Suggestion: Implement Peer Moderation on SDF
- Thread starter solarz
- Start date
solarz
Brigadier
As I mentioned above, having lots of upvotes will not do anything for a post. It will not promote that post or make it otherwise more prominent.
Only downvotes will have an effect, and that is to collapse posts with too many downvotes. The post will still be there, it just takes an extra effort to see it. What's more, any replies to collapsed posts should also be collapsed by default. Those members who wish to engage in prolonged back-and-forths can still do so, but they will not affect the enjoyability of the forum for other members. Moderators will no longer need to act as babysitters.
In a way, what @by78 said also makes sense. Sometimes the thread is just so inflamed that 90% of the whole content would be collapsed posts (if what you proposed is implemented). Therefore, it might be better for the report button to come in first so we can call the mods more easily. That way we can also have more time to get used to the old rules (no politics in non-political thread). The abuser of the report button would be warned and timed out, with banning as a last resort (though I think quite a few will be banned before it slows down...). Then the mods can slowly introduce the peer moderation for those political posts and take the back seat. The report button would then be used for the most serious of the offenders, like those provocateurs that we just want to be gone from the forum altogether.
I mainly want peer moderation since there's some thread that has many low-quality posts (irrelevant one-liners, etc.) that's not serious enough to warrant a mod's coming but annoying enough for the rest of us who want high-quality content. That way we can clean up the thread quite easily.
Note: mods can uncollapse the post if they happen to see it and think it deserves more attention.
by78
General
This approach could prove useful in saving a lot of moderator bandwidth. The only thing I'm afraid of is that fanboys will upvote political posts so much that they cancel out the downvotes. This is where that report button comes in handy, provided it pushes complaints about political content to the top of the moderation queue for review. If a violation is judged to have taken place, an immediate ban (of 1 week minimum) should be imposed. There is no need for warnings, since members will have already been made aware that political discussions are strictly forbidden in the main military forums.
That doesn't show up for me.
It is not isolated to your account.
I've been considering limiting the report button for only senior and/or junior members. If its open for everyone then everyone and their uncle starts reporting even the slightest hint of a post where they don't agree or feel "offended" by someone. So, i am thinking, the reporting functionality needs to be limited to those with some sense and experience on the forum and not for everyone who may be triggered very very easily.
Picking who gets the report button must be hard. I've seen even some pretty senior members get triggered so hard that the thread just got covered in political posts. Case in point, I consider Chinese Economics Thread to be one of the problematic thread.
True. A much easier option is to just ban troublemaker from the thread.
Why? It's the forum about Chinese defence, at least one person from China should be a moderator. Of course, If there is a one who qualifies.
Maybe it's the problem of finding a new mod candidate that can both connect to the forum frequently enough to do the moderating (those from China might have some trouble with the great firewall in place?) and have the necessary judgment so they'll not arbitrarily impose their own biases on the reported posts (this is a problem for all mod candidates, no matter where they come from).
One thing is for sure, the mods must not be the troublemaker. I agree that we might need more Chinese members/mods that can give more detailed insider perspectives, though that could easily morph to fanboying and similar stuff. Maybe that's what holding the selection back.