P&N Community Poll (mod-sponsored): Renewal Vote on "No thread-crapping, etc" Rule

[Idontcare]

Hello P&N forum members and community at large,

Three months ago this community voted on, and approved, the adoption of a "No thread-crapping, thread-derailment, off-topic posting, trolling, the intentional posting of logical fallacies or misinformation" policy as captured in this community poll thread.

The policy was intentionally implemented with an expiration date such that the community would have the opportunity to assess for themselves whether or not an anti-threadcrapping policy was workable and have the desired effect by way of a trial period.

That trial period expired a few days ago (May 17, 2012).

As such, this new poll is dedicated to the community voting on permanent adoption of the same "No thread-crapping, etc" policy that has been in effect since Feb 17, 2012.

From the moderator's perspective here is what we have observed over the past three months:

1. The policy is a step in the right direction, certainly no harm has come from having the policy in place.
2. It is a difficult policy to rigorously enforce owing to the depth of some of the disputes that transpire in a passionate forum like P&N.
3. The difficult factor in enforcement is a matter of experience and education on the part of the attending moderator, as such the efficiency in enforcing this policy is expected to increase over time as the moderators come to be more experienced at deftly surmising whether or not a thread crap, derailment, etc, is occurring.

From a moderator standpoint we would like to see this policy permanently adopted for all the obvious reasons. There doesn't appear to be any down-sides to the policy considering it has already been in effect these past 3 months. And the effectiveness of the policy will only increase as time goes on and the moderators have more time to allocate to the pursuit of minimizing thread-crapping.

However, regardless the preference of the moderators, the decision is up to the community, so please log your vote - for or against - the permanent adoption of the same "no thread-crapping, etc" policy that has been in effect these past 3 months.

If adopted then we basically just keep the status quo from the past 3 months. If not adopted then we go back to the way things were last winter (for better or worse).

The poll will be open for 7 days. Thank you for your time.

Administrator Idontcare


edit Jun 6, 2012:

Alright, the final results of the community poll are in and it looks like the people have spoken.

70% voted in favor of permanently adopting the "no thread-crapping" rule, while 30% voted to not adopt it.

As such, the "no thread-crapping" rule is hereby permanently adopted into P&N posting rules and guidelines.

Here's how this works. You, good citizens of this community, report any and all posts you come across that appear to violate this rule by using the "Report Post" button located in the lower-left corner of the post you wish to report.

It looks like this:

Administrator Idontcare

 

[Pens1566]

I'd be in favor of it if the "intentional posting of logical fallacies or misinformation" part were actually enforced. Haven't seen any evidence of that in the temporary version.

 

[Atreus21]

I'm in favor of this: "No thread-crapping, thread-derailment, off-topic posting, trolling."

I'm not in favor of this: "intentional posting of logical fallacies or misinformation"

"Logical fallacies" are too subject to interpretation. Thread-crapping, derailment, and trolling, are not.

 

[WackyDan]

How exactly do you determine if a post was made with intentional misinformation?

Slippery slope to a viewpoint being censored because a mod doesn't agree with it.

 

[Pens1566]

There are 23000+ posts in just one thread that would qualify as intentional misinformation ...

 

[cybrsage]

I voted against it due to there being no enforcable forum definitions of any of the above. Mods are free to decide one post is bad and the other good based on the target of the post with no recourse to the forum users to do anything about it. Without being able to force a consistent enforcement of the rule, it should go away.

For example, two threads can each be made whose titles do not reflect what the body of the linked source actually says. One will be sanctioned and locked due to being a troll thread and the other will have nothing done to it, based on the whim of the mods.

 

[Idontcare]

How exactly do you determine if a post was made with intentional misinformation?

Slippery slope to a viewpoint being censored because a mod doesn't agree with it.

It is handled in a purely reactionary - burden of proof is born by the presenter - approach.

It is time consuming because first we must afford the accused the excuse that they were simply misinformed or misguided themselves.

So everyone gets to lie about something at least once, and then either claim - legitimately or falsely - that they were ignorant and simply didn't know any better. I.e. that the misinformation was not posted intentionally.

Then the mods have to document it all so that if and when the member posts the same misinformation at a subsequent date we can call up that documentation to then prove the member has no excuse, ignorance is no longer a claimable defense, and as such the repeated posting of misinformation must have been intentional.

Why is this so arduous? Because while we like to think the worst of people when sitting behind our keyboards getting irritated and annoyed by what we are reading on our screens, the reality is a lot more closer to that expressed as Hanlon's Razor:

Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.

And society has concluded that while malice can be treated as a crime, stupidity can not.

