meta-discussion, so talking about members is fine (N.B. in this thread). Personal attacks are still not okay but mods and admins, unlike some members, :tongue: are only human.

:coffee:
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by Schrödinger’s Yidam »

I still say if we moderated ourselves we wouldn't need moderators.

Obviously we don't do that, so we do need moderators.
:rules:
1.The problem isn’t ‘ignorance’. The problem is the mind you have right now. (H.H. Karmapa XVII @NYC 2/4/18)
2. I support Mingyur R and HHDL in their positions against lama abuse.
3. Student: Lama, I thought I might die but then I realized that the 3 Jewels would protect me.
Lama: Even If you had died the 3 Jewels would still have protected you. (DW post by Fortyeightvows)
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by boda »

Ayu wrote:
boda wrote:The alien is correct on this point. To effectively moderate this site one only needs to know the Terms of service.
False. You cannot understand the point of any stirr, if you don't know about the issue.
A moderator has to learn all the time.
If you're suggesting that moderators sometimes go beyond moderating that's understandable. As Kim O'Hara just pointed out, mods and admins are only human.
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by Schrödinger’s Yidam »

Alien pointed out that there are about 40 regular posters here. (I have no idea if that is true or not.) But for the sake of discussion let us say it is so for a moment. Probably 30 or those 40 have had the job of moderator at one time or another. (Yes, I guessing.) So it really is a case of us moderating us. It is not as if there is some entity, "the mods", that imposes its will upon us. We, as a community, see a need for it, and those of us that are willing to give our time and energy towards a task that we are not paid for and are criticized for almost continually, all I can say to that is "thanks". Really. I imagine the task being something akin to eating broken glass.

And for people like Alien that object all I can say is that, given the turnover, it is really the community that mods. If one were to leave another would take their place (we hope) and it would be close to the same standards. Maybe not the exact decisions, but close. That being the case, the question then becomes, "Do you really want to participate in the community?" If so, fit in. Voice whatever your views and opinions are, but do so with respect and courtesy.

How hard is that?
1.The problem isn’t ‘ignorance’. The problem is the mind you have right now. (H.H. Karmapa XVII @NYC 2/4/18)
2. I support Mingyur R and HHDL in their positions against lama abuse.
3. Student: Lama, I thought I might die but then I realized that the 3 Jewels would protect me.
Lama: Even If you had died the 3 Jewels would still have protected you. (DW post by Fortyeightvows)
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Paul
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by Paul »

smcj wrote:I imagine the task being something akin to eating broken glass.
Yes. Only the glass tastes horrible.
Look at the unfathomable spinelessness of man: all the means he's been given to stay alert he uses, in the end, to ornament his sleep. – Rene Daumal
the modern mind has become so limited and single-visioned that it has lost touch with normal perception - John Michell
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Ayu
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by Ayu »

Paul wrote:
smcj wrote:I imagine the task being something akin to eating broken glass.
Yes. Only the glass tastes horrible.
:tongue: You have to think of something nice while chewing it.
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by Admin_PC »

Ayu wrote:
Paul wrote:
smcj wrote:I imagine the task being something akin to eating broken glass.
Yes. Only the glass tastes horrible.
:tongue: You have to think of something nice while chewing it.
Glass? I thought you told me these were nachos?!
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by dude »

This board is now little more than frivolous chatter.
Anything of substance gives rise to disagreement, and the thread gets shut down.
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Kim O'Hara
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by Kim O'Hara »

dude wrote:This board is now little more than frivolous chatter.
Anything of substance gives rise to disagreement, and the thread gets shut down.
That's a bit of an exaggeration but yes, it does happen far too often.
Do you have any suggestions for alleviating the problem?

:namaste:
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by dude »

If the managers show the slightest interest in talking about it, I'm there.
I am not optimistic.
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by dharmagoat »

dude wrote:If the managers show the slightest interest in talking about it, I'm there.
They are and you're here. :smile:
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by dude »

no evidence of that so far
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by Kim O'Hara »

dude wrote:no evidence of that so far
Six pages of discussion, in which various members of the mod team have participated regularly?
Looks like evidence to me.

