28 réponses à ce sujet

[Natashina]

Here lately I've noticed more and more posters getting into trouble over things that aren't violations of the TOS while some posters that spout very hateful and TOS breaking things are left alone.

Night and I thought that maybe starting a thread in the BSN help section about our feelings on the moderation strategy might help. I know this might not do any good, but I'm sick of hanging out on the forums waiting for the next time someone gets upset and mashes the report button. I'm tired of seeing it happen to more and more posters.

My goal with this thread is to try to get a general outline of our mod concerns here in the group. Once we've agreed on the general points, I'd be happy to start banging out an opening post for the Help section. I'll show you guys every draft so this can come out right.

Tone is important here. If this mod feedback thread gets going in the Help section, then we can't come in acting angry or confrontational. That'll make them instantly tune us out and I don't want that.

[nightscrawl]

This is a cross-post from the vent thread, just so it's all in one place.
 
* * *

OK I looked through the "Bring Back Off-Topic" thread and I do see one issue with it: people being pissy and whiny, and saying stuff like, "when they shut it down bioware made clear that they don't give a **** on their community," and, "Nope, sorry. No fun allowed." (Quotes posted as-is.)

Granted, the thread was not inflammatory, but it was also not constructive. Some of the statements may indeed be true, but making a thread to complain is not helpful, and that is exactly what that thread was.

The key is to craft a post with examples of poor moderation you've witnessed, ideally with links to the threads where these examples occur: hate speech going unpunished but other innocuous things being removed, and so forth. You need to have something to point to and say, "I got a warning point for <lame thing>, but this racist, sexist, etc. other poster is allowed to go on," or say that you looked through the ToS and could find nothing in there that you seemed in violation of and the mod that gave you the point never said what it was for, just as Dave mentioned earlier in this thread.

It seems to me that the main problem is the mods are only looking at posts that are being reported, not reviewing the context of whatever post, nor other posts in the thread, before taking action. They are also not taking into consideration that some troublesome posters are likely using the report function as a weapon to punish those they disagree with.


Also, I am curious as to how many of you actually do report other posters when they use bigoted language. I know it's tempting to avoid it, particularly if you're concerned that an otherwise good thread is going to get closed. There were some moments in that Mae thread where I was quite concerned over that fact. How many times did the Badass Gay Character thread descend into ugliness and then turn around? At least three that I witnessed, and I took frequent lengthy breaks from the thread.

Make no mistake, I'm not holding myself up as some shining example of forum policing. I haven't observed it very often, but as I said earlier, I tend to just leave threads if they get too bad. I can only think of one or two threads/posts that I've reported in the past few years. I have to be REALLY steaming mad to report someone.

The goal with any such post about this moderation issue is to calmly, reasonably bring to light the concerns that you have regarding inequitable moderation practices with the stated purpose of making this a better, friendlier, more open and welcoming place for everyone, and to encourage discussion of all sorts. Ideally, it would be framed in general terms, while trying to not dwell too much on your own warning points (rather, to only use those as examples), lest it seems like it's only about being personally disgruntled over the fact.

It's not a perfect solution by any means, I don't pretend that it is. The thread may very well get closed, as was the OT thread. Perhaps the mods and CMs don't want to hear of criticism of any kind. Perhaps they aren't in a position to do anything about it. It might not be effective at all. But I don't think it can hurt to try, and my above suggestions are the very best way that I know how.

Above all: to leave emotion out of it. And also, you attract more flies with honey than vinegar.

[Natashina]

You've given me some points I can start thinking about that feedback thread. My mind is going 100 mph at the moment. Once this thread has some more posts, then I can start trying to put together a format. I've done something like this before years ago, only a bigger and more public scale.

[Steelcan]

I'm just throwing out that I rarely report a post. Partly because I don't think it's a constructive system and partly to avoid the wrath of the benevolent autocrats we call mods because let's face it, I ain't the cleanest of posters.

In the end though I think it has more to do with BioWare's lack of commitment to these forums and the devolution of moderating authority away from BioWare employees to what are as far as I know 1's and 0's.

