Zen and the art of moderation 2 2

[Awax]

 

 

I work with dogs. Every time I hear about things like this it never gets easier.

 

Sorry.

Edited April 24, 2013 by Awax

[Unca Ben]

I am so sorry to hear that you and your family had to go through this.

 

Grief and loss are difficult things to cope with, may you and your family emerge from this dark time with love and grace.

[COI]

This is just a friendly reminder that none of us is the center of the universe. Moderation is not about any one person. It's about setting limits for the community in order to allow for constructive discussion.

 

I read a story once a while back about a guy who was driving down the highway somewhere in the south, staying with traffic, minding his own business. Traffic, however, was going about 15mph too fast for the limit. As he is driving, he and all of the other drivers have the bad luck to drive past a speed trap.

 

Out roars the police car, on go the lights - bam, he's got somebody. Well, it turns out to be our hero - the one who is just driving along with traffic.

 

Our hero gets ticked off, and can't wait for his court date. In court he makes alot of noise at the judge about how everyone was driving fast and how he was not even the fastest of the pack. He protests in a loud voice about the injustice of it all, the lack of consistency and horrible mental anguish that this speeding ticket has caused him.

 

The judge looks at him and says, "Hey, have you ever been duck hunting?"

 

This stops the man short. Weird question. "Yes, I have," he says.

 

"When you go," says the judge, "and you're sitting there in the duck blind, and a flock of ducks flies by over head, do you pick out the fattest duck in the flock... the one that looks like it has the most flavor, or do you just pick a duck and shoot?"

 

The man just looks at him. "Guilty," says the judge, and fines him.

 

The point of the ticket in this case was definitely about the speeder, but it was also about all of the other speeders.

 

Your posting guideline tasks, should you choose to accept them, are pretty basic. They are outlined fairly decently here on the site. They are executed by a number of different people who interpret those guidelines as they moderate, just as all of you interpret those guidelines as you post. It's not a big deal. It's not a deep mystery. It isn't a conspiracy.

 

If you don't want to get shot, don't be a duck. Sometimes you can drive by a police car at 7mph over, sigh with relief and not get a ticket... and sometimes for the same thing you get pulled over AND you get a ticket for not wearing a seatbelt. Other times, you get a warning ticket.

 

What moderators want is to set some boundaries so that good discussions can take place without everyone wanting to destroy each other and to set the acceptable social tone at a level that doesn't drive any notable percentage of the community away. That is true whether the posts are humor or debate.

 

Some of you occasionally (read: everyone who ever got a strike or warning) may deeply believe that in your case it was all about injustice. You may even have a point - like our speeder above who was not the fastest one in the pack. But you were still speeding.

 

By and large I tend to give the benefit of the doubt to moderation because:

 

1. The people posting are generally wrapped up in their posts whereas the moderators are not.

 

2. The moderators, contrary to popular opinion, are not doing this because they love tedious thread trimming and reading moderator notifications by everyone from upstanding members of the community to lunatics. They are just trying to help the community.

 

If you think someone got treated unfairly and then you look around and suddenly evidence starts popping up all around you of a trend of unfairness... you may want to research confirmation bias.

 

Did you know that smarter people are actually MORE likely to suffer from confirmation bias?

 

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/frontal-cortex/2012/06/daniel-kahneman-bias-studies.html

 

Take a deep breath and enjoy your comics.

 

Oh, and stop hassling the mods. They are trying to help. Think about what it's like to be a mod - the difficulty and tedium of sorting out he-said she-said, the process of choosing where to rein things in when a whole thread has started going off track without just laying waste to everything around you.

 

Then do this: assume that the moderators have positive and helpful intentions. Assume that they didn't aggressively apply to become moderators out of a deep desire to torture an internet community. Think about why they do what they do with all of that in mind. You might come to different conclusions about the mechanics of moderation and community.

 

Have a nice day, guys.

 

Cool story, bro.

 

Tell your positive, helpful moderators that pulling stuff from someone's sales thread with zero explanation, or pulling posts in general without explaining what was wrong is neither positive nor helpful. The cops in your analogy don't just issue blank tickets; you're told why you're being stopped, what you did wrong, and why you're being ticketed.

[BlowUpTheMoon]

This is just a friendly reminder that none of us is the center of the universe. Moderation is not about any one person. It's about setting limits for the community in order to allow for constructive discussion.

 

I read a story once a while back about a guy who was driving down the highway somewhere in the south, staying with traffic, minding his own business. Traffic, however, was going about 15mph too fast for the limit. As he is driving, he and all of the other drivers have the bad luck to drive past a speed trap.

 

Out roars the police car, on go the lights - bam, he's got somebody. Well, it turns out to be our hero - the one who is just driving along with traffic.

