#community moderation

[chaos-ducks]

I was looking in a community tab and I saw a bot and went to report it to the moderators. Then I realized I was the moderator.

[i-could-do-stuff2]

if i made an ultimate frisbee community, would anyone join?

[bogappreciation]

Hello. I definitely do not consider this a misunderstandings and the issue is definitely not cleared. It is not fair; making mood boards and pin boards, for a lot of writers, is part of writing and it is a WRITING community. Checking the MILLIONS of photos on Pinteres looking for the original pic is like looking for a pin in a GRASS FIELD, so saying what basically means saying 'well, just find the original' is incredibly frustrating.

I post of mood boards in communities because I want people to see my work and let other people like me comment on them, even leaving an emoji makes my day. So this suddenly becoming a new rule is crazy. I understand the ban of AI imagery --that is totally valid-- but banning a tool hundreds of writers use cannot be accepted, at least for me.

I'm sorry you feel that way. If you genuinely tried to track down the sources of your images and traced it back to sometime over 5 years ago (pre generative AI), then "unknown" with "sometime before (date)" would be acceptable, but people are not doing that. They're not even using a basic reverse image search. There's no distinction between "origin lost to time" and "active artist whose credit has been stripped due to a disrespectful amount of reposting." Just because other people are doing it doesn't mean it's alright.

This rule goes alongside the generative AI policy. When people don't know the origin and post anyway, they almost always post AI pictures. We tell them to stop posting AI images, they say "it's not AI," and then can't give us the source beyond "I found it on Pinterest." When it's obvious that it's AI we'll take it down anyway, but AI is improving and we won't always be able to tell. So you need to know where the images you're using came from.

Personally, I think this is long overdue. Normalizing art theft is disrespectful to visual artists and I don't want to be a part of a space that allows it.

[zettelkaestchen]

hey! i think i want to be co-moderator in the new community but ive never done that before so how does that work/what is expected of me?

Hello! Thanks for your message and application. 😊

No problem to do it for the first time. Also not so much different from reporting posts or accounts I think.

So this community is request to join, and one of the tasks is doing little background checks of people who want to join (no bots, ace/queerphobes or trolls and such please). Another task is to look out for posts or comments that go against the community rules and that's basically all of it. Do you think you're able to do that while you're hanging out on tumblr?

Hope it's ok for you I'm answering this publicly. :)

[frameacloud]

"[One of the types of red flags of a bad online community is] Rule weirdness: Rules that are strange or excessive in ways that are used to control or abuse others. [Some examples of that are:]

"Vague rules on an otherwise very specific list, especially rules the mods will not elaborate on when asked.

"Rules that update without notice.

"‘Public required blacklist’ use in servers larger than just a couple friends. Particularly if the list is updated without notice and using it is strongly enforced.

"Favoritism regarding who can break rules and how much, having rules apply in different ways and different situations to different people.

"Enforcing ‘hidden rules’ that are not stated but are expected to be followed anyway.

"Allows minors to be in NSFW/adult/kink areas."

- Excerpt from page 10 of "Safety in Alterhuman Spaces," a document by the Dragonheart Collective. You can read the whole document here (PDF).

[implausiblyjosh]

It’s so funny watching Reddit’s userbase just completely shit on the concept of moderators. I understand the CEO doing it, he captured lightning in a bottle by having an entire crucial workforce in their company be entirely volunteer-run, but the users? It’s wild!

Like, their world view is so limited that they cannot conceive that moderation is work. Reddit is getting unpaid labor! I’ve done community moderation and management, and it’s work. I’ve run my own message boards, discord server, I’ve been a paid forum moderator for a billion dollar company… it’s all work!

It’s wild. It’s like thinking janitors don’t deserve to get paid because you can throw your own trash in the trash can. Feels so limited.

[shadesofbrixton]

been thinking a lot about anti jewish, anti muslim, anti islamic sentiment in the light of everything happening with the I/P conflict, and let me tell you, i'm 38 and nothing on the internet has taught me as much about bystander intervention as moderating a public discord server for a little over two years.

we have (apparently? according to our members?) a pretty unique method of dealing with trolls: when they come in, we bait them. you can identify them pretty fast, right? a lot of folks have obvious red flags in their user names or profile pics, or put quotes from the bible or from fascist leaders in their status. as soon as they're identified, the staff initiates what i can only term a period of gentle cajoling harassment. we start asking the trolls questions about the stuff in their profile. not accusations, always questions.

the intention here is to kick off the troll so that they reveal themselves ASAP, and begin posting reportable content - which 9/10 times we can get done in about 15 minutes. so then the troll starts spamming the N-word and the F-word and dropping horrific memes they've got saved up and talking about how all X should die and all that nonsense, and this is when the community rallies: they bully the bully. not with reportable content, but generally with:

insults about their social life

softcore queer gifspam

confused, innocent questions intended to garner more reportable content

generally, the troll gets so frustrated and annoyed, they leave. if they don't, we ban them after a minute or two of community-wide booing. then we report and delete all the offensive content.

the point here, though, is that we get the entire community involved. EVERYONE gets a taste of learning how to speak up, in a setting where they know that they're supported by the majority. everyone gets a lesson in standing up, even when it's not their demographic. and it's been really easy to get people on board with this for BIPOC racism and for LGBTQ+ phobic behavior, but you could feel the handholding that was necessary for defense of Jewish communities, Muslim communities, SWANA communities.

but it WORKS, yall. the hand-holding WORKS, and the catharsis is INSANE. the staff leads the charge (we have one staff member from each of these communities, btw, that helps a lot) and the community learns how to defend itself and each other. instead of ending these sessions feeling angry and unsafe and rankled, the mood is celebratory and proud.

not every setting in life is safe for you to confront a bully. not every setting lets you fight back. but when you can, and when you can bring people into it with you, and when you can educate, and when you can do it safely: do it. fight back. teach others how to fight back.

and you know, it's wild that how no matter what flavor the trolling content is, they all really hate softcore queer gifs. reeeeeally makes you think. ✨