[Biotic Apostate]

The Badass thread went down and up at least 5 times. But there wasn't really much that you could report, because those people were careful about it. As bi-/homophobic it is to say that someone like Kaidan, a soldier, could never realistically be ever with a man, or that Garrett would never bottom for "an elf or a sissy boy," I don't think I can actually report it without looking petty. Those penis comments in the Mae thread were disgusting, but I'm not sure the mods would care. When BW peeps were here, I'd see them hide posts that misgender trans people. Should I expect the same now?

 

The problem is, I don't know what counts here exactly as a violation of the ToS. I've made 6 reports, I think. Two about racism, the rest contained hateful slurs. Otherwise, when it's stuff I'm responding to, I feel like reporting that would make me seem far from impartial.

 

I would dig up some examples of super homophobic threads from the ME3 section (including those that called it an illness) that stayed up, but I'd rather not go through that again.

 

There's the Weekes Krem thread, where someone compared being gay to smoking, adultery, and murder. The sexuality thread had a post questioning the mental state of trans people. And of course the Celene thread (and 2 others), where blatantly racist posts are still up. 

 

And while the mods are super busy scraping words like boobs and hell from the MEA forum, I had to report multiple posts with f***** before they were removed, because alternative forms, like plurals, are not covered in the censor.

 

Plus, this

http://forum.bioware...8#entry20290346

http://forum.bioware...7#entry20220409

http://forum.bioware...5#entry12391912

I mean, can this be reported or is this ok?

[Natashina]

The second post from the bottom certainly has some weight. I've seen that the term tranny is considered hate speech, but only if it's reported. As for the other three, unfortunately there isn't much that can be done about it. They are being jerks, but not outside of the TOS.

Finding examples of racist posts, outright slurs, or examples of the language double standards are a good start. That doesn't just apply to women, minorities or the LGBT+ community either. Bashing on folks based on religion that have been allowed to go on and examples of straight men getting insulted for how they were born.

This isn't do to any sort of mass reporting. Steel, you brought up an excellent point on how the system can be abused. My goal is to try to get the attention of someone other than the poor modbots that probably make a little over minimum wage.

One of the thoughts my husband had was to make the like system anonymous. I've seen and been dragged into drama because of who or what I liked. I appreciate my friends supporting my words, but I don't want the whole forum to see. All it can take is someone liking a post the other doesn't and suddenly the report button comes out. So that's something I would suggest.

One of the bigger reasons why I'm doing this thread is to try to get some clarification from the mods. By using examples like "sissy boy" or "trannies" or "cis white craplord," we can have specific examples where we can ask about what is or isn't hate speech. That'll be one of the many parts I hope to cover with this upcoming thread/open letter to the CMs.

[Steelcan]

Anyone who takes serious offense to "sissy boy" needs to be exposed to some real insults at some point.

RIP in piece insults like "genocide fetishist" and "mouth breathing Luddite".

In all seriousness though, I don't think a blacklist of hate terms is the right way to go about this. There are innumerable ways to get around such restrictions, such as simply using less "hateful" terms or just editing them slightly. Not that there should be no enforcement of rules against hate speech though.

The mods instead need to take a closer look at what a poster does over time and wether that constitutes a ban able offense or not. If a poster has a history of misogyny, homophobia, or racism (and they need to open their eyes to racism that isn't just using the n word and ranting about Jews) they need to be banned permanently, not a few small bans ad infinitum.

[Natashina]

I can see why the "sissy" comment can be hurtful, but I completely agree about not doing a list. Thanks for pointing that out. That's why I started this thread first here before moving this out in public. You guys will help me get this right.

I guess without using examples, how do we effectively communicate with the mods about some the confusions around what makes hate speech? Other than the most obvious, which is posters insulting/attacking each other and possibly derailing or locking threads with it. That goes for the inconsistency and double standards that the mods are clearly suffering from. Their main bosses (those above the CMs) call those kinds of shots so it does come down to poorly executed forum management.

I think your suggestion is a lot more constructive than mine. If I'm mistaken let me know, but I think you're suggesting that they look more objectively at some of the more offensive posters and setting higher standards,

The mods can easily see context of the rest of the person's history. For example, someone that's been tagged as being off-topic in a harmless way a few times or having a bit of a mouth isn't the same as some of the posters that are truly being vile and hateful towards fellow posters.