 

Our hero gets ticked off, and can't wait for his court date. In court he makes alot of noise at the judge about how everyone was driving fast and how he was not even the fastest of the pack. He protests in a loud voice about the injustice of it all, the lack of consistency and horrible mental anguish that this speeding ticket has caused him.

 

The judge looks at him and says, "Hey, have you ever been duck hunting?"

 

This stops the man short. Weird question. "Yes, I have," he says.

 

"When you go," says the judge, "and you're sitting there in the duck blind, and a flock of ducks flies by over head, do you pick out the fattest duck in the flock... the one that looks like it has the most flavor, or do you just pick a duck and shoot?"

 

The man just looks at him. "Guilty," says the judge, and fines him.

 

The point of the ticket in this case was definitely about the speeder, but it was also about all of the other speeders.

 

Your posting guideline tasks, should you choose to accept them, are pretty basic. They are outlined fairly decently here on the site. They are executed by a number of different people who interpret those guidelines as they moderate, just as all of you interpret those guidelines as you post. It's not a big deal. It's not a deep mystery. It isn't a conspiracy.

 

If you don't want to get shot, don't be a duck. Sometimes you can drive by a police car at 7mph over, sigh with relief and not get a ticket... and sometimes for the same thing you get pulled over AND you get a ticket for not wearing a seatbelt. Other times, you get a warning ticket.

 

What moderators want is to set some boundaries so that good discussions can take place without everyone wanting to destroy each other and to set the acceptable social tone at a level that doesn't drive any notable percentage of the community away. That is true whether the posts are humor or debate.

 

Some of you occasionally (read: everyone who ever got a strike or warning) may deeply believe that in your case it was all about injustice. You may even have a point - like our speeder above who was not the fastest one in the pack. But you were still speeding.

 

By and large I tend to give the benefit of the doubt to moderation because:

 

1. The people posting are generally wrapped up in their posts whereas the moderators are not.

 

2. The moderators, contrary to popular opinion, are not doing this because they love tedious thread trimming and reading moderator notifications by everyone from upstanding members of the community to lunatics. They are just trying to help the community.

 

If you think someone got treated unfairly and then you look around and suddenly evidence starts popping up all around you of a trend of unfairness... you may want to research confirmation bias.

 

Did you know that smarter people are actually MORE likely to suffer from confirmation bias?

 

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/frontal-cortex/2012/06/daniel-kahneman-bias-studies.html

 

Take a deep breath and enjoy your comics.

 

Oh, and stop hassling the mods. They are trying to help. Think about what it's like to be a mod - the difficulty and tedium of sorting out he-said she-said, the process of choosing where to rein things in when a whole thread has started going off track without just laying waste to everything around you.

 

Then do this: assume that the moderators have positive and helpful intentions. Assume that they didn't aggressively apply to become moderators out of a deep desire to torture an internet community. Think about why they do what they do with all of that in mind. You might come to different conclusions about the mechanics of moderation and community.

 

Have a nice day, guys.

 

Cool story, bro.

 

Tell your positive, helpful moderators that pulling stuff from someone's sales thread with zero explanation, or pulling posts in general without explaining what was wrong is neither positive nor helpful. The cops in your analogy don't just issue blank tickets; you're told why you're being stopped, what you did wrong, and why you're being ticketed.

 

According to Arch, explaining why a post got pulled would be too time consuming

[RockMyAmadeus]

[Aces]

This is just a friendly reminder that none of us is the center of the universe. Moderation is not about any one person. It's about setting limits for the community in order to allow for constructive discussion.

 

I read a story once a while back about a guy who was driving down the highway somewhere in the south, staying with traffic, minding his own business. Traffic, however, was going about 15mph too fast for the limit. As he is driving, he and all of the other drivers have the bad luck to drive past a speed trap.

 

Out roars the police car, on go the lights - bam, he's got somebody. Well, it turns out to be our hero - the one who is just driving along with traffic.

 

Our hero gets ticked off, and can't wait for his court date. In court he makes alot of noise at the judge about how everyone was driving fast and how he was not even the fastest of the pack. He protests in a loud voice about the injustice of it all, the lack of consistency and horrible mental anguish that this speeding ticket has caused him.

 

The judge looks at him and says, "Hey, have you ever been duck hunting?"

 

This stops the man short. Weird question. "Yes, I have," he says.

 

"When you go," says the judge, "and you're sitting there in the duck blind, and a flock of ducks flies by over head, do you pick out the fattest duck in the flock... the one that looks like it has the most flavor, or do you just pick a duck and shoot?"

 

The man just looks at him. "Guilty," says the judge, and fines him.

 

The point of the ticket in this case was definitely about the speeder, but it was also about all of the other speeders.

