Author Topic: Arbitrary moderation?  (Read 90415 times)

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Offline zaptaTopic starter

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Arbitrary moderation?
« on: July 17, 2014, 10:45:44 pm »
The moderation in this forums seems to be very arbitrary recently.

For example this thread was closed today https://www.eevblog.com/forum/chat/airline-crash-7-17-14/ with the reasoning "Thread locked pending some electronics connection." while this one https://www.eevblog.com/forum/chat/ot-weird-al-gets-tacky/ is in it's 6th page.

The moderator claims here that he is not arbitrary and it's just a matter of staying on topic https://www.eevblog.com/forum/chat/ot-australia-votes-to-repeal-carbon-tax/msg480558/#msg480558 but then he invokes the reasoning of not having electronic content.

Any thought?
 

Offline retrolefty

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #1 on: July 17, 2014, 10:52:34 pm »
Well it's an Australian site, different rules.

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General Topics:

This is where everyone hangs out and rants and chats about whatever electronics topics that don't fit into the other more specific categories on this forum. Occasional off-topic stuff is ok, but generally we like to keep it electronics related.

 Problems is 'occasional'; isn't defined, so maybe two in one day is too many?
« Last Edit: July 17, 2014, 11:06:05 pm by retrolefty »
 

Offline miguelvp

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #2 on: July 17, 2014, 11:38:43 pm »
One of them is labeled "OT" (Off Topic) the other one is not.
 

Offline David_AVD

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #3 on: July 17, 2014, 11:48:08 pm »
I didn't see the need for the latest plane thread.  At least the 'Weird Al' Yankovic one is related to nerds.   :)

Anyway, it's Dave's forum and he ultimately calls the shots.  Don't like it ?  Don't come here.   :P
 

Offline TerraHertz

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #4 on: July 18, 2014, 12:55:54 am »
It's not a 'lack of interest', nor is the moderation arbitrary, nor is it motivated by 'keeping discussion on topic of electronics.' The last element is disproved by threads such as the 'which cola do you drink?' which went on for many pages and was never touched at all.

Also Dave can't claim it's just Geoffs being a bit too enthusiastic. Geoffs is implementing Dave's own policy, while Dave usually stays out of it to avoid being visibly associated with this kind of censorship. I was disappointed to discover it actually originates from Dave, when he personally threatened to ban me from the site if I posted even one more comment in the MH370 thread. This was after I'd merely listed 'plane lost as a result of actions from outside the plane' among other cases in a logical enumeration of the fundamental possibilities. Personally I think the real reason was that I was trying to start a discussion on the technical details of Inmarsat's public claims. Which is about as on-topic to electronics as you could possibly get, but also carries a risk of turning up something contradictory to the official narrative. Dave's description of my everist.org web site as 'conspiracy central' was particularly amusing. I got the impression his disdain is related to one folder in my site containing lists of links to news articles on various topics - some of which are related to our friends the chosen tribe.

Now we see Geoffs very rapidly shutting down a thread, in which the obvious focus would have been 'exactly who's anti-aircraft targeting radar was it, that was detected locking on the plane just before the missile fired?'
I think that's on-topic, don't you? And where else is it likely to be discussed sensibly?

Off Topic section deleted
Keep comments about moderation please.


In my view, electronics practice in today's world is intrinsically and unavoidably linked to politics in many ways. To deny people with electronics expertise the opportunity to discuss such matters anywhere in a popular electronics forum, is well into the realm of immoral behavior. I also don't think the reasons claimed for enforcing such a ban are the true reasons. You can work out the real reasons by observing the effect of actions and the specifics of which topics are removed. It's not what they say, it's what they do that matters.

If the real reason was to avoid argument disrupting threads throughout the forum, then what's wrong with having a 'Current Events' category? (As if 'General Chat' isn't specific enough for that.) We've seen new topic areas created recently, so it can't be claimed it to be too hard to do. Then those who wish to avoid politics can just not look at it.

Incidentally, I'd advise anyone about to post something like the above, to save a local copy first. Screenshots too, if it goes up for a while. PNG is better for text, not JPG.

