PF RULES AND GUIDELINES - Comments Welcome

Hello, I'm curious. What do we do when we're reporting threads? Do we just hit the report button?

 

You hit the little warning picture in the top right, then post your comments in the new screen that comes up, explaining why you feel it is breaking the rules.

 

I have to explain? I usually just copy and paste what the person said, then report it.

 

When you hit the warning sign and fill out the little box your comments and the complete post you're reporting goes to a mods-only forum where they can see everything.

 

I don't suppose you have to explain it. However, if there is any ambiguity, a comment by you that explains your specific objection or reasoning, might help to explain why you reported it.

 

Oh...

Makes sense now.

 

On a similar note, I had a question. However, it requires a significant amount of background, so I hope you will bear with me.

There are, essentially, two kinds of rules, based upon enforcement. There are the ones that are enforced heavily, and the ones that are enforced lightly. This is for fairly obvious reasons. The ones that are more heavily enforced are a much larger problem than the ones that are less heavily enforced.

Heavily enforced rules being things like: Obscene, vulgar, or sexually-oriented language and pictures (to a lesser degree than others), harrassing, threats, multiple users, and proxies.

Lighter enforced rules being things like: Off-topic comments, personal attacks, flamebait/trolling, duplicate (and triplicate and quadruplicate threads), metaposting, and signature lines.

In general, the heavily enforced rules will result in bans, usually the first time. The lighter enforced rules will result in deletions, moving, infractions, etc... The lighter enforced rules possess another notable characaristic, which distinguishes them from the heavily enforced rules. That is that each contains exceptions. A personal attack is okay, depending on how it is worded. A duplicate or triplicate thread will stay if it gets enough comments. Trolling stands if enough people take it up as the new conversation (essentially, if it is successful). So on and so forth.

However, I've noticed that what most people take from this is that ones that are lighter enforced, are considered acceptable to violate (as evinced by the 9 threads in Current Events with 29 deleted posts between them). A handful of users (obviously you are all well aware of who they are) break the rules on a repeated basis, and have learned, to a degree, the specific circumstances that allow a post that, ostensibly, violates the rules, to remain.

So, somebody posts a duplicate thread, and they get the same people who responded to the first, to respond to the second. By the time the mods can check, it has 15 pages, and thus, stays.

Somebody wants to post something off-topic, so they reply, make a small comment that addresses the topic, then goes off on a tangent (doing so in multiple threads, with the same addendum on each and a different introductory comment).

So on and so forth.

As a user who sees these on a regular basis from the same handful of people, and is growing increasingly frustrated, what can I do to help deal with this?

edit: Oh, and I think it goes without saying, but it might not. This is not intended as a criticism. I genuinely would like to help deal with these issues, and don't know how I can do so.

 

Befriend the offender to the point where they trust you enough to share their real name (say Mr. Smith for example) and address.

Once you've got that phone their internet provider and say "this is mr. smith and i'd like my internet disconnected please".

That should work.

 

Doug, you're scaring me.

 

While I disagree with the specific criteria there are certainly different level of seriousness that we address. While I speak for myself I believe that most moderators would be comfortable with the following.

Top of the list which result in permabans:

Spammers - We generally catch spammers while they are still moderated members and this is invisible to the membership as their posts are deleted before they even make it to the forums. Sometimes they evade us as in the case of those that would spam the site with pornography and when that happens we do deal with them just as we would with any other spammer. Spammers are permabanned whenever they are identified.

Next at the top of the moderator's list is socks which are members that have been previously banned but return as a new member. This lead to the ban on annonymous proxies which is the most common means for socks to evade detection. Identifying socks takes up more moderator time than probably anything else. Sock are permabanned whenever they are identified.

Other violations of the Forum Rules and Guidelines:

Personal attacks and flamebaiting are probably next on our list. Personal attacks basically come down to derogatory statements directed at a member or about a member. Derogatory statements about public figures or institutions are not personal attacks although some members can be insulted because they are members of institutions that are attacked. Flamebaiting is any post where the sole intent is to elicit and emotional response.

The would probably come posting of offensive images although this is not a serious problem as it rarely comes up relative to other Forum Rules violations. We do try to delete these as soon as possible.

Duplicate threads are certainly problematic and we do try to merge them whenever pragmatically possible. As noted though once they reach a certian point where they have a lot of posts having a moderator merge them creates chaos in the thread as posts merge based upon the date/time of post. Here members can help us by not posting to duplicate threads but instead immediately Report the second thread with a link to the first. It is the membership that makes merging duplicate threads either possible or impossible for the moderators.