 

Your posting guideline tasks, should you choose to accept them, are pretty basic. They are outlined fairly decently here on the site. They are executed by a number of different people who interpret those guidelines as they moderate, just as all of you interpret those guidelines as you post. It's not a big deal. It's not a deep mystery. It isn't a conspiracy.

 

If you don't want to get shot, don't be a duck. Sometimes you can drive by a police car at 7mph over, sigh with relief and not get a ticket... and sometimes for the same thing you get pulled over AND you get a ticket for not wearing a seatbelt. Other times, you get a warning ticket.

 

What moderators want is to set some boundaries so that good discussions can take place without everyone wanting to destroy each other and to set the acceptable social tone at a level that doesn't drive any notable percentage of the community away. That is true whether the posts are humor or debate.

 

Some of you occasionally (read: everyone who ever got a strike or warning) may deeply believe that in your case it was all about injustice. You may even have a point - like our speeder above who was not the fastest one in the pack. But you were still speeding.

 

By and large I tend to give the benefit of the doubt to moderation because:

 

1. The people posting are generally wrapped up in their posts whereas the moderators are not.

 

2. The moderators, contrary to popular opinion, are not doing this because they love tedious thread trimming and reading moderator notifications by everyone from upstanding members of the community to lunatics. They are just trying to help the community.

 

If you think someone got treated unfairly and then you look around and suddenly evidence starts popping up all around you of a trend of unfairness... you may want to research confirmation bias.

 

Did you know that smarter people are actually MORE likely to suffer from confirmation bias?

 

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/frontal-cortex/2012/06/daniel-kahneman-bias-studies.html

 

Take a deep breath and enjoy your comics.

 

Oh, and stop hassling the mods. They are trying to help. Think about what it's like to be a mod - the difficulty and tedium of sorting out he-said she-said, the process of choosing where to rein things in when a whole thread has started going off track without just laying waste to everything around you.

 

Then do this: assume that the moderators have positive and helpful intentions. Assume that they didn't aggressively apply to become moderators out of a deep desire to torture an internet community. Think about why they do what they do with all of that in mind. You might come to different conclusions about the mechanics of moderation and community.

 

Have a nice day, guys.

 

Cool story, bro.

 

Tell your positive, helpful moderators that pulling stuff from someone's sales thread with zero explanation, or pulling posts in general without explaining what was wrong is neither positive nor helpful. The cops in your analogy don't just issue blank tickets; you're told why you're being stopped, what you did wrong, and why you're being ticketed.

 

According to Arch, explaining why a post got pulled would be too time consuming

But it would be nice to know why one gets wrists slaps...

[towards2112]

*yawn*

[Transplant]

I've recently been considering, who is the intended audience for this site? On the one hand, cursing and prurient pics are prohibited. On the other, there are multiple cover and interior images posted that are decidedly NSFW.

 

Which is it? Adult? Family friendly? Personally, I vote for adults since you have to be 18 to post supposedly. Let people curse. Let them post non-pornographic/non-graphically violent images appropriately marked NSFW or otherwise. But let's get some consistency.

 

Case in point: Salacious dimestore novels sales thread gets removed. Comic covers with actual (not that Wertham implied stuff) bondage and sliced up females remain.

[ItsJustRyan]

[Park]

I've recently been considering, who is the intended audience for this site? On the one hand, cursing and prurient pics are prohibited. On the other, there are multiple cover and interior images posted that are decidedly NSFW.

 

Which is it? Adult? Family friendly? Personally, I vote for adults since you have to be 18 to post supposedly. Let people curse. Let them post non-pornographic/non-graphically violent images appropriately marked NSFW or otherwise. But let's get some consistency.

 

Case in point: Salacious dimestore novels sales thread gets removed. Comic covers with actual (not that Wertham implied stuff) bondage and sliced up females remain.

 

This is just a friendly reminder that none of us is the center of the universe. Moderation is not about any one person. It's about setting limits for the community in order to allow for constructive discussion.

 

I read a story once a while back about a guy who was driving down the highway somewhere in the south, staying with traffic, minding his own business. Traffic, however, was going about 15mph too fast for the limit. As he is driving, he and all of the other drivers have the bad luck to drive past a speed trap.

 

Out roars the police car, on go the lights - bam, he's got somebody. Well, it turns out to be our hero - the one who is just driving along with traffic.

 

Our hero gets ticked off, and can't wait for his court date. In court he makes alot of noise at the judge about how everyone was driving fast and how he was not even the fastest of the pack. He protests in a loud voice about the injustice of it all, the lack of consistency and horrible mental anguish that this speeding ticket has caused him.

 

The judge looks at him and says, "Hey, have you ever been duck hunting?"

 

This stops the man short. Weird question. "Yes, I have," he says.