:thinking:
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by dude »

Fair enough, Kim.
I'll go back over it and see if we can build a dialog.
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by dude »

Ayu wrote:Hello BrianG,

thanks for your concern.

Please give us a little bit more time to find our patterns. The team is working in a brandnew constellation right now. It takes some months to find through this scrub.

As far as I perceive it, we are trying our best to have a balance between keeping the reins slack and restrictions. The problem is, that you members can only see the tip of the iceberg. That's why you cannot know, which facts lead to the decisions you detect. Also you never know how often we decided to wait before acting and how much things are happening.
I'm sorry, there is no possibility to inform you about all of this. We try to keep moderation transparent though.

You can only judge the moderation as far as you are involved yourself.
If you feel sorry, because you cannot answer to a locked thread, you are always free to write a PM to the staff.
:namaste:

This doesn't fit my experience at all. I see little or no attempt to admonish what you may object to before out of nowhere the thread is history. Most of the time I don't even know what was ok and what wasn't.
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by dude »

Dan74 wrote:
BrianG wrote:
KeithBC wrote: I am much less active on this forum than I used to be on other Buddhist forums because I find the moderation here too slack. Discussions on interesting topics that I might have wanted to participate in degenerate quickly into bicker-fests with members nit-picking each other to death and losing sight of the original topic.
If your point of view is that you are only going to contribute to threads that you approve of, then that is extremely childish. You can take your ball and go home.
Brian, I'm surprised at this rude response. You are an intelligent man and I'm sure you can parse what Keith is saying. Do you like to participate in conversations which degenerate into nit-picking arguments and lose sight of the key point?
BrianG wrote: The reason I brought this up in the first place, was because of this thread - http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.ph ... &start=300

It was actually an interesting thread, and I didn't see Serenity509 violating the terms of service. I wanted to continue contributing. But Porkchop wanted to power trip and lock it with no explanation of how it violated the TOS.
Not sure of the need for rudeness here either, seeing that you don't know Porkchop's intentions, his history of interaction with Serenity509, etc. Would've been a lot more appropriate to write to Porkchop or David Snyder with your concerns, before jumping to conclusions.
Then then thread about the Paris bombings was locked. No reason given - "Topic locked". The concept that the CEO of Google isn't going to prison for distributing links to Dabiq online apparently goes way over the moderators heads.
Yes, we are just a bunch of dullards, sorry (you're really good at this, aren't you?)
BrianG wrote:Is it too much to ask for the moderators to explain why they are locking threads?
No. Have you asked?
BrianG wrote: On one point, I do agree with KeithBC. Threads like this - http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.ph ... &start=100 , probably deserved to be locked a long time ago.

Being a moderator isn't a thankless job, posters have said "thank you" to the mods. Have the moderators said thank you to the posters? Writing posts takes time and energy. Very frequently I have to do research before I post. Every time a thread is locked that I was contributing to, and yes I realize I can be provocative, I find it extremely disrespectful if no reason is given.
Yes, I agree and I have thanked members in the past. Members make this forum. Or break it. Mods are meant to remove anything that gets in the spokes and oil the wheels somewhat. I hope you keep contributing. Maybe even tone down the rudeness and dial up respect a notch but it might be too much to ask for a dude with a lot to say? ;)


This is bad. While Brian's tone may have left something to be desired, Dan's sarcasm and veiled insults make things worse.
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by dude »

Dan74 wrote:
BrianG wrote:
KeithBC wrote: I am much less active on this forum than I used to be on other Buddhist forums because I find the moderation here too slack. Discussions on interesting topics that I might have wanted to participate in degenerate quickly into bicker-fests with members nit-picking each other to death and losing sight of the original topic.
If your point of view is that you are only going to contribute to threads that you approve of, then that is extremely childish. You can take your ball and go home.
Brian, I'm surprised at this rude response. You are an intelligent man and I'm sure you can parse what Keith is saying. Do you like to participate in conversations which degenerate into nit-picking arguments and lose sight of the key point?
BrianG wrote: The reason I brought this up in the first place, was because of this thread - http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.ph ... &start=300

