Yep, but I was too busy for shenanigans recently.
Reform of CFC Public Discussion of Moderator Action Rules
- Thread starter Thlayli
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Thlayli
Le Pétit Prince
A public appeal thread would become a giant cluster f. People won't be more satisfied with the answers there, they'll gather support (IOT/NESers mainly), use the same flawed logic as in here, throw some tantrums and try to get rid of a few specific mods. I foresee a couple of permabans
Fear of the mob will get you nowhere, my friend. Nor will this casual elitism and scaremongering. Human institutions rely on public support, even if they're just online forums. The vast majority of CFCers agree with that, since we are on balance, mostly rational and polite people. But perhaps you're Russian or Chinese and uncomfortable with a civil society...?
Regardless, I'm sure if you launched a PDMA poll in OT it would have hundreds of votes and a similar majority in favor of reform. Most people don't look at this forum though.
The NESing forum is dead now. Its members have entirely left. One of the richest and most varied experiences of incredibly intelligent and thoughtful people on CFC scattered to the winds. That's largely attributable to the heavy-handed modding policies taken by our "moderators" treating us like children. Lo, ye have made a desolation, and call it peace.
The irony is that on a raw intellectual level, most of them were probably smarter than most of the moderators. In fact, I know many of their test scores, so I know they are. But power, even sad imaginary internet power, isn't easily surrendered, nor will the immense pride of certain mods ever bend. That's the reality of this situation.
gay_Aleks
from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free!
Actually, a poll on PDMA in OT would get the following responses:
"This again?"
"Meh."
"This again?"
"Meh."
pigswill
fly (one day)
Thlayli: do you know the test scores of the moderators? If so, fair enough. If not you're drawing a conclusion from partial data.
It seems likely that a demand for PDMA will continue to be voiced until its tried. There's a possibility of PDMA getting out of control because there's some polarised viewpoints even in this thread.
I'm not convinced the moderation system is perfect, I've not been convinced that PDMA will improve it.
Has anyone launched a poll in OT? Maybe three options: Agree, Disagree, Not This Again.
It seems likely that a demand for PDMA will continue to be voiced until its tried. There's a possibility of PDMA getting out of control because there's some polarised viewpoints even in this thread.
I'm not convinced the moderation system is perfect, I've not been convinced that PDMA will improve it.
Has anyone launched a poll in OT? Maybe three options: Agree, Disagree, Not This Again.
It's best that there was no official April Fool's Day stuff. The last time was... underwhelming, to be diplomatic about it.At the very least we'll stop incessantly arguing for it. Would PDMA hurt things, though? If we're wrong and it makes CFC crappy then just undo the rule change and we'll be fine with no PDMA because there'll be hard evidence as to why it's awful.
And Lefty, you missed a great April Fool's opportunity with this thread.
The thing is, different people have different reasons for wanting a change. The reasons that people in NES/IOT have are not the same as the people in OT, Civ III, or other areas of the forum. And if you took a poll of the OT forum, you'd also get differing views of why those in favor of change have that opinion.
ywhtptgtfo
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My my, what a hole you've dug yourself into.
BSmith called someone a troll and that fits your definition of "flaming". Since it was also not under a Moderator Action label, your gag order on PDMA does not apply - sorry.
Even if he put it under a Moderator Action label, it would still have been rude which is still unacceptable.
Moderator Action: Continued discussion of a moderator action.
Please read the forum rules: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=422889
Now, please do the right thing and apply the same standards on BSmith. Thanks.
Yes, you got too eager to find an excuse to threaten me and it backfired. Shame.
ywhtptgtfo
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It will certainly take curb abuses because of the increased transparency.
You saw the stunt that Lefty did in the past few pages. He tried to hide behind the PDMA gag order after he got caught trying to abuse the system.
Even if PDMA is neutral in terms of functional impact, I still consider it disrespect to be barred from it. What are we? Soviet peasants?
Thlayli
Le Pétit Prince
I'm sure one day the system will change for the better. Lefty and his clique won't be running the show forever. The younger generation of moderators is definitely more open to making changes, so hopefully it's just a matter of time.
ywhtptgtfo
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I share your interested in not having a certain person and his/her like around. It's silly to have a one-way discussion with someone who slams you repeatedly in public and whom you are apparently forbidden to talk back against.
Oh well, at least I did catch someone with his/her pants down even though this person did end up threatening people who called him/her out on it.