 

"When you go," says the judge, "and you're sitting there in the duck blind, and a flock of ducks flies by over head, do you pick out the fattest duck in the flock... the one that looks like it has the most flavor, or do you just pick a duck and shoot?"

 

The man just looks at him. "Guilty," says the judge, and fines him.

 

The point of the ticket in this case was definitely about the speeder, but it was also about all of the other speeders.

 

Your posting guideline tasks, should you choose to accept them, are pretty basic. They are outlined fairly decently here on the site. They are executed by a number of different people who interpret those guidelines as they moderate, just as all of you interpret those guidelines as you post. It's not a big deal. It's not a deep mystery. It isn't a conspiracy.

 

If you don't want to get shot, don't be a duck. Sometimes you can drive by a police car at 7mph over, sigh with relief and not get a ticket... and sometimes for the same thing you get pulled over AND you get a ticket for not wearing a seatbelt. Other times, you get a warning ticket.

 

What moderators want is to set some boundaries so that good discussions can take place without everyone wanting to destroy each other and to set the acceptable social tone at a level that doesn't drive any notable percentage of the community away. That is true whether the posts are humor or debate.

 

Some of you occasionally (read: everyone who ever got a strike or warning) may deeply believe that in your case it was all about injustice. You may even have a point - like our speeder above who was not the fastest one in the pack. But you were still speeding.

 

By and large I tend to give the benefit of the doubt to moderation because:

 

1. The people posting are generally wrapped up in their posts whereas the moderators are not.

 

2. The moderators, contrary to popular opinion, are not doing this because they love tedious thread trimming and reading moderator notifications by everyone from upstanding members of the community to lunatics. They are just trying to help the community.

 

If you think someone got treated unfairly and then you look around and suddenly evidence starts popping up all around you of a trend of unfairness... you may want to research confirmation bias.

 

Did you know that smarter people are actually MORE likely to suffer from confirmation bias?

 

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/frontal-cortex/2012/06/daniel-kahneman-bias-studies.html

 

Take a deep breath and enjoy your comics.

 

Oh, and stop hassling the mods. They are trying to help. Think about what it's like to be a mod - the difficulty and tedium of sorting out he-said she-said, the process of choosing where to rein things in when a whole thread has started going off track without just laying waste to everything around you.

 

Then do this: assume that the moderators have positive and helpful intentions. Assume that they didn't aggressively apply to become moderators out of a deep desire to torture an internet community. Think about why they do what they do with all of that in mind. You might come to different conclusions about the mechanics of moderation and community.

 

Have a nice day, guys.

[COI]

You guys wanna give Arch -5?

[Park]

You guys wanna give Arch -5?

 

No way this thing ever gets locked.

 

Our magical meme locking powers have no effect against Arch.

[DiceX]

I've recently been considering, who is the intended audience for this site? On the one hand, cursing and prurient pics are prohibited. On the other, there are multiple cover and interior images posted that are decidedly NSFW.

 

Which is it? Adult? Family friendly? Personally, I vote for adults since you have to be 18 to post supposedly. Let people curse. Let them post non-pornographic/non-graphically violent images appropriately marked NSFW or otherwise. But let's get some consistency.

 

Case in point: Salacious dimestore novels sales thread gets removed. Comic covers with actual (not that Wertham implied stuff) bondage and sliced up females remain.

 

My name is DiceX, and I approve of this message. (thumbs u

 

 

[seanfingh]

I've recently been considering, who is the intended audience for this site? On the one hand, cursing and prurient pics are prohibited. On the other, there are multiple cover and interior images posted that are decidedly NSFW.

 

Which is it? Adult? Family friendly? Personally, I vote for adults since you have to be 18 to post supposedly. Let people curse. Let them post non-pornographic/non-graphically violent images appropriately marked NSFW or otherwise. But let's get some consistency.

 

Case in point: Salacious dimestore novels sales thread gets removed. Comic covers with actual (not that Wertham implied stuff) bondage and sliced up females remain.

 

Great story. Compelling and rich.

[Transplant]

This thread is the lead to your kryptonite laced memes.

[seanfingh]

 

I would love to have more of idea what is going on with the mods. After getting a strike for a three letter acronym, I am like a dog that's been beat too much, and I spend half my life justa coverin' up.

[Ogami]

I think one thing we can all agree on is that CGC mods like they grade. In secret and with no written guidelines.

 

 

And it isn't doing anyone any good. Perhaps we could pay extra for mod notes?

[THE_BEYONDER]

 

 

Perhaps we could pay extra for mod notes?

 

[joecgcmaniac]

I would love to have more of idea what is going on with the mods. After getting a strike for a three letter acronym, I am like a dog that's been beat too much, and I spend half my life justa coverin' up.

 

[lizards2]

I think one thing we can all agree on is that CGC mods like they grade. In secret and with no written guidelines.

 

 

This.

 

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