I'll be putting together a bullet list sometime tonight or tomorrow of issues that's been expressed. Bouncing ideas around the group is a good way to help find a way to express those issues clearly to the mods.

One of the suggestions I want to make is to have the CMs fix the profanity filter itself. That's what it's supposed to be doing there, after all. I've watched several posters get busted because the profanity filter isn't working well. They weren't trying to circumvent the filter, they just typed it in and left it because they though the word was okay. I also think the outrage over using one asterisk to censor a word is a waste of time. It's their rules, their sites, but they are focusing too much on the smaller stuff.

I know the numbered mods can't directly participate in threads. I would request that they are encouraged to check the context of the post first and the posts around it. I do think the numbered mods care, but they have very limited say in what they can and cannot do.

[Natashina]

Brain is going 100 mph again. I wrote down some points and this is what I've got so far.

--Moderations is inconsistent in any given thread. One poster can get issued a warning point and a post wipe for saying the same someone else did in the same page. Context is an issue.

--Hate speech should be a little stricter, and this includes with religion and gender (including men,) and gender identity. I've seen many slurs for transgendered folks go unchecked and I've seen religious folks get ripped apart with no action taken. The posts remain, despite us using the report system.

--Moderators need to take a closer look at the context of a person's warning history. There should be less leniency towards the more destructive repeat offenders.

--Improve the profanity filter so posters don't accidentally accquire a warning point. By leaving the word uncensored, the poster thinks it's within the TOS.

--When a warning is isssued, we aren't allowed to look at the offending post. A mod showing us a copy/pasted version of the specific post can help show us where exactly we broke the TOS and how to avoid doing it again in the future.

--There is no way to communicate with the moderators at all. If a poster has a question about receiving a warning point, or feels their post was within the TOS, attempts to contact a mod or a full-time CM end with no feedback. This can make it difficult for a poster to clearly establish exactly where they went wrong. Particularly if a poster had made several posts in the same thread in a short amount of time.

--Bringing back OT.* I think the mods had good intentions when they shut down Off Topic. It wasn't to "kill fun," it was an attempt to control the forums and encourage more posters to talk to each other. Unfortunately, this has led to a huge influx of negative and destructive posters coming in from the closed section. This has also lead to such actions like topics being shut down for posters comparing current and older BioWare games. I'm not making that one up.

Open discussions about other games and different media helps foster a community. I tihnk the best solution is just to enforce the TOS and let it return. Off-topic did become a free-for-fall towards the end, but it doesn't have to stay that way if it returns.

*That last point I'm leery of bringing up in the Help section for obvious reasons.

[nightscrawl]

Anyone who takes serious offense to "sissy boy" needs to be exposed to some real insults at some point.

RIP in piece insults like "genocide fetishist" and "mouth breathing Luddite".

In all seriousness though, I don't think a blacklist of hate terms is the right way to go about this. There are innumerable ways to get around such restrictions, such as simply using less "hateful" terms or just editing them slightly. Not that there should be no enforcement of rules against hate speech though.

The mods instead need to take a closer look at what a poster does over time and wether that constitutes a ban able offense or not. If a poster has a history of misogyny, homophobia, or racism (and they need to open their eyes to racism that isn't just using the n word and ranting about Jews) they need to be banned permanently, not a few small bans ad infinitum.

 
We have to be realistic here. They're not going to put out a great deal of effort to go through a poster's entire history. There are too many posters, too many threads, and too many posts. I think the only reasonable expectation that we can have is for them to attempt to look at the context of whatever post, and perhaps also the posters that the person is engaging with. If, say, Biotic or Dave (sorry guys), get into one of their arguments with some jerk, they're not doing it because the person just doesn't like gay romances; more than likely it's because the person is being bigoted in some way. The posts are there, they quote them in their responses to these people. It requires minimal effort to look over the past couple of pages to see why someone might have been reported. It is absurd that the mods are not considering the context of arguments when they are using their moderation powers.
 