Edit: fix typo. Also just realized: It's probably not a mere coincidence that the plane was Malaysian. There must be many commercial airliners flying over Ukraine each day, so why Malaysian, and why now? I can see an obvious reason.
« Last Edit: July 18, 2014, 01:15:52 am by TerraHertz »
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Offline zaptaTopic starter

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #5 on: July 18, 2014, 01:24:54 am »
Anyway, it's Dave's forum and he ultimately calls the shots.  Don't like it ?  Don't come here.   :P

It's seems that Dave doesn't mind non electronic thread and participate in some of them (e.g. the Onion and the Weird Al threads) so it seems arbitrary when the somebody else closes the air crash thread https://www.eevblog.com/forum/chat/airline-crash-7-17-14/  for non electronic related content.
 

Offline TheBorg

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #6 on: July 18, 2014, 01:49:09 am »
Also just realized: It's probably not a mere coincidence that the plane was Malaysian. There must be many commercial airliners flying over Ukraine each day, so why Malaysian, and why now? I can see an obvious reason.
Please, just not now, not in this thread...
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Offline deth502

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #7 on: July 18, 2014, 02:14:16 am »
ibtl!!

seems this comes up every month or so when someone gets butthurt about thier thread being closed.

this is a privately owned and maintained discussion forum. if you dont like the way its run, dont come here. if you think you can do it better, start your own, then you can choose to arbitrarily close, lock and/or delete any damn thread you want, but crying in your cheerios here aint doin' shit.
 

Offline Prime73

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #8 on: July 18, 2014, 02:18:45 am »
this is a privately owned and maintained discussion forum. if you dont like the way its run, dont come here. if you think you can do it better, start your own, then you can choose to arbitrarily close, lock and/or delete any damn thread you want, but crying in your cheerios here aint doin' shit.

 :-+
 

Offline pickle9000

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #9 on: July 18, 2014, 02:23:23 am »
This is an electronics forum, in general. That said, things are discussed outside the field but only up to a point. The points vary according to what direction Dave decides. This is part of his business and he decides.
 

Offline Stonent

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #10 on: July 18, 2014, 02:24:58 am »
this is a privately owned and maintained discussion forum. if you dont like the way its run, dont come here. if you think you can do it better, start your own, then you can choose to arbitrarily close, lock and/or delete any damn thread you want, but crying in your cheerios here aint doin' shit.

 :-+

Maybe he'll incorporate and we can buy shares :P
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Offline pickle9000

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #11 on: July 18, 2014, 02:33:58 am »
this is a privately owned and maintained discussion forum. if you dont like the way its run, dont come here. if you think you can do it better, start your own, then you can choose to arbitrarily close, lock and/or delete any damn thread you want, but crying in your cheerios here aint doin' shit.

 :-+

Maybe he'll incorporate and we can buy shares :P

"Design by comity" Dave would love that. :-DD
 

Offline EEVblog

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #12 on: July 18, 2014, 02:35:56 am »
The moderator claims here that he is not arbitrary and it's just a matter of staying on topic https://www.eevblog.com/forum/chat/ot-australia-votes-to-repeal-carbon-tax/msg480558/#msg480558 but then he invokes the reasoning of not having electronic content.
Any thought?

Well, one has a proven history of leading to the conspiracy theory nutters taking over, and the other is just a random topic not likely to pop up again.
I'll let you decide which is which  ;D
 

Offline TerraHertz

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #13 on: July 18, 2014, 02:36:24 am »
Please, just not now, not in this thread...

Don't worry. If I'd wanted to continue that line I would have. But yes, this is not the place.

Regarding the 'moderation', one problem is that many people are probably not aware of how extreme it can be here, since the more extreme instances typically involve outright deletion, without even any indication that something was deleted. I'd suggest that forum members should keep copies of anything they post that might be deleted. Over time, observe the pattern of what gets deleted and what doesn't. It can be quite revealing.

Actually I'm surprised this whole thread isn't locked already. It will be interesting to see where it is allowed to go. A discussion of moderation style that excludes from the forum anything that's politically incorrect, even when electronics are directly involved? Now in this discussion, 'on-topic' is demonstrated to exclude electronics! (See my sig, for the text above that was removed.)
Presumably any arguments about the moderation that refer to specific political issues will also be removed.