Trolling and off topic posts are certainly an issue but with thousands of posts daily the moderators cannot address them all. We are concerned with a member chronically making trolling or off topic posts. That is a member we need to deal with. The occasional off topic or trolling post is not as much of a concern. Once again the membership can help with this one by not responding to trolling or off topic posts. The responses to off topic and trolling posts is what takes a thread off topic.

Harassment does happen and we do enforce the prohibition agianst harassment but it is a rare violation of the Forum Rules.

There are other Forum Rules that we enforce but to a much lessor degree and don't warrant too much discussion here.

Remember that for Forum Rules violations we're not seeking to ban the member but instead we're trying to get them to comply with the Forum Rules. That is our desire and why we issue warnings and infractions but some members refuse to comply and eventually that leads to tempbans and eventually to permabans.

We don't generally like imposing tempbans because it's alot of work. It's not just a "push a buttion" but we also have to report it to the other moderators for review. Repeated or very serious violations of the Forum Rules can lead to a tempban or even a permaban.

Permabans are even more work because, except as noted in the case of spammers and socks, it requires a vote of the moderators. That requires the initiating moderator to provide evidence that the member refuses to comply with the Forum Rules and is a chronic violator of them. It takes about a week for the moderators to reach a decision on permabans and it is a slow and methodical process.

What the members can do first and foremost is to comply with the Forum Rules and Guidelines. Next is don't respond to personal attacks, flamebaiting, trolling and off topic posts. Instead use the Report function. We can't work all Reports all of the time but we do try to work as many as possible.

I hope this helps explain what we do and why to a reasonable degree. We certainly appreciate those members that follow the above in complying with the Forum Rules and Guidelines and Report posts that violate them.

Shiva_TD
Site Moderator

 

I shortened your post because I wanted to just address this part, about the duplicate threads, this is my number one complaint...why can't these threads be merged if there are 'too many posts' to delete? it is so hard to discuss a current event with people if they are spread out over three or four threads...imagine a coffee shop full of people, it's like you are having a conversation at your table and over on the other side of the room someone else is having the same conversation.

I come online to talk to an assortment of people, breaking up the conversation like this stifles communication...and winds up with people repeating themselves and diluting the discourse.

Also, it knocks other subjects off the front page, and they get lost...I would much rather have a front page with fifteen different subjects than a front page with four threads about what the Congressional Black Caucus said yesterday and three about a football brawl and so on..

 

I have known people online for over five years that I consider VERY good friends that not only do not know my address, they don't know my real name.

you CAN'T befriend me that well...

 

thank you for your indepth explanation of the mod process here; it sounds very logical and fair.

and I do understand the entire 'chaos' thing...but most people do quote the comment they are referring to. If anyone asks..LOL...I would prefer to have merged threads and the confusion rather than several threads about the same event.

When I come on and want to start a thread about a topic, I DO use the 'search' function. It would really help if people would use more accurate thread titles too.

 

Perhaps from experience I might say that members often post a direct response to the prior post without quoting it. They certainly do generally quote a post that is well before the last post but there are actual a lot of posts related directly to the preceeding post that don't use a quotation. Merges based upon date/time of post do create chaos as I've merged long threads before and then seen the results. ARGH!!! I regretted doing it and unfortunately there isn't an "unmerge" button.

Some of the thread titles really annoy me as well and in rare instances we do change them. There has to be a compelling reason for the change though and generally the moderators take a "hands off" policy related to this.

Shiva_TD
Site Moderator

 

By myname section there are two green squares in it. When I click on them, it gives me a small snippet of a comment someone apparently said about me. How can I see all of these comments?????????????

 

Click on "User CP" in the upper left corner of the page and look down for "Latest Reputation Received." You should be able to click on a link to see what post the comment was made on.

 

Not to usurp 12th's advice... but those little comments seem to be made by the forum and not any individual. They say standard stuff (depending on how many little green dots you've got).

"big daryle has a spectacular aura about"

"injest is a jewel in the rough"

"Shiva_TD has a reputation beyond repute"

*koff*

 

WOW, I've never received a Rep like any of the above. There are some that would argue against the Rep comment about me though. It should probably be "Shiva_TD has a reputation" and left at that. LOL

Shiva_TD

 

LOL, it's NOT a rep... it's the msg you get if you hold your cursor over the green dots opposite your name.

Don't get too cocky... mine sez the same thing as yours!

ROFLMAO

 

No comment...(poke)

SMV is right I think, it's the board settings. It says that on lots of boards, depends how many reps/credits you have I think. Big Daryle it will change when you get some more reps.

 

Who's SMV?

 

I obviously missed that one and didn't even know it existed. Hey, we're Rep related!!! Now isn't that a scary thought.LOL

Shiva_TD

 

Peas in a pod!

 

She's related to JOMV...