 

One of the suggestions I want to make is to have the CMs fix the profanity filter itself. That's what it's supposed to be doing there, after all. I've watched several posters get busted because the profanity filter isn't working well. They weren't trying to circumvent the filter, they just typed it in and left it because they though the word was okay. I also think the outrage over using one asterisk to censor a word is a waste of time. It's their rules, their sites, but they are focusing too much on the smaller stuff.

Let's see... I am not altering these in any way.

Spoiler

****, ******, fuckers, fucktard, fuckwad, motherfucker

 

 

[edit]

^ That is ridiculous.

Modifié par nightscrawl, 15 juin 2016 - 12:54 .

[Biotic Apostate]

The sissy boy example wasn't about the word sissy being hurtful, more about the fact that a homophobic (or a transphobic) post can be within the ToS, if it's carefully worded.

 

And as nightscrawl points out, the censor is very flawed. If something is filtered in it's base form, then related, or alternative forms, should be too. There are many sources of word filters, if they want to censor stuff, they should at least be consistent about it.

 

Also, off-topic is a lost cause. I think it generated too much work for them, and they don't have enough people moderating. It seemed easier for a thread to start breaching the ToS on that board. Either way, people making trouble should be punished, not threads. Which is another point - if one person is derailing the thread and posting idiotic stuff (the elf thread) then don't lock it, ban the user that is causing all that mess, directing it towards a different thread is not solving anything.

[Panda]

I rarely report posts, sometimes yes, but not very often. Usually only if they are very insulting and talking to person doesn't help.

 

For feedback, I think it's not good practice to shut down whole threads of discussion if some people got reported in the thread unless the topic itself is stupid. Like there has been times where thousand pages long characters threads are being locked or even hidden/removed due to few posters and that makes no sense to me even though usually they are brought back when they are cleaned up a bit. Overall I don't simply think reporting someone for violating rules or being insulting/toxic shouldn't punish everyone who wants to take apart in the thread. I guess mods do try with making warnings of not derailing thread etc., but I don't think persons who have been troublemakers in the thread care if the thread gets closed, because of them.

[Steelcan]

The sissy boy example wasn't about the word sissy being hurtful, more about the fact that a homophobic (or a transphobic) post can be within the ToS, if it's carefully worded.

 

And as nightscrawl points out, the censor is very flawed. If something is filtered in it's base form, then related, or alternative forms, should be too. There are many sources of word filters, if they want to censor stuff, they should at least be consistent about it.

 

Also, off-topic is a lost cause. I think it generated too much work for them, and they don't have enough people moderating. It seemed easier for a thread to start breaching the ToS on that board. Either way, people making trouble should be punished, not threads. Which is another point - if one person is derailing the thread and posting idiotic stuff (the elf thread) then don't lock it, ban the user that is causing all that mess, directing it towards a different thread is not solving anything.

I can't agree that Off-Topic gave them too much work, I think they axed it because properly moderating would have required work but they just decided "nah".  BSN has a history of that

[LightningPoodle]

If a post or thread does get reported enough, the moderators should look at the post or thread in question and come to a decision like a jury would. For example, Fozee, one of the named moderators with a personality, had to unlock the Drinkquisition thread because another moderator had gone and locked it, without leaving any sort of reason for doing so. That shouldn't have happened.

It feels like each moderator has their own set of rules. They see different things, well, differently and take action in the way that they themselves deem necessary, whereas another mod might not see reason to take action at all. That should change. The moderators should adhere to the same code, not their own one. This not only brings consistency to what they do, but also a more united objective in policing the forum.

I admit, I do have a bit of cheek when it comes to posting stuff I know I can get warning points for. I would feel less inclined to test the water if I knew that regardless of which mod sees it, the same action would be dealt to me.

For example. I like mod04. Recently, I made a post that was removed by a moderator. It was, if I remember correctly, a reply to a comment saying that "this persons belief in this is because she is such and such religion" and I stated that her religion had nothing to do with the discussion. My post was removed but with a private message and no warning point given. Other moderators wouldn't have done that. I might have got a warning point because it was removed. I certainly wouldn't have gotten a message saying that it was only removed so as not to send the topic of discussion off-topic into such murky waters.