So what does that leave? It's hard to imagine a more neutered discussion.
What's left is a bunch of people nodding and agreeing that it's Dave's forum (true) and he can run it however he likes (true, if he doesn't care about social justice, morality or Truth), and that anyway anyone who doesn't agree with the 'consensus' is a raving conspiracy theorist. Which is true too, given that most of the bad things that happen in the world actually do arise from conspiracies, and they are generally so appalling that those aware of them do tend to rave.
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Offline EEVblog

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #14 on: July 18, 2014, 02:44:37 am »
I don't think it has anything to do with being an Australian site. Any long time forum member who has seen endless threads started not related to electronics has seen them degenerate into a strongly opinionated meandering quagmire of religiously held views.

And I wouldn't have guessed that for the Weird Al thread, but it seems to have happened  :palm:

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The rules are posted, and Dave has long stated he doesn't like rules. However it is my interptretation he also doesn't want a relatively small number of members to diminish the experience of the generally quieter majority who seek out this place as a refuge of calm and sanity from the wider internet experience. There are plenty of other places to talk about climate change, gun control, religion and so on. 

Yes, it's very fine line that any forum has to run.
I really really hate heavily modified forums where anything even remotely off-topic is strictly censored and forbidden, that is why occasional off-topic stuff is allowed.
But at the same time you can't have a free-for-all otherwise you devalue the forum for most users and it ends up like usenet.

Quote
So whilst I can't speak for Dave and the moderators I have noticed that rather than closing down threads arbitrarily they are closed down for much the same reason you would burst a pimple. They become an irritation.

And that's why a moderator stepped in on the new plane thread.
This kind of topic has a known habit of degenerating very quickly, and it is clear there is going to be no possible electronic or engineering content here like there was with MH370, it was only ever going to end up politics and conspiracy theories.
 

Offline zaptaTopic starter

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #15 on: July 18, 2014, 02:51:46 am »
And that's why a moderator stepped in on the new plane thread.
This kind of topic has a known habit of degenerating very quickly, and it is clear there is going to be no possible electronic or engineering content here like there was with MH370, it was only ever going to end up politics and conspiracy theories.

You can mention it in the reasoning then ('likely to bring conspiracy theories'), otherwise the moderation seems arbitrary.
 

Offline EEVblog

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #16 on: July 18, 2014, 02:56:05 am »
Also Dave can't claim it's just Geoffs being a bit too enthusiastic. Geoffs is implementing Dave's own policy, while Dave usually stays out of it to avoid being visibly associated with this kind of censorship.

FYI I did not even see the new plane thread before I saw this thread.
I can't be on here here 24/7 and don't even try to read all the topics any more. More often than not most have scrolled off my "Show unread posts" list, so I never get to see or read many topics.
This is why there are two other moderators, but really their main role is to not read threads, it's just to respond to reports etc. But if they (or I) do see something that might get out of hand, we'll nip it in the bud without a report.

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I was disappointed to discover it actually originates from Dave, when he personally threatened to ban me from the site if I posted even one more comment in the MH370 thread.

Correct.

Quote
This was after I'd merely listed 'plane lost as a result of actions from outside the plane' among other cases in a logical enumeration of the fundamental possibilities.

It was a lot more than that and you know it.

Quote
Now we see Geoffs very rapidly shutting down a thread, in which the obvious focus would have been 'exactly who's anti-aircraft targeting radar was it, that was detected locking on the plane just before the missile fired?'
I think that's on-topic, don't you? And where else is it likely to be discussed sensibly?

No, it won't be, I'd bet money on it.

Quote
If the real reason was to avoid argument disrupting threads throughout the forum, then what's wrong with having a 'Current Events' category? (As if 'General Chat' isn't specific enough for that.) We've seen new topic areas created recently, so it can't be claimed it to be too hard to do. Then those who wish to avoid politics can just not look at it.

Because that's exactly the same thing a free-for-all General Chat section.
It will grow and grow until it dominates the "Unread Posts" section which is how most people use this forum.
I want people who come to this forum (both current and new) to see mostly electronics/engineering related content.
 

Offline EEVblog

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #17 on: July 18, 2014, 02:58:05 am »
Also just realized: It's probably not a mere coincidence that the plane was Malaysian. There must be many commercial airliners flying over Ukraine each day, so why Malaysian, and why now? I can see an obvious reason.
Please, just not now, not in this thread...