As such, as moderators seeking fairness and due process for all who are accused, we must approach every instance of a member being accused of intentionally posting misinformation with some degree of a benefit of the doubt (innocent until proven guilty) lest we unintentionally penalize someone who was truly posting misinformation out of ignorance.

 

[Ninjahedge]

Enforcement is also an issue.

Most people, although disgruntled, would not mind a bit of regulation but would certainly mind a virtual rap across the knuckles.

 

[werepossum]

I'm in favor of this: "No thread-crapping, thread-derailment, off-topic posting, trolling."

I'm not in favor of this: "intentional posting of logical fallacies or misinformation"

"Logical fallacies" are too subject to interpretation. Thread-crapping, derailment, and trolling, are not.

My feelings as well. My fear was that the mods will consciously or unconsciously take their own positions as correct, so that the forum gradually becomes an echo chamber of one point of view or the other. Therefore I originally voted against it. However, I haven't noticed any adverse effects over the last three months, so I reversed myself and voted yes this time. I'm frankly surprised that the mods even have the resources to do this, but a little enforced civility is a good thing.

 

[Infohawk]

I would vote yes subject to the exception that I also have doubts about the intentional logical fallacies. There's no point having a rule that is not enforced and in this case I don't blame the moderators for not enforcing it. It would take too much time to enforce it. At the end of the day, I haven't seen anyone punished for this in the past couple months. No point having a rule that cannot and is not enforced.

 

[cybrsage]

We do not have a definition of Trolling on this forum. We need one if we are going to have any kind fair judgement regarding it.

 

[piasabird]

Too subjective.

 

[brandonb]

In my experience when forums try to moderate P&N it usually turns into a nightmare for the moderators and eventually the forum operators will just say its not worth the effort, and close down the P&N forum. That is other websites of course. Not Anandtech. That said, please do not close down P&N if it comes to that, just remove the moderation.

The only thing I can say is that some things get overlooked, I haven't really seen much moderation. I can tell you that every single religious thread in the past 3 months there are certain non religious people that go into the thread, say something about "fools", "spaghetti monsters", etc, where the only thing they are doing is trolling and nothing ever happens to them. Why? It becomes destructive to the conversation. Some even try to have an intelligent conversation but usually by page 2 or 3 that is gone and only trolling remains. I've never seen a no trolling mod edit in any religious thread. I don't even bother anymore with certain topics. Is that the intention?

The next thing is that certain people get a reputation and then whenever that person posts, we have an entire page of people trying to point out that person is an idiot, right or wrong. Most of the time these people are trolls, but other times, the people are not trolls. I don't like to call out certain members, but on both sides of the spectrum, we have Cybrsage who is one of the only few that seems to keep a relatively open mind from what I can tell and doesn't resort to trolling. Yet when he posts, we have a page of people trolling that member (at times.) The other side of the spectrum is DaveMcOwen, no introduction needed. If either of these members post, we seem to have a page of "you're an idiot, stop posting" responses, again right or wrong. But trolling those members is trolling.

Even a troll who starts a topic about something silly, it can and has turned into a good discussion at times, using the "what if" scenarios, and if people took the topic seriously rather than to troll the member.

Right now, I'd rather just have no moderation here than the limited moderation I've seen. I'm not sure anandtech has or will ever have the necessary amount of moderation required for a P&N forum. I'd rather go without moderation than a limited moderation. Then we can police ourselves if need be vs. hoping a moderator will step in.

 

[JEDIYoda]

Then we can police ourselves if need be vs. hoping a moderator will step in.

How can that be effective.....

 

[cybrsage]

If it is kept, can we at least get a working definition of troll that everyone will use? Everyone should be using the same meaning so that enforcement has a chance of being the same from mod to mod.

 

[Bowfinger]

If it is kept, can we at least get a working definition of troll that everyone will use? Everyone should be using the same meaning so that enforcement has a chance of being the same from mod to mod.

You seem awfully concerned about moderators using good judgment. Why is that? It's only when one is intent on violating the spirit of the rules that one needs a clear, sharp line to ride. If one strives instead to focus on contributing constructive, honest, productive comments and thoughts, moderation becomes a non-issue. One will always stay well within the lines that way ... and be a much more valuable member of the P&N community.

Food for thought.

 

[cybrsage]

You seem awfully concerned about moderators using good judgment. Why is that?

Because moderators using good judgement is a good thing. You should be concerned when people DON'T want moderators to use good judgement, not when they do.

Food for thought.

 

[Bowfinger]

Because moderators using good judgement is a good thing. You should be concerned when people DON'T want moderators to use good judgement, not when they do.

Food for thought.

