Moderators, Comments and Censorship. I've had enough.

Lblitz on 12/05/2012 - 17:06

An anonymous moderator recently gutted the comments in this post:

Black Lace Halter Mesh Teddy Lingerie for $5.99 USD + Free Shipping
http://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/69889

The moderator (quite cleverly) deleted a slew of comments, and then listed the removed posts as "off topic". For some reason, many comments of the same style are still present in the thread. Honestly, how much more off-topic could these comments be??

mr_vino89 21 hours 44 min ago
only clicked on the link because of the hot model…. absolute stunner!

giggles 17 hours 52 min ago
My mum looks great in a Black Lace Halter Mesh Teddy Lingerie for only $5.99

Josh81 1 hour 59 min ago
$1 for each second it stays on her. :]

All of these comments are still in the thread - obviously these comments are suitably "on-topic" and the moderator didn't need to delete them.

I don't find this acceptable. I'm not going to continue to post on this site if moderators can simply delete perfectly reasonable comments wholesale. Of course, if a comment is genuinely offensive or needlessly unrelated, then fine. But the deleted comments were innocuous. This reeks of a moderator with an axe to grind and wielding their power because their precious sensibilities were being challenged.

This is a community site. If you're going to allow posts for things like lingerie, then you're going to have to accept that people are going to comment along those lines.

I've been a member here for over three years. I visit and comment every day. A couple of my posts have even won the weekly prize. One of my comments is in the hall of fame. I genuinely care about how this place is going. But I'm not going to hang around while some anonymous moderator on a power trip censors comments for no reason. Why have comments at all????

Site Discussion

closed Comments

- scotty on 17/05/2012 - 14:16
  
  +1
  
  I think for people who want to "have fun", it is probably better to leave them in a confined corner so people can enjoy their discussions there. Like what neil said here, IBUZone posts pretty much just baits for some members to vote up. I doubt many actually are interested in the "deals" themselves.
  
  Now "confined corner" — we'll still need to implement tags/flags for those deals (NSFW flag?) so the rest of the community can ignore.
Natt on 17/05/2012 - 14:10

+2

Gosh guys you really put the effort in to try and make a workable community.

It is appreciated :)

Although you will never please everyone possibly me included.

But thats aside from recognising the hours that must be spent tending to ozbargain.

So Thanks!
pspman on 21/05/2012 - 09:26

+1

I agree Moderator censorship is getting bloody ridiculous!
- Moderatorneil on 21/05/2012 - 10:32
  
  Can you be specific?
  
  Moderatorneil on 21/05/2012 - 10:32 (Collapsed - Offtopic. Show)
  - pspman on 21/05/2012 - 11:59
    
    +1
    
    Yes, Almost 50% of the Negative votes cast being removed for some reason or another.
    - Moderatorneil on 21/05/2012 - 12:16
      
      We really need a link to assess that. Without that I'll give you an analysis.
      
      Looking at your voting history for the past year:
      
      Revoked by community due to 6 votes against your comment.
      
      Revoked by moderator as the comment didn't state anything
      
      Negative vote still intact
      
      Negative vote still intact
      
      Neg still intact
      
      Neg still intact
      Neg still intact
      Neg still intact
      Neg still intact
      Neg still intact
      Neg still intact
      Neg still intact
      Neg still intact
      
      13 total negative votes on deals.
      84.6% of your negative votes remain intact.
      1 revoked by the community. 7.6%
      1 revoked by a mod. 7.6%
      
      So sorry 50% is incorrect.
- pspman on 21/05/2012 - 12:41
  
  +2
  
  Alright Neil, I think the simple fact of the matter is that looking at this thread there is a large number of people pissed of at the countless (Comment removed by) (Off Topic) etc.
  
  This is a place for the wider community, and some mods are needed to get rid of trolling etc, but not needed to delete comments that are just a bit of fun. The negative vote counts practically hide them for us anyway
  - [Deactivated] on 21/05/2012 - 16:59
    
    This.
    - Moderatorneil on 21/05/2012 - 17:08
      
      As before, we are looking at implementing an off-topic toggle based on this feedback. Factual discussion on community feedback is a good way to entice change.
Moderatorscotty on 23/05/2012 - 15:48

We have a code update this morning adding a few more things (for example mods can now send feedback to reporter when a report gets resolved). Another change is that mods can now mark certain comments as "Off-Topic".

When comments (and sub-threads) get marked as "Off-Topic", it would be collapsed by default. I am using neil's comment here as an example (not that his comment is off-topic). The comment itself + all the replies are collapsed/hidden by default labelled "Off-Topic". People need to explicitly expand to read the content.

Off-topic comments/clean humours won't be not removed, and people can still read them. However they are just out of the way to make informative comments more stand out. Moderator would still remove offensive comments though.

As a community member, feel free to report comments that you think are off-topic. When moderators inspect a comment he/she would see how many "Off-topic" reports are there. So do your bit to help clean up.

If you hate to have off-topic comments collapsed by default, you can go to your Settings page, and uncheck "Keep off-topic comments collapsed" option.
- Commonwealth Pig on 23/05/2012 - 21:17
  
  Hi Scotty. I'm not able to view the collapsed comment thread on the mobile site. I click it but nothing appears.
  - Moderatorscotty on 23/05/2012 - 21:27
    
    Yeah… That's something we missed as on the mobile site you don't get the little toggle icon to expand the collapsed comment. I'll figure out a fix this week.
- samfisher5986 on 23/05/2012 - 22:23
  
  I can't upvote you anymore, so I thought I'd post that this is really cool, thanks for listening to the community.
  - Moderatorscotty on 23/05/2012 - 22:27
    
    Another recent change is that moderators are able to flag specific comments as "mod comments", where you can't vote +1/-1 on them. Many moderators also want to join in the deal discussions so don't want to mark all their comments as "mod comments".
    
    On the other hand, we also don't want to see mod comments becoming hidden from getting too many -1 votes, because somehow the community does not agree with what the moderator says.
    - samfisher5986 on 23/05/2012 - 22:55
      
      Can't you just prevent mod comments from being downvoted?
      
      I like to positive vote to show I agree with a mod without commenting.
    - [Deactivated] on 24/05/2012 - 11:35
      
      +1
      
      Interesting idea, but unfortunately those who may disagree with a mods comments will just interpret this as mods trying to shut them out.
      
      Unfortunately like everyone, modding is welcome when it suits someone, and when it doesn't then, we are seen to be dictatorial.

Moderators, Comments and Censorship. I've had enough.

closed Comments

New Forum Topics