In case you are wondering, I am not referring to anyone in particular. For all we know, I can be referring to that crazy ex-girlfriend I had in high school - DON'T YOU DARE TO PUBLICLY TALK BACK AT ME YWHTPGTFO!!!!
Guys, this isn't going to help...
gay_Aleks
from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free!
Not that this certain topic is helping in any way.
pigswill
fly (one day)
Recent discussion has perhaps highlighted a fairly fundamental issue, namely what is a 'moderator action'. It can reasonably be assumed that any statement wrapped in moderator tags is a moderator action. What may not be so widely assumed is that any comment by a moderator could be retrospectively classified as a 'moderator action' if the moderator believes it was obvious that the action was intended as a 'moderator action' even though it wasn't labelled as such at the time.
Moderator action is anything the moderators do about the rules and order. Infractions which put a little colored card in the corner, and may or may not be accompanied by text edited into a post; deleting posts (no mod tags to be seen there, anybody doubt that is a moderator action?); moving a thread to another sub forum; Deleting or trash binning a thread (no text or tags to be seen there, but if the poster then posts a "Why was my thread deleted" thread, that is PDMA); private messages or warnings about rules, almost always without any mod tags in them; editing posts, editing thread titles, deleting text; closing a thread, etc. Some of these do not even involve adding text that you could use a mod tag in. All are obviously with the scope of staff duties. Most of these were preformed for years before there were even mod tags available (I believe the infraction system came some time later than the mod tags were created). The mod tags are for giving more visibility to inserted text and instruction, when it is meant for a wider audience in the thread, it does not create the action. Choosing NOT to infract a reported is a action covered by the PDMA rule, obviously no text or tag there, but if you publicly complain about your forum enemy not being infracted for his post, you will be breaking the PDMA rule. If a moderator infracts a member and edits the members posts, that is a moderator action, whether or not he adds any text at all to the post. Most of my front line moderator experience in the OT and the game forums was before they were available. The PDMA rule precedes their invention by a few years.
ywhtptgtfo
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A while back, I learned that there are some royal protocols that one must follow when meeting with Queen Elizabeth II. Namely, one may not initiate a handshake, turn their backs, or eat after she took her last bite.
Well my fellow peasants, we apparently have some royal protocols to follow as well when it comes to dealing with these royalties dwelling in the CFC forum. When one can't be a royal in life, why not pretend to be one on web?
Nice wall of text by the way.
Rich single child with princess syndrome. She's past that phase now and we are still friends.
Nah, the people with their pants down are The Ones Whose Names and Actions Cannot Not Be Spoken Of. You are free to break the taboo though.
Well my fellow peasants, we apparently have some royal protocols to follow as well when it comes to dealing with these royalties dwelling in the CFC forum. When one can't be a royal in life, why not pretend to be one on web?
Nice wall of text by the way.
Rich single child with princess syndrome. She's past that phase now and we are still friends.
Nah, the people with their pants down are The Ones Whose Names and Actions Cannot Not Be Spoken Of. You are free to break the taboo though.
Paragraphs are your friend, Lefty.
I'm pretty sure everyone knows that receiving a yellow warning or red infraction card is a moderator action. We're all aware that when a moderator posts mod-tagged text, it's a moderator action.
But let's do examine the issue of deleted posts and threads. As you say, there are no moderator tags to explain why someone's (or lots of someones') words have suddenly vanished. It's a reasonable thing to ask where they went, and it's not reasonable to infract people for asking. You have some context for it since moderators can still see soft-deleted posts (not a CFC secret; this is how all vBulletin forums work). But to the rest of us, our words are there one second and gone the next, and most of the time we have no idea why and there have been occasions when it's been made very plain that it's really inconvenient to be asked for an explanation.
Considering that some peoples' perfectly innocent, legitimate posts occasionally vanish along with the ones that do merit deletion, it's just plain rude and inconsiderate to prohibit people from asking where their posts went - because there was nothing wrong with them!