It was actually an interesting thread, and I didn't see Serenity509 violating the terms of service. I wanted to continue contributing. But Porkchop wanted to power trip and lock it with no explanation of how it violated the TOS.
Not sure of the need for rudeness here either, seeing that you don't know Porkchop's intentions, his history of interaction with Serenity509, etc. Would've been a lot more appropriate to write to Porkchop or David Snyder with your concerns, before jumping to conclusions.
Then then thread about the Paris bombings was locked. No reason given - "Topic locked". The concept that the CEO of Google isn't going to prison for distributing links to Dabiq online apparently goes way over the moderators heads.
Yes, we are just a bunch of dullards, sorry (you're really good at this, aren't you?)
BrianG wrote:Is it too much to ask for the moderators to explain why they are locking threads?
No. Have you asked?
BrianG wrote: On one point, I do agree with KeithBC. Threads like this - http://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.ph ... &start=100 , probably deserved to be locked a long time ago.

Being a moderator isn't a thankless job, posters have said "thank you" to the mods. Have the moderators said thank you to the posters? Writing posts takes time and energy. Very frequently I have to do research before I post. Every time a thread is locked that I was contributing to, and yes I realize I can be provocative, I find it extremely disrespectful if no reason is given.
Yes, I agree and I have thanked members in the past. Members make this forum. Or break it. Mods are meant to remove anything that gets in the spokes and oil the wheels somewhat. I hope you keep contributing. Maybe even tone down the rudeness and dial up respect a notch but it might be too much to ask for a dude with a lot to say? ;)


This is bad. While Brian's tone may have left something to be desired, Dan's sarcasm and veiled insults make things worse.
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Kim O'Hara
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by Kim O'Hara »

dude wrote:
Ayu wrote:Hello BrianG,

thanks for your concern.

Please give us a little bit more time to find our patterns. The team is working in a brandnew constellation right now. It takes some months to find through this scrub.

As far as I perceive it, we are trying our best to have a balance between keeping the reins slack and restrictions. The problem is, that you members can only see the tip of the iceberg. That's why you cannot know, which facts lead to the decisions you detect. Also you never know how often we decided to wait before acting and how much things are happening.
I'm sorry, there is no possibility to inform you about all of this. We try to keep moderation transparent though.

You can only judge the moderation as far as you are involved yourself.
If you feel sorry, because you cannot answer to a locked thread, you are always free to write a PM to the staff.
:namaste:
This doesn't fit my experience at all. I see little or no attempt to admonish what you may object to before out of nowhere the thread is history. Most of the time I don't even know what was ok and what wasn't.
I think the key words there are, "I see."
AFAIK you hang around the Nichiren forum more than others, and visit somewhat irregularly. Irregular visits mean you won't usually have any idea about who has been causing difficulties for other members recently, and I'm told (I don't visit often) the Nichiren forum has its own style of behaviour and moderation is a bit looser than elsewhere on DW.
On top of that, a fair bit of our admonishing is via PM. That does make it less transparent (not so good) but does interrupt the thread less and embarrass people publicly less (not so bad). As Ayu said, you are always free to get in touch with us if you can't see a reason for our actions.

We do try!

:namaste:
Kim
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Ayu
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by Ayu »

I think this was an interesting topic until now.
I hope it becomes obvious, that every person doesn't perceive the whole thing ( - especially when you just observe it without being involved directly and without reading much at all).

It is not possible to moderate exactly as everybody wishes, because these wishes are way too heterogene. We cannot wash a cat without pouring water on it.

Best measure is to start a conversation with the mods, best via PM. Just ask or tell us your view, but please be a little bit slower with making accusations, since nobody can see all the reasons for actions or non-actions.
Our intentions are benevolent. Maybe you should know that. :smile:
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Re: Dial back the moderation a notch please

Post by BrianG »

The main thing I was trying to get at, is that it would be cool if the moderation was dialed back a notch. Please.
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