[BraveVesperia]

 
We have to be realistic here. They're not going to put out a great deal of effort to go through a poster's entire history. There are too many posters, too many threads, and too many posts. I think the only reasonable expectation that we can have is for them to attempt to look at the context of whatever post, and perhaps also the posters that the person is engaging with. If, say, Biotic or Dave (sorry guys), get into one of their arguments with some jerk, they're not doing it because the person just doesn't like gay romances; more than likely it's because the person is being bigoted in some way. The posts are there, they quote them in their responses to these people. It requires minimal effort to look over the past couple of pages to see why someone might have been reported. It is absurd that the mods are not considering the context of arguments when they are using their moderation powers.

Presumably they could also have a list of repeat offenders though? Perhaps so that if someone's repeatedly getting a temporary ban, they hit a limit and get permanently banned. Unless it's bad enough to get an instant permanent ban, of crouse. I'm not entirely sure how the moderation system works.

[daveliam]

Somewhat related to this thread:  In the "gaylien" thread, there was a guy saying how the blood of hate crime victims is "on the hands" of feminine gay men for acting the way that they do.  And that they are "worse than those who commit the crime".  I reported him with a really exasperated explaining like, "Seriously, what is happening on this board?  Why are you allowing blatant hate speech that is condoning the murder of gay people?  Why don't you moderate this stuff more proactively?"  I didn't get a response from them, but they did go in and delete his posts (I quoted them just to preserve them for posterity.....).  Of course it only took them about 2 days to delete them. 

[Dani100]

Somewhat related to this thread:  In the "gaylien" thread, there was a guy saying how the blood of hate crime victims is "on the hands" of feminine gay men for acting the way that they do.  And that they are "worse than those who commit the crime".  I reported him with a really exasperated explaining like, "Seriously, what is happening on this board?  Why are you allowing blatant hate speech that is condoning the murder of gay people?  Why don't you moderate this stuff more proactively?"  I didn't get a response from them, but they did go in and delete his posts (I quoted them just to preserve them for posterity.....).  Of course it only took them about 2 days to delete them.

I did the same, I told them that they have completely lost control of the forums and that this hate has to go. I didn't get a response either.

[Biotic Apostate]

Honestly, I'm still seething after those posts. My initial response had far more expletives in it. Either way, it's clear that BSN has far too few mods for a forum of this size, and they rarely seem to go into threads.

[Evamitchelle]

Has the poster been banned too? Unless I'm missing something there's no way for us to tell whether someone has been banned right? 

[lynroy]

You can tell someone has been banned by scrolling over their user name--you won't be able to click on a banned users name. Same goes for deleted accounts, but those always have *deleted* attached to the name.

 

They need consistency. That is what really grates me here. One mod will handle a report differently than another for the same offense. One mod may interpret certain site rules differently than another. My first ever warning point, I did use an asterisk to get a word passed the censor. No complaints, I know the forum rules about that. But then, for every one post removed for a stray asterisk, a bunch more get left alone or a mod will edit the post and remove the profanity. I have seen too many good posts removed for an asterisk, when editing out the word would have been better because the post still offered discussion. The mod was reasonable enough to set an expiration date for it too. I think this is a feature that mods need to use more often. Thank you, Mod.

 

The second warning point was for, and I quote, " 'I know you are, but what am I?' Still acting the ten year old." Okay, if you want to interpret that as 'Abusive behavior', fine. I know who reported me for that, and they've abused the report button in that thread on more than one occasion, so not surprised. There are other posts I've seen that were not bad, but someone throws a tantrum and a mod swoops in. Context is everything. If a post is reported, look at the posts surrounding it to get context on what is going on.

 

When I got a warning point for "Inappropriate language" from this post, "What the hell is up with that?" two days after I made it, I was more than a little confused. It was made in a private group too. I had used 'hell' in about twenty more posts since I made that one. I mean, what was up with that? I wish I could have contacted the mod and asked them to elaborate. There should be a way to get more explanation than the copy/paste "A post you made in [thread] has been removed because blah blah blah". 

