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Originally Posted by sopsych
I too have seen the red text used for public notices, and I like it. Editing out inappropriate content would encourage third parties to police themselves and sometimes would reduce the need for deletions and the drama they can cause. Also, I like tore's suggestion of gradual implementation. I think changes should take place slowly, with formal punishment (infractions and bans) not possible for a while. Things could even be rolled out one sub-forum at a time, and perhaps at first some editing should only happen if members Report misbehavior. I don't want more bans around here.
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I agree with the first part of your post about editing a person's post while making it known that a moderator edited it. Then, if they don't get the message, take further steps. We used to do that more than we do now, and I agree in that we should implement it more. Just so long as people don't accuse us of public shaming, like it was done in the past.
As for your second part, regarding punishment not being possible a while and only on the condition that someone reports it, that's pretty much taking wheels off our bike. If we can't independently verify whether someone is breaking the rules, and must rely on someone reporting it, then this place would be a war zone. Coming from someone who has been doing this for years, and not just here, I can categorically tell you that your idea in this respect would not work.
Of course, I could be misinterpreting what you were saying, so do feel free to clarify if applicable.
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Originally Posted by tore
Generally speaking, I think the best way to get good behaviour is by encouraging good behaviour. I have the naive, positive belief that if people are allowed to become closer as friends, they will be friendlier. Maybe members meeting up in real life or hanging out on plug.dj or chatting with eachother over Skype would make people friendlier. I think it's too bad MB can't do more to facilitate that (ex. have a skype/plug.dj-ish chatroom as part of the site). If you have a simple karma system that allows you to +1 members for good posts, perhaps that could contribute to things getting friendlier.
People behave in part according to the environment they find themselves in and in this simple forum solution, there are not that many ways of promoting good behaviour besides moderation. I know I'm repeating myself here and sorry if you've heard it before, but I think a change of environment could lead to an environment with less need for strict moderation in order to achieve general niceness.
As MB is now, more power to more decisive and stricter mods seem to be the most feasible way of getting a more friendly environment in my opinion, but I wish there were better ways.
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We don't need gimmicks to promote good behavior. We need members that want to behave well. The fact that you think we need motivation for people to not be a problem is pretty telling in that you, at least subconsciously, know that the people in question are not interested in being good because it's their nature. Me personally, I'd rather just weed out the bad to make room for the good. I'm not going to sit here and waste time trying to convert the problem people, I'm just going to punish the ones who cause problems. And you're completely right about us needing to be stricter. I think the main problem as of late is that we were far too lenient with the problem people, and that's how this whole mess started. Fortunately for your peace of mind, I don't think we'll be doing that anymore, but I think we might like some input on how to balance the gray areas a bit better. Sopsych has some input, some of which I agree with, but I think we're missing the mark when the primary stance is to reward good behavior with gimmicks, because we're then acknowledging that people are inherently not interested in making this place the kind of place they want to be a part of. And I think that's entirely cynical and insulting.
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Originally Posted by Paul Smeenus
A question I've been wanting to ask since the day I joined here. As a former mod of a vBulletin forum, I've been curious why the vBulletin "thank this poster" feature isn't used here...
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1. We haven't requested it
2. Based on our previous experiences, it wouldn't be implemented anyway.
Whether it's a good idea or not, I don't know. If the whole idea is to not reinforce cliquish behavior, then it seems to me that a system people can use to elevate another person is completely conducive to cliquish behavior in a community such as ours. Not to mention the fact that we don't need a gimmick in order for people to behave well. We just need people to behave well. If they can't do it on their own, we have mods that can take care of it.
We're not trying to build a society of individuals who love rewards. We're trying to foster a community of people that enjoy talking about music. All we need are people that enjoy talking about music.
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Originally Posted by GuitarBizarre
Yes. It will turn into what the shoutbox shout counts did - One person making it their mission to get the highest number and a mad rush from a few people to compete for that until one clear winner emerges and lords that over everyone else.
Karma systems on forums do NOT encourage anything other than vain competition for internet points - They never have, and I remember having this same discussion with people as far back as 2006 on other forums - The consensus was pretty clear. They're a bad idea.
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I agree, and have seen this myself. It works better in very large forums of thousands of active users, such as city-data. They even have cash prizes for "most helpful" competitions. In our scenario, it would only foster more competition, then after a while you'd have people bubbling up to the surface of the matter complaining that only the friends in a clique are voting their friends up, just like we already have people complaining that posts are not being replied to because of cliques.
If certain people can't see the parallel there, then I am extremely worried.
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Originally Posted by tore
But people would only +1 a post if they thought it was good, right? So if someone does a mad rush to get the most points, wouldn't that be a mad rush to make posts that other people like and thus reward with a +1? 
It is certainly sounds better to me than post count which only rewards posting, no matter what the content is! |
Ok now I'm extremely worried.
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Originally Posted by sopsych
I said that to Trollheart after he attacked me, which wasn't the first time. I do appreciate some of his music posts when I read them (but until this week, I had never read a journal here). And I stand by my incendiary comment about people patting themselves on the back for making more music posts, as though that does much to prevent drama. (Yeah, I'm a glass-half-empty kind of person. That won't get me friends, but it shouldn't negate my ideas.)
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So then your position is that people just stop creating drama to make this place better? I totally agree!
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Originally Posted by sopsych
I too think there's an elitist feel to this site. Maybe that's why few people seem to respect my music knowledge or even reply to my music comments.
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Do you think people are elitist for not responding to your comments?
Do you know how many posts I make that go completely ignored? Lots. And I'm even part of the "elite mod group"... But when I wake up the next day, finally sober, I look back on those posts and realize they were just bad or uninteresting to people. I can't just sit there and blame everyone else because my posts weren't interesting enough to generate feedback.
I understand your feelings, however I think you're misplacing the cause here.
Also, you've been here long enough to be ineligible to claim the things you're claiming. If you had joined a week ago, your claims might hold some weight. But if you're going to blame everyone else for the fact that you haven't become as prolific as you want to be in all the time you've been here, then you're up for a pretty sore disappointment.
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There are two posts in that other thread that show you're not an innocent victim of my "medal" comment. One post includes an eye-roll and the second is a long derail filled with put-downs and technical truths that are worded sharply. I consider this mini-discussion over. In the future, please stick to your alleged non-attack policy. If people really did operate that way, there would be less drama on this site.
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Stop attacking me. You see how easy it is to make that claim? I feel insulted. Please follow the rules...
Obviously you can see the value in one single person not dictating the reality of the scenario, and I hope you understand from here on out that the mods are acting on an aggregate of information when things are not clear cut. Posting an eye-rolling smiley is not an attack, otherwise we'd have it removed. Just because you feel a certain way does not make it true. It's the kind of thing you report if you feel you're being attacked, and a team of individuals will determine if it holds weight. There is absolutely no way you can sustain a community with the kind of retribution you're advocating.