Rule Change: Publication of Infraction Appeal Threads

;) Valka: Everybody getting exactly what they asked for would require a large number of alternative parallel universes, which is something currently beyond the technical proficiency of CFC staff. We have a hard time just getting a quorum of staff together on one theory.
as that would discourage small-time trolls (people who are, for the most part, sincere except for the rare moments) from wasting everyone's time.
From the current numbers I suspect that the publication rule may already have some effect at discouraging weaker appeals. It is hard to tell, however.
 
I think the public infraction reviews were great. It was interesting to read what is going through the collective mind of the moderation when it comes to these things. I think the only major drawback was removing so much at the request of the user.

Synsensa said it best in my opinion. The bhavv v Bootstoots thread is particularly frustrating because so many PMs were removed in the original post that I believe some context was lost in the process. I would make a prerequisite to beginning an appeal approval of posting relevant private messages.
 
Yeah it really defeats the purpose when there's no context for posterity.
;) Valka: Everybody getting exactly what they asked for would require a large number of alternative parallel universes, which is something currently beyond the technical proficiency of CFC staff. We have a hard time just getting a quorum of staff together on one theory.

use your illuminati magic I believe in you
 
Given the amount of noise to get it set up and the sparsity of public criticism since it started I can't see the value of stopping.
 
;) Valka: Everybody getting exactly what they asked for would require a large number of alternative parallel universes, which is something currently beyond the technical proficiency of CFC staff. We have a hard time just getting a quorum of staff together on one theory.

From the current numbers I suspect that the publication rule may already have some effect at discouraging weaker appeals. It is hard to tell, however.
:coffee:

I suspect that the reasons people deny permission for their PMs to be posted are twofold:

A. PMs between moderators and members are expected to be kept confidential (at least that's an expectation that members tend to have, in my experience);

B. It's not unusual for members to be angry when infracted, and so their first PM is likely to be worded more strongly/emphatically than subsequent ones. It's not a comfortable thing to contemplate those words being shared publicly with the rest of the forum, and there may be other privacy issues as well, if other posters' names are part of the argument being made (ie. "Well, Poster X made the same kind of comment, how come you didn't infract THAT one?"). Unless Poster X gives permission to have his/her name publicized like this, it's unethical to include that in any part of this that's made public.

So these are part of the reason why it's really difficult for people who are not involved to get the whole context of why the infraction happened and why the infractee is choosing to appeal.

Another part is that other people involved are not allowed to make their views known - as in why the post was reported in the first place.
 
1. Which is why I suggest making waiving away confidentiality as a condition to appeals.

2. If the moderators make it extremely clear that a condition for appeals is accepting public disclosure of PMs, then I would bet that there would be far fewer emotional PMs out the gate.

If a third party is brought up, then the solution is as simple as redacting that section of the PM. Not the entire PM.
 
To add to what Valka said, most infractions likely result from a public post. Resulting private correspondence is less likely to be important to discussion of the infraction itself.

Furthermore, having private messages to mods be actually private, or at least confidential as to the public, encourages candor in communication. It might also encourage Kandor in a bottle.


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Or what was the point in first place. In fact, most of the people clamoring for it either left or forgot about it.
Or maybe never found out…?
 
If they already left, they probably wouldn't even have came back if the admins offered them free hookers and a night in Las Vegas.
 
If that's your initial offer, I might be willing to negotiate on behalf of my clients…
 
Yeah - still here. Still think the rule change was a good idea. Would like to see it continue.
 
Or what was the point in first place. In fact, most of the people clamoring for it either left or forgot about it.

It's a measure that is largely not satisfactory for any party. It was better than nothing, but also completely one-sided in narrative.

What was originally desired were (1) open discussion and perhaps (2) penalized moderators for past abuses. As we already know, neither options are acceptable to the volunteers who are moderating the forums.

With this said, there are greener pastures elsewhere in the web. Reddit, voat, and armchair generals are superior alternatives. What's also good in those places is that popular unrest have a history of removing abusive moderators/administrators (which their counterparts in CivFanatics rightfully fear).

If they already left, they probably wouldn't even have came back if the admins offered them free hookers and a night in Las Vegas.

That's true. The ship has already sailed for a number of us (including me). Better pray for a reversal of the Civ Franchise's dismal progression to keep the dwindling user base.
 
From CFC to Reddit? Seriously? Have you never heard of the saying "from worse to worst"?

also dae cfc mods literally nazis
 
...I like the 'Inside Baseball' look at the deliberations. As a forum manager myself, I have to think about these moderation issues all the time, and am always interested in how others approach it, definitely not least here. Reading this kind of thing is definitely relevant to my interests.

But how to say the rest fairly and diplomatically? Strongly agreed that getting one side with all the redaction is frustrating - if just the public information was painstakingly linked and I read everything at the link, I'm still missing tons of history and context that no one's masochist enough to compile, nor frankly, I to read. I also agree that it's something of a band aide on the Titanic - a sop to one small corner of what was being asked for, which I did follow at the time.

I do hope that at least this much will be continued. The CFC staff has admirable collective discipline about keeping private private (with one major exception I experienced to my regret a long time ago - and I do mean admirable; I've seen more trouble caused at other sites by half-butted info leaks of 'private' conversations, not least by management who should know better) but that has an unfortunate effect of sometimes making the staff look like mysterious some black-box star chamber. If this is only a sop to greater transparency, I think it's an important gesture, still.
 
More like "let them eat cake"-sort of gesture. Really, for all the noise that was made, I feel like it was rather unimportant, if unimpressive change. Beyond that, I don't see the point of appealing infractions unless they never expire. Just wait it out. And if you're on balancing on the tip of getting perma-banned, well, there's probably nothing that could be done.
 
More like "let them eat cake"-sort of gesture. Really, for all the noise that was made, I feel like it was rather unimportant, if unimpressive change. Beyond that, I don't see the point of appealing infractions unless they never expire. Just wait it out. And if you're on balancing on the tip of getting perma-banned, well, there's probably nothing that could be done.
The point of appealing an infraction is because everything is part of your infraction record, and at some point there comes a time when, if you've accumulated a very large number of infractions over the years, you get moved into the "permanent points" group.

So there are times when it's definitely worth the effort to try to have an infraction downgraded or reversed, if you can make a case that the infraction was issued in error or was too harsh.
 


Do you even Reddit

Every single day for years.

There are definitely abusive moderators there but all one needs to do is to move to a similar sub-reddit (open a new one) and invite his crowd over.

If you find reddit to be a horrible place, then that's a pity. It's not an utopia by far (e.g. Ellen Pao's circus) but I consider it much more to my liking. To each his own I guess.
 
Well there were hardly any appeals.

I hope that making them public hasn't caused otherwise meritorious appeals not to be made. I.e. if people who actually deserve to have their infractions revoked decided not to appeal because they didn't want their appeal made public, then that would be a bad thing. I doubt that's really happening, though.
 
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