 

A friend posted a gif with the 'ass' in it and he was issued a warning point for it. Later, I posted a picture with the same word in the same thread and nothing happened. Why was one slapped with a warning and the other not? 

 

Sorry, end personal rant.  It's way past sleep time and I think I'm rambling now. Can you ramble when typing?

 

tl;dr

-More consistency

-Look at context of reported posts

-Fix your censor

[nightscrawl]

^ Those are fantastic examples, and exactly the sort I was referring to that need to be included.

[Natashina]

Thanks for all of the feedback guys. I'm going to watch the thread through the weekend. When Wilbur goes in for some minor surgery next Tuesday (poor Little Dude has a small wart-like mass that needs to be removed,) I'm going to put together a new bullet list based upon what we've talked about.

@Dave Well, that's utterly sickening. It's right up there with, "She was wearing a short skirt and a low cut blouse. She was asking for it." I don't care if you're gay, straight, bi, asexual, black, white, brown, red, male, female transgender or a Two-Spirit. Or what you're religion is. No one deserves to get raped. Period, end of story.

I know that I'm preaching to the choir here but I wanted to get that off of my chest.

[lynroy]

Right, I just received another warning point for a post I made five days ago. It seems I have my own personal mod stalker. This has gone too far. /sorry, not happy right now

 

BTW, I found these posts interesting:

http://forum.bioware...ime/?p=20326248

http://forum.bioware...ime/?p=20327262

[Natashina]

Well, I've gotten a post banged out for the Mod Feedback post. This is just a first draft, so be gentle.



I'm writing this post to try to send feedback to the moderators. There has been some issues that have been occurring over the last couple of months that have concerned other posters.

First, I'd like to thank you all for taking the time to read this thread. We do appreciate it and we know the moderators work hard.

The goal here is to establish better communication between the moderators and posters. A big concern many have expressed is the consistency of the moderation, as well as feeling like context wasn't taken into consideration.

There is some problems and confusion about moderation as of late. In order to avoid naming and shaming posters, I can send the links to the problem posts over PM if requested.

1) Posters have gotten into trouble for circumventing the profanity filter. That can be merited and no one is disputing that. The problem lies with the consistency. There are several words that are not filtered. Also, stronger language is allowed to stay even as posters are getting warning points for using asterisks. Some posts have the language edited, and others are just removed entirely due to one word. There doesn't seem to be any one set standard for the moderation team.

2) Threads that violate the TOS will be reported almost immediately by posters and sometimes takes days to lock. If they are locked at all. More than one of those threads has left posters wondering where the mods are. Also, many threads have gone wildly off topic and have been allowed to stay despite posters using the report system.

3) Hate speech is becoming a real problem. Anti-Muslim speech, trash talking about other nations, hateful comments towards straight men and others. There was a post that stated that it was the fault of effeminate men that gay men are beaten to death and they were worse than the killer themselves.

There are several slurs used against the LGBT+ community that have been left untouched by the mods. Particularly in regards to transgendered characters. I personally read one of the most hateful comments against the characters Krem and Mae. It was also the most vulgar and crude thing I've ever seen on the forums. It was written as of May 26th and as of this writing was visible for all to see. Ignoring a poster only goes so far and there are folks that don't have Origin accounts that read the forums.

4) There is no way for the posters to effectively communicate with the moderation team. Lately, posters have said that they got a warning point about a post without being told which post that it was. If a poster has been very active in the same thread for, say, an evening, then they don't know what exact post got them into trouble.

Posters cannot learn how to do better without knowing what they did in a deleted post without a moderator. There are posters that have tried to ask moderators for clarification and were ignored. We need more active community managers to address those concerns and questions.

We want the Bioware forums to be a more productive and fun place again. However, without proper and consistent moderation, the more confused and frustrated posters become. There doesn't seem to be any context taken into consideration, which makes things more confusing.

Please take the time to consider this thread and where some of the members of the forums are coming from. Again, thank you for your time.

[Natashina]

I didn't want to have any tones that were disrepectful. I also wanted to avoid comments about mod stalking and about off topic since those would lead to a lock.