This is just one reason why I favor a PDMA subforum - so people can ask what happened to their posts or threads. And if several people were affected, isn't it more of a time-saver to only explain it once where everyone can see, instead of dealing with several people via PM? (and don't come back with 'it would save even more time to not explain at all; that would be a very unproductive answer)
Assuming the poster of a deleted single post or the starter of of a deleted thread were not sent a PM about the action (or they have private messages disabled or they ignore them), they are only bared from asking by public post on CFC. They may use PM or other private channel to inquire.
hobbsyoyo
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This derail from a few pages ago rather proves my point, I think. I raise concerns about people forming 'cliques' in the context of a PDMA thread to ban together to attack or defend someone's actions in such a way as to make a PDMA thread completely untenable from a practical standpoint. It will all break down into trolling. I've stated that I am just offering my opinion on the subject and am willing to admit that I may completely wrong. See below:
It's a red herring, but people were repulsed enough by the idea that I suggested to ban together to show exactly what I'm talking about. The above quotes contributed 0 to the overall discussion and didn't actually disprove my point in any way.
I understand my opinion on the matter is not held in high esteem here. I understand a majority think I'm wrong. But I also see that a group of people decided to waste everyone's time and partially derail the thread to circlejerk about how wrong I am and turn the conversation into a red herring about how I apparently think you are all are in a coordinate covert secret attack squadron.
Now imagine that instead of talking about an abstract idea, we were discussing the merits of an actual infraction or the actions of a moderator. You know, the kind of subjects where people are really motivated to take sides and feel strongly about the issue. I mean heck, I've tried to be conciliatory and freely admit that I'm only going on a gut instinct and may be wrong, but that didn't stop all the useless baiting (all of the above) and vindictiveness (below) from coming out.
My main objection to PDMA threads is not that any group of people are consciously coordinating trolling, flaming and attacking (though I've been involved in that enough myself to know that it does happen). My main objection is that the kind of behavior shown in the quotes above will come to dominate PDMA threads and make them untenable. You all aren't a 'clique', you aren't hanging out in real life discussing how to show me how stupid I am. But given a subject you care about, you are going to tend to feed off of each other's useless comments. Throw in the hurt feelings of infractions and bad moderations and I think it will be much much worse than this rather benign show of circlejerking.
Or, because it's more fun, we can go back to focusing on how I think everyone's in a secret cabal.
Instead of focusing on the merits of my argument vis a vis people gunking up PDMA threads with useless circlejerking, we instead get post after post of people banning together to prove their not in a secret cabal.
I'm slightly puzzled that 'anyone has the right to protest' can be interpreted as saying 'we should repress minorities' but I'm easily confused.
It's a red herring, but people were repulsed enough by the idea that I suggested to ban together to show exactly what I'm talking about. The above quotes contributed 0 to the overall discussion and didn't actually disprove my point in any way.
I understand my opinion on the matter is not held in high esteem here. I understand a majority think I'm wrong. But I also see that a group of people decided to waste everyone's time and partially derail the thread to circlejerk about how wrong I am and turn the conversation into a red herring about how I apparently think you are all are in a coordinate covert secret attack squadron.
Now imagine that instead of talking about an abstract idea, we were discussing the merits of an actual infraction or the actions of a moderator. You know, the kind of subjects where people are really motivated to take sides and feel strongly about the issue. I mean heck, I've tried to be conciliatory and freely admit that I'm only going on a gut instinct and may be wrong, but that didn't stop all the useless baiting (all of the above) and vindictiveness (below) from coming out.
My main objection to PDMA threads is not that any group of people are consciously coordinating trolling, flaming and attacking (though I've been involved in that enough myself to know that it does happen). My main objection is that the kind of behavior shown in the quotes above will come to dominate PDMA threads and make them untenable. You all aren't a 'clique', you aren't hanging out in real life discussing how to show me how stupid I am. But given a subject you care about, you are going to tend to feed off of each other's useless comments. Throw in the hurt feelings of infractions and bad moderations and I think it will be much much worse than this rather benign show of circlejerking.
Or, because it's more fun, we can go back to focusing on how I think everyone's in a secret cabal.
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Not sure how you can claim that it is untenable from a practical standpoint when AlternateHistory.com has been doing it for eight years without much issue thanks to the fact that, surprise, rules are still enforced in the thread.
For the record, I am not, and have never been part of, a secret cabal of CFC users.
Nice try, but I know dried smoking herring when I see and smell it.
You can't weigh the contribution of the above quotes. I would like to see your metrics as to how you gauged contribution. Have your metrics been peer-reviewed? It not, why haven't they been? I think there is something shadowy and cabal-esque about using secret metrics to gauge contribution.
Nobody brought up red herrings until you did.
For the record, I am not part of a well-coordinated covert secret attack squadron.
AH.com
That's silly. Nobody here is part of a secret cabal.
Haha.
Hahahahah right guys?
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