Yes, you see, he can't help himself.
And he wonders why I threatened to ban him if he posted in the MH370 thread again.
Give them an inch and they'll take a mile.
 

Offline EEVblog

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #18 on: July 18, 2014, 03:05:15 am »
What's left is a bunch of people nodding and agreeing that it's Dave's forum (true) and he can run it however he likes (true, if he doesn't care about social justice, morality or Truth)

That has little to do with the practicalities of running a large technical forum like this.
You'd realise this if you actually had to run one.
I'm all for uncensored free speech, and if here wasn't a forum to do that, I'd be the first one to set one up. But this is NOT the kind of forum that was setup for, nor will survive being a free-for-all general topic free speech forum. What part of that is so hard for you to understand?
 

Offline zaptaTopic starter

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #19 on: July 18, 2014, 03:15:03 am »
What part of that is so hard for you to understand?

Mostly the inconsistency. For example closing a thread for 'non electronic content' while there are many other thriving non electronic threads. It seems arbitrary. If the reason is different it will be useful to mention it in the closing message.
 

Offline EEVblog

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #20 on: July 18, 2014, 03:20:24 am »
Mostly the inconsistency. For example closing a thread for 'non electronic content' while there are many other thriving non electronic threads. It seems arbitrary. If the reason is different it will be useful to mention it in the closing message.

I have tried to explain this.
Unfortunately it has to be "inconsistent" of sorts in order to allow for some occasional off-topic stuff, but also to stop threads and topics that have a known history of getting out of control.
It is simply impossible to be 100% "consistent" without turning this into a ridiculously heavily moderated 100% on-topic forum with every post.
 

Offline GeoffS

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #21 on: July 18, 2014, 03:24:43 am »
I propose a new catch all reason for the locking of threads:

"Because:)

That should keep everyone consistently happy (or annoyed)
 

Offline TheBorg

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #22 on: July 18, 2014, 03:36:16 am »
The obvious solution would be to introduce a separate sub-forum where political controversy, et cetera could be discussed. I frequent another forum where this is implemented, leaving a general community chat which is often off topic but in the sense that the "Weird Al" thread was before it de-railed. Just a bunch of people chatting online...

However, as Dave mentioned it has the potential to make the site unusable because it could run rampant.
Is there a way to make a sub-forum blocked from the unread list?

I see two options here

1. A sub-forum catch-all is made, and we have to live with the unread posts (annoying and a turn-off for many users)

2. The forum stays just like it is and threads get locked when they run off the rails. Deal with it.

I'm perfectly fine with, and even encourage, off topic discussion. I mean, none of us does 100% electronics all day (not even Dave). But I do have to agree with the moderators a lot when they start locking threads that are unrecoverable from the starting intention of the thread.
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Offline cimmo

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #23 on: July 18, 2014, 03:39:02 am »
I'd like to know why there are only two options to deal with a thread? Consider it "normal" (whatever that is determined to be) and locked?
Why not something in the middle? If a mod decides the thread is too far OT or doesn't fit the current paradigm, why not let it continue, unmoderated, but with a flag to warn the easily offended and politically sensitive viewers that they are entering 'no-man's land'?

Or maybe just set up a sub-category for these potentially offensive threads and move a thread that has wandered to far OT to this sub-category. If people don't like these threads (including mods) then they don't have to look.

What is wrong with having a free-for-all, unmoderated area?

"Because that's exactly the same thing a free-for-all General Chat section.
It will grow and grow until it dominates the "Unread Posts" section "
So, why have these OT posts even listed as "unread"? Is the forum software capable of ignoring postings in a category/section and not appending these to the "unread" list?

Edit: TheBorg and I are of the same mind, it seems?
Did I get assimilated?
« Last Edit: July 18, 2014, 03:57:21 am by cimmo »
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Offline GeoffS

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Re: Arbitrary moderation?
« Reply #24 on: July 18, 2014, 03:42:37 am »
There have been threads where I issue a warning that it's drifting off topic, This results in one of two things happening (often  both)

1. Someone will complain and want a justification or explanation of why I think it's off topic.

2. The thread will continue to go off topic.



« Last Edit: July 18, 2014, 03:59:01 am by GeoffS »
 


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