On the odd chance that you're not playing your usual lame word games (i.e., willful intellectual dishonesty), let me rephrase that more precisely:

You seem awfully intent on NOT letting moderators use good judgement, trying instead to tie their hands with detailed rules. Why is that? ...
​

Now that I've clarified how you inverted the clear intent of that statement, unintentionally or otherwise, feel free to respond to my ENTIRE post, in context.

 

[Moonbeam]

I thought the mods suggested it in not feasible to differentiate a t word type form a sincere but perhaps ignorant person. I personally never call people trolls, never see anybody as such, am and have been repelled by the word since I first heard it used, and see it at totally subjective. I also find the deep emotional struggle some folk go through to call somebody else a troll to be a self induced frustration. It looks to me like a means by which a bigot will resort to stereotype somebody thus justifying projecting their own self hate on somebody else by target him or her for ridicule.

 

[cybrsage]

On the odd chance that you're not playing your usual lame word games (i.e., willful intellectual dishonesty), let me rephrase that more precisely:

You seem awfully intent on NOT letting moderators use good judgement, trying instead to tie their hands with detailed rules. Why is that? ...
​

Now that I've clarified how you inverted the clear intent of that statement, unintentionally or otherwise, feel free to respond to my ENTIRE post, in context.

Good judgement is biased. No matter how much a person tries to NOT be biased, they still are. For example, if a mod (due to political leanings) may be perfectly fine with someone saying all conservatives suffer from brain damage and they are what is wrong with the country, but have a problem if you say the same thing about libs. This is because the mod identifies with libs and suddenly finds himself in a group which was just insulted. He may then toss out an infraction and close the thread as a troll thread...whereas the conservative thread remained open. This did not happen, just creating a hypothetical situation.

If there is a definition which is used, a person could take a grievance to the moderators forum and mention it there. Without a definition, there is no recourse but to leave it up to the individual biases of the mods.

It also is a way to inform the user base of what trolling actually is. Trolling is a word used quite often in this forum, and almost always used incorrectly, whose only purpose is to insult. With a definition, a person incorrectly calling another person a troll can be warned to stop using insults.

Having a working definition is really a win for everyone. What is the downside to it?

 

[dank69]

Good judgement is biased. No matter how much a person tries to NOT be biased, they still are. For example, if a mod (due to political leanings) may be perfectly fine with someone saying all conservatives suffer from brain damage and they are what is wrong with the country, but have a problem if you say the same thing about libs. This is because the mod identifies with libs and suddenly finds himself in a group which was just insulted. He may then toss out an infraction and close the thread as a troll thread...whereas the conservative thread remained open. This did not happen, just creating a hypothetical situation.

If there is a definition which is used, a person could take a grievance to the moderators forum and mention it there. Without a definition, there is no recourse but to leave it up to the individual biases of the mods.

It also is a way to inform the user base of what trolling actually is. Trolling is a word used quite often in this forum, and almost always used incorrectly, whose only purpose is to insult. With a definition, a person incorrectly calling another person a troll can be warned to stop using insults.

Having a working definition is really a win for everyone. What is the downside to it?

The definition of troll is all over the internet. The definitions may be worded slightly differently from site to site but they all boil down to the same general concepts.

 

[cybrsage]

The definition of troll is all over the internet. The definitions may be worded slightly differently from site to site but they all boil down to the same general concepts.

That is true, so it should be easy to adopt one here as our forum's official defintion. Once done, those who violate it and instead use Troll as an insult can be sanctioned for performing a direct personal insult.

As it now stands, the defintion of troll changes based on the whims of the mods. Good moderation is as unbiased as it can be, and basing definitions on a whim is not conducive to unbiased moderation.

EDIT: Basically, we need a definition for the same reason we have definitions in law. We would never want to allow a judge to decide the laws based on his personal views or whims - we demand laws be defined so everyone knows what they are and everyone is judged equally by them.

 

[randomrogue]

Why is it that everytime we have one of these threads Cybrsage overwhelms us with his post count?

 

[cybrsage]

Why is it that everytime we have one of these threads Cybrsage overwhelms us with his post count?

You answered your own question without realizing. Because people ask questions of or about me and I reply. The more people who do what you did, the more replies I post. It really is that simple.

 

[dank69]

That is true, so it should be easy to adopt one here as our forum's official defintion. Once done, those who violate it and instead use Troll as an insult can be sanctioned for performing a direct personal insult.

As it now stands, the defintion of troll changes based on the whims of the mods. Good moderation is as unbiased as it can be, and basing definitions on a whim is not conducive to unbiased moderation.

EDIT: Basically, we need a definition for the same reason we have definitions in law. We would never want to allow a judge to decide the laws based on his personal views or whims - we demand laws be defined so everyone knows what they are and everyone is judged equally by them.

If the definition is the same everywhere, why do you say the definition changes?